Zeroun, Zeroun, is where I would be. Transport me now across the sea! And Lara was gone in a puff of green smoke to reappear upon the sands of the oasis. The tent was there awaiting her, and Kaliq was standing in its entrance. Lara ran to him.

11

“YOU TOOK YOUR TIME IN answering my call,” Ciarda said to the young man before her. “Remember your fate is in my hands. I control you.”

Cam of the Fiacre looked at the beautiful Darkling and smiled his charming smile. “It is you who should remember that without me you cannot continue on with your plans, Ciarda,” he told her bluntly.

“Where were you?” she demanded to know.

“With Anoush,” he replied, knowing the answer made her jealous.

“That vapid girl? Really, Cam, can you do no better than that weak Halfling?” Ciarda’s color was high as she imagined his time with Anoush.

“You tell me I am the Hierarch,” Cam answered her. “Whether that is true or not I do not know, but I do know that your magic will make it appear so. But we will need more than that, Ciarda, to convince the people of Hetar to accept me. Remember I am an Outlander. We will not be able to hide that fact, and Outlanders are still scorned and believed savage by Hetarians. The Lord High Ruler is wed to the daughter of Magnus Hauk. Her mother is my aunt Lara, the faerie woman. Should not my wife be one of Lara’s other daughters? I have known Anoush since childhood. She is perfect for me.”

“What of the other of Magnus Hauk’s daughters?” Ciarda wanted to know. “The twin of the young Dominus. Would she not be more suitable? I am told she has magic, which could be to our advantage, Cam.”

“She is too young, and besides, Anoush tells me she is with her grandmother Ilona now. You are forbidden from Ilona’s kingdom, Darkling,” he taunted her. “No, I want Anoush. She has the Sight, which could be valuable to me, and she is a healer.”

Ciarda hissed angrily with her frustration, but she knew she had no choice. She needed this mortal man if her plans were to succeed. The origins of the legend of the Hierarch had vanished in the mists of time. When she had lost the opportunity to manipulate her twin half brothers she decided to use that legend to her own advantage. Times were hard in Hetar, and the rumors among the poor had already begun of a savior who would rescue them all from their misery, and restore Hetar to its glory.

What fools these mortals were! Did they not realize they alone were responsible for their own miseries? And only they could overcome them? Mortals were odd creatures, for they always hoped for a better tomorrow. Well, she would give it to them, if only briefly. The Hierarch was central to her plans. And Cam of the Fiacre was the perfect mortal to play the role. He was beautiful, charismatic and had incredible charm. The people would flock to him. She knew she already had him half-convinced that he was what she proposed he be.

She had found him quite by chance. Her plans were blooming and ripening within her mind’s eye, but she had yet to consider the unfortunate mortal she would use to bring these plans to a conclusion. And then one evening as she lurked unseen in the hall of the headwoman Sholeh, Ciarda had seen him. At first he appeared to her to be just a beautiful young man whom she might seduce. But then as she watched she had seen him charming Sholeh. The headwoman was known for her practical nature and no-nonsense attitude, yet Cam had her eating out of his palm. Ciarda was impressed.

Over the next few days she watched Cam, and the more she saw of him the more Ciarda realized that fate had put the Hierarch into her hands. His way with the people around him was quite amazing. His smile was infectious. His public manner patient. He was quick to reach out to others when help was needed. He was really quite perfect. And yet he was perhaps too perfect, which meant that he certainly had a dark side.

Ciarda revealed herself to Cam one afternoon as he sat beneath a tree watching one of the herds belonging to Sholeh. To her complete amazement he did not seem shocked by her dramatic appearance in a burst of fiery flames. Indeed, he smiled at her. Ciarda struggled to maintain her composure. Mortals facing her were usually frightened. This man was not taken aback in the least by her. “I am the Darkling known as Ciarda,” she announced to him, tossing her head so that her ebony hair swirled about her.

“Your coming was foretold me,” Cam said.

“Who told you such a thing?” Ciarda said, surprised.

“The shade of my mother,” he said. “Before her spirit was taken into Limbo she reached out to the little child I was. She said someone would come to me one day, and that I should be a great man.”

“Indeed,” Ciarda replied. “Well, I know nothing of your mother’s shade, Cam of the Fiacre, but it is my duty to see you reach greatness. You are the Hierarch of legend, and you will return Hetar to its former glory.”

