Zusatztext Praise for series: "Lackey has written another intensely wrought! finely detailed story of heroic victims struggling to do the best with their fate. Vanyel's magical strengths are countered by his very human insecurities." VOYA "Lackey's characterization! plotting! and wit are all of a high order. A real page-turner for any fantasy collection. " Booklist "Emotionally tense and full of drama and magic ." Locus "In Vanyel! [Lackey] has created her most empathetic male character to date ! making our emotions run high as he meets his fate. And best of all! the very last plot twist is one of haunting beauty that will touch your heart." RT Reviews "In this trilogy! Lackey reaches an intensity she had only begun to achieve.... The story of Vanyel is darker than her earlier books ! and the pace is unrelenting." American Fantasy Magazine Informationen zum Autor Mercedes Lackey Klappentext The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy-three groundbreaking, Lambda Award-winning novels that established Mercedes Lackey as a fantasy tour-de-force and her Kingdom of Valdemar as a place millions of readers return to again and again. This Lambda Award-winning trilogy tells the story of Vanyel, persecuted and abused son of a Valdemaran noble, who finds acceptance at Haven when he is Chosen by the Companion Yfandes. Companions like Yfandes are magical horse-like beings with the power to communicate and bond with their Chosen, and trigger the potential for psychic abilities-and magic. But Vanyel discovers other things about himself at Haven as well. He discovers love in an unexpected place, and loses it, and nearly his own life. With Yfandes and his aunt, Herald Savil, he will travel to the home of the mysterious Hawkbrothers in search of healing and training, and will grow from a troubled and heartbroken Trainee to become the most powerful Herald-Mage in the history of Valdemar-and the one hope for Valdemar against an implacable foe bent on eradicating magic from the Kingdom entirely Magic's Pawn Chapter 1 Your grandfather, said Vanyel's brawny, fifteen-year-old cousin Radevel, was crazy. He has a point , Vanyel thought, hoping they weren't about to take an uncontrolled dive down the last of the stairs. Radevel's remark had probably been prompted by this very back staircase, one that started at one end of the third-floor servants' hall and emerged at the rear of a linen closet on the ground floor. The stair treads were so narrow and so slick that not even the servants used it. The manor-keep of Lord Withen Ashkevron of Forst Reach was a strange and patchworked structure. In Vanyel's great-great-grandfather's day it had been a more conventional defensive keep, but by the time Vanyel's grandfather had held the lands, the border had been pushed far past Forst Reach. The old reprobate had decided when he'd reached late middle age that defense was going to be secondary to comfort . His comfort, primarily. Not that Vanyel entirely disagreed with Grandfather; he would have been one of the first to vote to fill in the moat and for fireplaces in all the rooms. But the old man had gotten some pretty peculiar notions about what he wanted wherealong with a tendency to change his mind in mid-alteration. There were good pointswindows everywhere, and all of them glazed and shuttered. Skylights lighting all the upper rooms and the staircases. Fireplaces in nearly every room. Heated privies, part and parcel of the bathhouse. Every inside wall lathed and plastered against cold and damp. The stables, mews, kennel, and chickenyard banished to new outbuildings. But there were bad pointsif you didn't know your way, you could really get lost; and there were an awful lot of places you couldn't...

Praise for series:

"Lackey has written another intensely wrought, finely detailed story of heroic victims struggling to do the best with their fate. Vanyel’s magical strengths are countered by his very human insecurities." —VOYA 

"Lackey’s characterization, plotting, and wit are all of a high order. A real page-turner for any fantasy collection." —Booklist 

"Emotionally tense and full of drama and magic." —Locus

"In Vanyel, [Lackey] has created her most empathetic male character to date, making our emotions run high as he meets his fate. And best of all, the very last plot twist is one of haunting beauty that will touch your heart." —RT Reviews 
 
"In this trilogy, Lackey reaches an intensity she had only begun to achieve.... The story of Vanyel is darker than her earlier books, and the pace is unrelenting." —American Fantasy Magazine

Autorentext

Mercedes Lackey

Klappentext

The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy-three groundbreaking, Lambda Award-winning novels that established Mercedes Lackey as a fantasy tour-de-force and her Kingdom of Valdemar as a place millions of readers return to again and again.

This Lambda Award-winning trilogy tells the story of Vanyel, persecuted and abused son of a Valdemaran noble, who finds acceptance at Haven when he is Chosen by the Companion Yfandes. Companions like Yfandes are magical horse-like beings with the power to communicate and bond with their Chosen, and trigger the potential for psychic abilities-and magic.

But Vanyel discovers other things about himself at Haven as well…. He discovers love in an unexpected place, and loses it, and nearly his own life. With Yfandes and his aunt, Herald Savil, he will travel to the home of the mysterious Hawkbrothers in search of healing and training, and will grow from a troubled and heartbroken Trainee to become the most powerful Herald-Mage in the history of Valdemar-and the one hope for Valdemar against an implacable foe bent on eradicating magic from the Kingdom entirely

Zusammenfassung
***The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy—***three groundbreaking, Lambda Award-winning novels that established Mercedes Lackey as a fantasy tour-de-force and her Kingdom of Valdemar as a place millions of readers return to again and again.

This Lambda Award-winning trilogy tells the story of Vanyel, persecuted and abused son of a Valdemaran noble, who finds acceptance at Haven when he is Chosen by the Companion Yfandes. Companions like Yfandes are magical horse-like beings with the power to communicate and bond with their Chosen, and trigger the potential for psychic abilities—and magic.

But Vanyel discovers other things about himself at Haven as well…. He discovers love in an unexpected place, and loses it, and nearly his own life. With Yfandes and his aunt, Herald Savil, he will travel to the home of the mysterious Hawkbrothers in search of healing and training, and will grow from a troubled and heartbroken Trainee to become the most powerful Herald-Mage in the history of Valdemar—and the one hope for Valdemar against an implacable foe bent on eradicating magic from the Kingdom entirely

Leseprobe
Magic’s Pawn

Chapter 1

“Your grandfather,” said Vanyel’s brawny, fifteen-year-old cousin Radevel, “was crazy.”

He has a point, Vanyel thought, hoping they weren’t about to take an uncontrolled dive down the last of the stairs. 

Radevel’s remark had probably been prompted by this very back staircase, one that started at one end of the third-floor servants’ hall and emerged at the rear of a linen closet on the ground floor. The stair treads were so narrow and so slick that not even the servants used it.

The manor-keep of Lord Withen Ashkevron of Forst Reach was a strange and patchworked structure. In Vanyel’s great-great-grandfather’s day it had been a more conventional defensive keep, but by the time Vanyel’s grandfather had held the lands, the border had been pushed far past Forst Reach. The old repr…