This chapter is dedicated to R McNeary, for reading, supporting and commenting. I cannot thank him enough for finding all the little inconsistencies in this work (Horrible POV shifts being chief among them) I have done some extensive re-writing, thanks to his eagle eye.

His work includes Unbroken and The Path of Fire, both of which I can highly recommend taking a look at. Also new this year from Rob, is Dragon and Phoenix, the next book in the Path of Light and Fire series.

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As Tahlia climbed the road between the first of the fortress-bailey's war-engine batteries, she started panting in a fashion that Mistress D'almeria would have considered most unladylike. She had a mind to clamber down into one of the battery's trenches, behind its thick wall of stone and metal plate, and squeeze her way beneath the comfortingly sturdy wooden beams that made up the machines' great turntables. It would have been nice to rest there for a while from the sun, but she knew she could not afford the time, and so ran past the network of silent machines and on towards the temple.

She kept to the softer grass alongside the road, but soon the road began its steeper climb up to the ridge of land, towards the temple. She stopped to let her breath catch her up. As she stood there gasping, she reached into her pouch for her flask of water, but then remembered that, in her haste, she had left it lying between the barns at the karabok-field.

"Oh, khlith spawn!"

She began to climb again, slowed to a dry, breathless walk. The ridge rose more abruptly to her right, broken upwards into sheer angled rock faces that formed the natural pedestal where the access-keep reared, but to her left the land was more gentle, rising and widening into a flat area where the temple stood. As she laboured up the road, she had time once more to marvel at the building's splendour.

Its outer walls were rounded and beautifully smooth, made of dark blue-grey stone, so that it looked like the complex shell of some massive creature, with the tall spiralled horn of the ascension tower rising from the middle of its curved back. Its narrow windows were tinted blue and were so artfully incorporated into the design of the building, they were almost indiscernible. The exception was the vast half dome window at the temple's high south point, its arching curve made from hundreds of panes of wedge shaped glass that always cast a pattern of shimmering rainbows into the chapel beneath it.

Countless crak were perched about the building, wherever their claws could find purchase on its architecture, and their red feathers were bright against the dark stones of its walls. One of the birds was squatting on the path ahead as she reached the low crest of the ridge, and as she approached, it snapped its vile beak at her and hopped away, croaking in consternation.

Tahlia ignored the cantankerous bird, and stopped to take a few panting breaths. From where she stood, a wide path led from the road and crossed the face of the round hill, up to the temple's towering metal doors, beneath their curving portico. Two Templars guarded the open doors, each one wearing patched plain armour covered with a black tabard, the curving sun symbol of Fortak emblazoned on their breasts. Her breath recovered, Tahlia climbed the path,  but when she finally reached the temple's doors, she looked around in annoyance at the empty hillside.

Her mother was late!

The two Templars stood impassive and unmoving and did not stir, even when Tahlia gave a loud indignant sigh and threw herself into the shade of the temple's portico. Once the breeze had cooled her a little, she began to grub out small stones from between the thick grasses and throw them at the heads of dried flower grass that were growing nearby, decapitating each one with deadly accuracy. There was very little going on in the surrounding fortress-bailey, and the only people to be seen, apart from the two silent Templars, were the specks of guards patrolling its distant walls, and a farmer driving an empty masdon cart down the spiral of the access-keep's road.

"Hello, my daughter."

Tahlia threw a sharp flat stone, which clipped a bunch of flower heads and sent out a small explosion of pollen.

"Hello, mother."

She turned her head up to regard the Lady Tahlessa.

Her mother had on her riding trousers and long boots, but over them she wore a short green dress of fine woven thread, cinched above her stomach to emphasise her pregnancy. Her long tawny hair was tied back with a ribbon the same colour as her dress. Vennar, Chief-communicant of Fortak, stood at her shoulder, leaning heavily on his gilded staff.

Her mother smiled down at her.

"How were your lessons with Mistress D'almeria this morning?"

"The same as last week," replied Tahlia.

Her mother reached down and plucked a dry grass head out of her hair. She straightened up, one hand held protectively over her swollen stomach, the other holding the liberated grass seeds up to her eye. She smiled.

"I think we shall have to start having Mistress Oleander personally escort you to your lessons in future."

"Mistress D'almeria's lessons are idiocy," replied Tahlia as she tried to straighten the dishevelment of her dress. "She makes us walk around with books on our heads."

"She teaches things a lady needs to know. Without them, no knight will ever want you as a wife."

Tahlia pulled a face and threw her remaining stone at a nearby flower head, missing it by a hand's breadth.

"And am I to spend my married life carrying books around on my head and reciting the laws of the household?" she asked.

Chief-communicant Vennar chuckled dryly, deepening the heavy wrinkles under his eyes and around his mouth. Despite the heat of the day, he wore a long coat over his dark trousers and tunic, with large pockets across the chest and at the waist. Metal insignia decorated its shoulders, and more were pinned above the pockets to signify his rank.

"She has your spirit, my Lady Tahlessa."

"Yes, I am rather afraid that she does."

