The Traitor's Tale Read Online Free PDF

how
he had seduced me, how I had wanted to be seduced. But a larger
part of it had been that he offered me power.
    For I loved power.
    I had loved having it, wielding it, loved the freedom
and the control it had offered me. For centuries I had regretted my
choices…but what if they all hadn’t been for nothing? What if
Arlmagnava could keep her word to me? I could be rid of the curse
without asking for the Keeper’s forgiveness, and have all the power
I wished.
    I shivered and closed my eyes.
    My memory was not what it had been…but I remembered
the last time I had thought that way. It had been before I had
betrayed the Keeper and spurned Malahan, before I had sided with
Mordred against the High King.
    That choice had led to nothing but disaster and
centuries of regret. If the wraith’s taunts had been right, it had
led to disaster and regret for uncounted millions.
    How much more disaster would this decision unleash if
I made the wrong choice?
    I opened my eyes and saw Arlmagnava watching me.
    “I am the apprentice of the Keeper of Avalon,” I
said, and the burning blue eyes narrowed. “I should have died as
the apprentice of the Keeper of Avalon, and perhaps I shall have
that chance yet.”
    “No,” said Arlmagnava. “You won’t. Your skill is far
too useful to permit your death. You shall cooperate, whether
willing or not.”
    She thrust her free hand at me, cold fire burning
around the armored fingers, and the power of her magic closed
around me like a giant fist. I shouted and stumbled, my staff
raised, its sigils burning as the Frostborn woman’s power wrapped
around me. I could not feel pain properly, not after the curse, and
I suspected that was a good thing, because I would have been in
agony otherwise. Thick white mist swirled around me in a ring,
growing harder and thicker.
    Arlmagnava was freezing me. Her spell would trap me
in a block of ice and force me into something like a coma. Then she
could transport me at her leisure and take the time to torture me
into compliance. Panic went through me. Once I had been able to
cast warding spells, but elemental fire did not lend itself to
protection. I could not cast a ward to protect myself from the
horrible cold and unyielding ice closing around me.
    Yet the light in my staff grew angrier, the wood
vibrating beneath my grasp. The Frostborn woman’s magic was that of
frost and cold, of ice and snow, the opposite element of the fire I
summoned. The two powers were violently opposed to each other. If
mixed, they would not react well.
    I had no other option. I summoned as much power as I
could hold and thrust my staff into the thickening mist, unleashing
all the fire I could.
    The results were explosive.
    The fire screamed out of me, drilled into the mist,
and then ripped through it in a snarling blast. A ring of fire
swept out, followed shortly thereafter by a cloud of superheated
stream. The locusari stumbled back with shrieks of pain, the steam
seeping through their carapaces to scald the sensitive flesh
beneath. Arlmagnava took a step back, stunned, the blue-burning
eyes widening as her spell collapsed.
    I did not hesitate, but leveled my staff and drew
upon my power. A ball of yellow-orange flame shot from the staff’s
length and hurtled across the clearing. Arlmagnava hissed in alarm
and cast a spell. A ward of pale blue light flared into existence
around her, and my fireball shattered into smoke when it touched
the superior power of her magic.
    By then I was sprinting back into the forest as fast
as my legs could carry me.
    “Take her!” shouted Arlmagnava. “Bring her to me
alive!”
    The locusari answered with their metallic shrieks and
sprang into motion. Blue blurs shot upwards as the scouts took to
the air, while the warrior drones surged forward. I kept sprinting,
heedless of the uneven ground, my staff clutched in one hand. If I
could just keep them away from me a little longer, I could escape.
I had almost gathered the power I needed to