Dark Vengeance by Ed Greenwood

first time. “To do otherwise—as you have done—is to leave me regarding your protestations of innocence as to the fate of your father with disbelief. Jalandral Evendoom, I believe you
not.
”
    The Evendoom spellblade cut at him with all Jalandral’s strength behind it, but this time the old lord met and parried it with his own sword, standing unmoved amid the shriek of tortured steel.
    â€œAnd if you care nothing for my opinion,” he continued calmly, as if they were holding goblets full of wine rather than spellblades whose warring had numbed both their hands, “considering it will be swept away when I am dead, then listen to other Talonar, and learn this well: all Talonnorn believes your father dead, and you the cause.”
    â€œYou
dare
to accuse me of this?” Jalandral snarled, at first seeking to appear righteous before Olone in the eyes of the watching crowd but finding himself losing his temper before his question was half out. “Do you truly insult me this much?”
    Raskshaula shrugged. “Evidently,” he replied—and parried in a manner Jalandral had never seen before, that let his blade rebound and
bend
momentarily, so that its tip darted in to slash open Jalandral’s cheek, just below his left eye.
    â€œOlone!” the High Lord of Talonnorn cried, both as an oath to pour out his feelings, and to make any devout Goddess-worshippers in the crowd think Olone was with him, healing him, as he awakened the healing powers of his spellblade.
    Again, the old lord did him the mock courtesy of stepping back and halting his attack while Jalandral healed himself.
    Leaving the High Lord regarding him balefully, anger gnawing steadily in his throat now.
    This dangerous old lord was going to greet death here, even if it cost Jalandral Evendoom’s life in the bringing of it to him.
    As it was starting to seem it just might.
    Â 
    Aloun chuckled and bent closer to the whorl. “This is splendid!” he said with a grin, lacing and interlacing his fingers excitedly. “You think the old Nifl has a chance?”
    Luelldar shrugged, did something with his will and two of his fingers that made the whorl grow larger and brighter, and said nothing.
    â€œHe’s the better blade, this Raskshaula,” the younger Watcher of Ouvahlor added. “But then, he would be, wouldn’t he? Yet he’s shorter and older, and can’t be as strong. And for all his talk of doing ‘anything,’ he’s letting Evendoom catch his breath and heal himself! And we haven’t seen any sly magics out of Jalandral Evendoom yet, but he
must
have some! How soon before he gets really angry—or hurt—and unleashes one of them?”
    â€œHow soon, indeed?” Luelldar echoed quietly. “What mattersis
how
the newly established High Lord of Talonnorn, Lord Jalandral Evendoom, deals with this very public defiance of his rule by the most respected surviving head of a Talonar noble House, Lord Morluar Raskshaula. Or rather, what all watching Talonnorn
thinks
of how he handles it. In that sense, however horribly he dies, Raskshaula may have won already.”
    Aloun looked sidelong up at the Senior Watcher. “So now the real question: who do you
want
to win? The old-blood veteran humbling the haughty upstart, no matter how entertaining his prancing has been to us? Or is the entertainment afforded us by the flamboyant Jalandral worth more than any amount of tradition, old wisdom, and morals?”
    Luelldar’s face betrayed nothing. “I am a Watcher of Ouvahlor,” he said calmly. “In matters I observe, I do not have ‘wants.’ I may predict what will befall, or expect certain things to happen—in certain ways, even—but I shun all preferences. To do otherwise is to color my observations, and make them worthless to our superiors. More than that: if I cling to mistaken beliefs and judgings, I taint what I see and any