Chief-communicant Vennar bent down awkwardly in front of Tahlia, taking his weight more heavily on his staff.

"I hope that you have been praying to Fortak for your mother's new child."

"A little," replied Tahlia. "When I remember."

Vennar gave his kindly smile again.

"Your mother prays continually. As she did for you and your brother."

Tahlia maintained a blank look of disinterest.

"So what did the Oracle say?"

"The child is strong and in good health."

"And?" said Tahlia, turning to her mother.

"Do you really wish to know?"

"It makes little difference, but I suppose that I do."

Her mother smiled.

"You are going to have a new brother, my daughter."

"Oh," said Tahlia, with little enthusiasm. "Well I suppose father will be pleased. He wanted another son."

"Tahlia!" said her mother, chidingly.

"Well it is true, is it not?"

"It is true that your father will be happy with a second son, but I would have liked another daughter." She looked down critically at Tahlia's muddied dress. "Though maybe a slightly more presentable one."

Vennar straightened himself carefully.

"Both sons and daughters are a blessing from Fortak. In whatever condition they may be." He looked around then, as if searching for something he had lost.

"Did you not ride here today, my lady?"

"No, High One. Doctor Fos advised against it."

"But have you no servants with you, Lady? You should not be walking the grasslands unaccompanied while you are so advanced with child."

"I am sure that I will be fine. I can probably make the walk from fortress to temple at a faster pace than you! Besides, I have my daughter to aid me if I should stumble."

Tahlia stood and went to her mother's side.

Chief-communicant Vennar smiled at her, then at her mother, then he raised his face up to the skies and smiled once more.

"The Order is indeed blessed by both of you."

Her mother smiled and laid a hand on the old man's arm.

"Go back to your spiritual duties. You should not stay out in this heat for too long."

Vennar nodded and looked up at the sun as though he had only just noticed it hanging in the sky.

"Besides, I have to decide what to do with my daughter. What do you think Chief-communicant? Should I take her to see High Madriel-master Sprak to choose her steed, or should I just ask him to throw her straight to the Pride for their dinner? Or maybe she would prefer it if I took her to Mistress D'almeria for some additional lessons." She placed an arm round Tahlia's shoulder, looked down at her, and pulled an errant blade of grass from her dress. Then she wrinkled her nose. "Or maybe just a good long bath for the rest of the morning?"

Vennar returned from his contemplation of the sun.

"Well I think she is too small to provide a satisfying meal for our beloved creatures, and Mistress D'almeria has a fearsome reputation for discipline, so I would not wish her on any child on a morning as fine as this one. Also, Fortak has blessed me in recent years with a distinct dwindling of my sense of smell so the child's state of cleanliness is of no offense to me. The first option would seem to be the most desirable."

"Very well, I will take your spiritual advice. Come, daughter. We do not want to keep Master Sprak waiting."

Vennar smiled once more, then bade them farewell, and Tahlia and her mother started on the path down to the road.

"Did the Oracle say anything else, mother?"

Her mother frowned, gazing at something in the middle distance.

"No," she said, her expression clearing. "It was her usual jabbering. She seemed obsessed with the colour of the grass in the lands over the mountains. Made no sense at all."

"So why do you consult her if she talks such rubbish?"

"Well, her predictions on childbirth always seem accurate. She was correct about you and your brother. 'Twins of an easy beginning but troubling dispositions' is what she said."

"Is that really what she said?"

"Her exact words, I seem to remember."

"And was she right?"

Her mother smiled and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Grifford has been little trouble," she said. "Apart from his moods, which I am sure he gets from your father's side of the family. He does at least do as he is told and has a tendency to be where you ask him to be."

"And I suppose that you would prefer it if I were more like him."

"No," her mother replied. "Though my life would be easier if I knew where you were more of the time."

"Have I really been that much trouble to you, mother?"

Her mother, the Lady Tahlessa, smiled.

"Only since you could crawl, dear." She pulled her closer and leant down to kiss her dishevelled hair. "Only since you could crawl."

* * * * *

When Maddock stepped through the door of the round building, his heart a rapid thumping in his chest, he did not find the darkness he had been expecting. The building was nothing more than a circular wall of wood, with no roof except for six long beams that supported the walls high above, crossing the space and meeting at its centre.

But it was not the roof's absence that made his pulsing heart twist.

A male madriel lay in the centre of the space, on the dry earth floor.

With his home lying as it did on the edge of the great-bailey, Maddock was used to the distant sight of madriel. He had seen them with their knights, of course, crossing the bridge above the farm's falls, but he had never been quite so close to a madriel of the Pride of Klinberg before.

The beast was almost three metres long, from its slitted nostrils to its hindquarters, and over a metre and a half tall at the shoulder as it lay with its front legs extended and its powerful hind legs folded beneath it. It held a poised, menacing beauty. Its short tawny hair was luxuriously patterned with slashes and whorls of black. Its muzzle was wide and powerful, ridged back to a pair of deep luminous brown eyes that looked at him with a baleful intensity, before the creature turned indifferently away. The two great horns, which grew from behind the beast's heavy skull and curved forward beyond its muzzle, looked as heavy and sharp as boak spears, and its claws, when it flexed one of its front paws, gouged at the earth like soil picks. In his hazed apprehension, Maddock saw the lines of scars crossing the fur about its shoulders and neck, and noted the slow rhythmic movement of its sides as the beast breathed. At that moment he was terribly aware of his own breath, coming shallow and fast in his chest.

