Chapter 102
I found Neville in Tuen. He was standing by the black graveyard, as silent and still as the black tree he glared at. In the center of the burial place, the black tree sank its roots while its tiny green leaves pulsed in bliss. It must have arrived in the dark, sniffing death, sniffing blood. I felt like saying:
‘See? I told you the truth. It feeds on death, the black tree does.’ I thought better of it and called, ‘Neville. My half-brother is awake.’
The reason I went to Tuen was not as much to find Neville, but to get away from Pierre. First he becomes pupil to a dragon, then he strolls around the Land of the Banished with a wolf of Sátiron, then he wakes up in Chambert with a real mage at his side; a mage older even than Chelag’Ren.
Fregósbor didn’t know my name.
— Gregoire’s Diaries.
Ah, the shame I feel now for being so jealous at the time! I should have gone back to the Frontier, instead I… Well, History knows what I did.
— Diary Revisited
The Deburian army spread down the road like a long caterpillar with almost a thousand pairs of feet, a hundred war horses, three dozen wagons. Its head was a colossal man with a blond mane. He raised his hand and the caterpillar stopped, then a rider detatched from the caterpillar’s body and rode up to the king. Henrique sat almost sideways on his saddle, his right shoulder raised like a shield to his neck, his eyes locked on what was left ot Tuen. On the same road, coming from the North, Patire’s army could be seen.
The rider was Maëlle and the king asked her:
‘What do we do?’
‘We camp.’
‘Fulbert is here.’
‘So are we.’