Winged Magic Read Free Page B

market and gathering place for the entire community. Its broad expanse was paved with slabs of granite, and at its centre, where the four main roads of the city converged, a tall, black obelisk towered nearly twenty feet into the air. Atop the obelisk hung a golden rayed sun, the emblem of the goddess Amara.
    Kelene watched the Khulinin sorcerer gaze around at the city of his ancestors, and she saw the subtle shift of expression on his face, from awe to anger. It was a change she had witnessed on many magic-wielders’ faces. It would have been very difficult not to feel anything. The rage that had massacred an entire population still lay mutely evident in the shattered wreckage of the old square, where skeletons of walls and hollow foundations lined the open space.
    The grand Sorcerers’ Hall showed the worst of the attackers’ fury, for its desecrated remains still had unmistakable signs of heat fractures and scorch marks from a large fire. It was known from the Korg’s tale that the attackers had thrown hundreds of bodies into the burning Sorcerers’ Hall — and Kelene believed it. Two hundred years had not been enough time in this semi-arid land to totally erase the bits of ash, remnants of bone, and the black stains of soot that still lay in the cracks and crevices of the mined stones of the hall. She and Rafnir had made no attempt to restore any part of the old foundation.
    But if the square had been the scene of tragedy, it was also the centre of returning life — little to be sure, but life nonetheless. Turning away from the dead hall, Kelene pointed Gaalney toward a side street where he could see several restored buildings just off the square. At the corner of the street and facing the square was a house of some dignity, completely rebuilt, and gleaming in the sun like a pearl among dross. It was the house Kelene and Rafnir had chosen when they moved to Moy Tura. Broad, open, and airy, it was a comfortable abode for people used to living in cramped, movable tents. It had taken Kelene some time to adjust to the differences in housekeeping, but now she loved the house and called it home.
    Gaalney’s tired face lightened when he saw it.
    “There is a guest hall down that street,” Kelene told him. “You may leave your things there and clean up if you wish while I find Sayyed. Rafnir should be at our house for his midday meal. Join us there. If Veneg would like to rest, there is a stable by the guest hall or he can join the other horses out in the fields.”
    Gaalney’s mouth lifted in his quirky smile. “Guest hall, huh? How many people do you have here?”
    “Not enough,” Kelene replied honestly. “We built the guest hall for the people who visit but don’t want to stay. At the moment we have three historians from the Five Kingdoms, an architect from Pra Desh who is helping us learn to build, two bards, two healers, several exiles who are trying to earn their way back into the clans, and a priest from Clan Dangari. The rest of our residents, the permanent ones, equal all of eighteen.”
    Gaalney grimaced at the cold numbers. Even he as a newcomer could see eighteen permanent residents — no matter how many guests they might have — were not nearly enough to make a viable colony. He spoke his thanks for her information and turned his stallion down the road to the guest hall.
    Demira trotted across the square toward the Sorcerers’ Hall. Kelene did not need to tell her where to find Rafnir’s father. Sayyed had been going to the same area almost every free moment since he’d arrived nearly two years ago. The mare bypassed the old foundations, walked up the main road, and turned left into the ruinous streets west of the hall.
    Before the Purge the area had been one of the finer residential neighbourhoods in the city. While a few of the houses had been destroyed in the fire that consumed the hall, many other homes had simply been plundered and left to rot.
    One day, out of curiosity, Sayyed decided to