He heard the door click firmly shut behind him.

Master Dramut was standing at his shoulder.

"Now," said The Madriel-master. "Advance to the first circle."

Maddock looked down at the floor and saw that the beast lay in the centre of a circle, four metres in diameter and marked with stone. Surrounding it was a second circle of six metres, then a third circle of eight.

He stepped up to the perimeter of the largest circle, facing the beast at its centre, while Master Dramut stalked about its edge to stand a quarter way around its side. His mind was quickly whirring, trying to think what form the test would take.

"This is Dracius," said Master Dramut. "He is my steed."

Maddock looked at the beast in the ring's centre, while he tried to calm his breathing.

"Now," the Madriel-master said. "You will order Dracius to stand."

"What?"

"My request was quite clear, I think."

Maddock licked his lips with a dust dry tongue.

"In your own time, boy."

Maddock looked at the madriel, feeling the arena's hot air in his mouth as he took a deep breath.

"Stand up!" he shouted, but it sounded in his ears like a high pitched squeal. The madriel did not move.

"Again, please," Master Dramut ordered.

Maddock drew in another hot breath of air.

"Stand up!" he shouted again, and his voice felt stronger and more confident. Still, Dracius did not move.

Master Dramut stood watching him, as motionless as the madriel.

"I will give you one last chance to impress me."

Maddock felt his face and neck break out in a cold flash of sweat, and an angry frustration suddenly rose up inside him.

"Stand!" he shouted, and he could hear the confidence in his voice. It had not been a request, but an order.

The madriel did not move. One of its ears twitched at a passing fly and a muscle on its flank rippled at some other small irritant, but its stare remained fixed on the opposite wall of the arena.

Master Dramut grunted in evident disapproval.

"That is enough," he said. "Advance to the second circle."

Maddock, his face still flushed and his brow now cold with sweat, took one step towards the madriel at the circle's centre, and then a second. His third step and then his fourth brought his foot onto the second circle of stones. Dracius turned his large powerful head and fixed him with his hard eyes. His muzzle twitched and drew back, and Maddock remembered Herd-master Grellik's comment about his scent and whether it marked him as a meal or not.

"Now walk to the third circle," Master Dramut ordered.

Maddock looked down at the smallest circle, the closest line of which passed within a few hands breadths of the madriel's claws, which flexed and gouged at the dark earth.

"Do not rush yourself."

The whole of the inside of his mouth seemed stuck together with dryness. So dry, he could barely swallow. He knew that this was the only chance he would have. In the face of his fear, he forced himself to take a step and placed one foot slowly onto the space between the two final rings. As soon as his foot touched the earth, the madriel's muzzle drew back fully over its row of heavy teeth, and a growl issued from somewhere deep inside the beast's chest, tearing the arena's hot air.

Maddock had already raised his other foot, and as he hastily brought it down, he stumbled forward a pace and the beast rose swiftly up from its position to tower above him with the light of challenge in its eyes. Its growling was a jagged vibration, so deep, he thought he felt it through the ground. He was rooted, staring into the depths of the beast's fierce eyes, unable to move and hardly daring to draw breath in case the movement provoked an attack.

"Step to the circle, boy," Master Dramut prompted, as though it contained nothing more than empty earth.

It would be madness to approach the beast further.

To reinforce that obvious assumption, the creature lifted its shoulders and swung its head low, so that the curve of its horns skimmed the earth scant centimetres within the perimeter of the circle.

Maddock risked a breath and prepared himself to move. All he had to do was place one foot in front of the other, first once and then twice more, and he would be there, but the message would not reach the muscles in his legs, no matter how hard he willed it.

"Are you not going to do as you have been requested?" asked Master Dramut, who had returned to stand behind him on the line of the first circle.

Maddock tried again to force himself to move, but still his legs would not obey him, and so he stood, mutely staring at the twin silhouettes of himself, reflected in the beast's fierce eyes.

"Step back then," Master Dramut said, "And you had better not turn your back from the beast as you do so."

Maddock lifted one foot and took a step back, and then a second, shame pricking at his eyes at both his failure and at the relief he felt as the space between himself and the madriel grew. As he stepped back over the second circle, the beast stopped its deep growling, though it remained standing with its head raised above him.

His breath was still coming in quick gasps as he stepped back over the first circle, and he forced himself to take a deeper breath to fight the terror down. He turned to face Master Dramut, who was staring at him with lowered brows.

"There is your way out," he said, pointing at a door opposite the one through which he had entered.

Maddock went to the door and pulled it open. It seemed his assumptions about the Order had been wrong. In the end, they had given him the chance that they had promised.

He had been tested.

He had failed.