The Rogue Read online

  BY TRUDI CANAVAN

  The Magician’s Apprentice

  The Black Magician Trilogy

  The Magicians’ Guild

  The Novice

  The High Lord

  Age of the Five

  Priestess of the White

  Last of the Wilds

  Voice of the Gods

  The Traitor Spy Trilogy

  The Ambassador’s Mission

  The Rogue

  COPYRIGHT

  Published by Hachette Digital

  ISBN: 978-0-748-11669-0

  All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2011 by Trudi Canavan

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.

  Hachette Digital

  Little, Brown Book Group

  100 Victoria Embankment

  London, EC4Y 0DY

  www.hachette.co.uk

  Contents

  COPYRIGHT

  BY TRUDI CANAVAN

  PART ONE

  CHAPTER 1: THE STONE-MAKERS’ CAVES

  CHAPTER 2: AN UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL

  CHAPTER 3: ACCUSATIONS AND PROPOSALS

  CHAPTER 4: VISITING

  CHAPTER 5: QUESTIONS, QUESTIONS

  CHAPTER 6: A WARNING

  CHAPTER 7: DECISIONS AND DISCOVERIES

  CHAPTER 8: CONSEQUENCES

  CHAPTER 9: ANTICIPATION AND BETRAYAL

  CHAPTER 10: SECRETS SHARED

  CHAPTER 11: A MISUNDERSTANDING

  CHAPTER 12: DELIBERATIONS

  CHAPTER 13: DIFFICULT DECISIONS

  CHAPTER 14: SCHEMES

  CHAPTER 15: UNINVITED COMPANY

  PART TWO

  CHAPTER 16: FEARS AND CONCERNS

  CHAPTER 17: MIND GAMES

  CHAPTER 18: ON THE HUNT

  CHAPTER 19: ESCAPEE

  CHAPTER 20: NO RETURN

  CHAPTER 21: LIES, HIDDEN TRUTHS AND DELUSIONS

  CHAPTER 22: IN GOOD COMPANY

  CHAPTER 23: GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS

  CHAPTER 24: A MEETING

  CHAPTER 25: GIVING AND WITHHOLDING

  CHAPTER 26: RINGS AND STONES

  CHAPTER 27: UNPLANNED ASSISTANCE

  CHAPTER 28: A WELCOME RETURN

  CHAPTER 29: THE DECISION

  CHAPTER 30: THE CHOICE

  EPILOGUE

  GLOSSARY

  LORD DANNYL’S GUIDE TO SLUM SLANG

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  PART ONE

  CHAPTER 1

  THE STONE-MAKERS’ CAVES

  According to a Sachakan tradition so old that nobody remembered where it had begun, summer had a male aspect and winter a female one. Over the centuries since their founding, Traitor leaders and visionaries had declared the superstitions relating to men and women – especially women – to be ridiculous, but many of their people still felt that the season that exerted the most control over their lives had many feminine characteristics. Winter was relentless, powerful and brought people together in order to best survive.

  In contrast, to occupants of the lowlands and deserts of Sachaka, winter was a blessing, bringing the rains that crops and livestock needed. Summer was harsh, dry and unproduct ive.

  As Lorkin hurried back from the Herbery, all he could think was that it was colder than he’d expected in the valley. The chill in the air held a threat of snow and ice. He didn’t feel like he’d been in Sanctuary long enough for winter to be this far advanced. Only a few short months had passed since he’d entered the secret home of the Sachakan rebels. Before then he’d been down on the warm, dry lowlands, fleeing in the company of a woman who’d saved his life.

  Tyvara. Something in his chest tightened in an uncomfortable, yet strangely pleasant way. Lorkin drew in a deep breath and quickened his stride. He was determined to ignore the feeling as resolutely as Tyvara was ignoring him.

