Ian Irvine - The Tower on the Rift (The View from the Mirror, #2)

WARNER BOOKS EDITION

Copyright 1998 by Ian Irvine

Maps copyright 1998 by Ian Irvine

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First eBook Edition: January 2002

ISBN: 978-0-446-55634-7

Contents

Llian of the Zain: He lives to make the past come alive, but now the ancient hatreds from that past may destroy him...

Karan of Gothryme: Daughter of three worlds, her birthright can lead to incredible powersor an eternal darkness of the mind...

Shand: For the sake of Llian and Karan, the reclusive hermit must return to acquaintances and a war he walked away from centuries before...

Tensor of the Aachim: His leadership caused his peoples destruction, his quest for revenge may cause their genocide...

Lilis: This waif from the street is a tiny bundle of courage, valor, and fury...

Mendark: Usurped and driven into hiding, this ancient mancer plots to rekindle the inner fires that once made him the worlds most powerfuland fearedruler...

Books by Ian Irvine

A Shadow on the Glass

The irony of history is inexorable.

BARBARA TUCHMAN,THE MARCH OF FOLLY

The View from the Mirror is a tale of the Three Worlds, Aachan, Tallallame and Santhenar, and of the four human species that inhabit them: Aachim, Charon, Faellem and old human. The setting is Santhenar, a world where wizardrythe Secret Artis difficult, and doesnt always work, and every using comes at a price aftersickness.

Long ago a whole race was betrayed and cast into the void between the worlds, a Darwinian place where life is more desperate, more brutal, more fleeting than anywhere. In the void none but the fittest survive, and only by remaking themselves constantly. A million of that race died in the first few weeks.

The terrible centuries ground on. The exiles were transformed into a new human species, but still they could not survive the void. Reduced to a handful, they hung over the abyss of extinction. Then one day a chance came, an opening to another worldAachan!

They gave themselves a new name, Charon, after a frigid moonlet at the furthest extremity of the void. Escaping it, they took barren Aachan from the Aachim, reducing them to servitude. The Hundred, as the remaining Charon became known, dared allow nothing to stand before the survival of their species.

Despite their efforts, they did not flourish on Aachan. One of the Hundred, Rulke, commissioned the golden flute, an instrument that could open the Way between the Worlds. Before it could be used, Shuthdar, the old human who made it, stole the flute and fled with it to Santhenar. Unfortunately Shuthdar blundered. He opened all the paths between the worlds, and the four species scrambled to get the flute for themselves. Rather than be taken Shuthdar destroyed it, bringing down the Forbidding that sealed Santhenar off completely. Now the fate of the Three Worlds is bound up with those marooned on Santhenar. They have never ceased to search for a way home, but no way has ever been found.

Volume 1
A SHADOW ON THE GLASS

Llian, a brilliant young chronicler at the College of the Histories, presents a new version of an ancient Great Tale, the Tale of the Forbidding, at his graduation telling, to unprecedented acclaim. But Wistan, the master of the College, realizes that Llian has uncovered a deadly mysteryevidence that a crippled girl was murdered at the time the golden flute was destroyed. The crime must have occurred to conceal a greater one, and even now such knowledge could be deadly, both for him and for the College.

Llian is also Zain, an outcast race despised for collaborating with the Charon in olden times. Wistan persecutes Llian to make him retract the tale, but Llian secretly keeps on with his research. He knows that it could be the key to a brilliant storythe first new Great Tale for hundreds of yearsand if he were the one to write it, he would stand shoulder to shoulder with the greatest chroniclers of all time.

Karan, a young woman who is a sensitive, was at the graduation telling when Llian told his famous tale. She loves the Histories and is captivated by the tale and the teller. Karan returns to Gothryme, her drought-stricken and impoverished home, but soon afterwards Maigraith appears. Karan owes an obligation to Maigraith, the powerful but troubled lieutenant of Faelamor, and Maigraith insists that she repay it by helping to steal an ancient relic for her liege. Faelamor is the age-old leader of the Faellem, exiled on Santhenar by the Forbidding. Desperate to take her people back to her own world, she believes that the relic may hold the key.

Yggur the sorcerer now holds the relic in Fiz Gorgo. Karan and Maigraith steal into his fortress, but Karan is shocked to learn that the relic is the Mirror of Aachan, stolen from the Aachim a thousand years ago. Being part-Aachim herself, she knows that the Aachim have never stopped searching for it. Either she must betray her fathers people or refuse her debt to Maigraithdishonor either way. And Karan has a dangerous heritage: part Aachim, part old human, she is a blending. Blendings, though prone to madness, can have unusual talents, as she has. They are also at risk: sometimes hunted to enslave the talent, as often to destroy it.

Maigraith, captivated by something she sees on the Mirror, is surprised by Yggur. Finally she is overcome but Karan flees with the Mirror into the flooded labyrinth below the fortress, pursued by Yggurs dreadful Whelm guards. Karan is clever and resourceful, and eventually escapes, but is hunted for weeks through swamp and forest and mountains. The Whelm, who are also sensitive, are able to track her through her nightmares. In a twist of fate, Karan saves the life of one of the Whelm, Idlis the healer. She heads toward Chanthed, a place of haunting memories for her because of Llian and his wonderful tale. Pursued by the Whelm and their dogs, she thinks of Llian as a savior and reaches out to him in her dreams.

Mendark, a mancer who is Yggurs bitter enemy, hears that the Mirror has been stolen and sends out his lieutenants to find it. Learning from Tallia that Karan is heading for Chanthed he asks Wistan to find her. Wistan, who would do anything to get rid of Llian, orders him to find Karan and take her to Mendarks city, Thurkad.