“Indeed,” Cam said. And then he burst out laughing. “Darkling,” he said to her, “you would use me for your own purposes. I am no simpleton to believe what you tell me. But I will help you if you will help me. I would take my revenge against she who slew my parents. I have waited many years to do so. Your power will aid me, and in return I will help you to gain whatever it is you desire. Do we have a bargain?”

“Upon whom do you seek revenge?” Ciarda asked him.

“The faerie woman Lara,” he replied.

“What form will your vengeance take?” she wanted to know.

“I will take something from her that she holds dearest,” Cam answered. “And that is all I will tell you, Darkling.”

Ciarda nodded. Revenge that black she understood, and she didn’t care what he did to the faerie woman as long as she gained her goals, her father’s goal of uniting the worlds in darkness. “We have a bargain,” she agreed, “but we must seal it by exchanging tokens. Take pleasures with me now, and I will keep your seed in pledge of our covenant. In return I will give you the ability to go where you want by simply asking to be there.”

He stood up from beneath the tree where he had been lounging. Reaching out, he grasped her by her long black hair, and pulled her to him. “I will have you here and now,” he said, loosening his garments and turning her about and pushing her up against the wide trunk of the tree.

Ciarda was astounded by his boldness. She magicked her garments away, but her nakedness neither shocked nor surprised him. His hands slid beneath her buttocks. The brief glimpse she gained of his manhood delighted her. He was large and he was thick. She moaned as he rammed himself into her. She gasped as he used her roughly until she was whimpering with her great need. Need such as she had certainly never known. And he satisfied her again, and again, and yet again. This mortal was the finest lover she had ever had. She clawed at him, pushing him even further until they were both groaning with the pleasures they were gaining from one another, and wet with their exertions. Finally he flooded her with his juices, which were so copious that they overflowed her womb, and ran down the insides of her thighs.

“You are magnificent!” Ciarda gasped as her legs fell away from his torso, and she clung to him because she could not quite stand on her own right now.

“Your sheath is narrow and tight,” he told her. “I quite enjoyed it. Now give me the small power you promised me.”

“You had it the moment you gave me your seed,” Ciarda told him.

“Let’s see if it works,” Cam said. “Take me to Ciarda’s bedchamber!” And he suddenly found himself in an exotic room with a large round bed covered in red silk. And there in the middle of the bed Ciarda lounged temptingly. He looked at her. “You are tempting, but I cannot shirk my duty as Sholeh’s herder. ‘Take me back to the meadow,’” he said.

“Come back tonight!” Ciarda called to him.

“Perhaps,” his fading voice answered her.

But he had not come back that night. She waited for several nights for him, and to her annoyance he did not come. She expected him to be surprised when he found her in his rustic bed several nights later, but he was not. He complained that it had taken her long enough to come to him. Then, mounting her, he rode her hard the night long, sleeping briefly and leaving her without a word in the first minutes of dawn to attend to his duties. Ciarda didn’t know whether to be furious or not.

In the end, however, she decided not to be angry. There was no mortal sentiment in Cam, and that was a good thing. In the weeks that followed she discovered his insatiable need for power. He would be ruthless with his enemies, and that was a good thing. Ruthlessness inspired fear in the masses, and fear gave one the ability to control.

As Hierarch Cam would rule Hetar for her with an iron fist. And for now she would give him the girl he desired for a wife because in the end when she controlled it all, the faerie woman’s daughters would be taken from the men who cherished them, and given to the Wolfyn for playthings. She expected Magnus Hauk’s daughter to last longer.

“You are smiling,” Cam said to her.

“I am thinking of our future,” Ciarda answered him.

Cam laughed. “You are so deliciously vile, Darkling,” he told her. “Let us hope your powers are strong enough to do all you seek to do. If my aunt decides you are an annoyance she will quite happily destroy you as she did your father,” he told her cruelly.

“Hateful mortal,” she snarled at him. “If my father had succeeded in his plans you would now reside beneath his boot, and not in my bed.”

“I enjoy your bed,” he said, grasping one of her large, round breasts. “Slaking my fierce and unquenchable lusts on your body allows me to play the gentle suitor with Anoush. She is falling in love with me, Darkling.” He squeezed her breast hard, and she was unable to restrain a whimper of pain. “In the spring I will make her my wife.” His mouth took Ciarda’s in a hard kiss. “And eventually you will both come to my bed together, and we will take pleasures. Anoush is a gentle maiden, but she will have her mother’s appetite for passion, I am certain. I will have you lick her secret treasures while I plunge myself into you over and over and over again. Will that please you, Ciarda?”