  I didn’t come here only because I fell in love with her, he told himself. He’d felt bound by honour to speak in Tyvara’s defence to her people, because she’d saved his life. She’d killed the assassin who had tried to seduce and murder him – but the assassin had been a Traitor, too. Riva had been acting on behalf of a faction that believed he should be punished for the failure of his father, the former High Lord Akkarin, to uphold a deal he’d made with the Traitors many years ago. Nobody within the faction had admitted to giving Riva an order to kill him. To have done so would mean they had acted against the wishes of the queen, so they claimed it had been all Riva’s idea.

  There are rebels within the rebels, Lorkin mused.

  His defence of Tyvara may have saved her from execution, but she had not evaded punishment. Perhaps it was the tasks that Riva’s family had set for her that kept her away from him. Whatever the reason, he’d endured the loneliness of a stranger in a foreign place.

  He had nearly reached the foot of the cliff wall that surrounded the valley. Glancing up at the multitude of windows and doors carved into this side of the valley, Lorkin knew there would be times he’d feel trapped within this place. Not because of the savage winter, which would make staying indoors necessary, but because, as a foreigner who now knew the general whereabouts of the Traitors’ home, he would never be allowed to leave.

  Beyond the windows and doors were enough rooms to house a small city’s populace. They ranged from small cupboard-sized hollows to halls the size of the Guildhall. Most were not cut far into the rock wall, since there had been tremors and collapses in the past and people felt more comfortable living close enough to the outside that they could run outdoors quickly.

  Some passages ventured a lot deeper. These were the domain of the Traitor magicians – the women who, despite their claims that this was an equal society, ruled this place. Perhaps they didn’t mind living further underground because they could use magic to prevent being crushed in a collapse. Or perhaps they like to stay close to the caves where the magical crystals and stones are made.

  At that thought, Lorkin felt a tingle of excitement. He shifted the box he was carrying to the other shoulder and strode through the arched entrance to the city. Perhaps tonight I will find out.

  The city passages were busy as workers returned to their families. At one point Lorkin’s path was blocked by the children of two Traitors who had stopped to talk to one another.

  “Excuse me,” he said automatically as he squeezed past.

  The adults and children looked amused. Kyralian manners puzzled all Sachakans. The Ashaki and their families, the powerful free people of the lowlands, had too great a sense of entitlement to feel the need to express gratitude for the services of others – and thought thanking slaves for doing what they had no choice in doing was ridiculous. Though Traitors did not keep slaves and their society was supposed to be equal, they hadn’t developed a sense of good manners. At first Lorkin had tried to do as they did, but he did not want to lose his habit of being polite to the extent that his own people would find him rude, should he ever return to Kyralia.

  Let the Traitors think of me as strange. That’s better than ungrateful or aloof.

  Not that Traitors were unfriendly or without warmth. Both men and women had been surprisingly welcoming. Some of the women had even tried to lure him into their beds, but he had declined politely. Perhaps I’m a fool, but I haven’t yet given up on Tyvara.

  Close to the Care Room, the city’s version of a hospice, where he worked most days, he slowed down to catch his breath. It was run by Speaker Kalia, the unofficial leader of the faction that had ordered his execution. He did not want her t
o think he had hurried back for any reason, or needed to finish his shift on time. If she thought him anxious to leave, she’d find a task to delay him. Likewise, if there wasn’t much to keep him occupied, he knew better than to sit down and rest or Kalia would find him something to do, and often something unpleasant and unnecessary.

  Still, if he sauntered in as if he had all the time in the world, she might punish him for that, too. So he adopted his usual calm, stoic demeanour. Kalia saw him, rolled her eyes and took the box from him with magic.

  “Why do you never think to use your powers?” she said, sighing and turning away to take the box to the storeroom.

  He ignored her question. She wouldn’t want to hear about how Lord Rothen, his old teacher at the Guild, believed that a magician shouldn’t substitute all physical exertion for magic to avoid becoming weak and unhealthy.

  “Would you like me to help you with that?” he asked. The box was full of herbs that would be turned into cures – some that he’d like to learn the recipe for.

  She glanced back at him and scowled. “No. Keep an eye on the patients.”

