The Gates of Winter - Mark Anthony [38]
Lirith sighed. “I agree, sister. I have seen firsthand how kind he is, but I have also seen the power he wields, and how it is not always under his command. Even so, I would not choose to work against Travis or King Boreas, but there is no way to escape the Pattern.”
“Actually,” Aryn said softly, “there might be.”
Grace stared at the baroness. Lirith set down her cup, slipped from the chair, and knelt on the rug beside Aryn. “What do you mean, sister?”
Aryn leaned back. Her blue eyes were haunted, yet there was a resolve to them. “I've joined a shadow coven,” she said.
Lirith gasped, and her brown eyes went wide. Grace didn't understand what these words meant, not as Lirith clearly did, but all the same they sent a thrill through her.
“Sister,” Lirith said, reaching out as if to touch Aryn's arm, “what have you done? The shadow covens were forbidden long ago, and for good reason. Many of the witches who belonged to them were cruel of spirit and deed.”
“But not all of them,” Aryn said, her tone defiant. “Do you remember Sister Mirda?”
Grace didn't recognize the name, but Lirith nodded. “She was at the High Coven. We never learned where she came from, but it was her words that softened the Pattern. Were it not for her, the Witches would be seeking, not to control Travis Wilder, but to slay him.”
“She came to Calavere before Midwinter,” Aryn said. “When Queen Ivalaine brought Prince Teravian back.”
Connections crackled in Grace's brain. “So that's who was with you,” she said to Aryn. “The time you spoke to me across the Weirding, when we were being held prisoner on Kelephon's ship, I felt another presence with you. It was this Mirda, wasn't it?”
“It was,” Aryn said.
As the fire burned low, they listened as Aryn spoke about the shadow coven, and about what Sister Mirda had told her. While the prophecies of the Witches told that one they called Runebreaker would destroy Eldh, there were other prophecies, ones just as deep and ancient, that spoke how Runebreaker would save Eldh as well. Because this idea was anathema to most—how could the world be at once destroyed and saved?—the Witches chose to ignore the second set of prophecies.
However, over the years, a few witches remembered. It was the purpose of the shadow coven to which Mirda belonged to work for the cause of Runebreaker, to make sure his destiny came to pass. And the Warriors of Vathris were part of that destiny.
“I knew it,” Grace said, her cheeks hot from wine and fire and excitement. “I knew Travis would never destroy Eldh.”
“But he will destroy it, sister,” Lirith said. “If one prophecy is true, then so is the other. How that can be, I do not know, but the crones of old were wise, and their vision far-reaching, and I believe they saw truth.”
Aryn gripped Lirith's hand. “So you'll join the shadow coven?”
Lirith didn't hesitate. “I will, but I do not see how it helps us. We are still bound by the Pattern.”
“Yes,” Aryn said, “but does the Pattern truly require what you think it does?”
“What do you mean?”
Aryn rose, standing before the hearth. “Sister Mirda left Calavere a few days before you returned. She told me she had to meet in person with the other witches who are part of the shadow coven—that they did not dare speak across the Weirding for fear of who might overhear. Before she left, she showed me a way to look deeper into the Pattern.
“On the surface, the weave of the threads seems to say we must work against the Warriors of Vathris and Travis Runebreaker, but if you look beneath, to the warp of the loom from which the Pattern was woven, what it really says is that we must work against them to save Eldh. Yet if working against them would somehow prevent Eldh from being saved—”
“—then the Pattern will allow us to work with them,” Lirith said, leaping to her feet. “The Pattern will allow us to do whatever would save the world in the end.” Her dark eyes shone. “You have given us hope where there was