The Traitor Queen by Trudi Canavan Read Free Book Online Page B

ones
     in both Arvice and Sanctuary.
    Sanctuary. I actually miss the place
, he realised.
Now that I’veleft, I can see that I liked it there, despite Kalia
. Memories of being abducted, locked away, bound and gagged while Kalia searched his mind for the secret of magical Healing
     darkened his thoughts, but he pushed them aside.
Kalia is no longer a Speaker. No longer in charge of the Care Room
, he reminded himself.
The Traitors have their flaws, some more than others, but all in all they’re good people
. Being stuck working with Kalia in the Care Room, worrying about her manipulations and how he was going to convince the Traitors
     to trade with the Guild, had distracted him too much to truly appreciate their way of life.
    His abduction had been the action of a small number of less scrupulous Traitors. He suspected not all of Kalia’s faction would
     have condoned her actions. Most of them wouldn’t have been willing to break Traitor laws as Kalia had, even if they agreed
     with her. They only thought the way they did out of a desire to protect their people. Their fear of the outside world was
     well ingrained after centuries of hiding in the mountains.
    While he wasn’t quite ready to forgive Kalia for stealing Healing knowledge from him, he could hardly begrudge her the desire
     to be able to use it to save the lives of Traitors.
Still, she was planning to kill me and claim I’d attempted to flee Sanctuary and froze in the winter snows. That’s not something
     I intend to forgive
.
    As compensation for what was taken from him, Queen Zarala had decreed that he be taught how to make magical gemstones. He’d
     learned a kind of magic the Guild had never heard of. It was the dream of finding new, powerful magic that had led him to
     volunteer as Ambassador Dannyl’s assistant in the first place. Looking back, he smiled at his own naivety. The chancesof finding something had been ridiculously remote. And yet he had.
    His hopes of finding magic that might render black magic obsolete, or at least provide protection against it, hadn’t been
     fulfilled, however. The potential in magical gemstones to negate the need for black magicians was in turn negated by the fact
     that a stone-maker needed to learn black magic in order to create them.
    He felt his smile fade and a knot of worry form inside his stomach.
What will the Guild do when they find out that I know black magic? Will they forgive it, once they understand I could not
     have learned stone-making otherwise?
    He had considered all possible consequences, and had hardened himself to the worst of them: the possibility they would exile
     him from the Allied Lands, as they had done his father. It would hurt, but would also free him to return to Sanctuary and
     Tyvara, which wasn’t too bad an outcome. Apart from one thing.
    Mother is going to be disappointed in me. No – more than that. She’ll be devastated
.
    Which was why he hadn’t said anything about it to Ambassador Dannyl or Administrator Osen yet. It was one piece of news he
     would be putting off for as long as possible. Osen
had
decided that nobody should be told anything more than necessary, in case the Sachakans did start reading minds. Even so,
     Lorkin knew he couldn’t avoid Sonea finding out forever.
    But when she does, I’d rather she didn’t hear it from anyone else. It’s not going to be easy to tell her, but maybe if I do
     it myself it’ll be easier for her to hear
.
    *      *      *
    Cery had lost count of the times he’d woken up, but this time he knew there was something different about the waking even
     before he gathered enough awareness to name what it was.
    Light
. After Anyi had returned with a little food and water taken from Sonea’s rooms, which they had given to Gol, they’d decided
     to sleep. To avoid using up all the candles, they’d blown them out – but not before Cery had tricked Anyi into giving him
     her matches. He hoped that robbing her of a source