  He shrugged to hide his frustration and turned to survey the large main room. Not much had changed since the early morning, when he’d begun working for the day. Beds were arranged in rows. Not many were occupied. A few children were recovering from typical childhood illnesses or injuries and an old woman was nursing a broken arm. All were asleep.

  It had been Kalia’s idea to put him to work in the Care Room, and he was sure she’d done it to test his resolve to not teach the Traitors how to Heal with magic. So far there had been no patients likely to die from sicknesses or injuries he could only cure with magic, but it was bound to happen eventually. When it did, he expected Kalia to stir up animosity toward him. He had a plan to counter Kalia’s, but behind her motherly appearance and demeanour was a shrewd mind. She may have guessed his intentions already. He could only wait and see.

  Right now he couldn’t wait. He needed to be somewhere else. He was late, and getting later every moment that passed, so he followed Kalia into the storeroom.

  “Looks like you have a lot of work to do,” he observed.

  She didn’t look up at him. “Yes. I’ll be up all night.”

  “You didn’t get any sleep last night,” he reminded her. “It’s not good for you.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” she snapped, glaring at him. “I’m more than capable of doing without sleep. This has to be done now. By someone who knows what they’re doing.” She turned away. “Go. Take the night off.”

  Lorkin did not give her a chance to change her mind. He smiled wryly to himself as he slipped out of the Care Room. Guild Healers knew how damaging lack of sleep could be to the body because they could sense the effects. Not knowing how to Heal with magic, Traitors had never sensed their error and believed a good night’s sleep was an unnecessary indulgence.

  He hadn’t tried to convince them otherwise, since reminding them of what they didn’t know wasn’t tactful. Many years ago, his father had promised to teach the Traitors to Heal in exchange for the knowledge of black magic, despite not having the approval of the Guild to pass on such knowledge and, more importantly, black magic being forbidden to Guild magicians.

  At the time, many Traitor children had caught a deadly disease and knowledge of Healing magic might have saved them. Black magic had allowed Akkarin to escape the Ichani who had enslaved him and return to Kyralia, but he never came back to Sachaka to fulfil his side of the deal. Since learning of his father’s broken promise, Lorkin had considered many possible reasons. His father had known that the brother of the Ichani who had enslaved Akkarin planned to invade Kyralia. He may have felt obliged to deal with that threat first. Perhaps he could not explain the threat to the Guild without revealing that he had learned forbidden black magic. He might have considered it too dangerous to return to Sachaka alone, risking recapture by the Ichani or the vengeance of his former master’s brother.

  Perhaps he never intended to uphold the deal. After all, the Traitors had known of his terrible situation for some time before they offered their help, whereas they helped others – mainly women of Sachaka – all the time without asking a price. That they hadn’t helped Akkarin regain his freedom until it was an advantage to them certainly demonstrated how ruthless they could be.

  The passages were quieter now, so Lorkin was able to travel faster, breaking into a jog when there was nobody around to observe. If someone from Kalia’s faction noticed he was in a hurry, it might be reported to her.

  Life here didn’t quite live up to Tyvara’s claims of a peaceful society – or even a fair one, despite the Traitors’ principles of equality. Still, they are doing better than many other countries, and especially the rest of Sachaka. They have no slavery, and the work people are given is mostly decided by ability rather than an inherited class system. They may treat men and women unequally, but so do all other cultures – the other way around. Most cultures treat women far worse than the Traitors treat their men.

  He thought of his newest and closest friend in Sanctuary, a man named Evar, who he was meeting tonight. The young Traitor magician had been drawn to Lorkin out of curiosity because he was the only other male magician in Sanctuary who had not yet paired with a woman. Lorkin had discovered that his first impression of the status of male magicians had been wrong: he’d assumed that if there were male magicians then the Traitors must offer them the same opportunities to learn magic as they offered women. The truth was, all male magicians here were naturals – magicians whose magic had developed naturally, forcing Traitor magicians to teach them or abandon them to die when they lost control of their powers. Magical knowledge was not otherwise offered to Traitor men.

