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A dark-haired woman he had never before seen appeared in the mirror closest to him

"You were hosts danced in her gray eyes "But I sent you away, and died alone and frightened"

At least this apparition had it wrong "You are not ive birth to you, my son" The priest held the woman’s hand as she stepped out of the mirror "For your safety and her own, she convinced her cousin Gwynyth to hide you at court while she used your existence to blackmail several lovers Unfortunately she went too far by dee from a duke" The priest paused to brush some of the cobwebs from her shoulders "He buried her alive in one of his fas ihtlands was lie, and this ied Lucan "Do you knohat Gwynyth did to me? The hell sheyou her son," the priest told him "Had she not, the duke would have seen to it that you joined your mother permanently"

Lucan watched the dark woh without atouch and your cold heart" The priest n of the cross over him "You ere to become Death Darkness has no need, my son"

"I am a man," Lucan said, "not darkness or death, or your son"

"I would have been your father, but for your et" His e swelled and reshaped its forreen eyes "When he brought da your sire, and told ht I lost the last rehtlands made the priest’s words the truthor he believed what he said to be true

"If by this tedious babbling you are attey, you are seven centuries too late" Lucan ignored a sharp crack that shifted the glass floor beneath him "I have no need for a father"

"Darkness has no need" The priestmirrors, which darkened to show Sae "Your woman has been taken prisoner by your nameless enemy" He reversed his hand, and Christian appeared, hurled to the deck before Sairl "So, too, the child she loves as a sister Do you knohat he does to wo, Lucan seized him by the throat, and a shower of crystal death rained down around them "Goddamn you, let me out of here"

Darkhis skin and robe until he beca as h his flesh, and the hand he had wrapped around the priest’s throat becaulfed in flame and blackened

"You are spellbound here by the one who do over the words like rusted metal "It is not within my power to free you"

"So you are as useless tothe priest fro the crystal blades ees on wall after wall exploded, filling the air with clouds of sparkling shards and stripping the copper facade from the priest

Lucan destroyed the world around the but hiarments restored

"You believe I am useless, and perhaps I am," the priest said "But this I can tell you, my son: I, too, have terrible powers, and for the love of a woman used them to destroy s, and only then will you understand me"

The priest vanished

"If that preposterous idiot is punishenius at torture" He was talking out loud to a God he no longer worshipped; surely un to set in Bespelled or not, he had to fight his way back to consciousness, find the women, and attend to his enemy

Endless as the void seemed, Lucan knew it to be but a veil betorlds He tehts on one objective: to awaken