Centyr Dominance Read Free

“The dragons give
     all of us unbelievably good hearing.”
    “Now, if they would just make the lot of ye smarter
     too, I’d be eternally grateful,” responded the hunter.
    Gram responded by pushing past the twin wizards and
     moving forward into the passageway. They followed him, saving their argument
     for later, while the hunter brought up the rear.
    Two offshoots led to dead ends, but Moira warned Gram
     away from them, and they continued until they came to the chamber that held the
     strange traces of aythar. It was a larger cavern, some twenty yards across and
     nearly forty in length. Water lay in a shallow pool to one side, but it was a
     flattened area in the center that drew their attention.
    The floor appeared to have been melted there, and it
     was readily apparent that it hadn’t been from some natural geologic process.
     Moira and Matthew both moved to the spot, their faces rapt with concentration.
    Damned magic, thought
     Chad, but then his eyes spotted something off to one side, a ripped and torn
     tabard. Gram followed his eyes and picked it up before he could say anything.
    Moira considered the traces of aythar with curiosity.
     The cave was full of them. Something momentous had occurred there. The
     feeling they carried was indeed similar to the magic that lay behind Gram’s
     sword and the magic she had felt the day Matthew had accidentally severed his
     own arm. Even so, she could make no sense of it. She turned her attention to
     Gram and the ranger. “What’s that?” she asked.
    “Someone’s discarded livery,” offered Gram, holding up
     the ragged cloth.
    Chad frowned. Something seemed off to him.
    “I don’t recognize it,” admitted Moira.
    “It represents the Earl of Berlagen, in western Dunbar,”
     explained Gram.
    Moira gave him a surprised look, “How did you know
     that?”
    “I may not be as bright as some, but Mother made me
     memorize the crests of every known house in Lothion, Gododdin, and Dunbar,”
     answered the young knight.
    “This didn’t come from Dunbar,” interrupted Matthew.
     “It came from someplace— else .”
    “Those soldiers that came with T’lar crossed over the
     northern wastes from Dunbar,” asserted Gram, “and this tabard came from there
     as well. I don’t see that there’s any reason to doubt that.”
    Chad spoke up, “Why would they leave something as
     obvious as a tabard here, unless they’re trying to lay the blame on someone
     else…”
    Matthew shook his head, “Not the tabard, this. ”
     He gestured at the empty area in the middle of the room.
    Neither Gram nor Chad could see anything there other
     than the partially melted floor, but Moira knew he was referring to the
     otherworldly aythar that lingered in the area.
    “Could Celior have crossed over here, or re-entered
     here?” she wondered aloud. As far as either of them knew, he had remained in
     the world since his first entry when Elaine Prathion had summoned him, the year
     before they had been born.
    “No, but something did,” said her brother. “I think
     the boundary has been changing since Mal’goroth tore his way through. It’s
     weaker. I think something new has come.”
    Moira shrugged, “Well whatever it is, it’s here now.
     We need to find it, and Father.”
    “Celior flew when I saw him leave after his fight,”
     Gram reminded them, “and whatever was here hasn’t left any significant trace of
     its departure.”
    “We need to go to Dunbar,” stated Moira firmly.
     “Someone there was part of this. Once we find them, we may be able to find
     their unnatural allies.”
    “We don’t know that your father was taken back there,”
     said Chad. “Yer best chance is to widen yer search here. Not that it’s a good
     chance.”
    “We’ll do both,” she answered decisively. Her eyes
     went to her brother, looking for his inevitable argument. She was surprised
     when he nodded in agreement.
    “She’s right,” said Matthew.
    “Chad can