  The few fortunate male naturals were still not equal to the women, however. Men were not taught black magic. This ensured that even weak female magicians were stronger than the male ones, because they could boost their strength by storing magic taken from others.

  I wonder … would I have been allowed into Sanctuary if I’d known black magic?

  He did not ponder that, as he had finally reached his destination: the “men’s room”. It was a large room that accommodated Traitor males who were too old to live with their parents but had not yet been selected by a woman to be her companion.

  Evar was talking to two other men, but left them as he saw Lorkin enter. Like most Traitor men, he was thin and small-boned, in contrast to the typical free Sachakan male from the lowlands, who tended to be tall and broad-shouldered. Not for the first time, Lorkin wondered if Traitor men had somehow grown smaller over time to fit their social status.

  “Evar,” Lorkin said. “Sorry I’m late.”

  Evar shrugged. “Let’s eat.”

  Lorkin hesitated, then followed the other man to the food preparation area, where a steaming pot of soup had been cooked up by one of the men for them all to eat. This wasn’t part of the plan. Had he returned too late? Had Evar’s plans changed?

  “Are we still going for that walk you suggested?” Lorkin ventured as casually as he could manage.

  Evar nodded. “If you haven’t changed your mind.” He leaned closer. “A few of the stone-makers are working late,” the young magician murmured. “Got to give them time to finish up and leave.”

  Lorkin felt his stomach knot. “Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked as they moved to one of the long dining tables, taking places at the end a little distance from the men already eating.

  Evar chewed, swallowed, then gave Lorkin a reassuring smile. “Nothing I’m going to show you is secret. Anyone who wants to have a look is welcome to, so long as they have a guide, keep quiet and stay out of the way.”

  “But I’m not just anyone.”

  “You’re supposed to be one of us. The only difference is you’ve been told you can’t leave. If I tried to leave, well, I doubt I’d get far without permission, and that permission isn’t likely to be granted. They don’t like having lots of Traitors outside
the city. Every spy is a risk, even with the mind-read-blocking stones. What if the stone was in your hand and your hand was chopped off?”

  Lorkin grimaced. “Even so, I doubt anybody is going to be happy about me being there,” he said, returning to the subject. “Or you taking me.”

  Evar swallowed the last bite of his meal. “Probably not. But dear Aunt Kalia loves me.” Though Lorkin had never seen Kalia chatting sociably to Evar, she did appear to approve of her nephew. “You going to finish that?”

  Shaking his head, Lorkin pushed the remains of his meal aside. He was too nervous to eat much. Evar frowned at the unemptied bowl, but said nothing, took it and simply finished off the leftovers. Since land for crops or livestock was limited, the Traitors didn’t approve of waste, and Evar was always hungry. They rose, cleaned and packed away the utensils they’d used and then left the men’s room. Lorkin felt his stomach twist and flutter with anxiety, yet at the same time he was full of impatience and anticipation.

  “We’ll go through one of the back ways,” Evar murmured. “Less chance you’ll be noticed going in.”

  As they travelled through the city, Lorkin considered what he hoped to find out. The Guild had maintained for centuries that there were no true magical objects, just ordinary things given structural integrity or enhanced properties – like magically strengthened buildings, or the walls that glowed in the University – because they were made from material in which magic acted slowly and so continued to have an effect long after a magician stopped working on it. Even glass “blood gems” didn’t qualify. They channelled mental communications between the wearer and the creator in a way that prevented other magicians from hearing, but they didn’t contain magic.

  He suspected that some of the gemstones in Sanctuary did. Most were like blood gems in that magic was sent to them and was converted by the stone to a purpose. Others appeared to hold magic ready to be used in some way. All Traitors who ventured outside their secret home carried a tiny stone inserted beneath their skin that not only allowed them to protect their mind if a Sachakan magician read it, but also let them project innocent, safe thoughts instead. The corridors and rooms within the city were illuminated by gems that gave off light. The Care Room where Lorkin attended the sick contained several stones with useful properties, from producing a warm glow or a gentle vibration to soothe sore muscles, to stones that could cauterise wounds.