Said the king, ‘For this heresy, I’ll see you burn.
I say destiny’s charge is not easy to turn.’
But the seer shook his head. ‘Sire, you have much to learn
For the urds said the same in their day.’
Now the king stands at his window and watches the sea
And he knows that his castle’s no sanctuary
As he waits for the truth of the seer’s prophecy
And the storm that will sweep him away.
Tears were running down Harod’s cheeks as the final line faded, and he stood trembling for a time. Finally, he reached inside his splint mail and took out the folded papers Orica had given him. He opened them up, revealing scribbled verses and pages of staves marked with musical notation.
‘Here is her song,’ he said. ‘Her masterpiece. It is all that is left of her. I say it will be the anthem of your revolution. I say we will spread it throughout this land, until her words are on the lips of every bard, and all who hear it will know it as her call to arms. The Krodans will say, “Death to all that play it! Death to all that hear it!” And they will play it anyway, in secret, in back rooms and behind closed doors. It will be a beacon of hope in the red days to come, when the Krodans bear down upon this land in vengeance for what we have done this night, and Ossian tears wash the streets. And when all is over, when you have driven the occupiers from your land, her name will be remembered for ever, revered for all time in your histories.’ He waved the papers before them. ‘A song for a new Ossia, written by a Sard. For this was her land as much as yours, and she has given her life for it.’
‘The anthem of our revolution,’ said Aren. ‘Well spoken. It shall be so.’
‘Then my sword is yours,’ said Harod. ‘Until the day your land is free and the Sards are returned to it. That is my quest, taken in her name.’
He bowed his head and stepped away from the grave. Birdsong fluted in the lightening sky and wind stirred the long grasses.
‘You know my mind,’ said Vika to them all. ‘The Aspects set me on this path. A great darkness gathers and the demons we faced tonight were the merest part of it. Whatever evil is coming, the Krodans are somehow involved; and so I will resist them to my last breath.’ Ruck barked in agreement.
‘My home is lost to me,’ said Fen, ‘and it always will be while Krodans rule in Ossia. Until they are gone, my home is here, with you.’
‘My home is lost, too,’ said Mara. ‘But there is liberation in that. No longer will I live in a society that limits and forbids me. I will set my discoveries and inventions to use at last, for the good of the resistance. My pupils may have lost their teacher, but I will see a day once again when no woman of this land will have her talents stifled and her thoughts curtailed by the Sanctorum and their damned kind.’
‘We all have our reasons for revolution,’ said Aren, ‘but this is our common cause.’ With a sharp ring, he drew the Ember Blade and brandished it before him, its blade touched with red in the first light of day. The sight of it inspired him, and made his words reckless and brave.
‘Some will say the last Dawnwarden died tonight,’ he said. ‘But we will make liars of them. For though we hail from different lands and different stations in life, though we believe in different gods or none at all, tonight we reclaimed that which the Dawnwardens lost. Tonight, we earned the right to take on their mantle.’ He raked them all with his gaze, his face alive with conviction. ‘We are the Dawnwardens now!’
‘Dawnwardens? Us?’ Mara looked bewildered, but as the idea sank in, a light kindled in her eyes. ‘Yet, why not? We did win back the Ember Blade.’
‘And who were the Dawnwardens but the guardians of the Ember Blade?’ said Vika, a wry smile growing on her face. ‘Long have our people wished for their return. It would not do to disappoint them.’
‘Grub want to be a Dawnwarden!’ Grub cried eagerly, bouncing up and down.
‘We are all Dawnwardens!’ Aren said, swept up in the moment. He held the sword before him. ‘I swear I will protect the Ember Blade with my life, until such a day when it can be put into the hand of one who deserves to rule this land. I pledge myself to any who share this purpose, an unbreakable bond, unto death. Will you swear with me?’
‘I will,’ said Harod, grimly.
‘Aye,’ said Vika, her eyes creasing with approval. Ruck barked happily at her side. ‘I think the Aspects would be pleased. I swear it, for the Ember Blade, and for each other.’
‘Me, too!’ Grub said, and then cackled. ‘Ha! Now you all have to be friends with Grub!’
‘I am not given to grand gestures,’ said Mara, ‘but I have kept my silence all my life, and my name has gone too long unrecognised. I will be a Dawnwarden. I swear with you.’
‘And you?’ Aren asked Fen. ‘Would you stand with us, knowing what’s to come? Knowing we might all fall together?’
‘Yes,’ she said softly, and there was that look on her face that Aren was coming to know, the one that sent fire through his veins. ‘I’ll stand with you.’
‘It is done, then,’ said Aren, and he thrust the sword back into its scabbard. ‘Let us spread the word. The Dawnwardens have returned, and they have the Ember Blade.’
Grub cheered then, and they looked at each other with new eyes, and a new sense of beginning. A shadow fell across Aren as he thought of Cade, who should have been there with them; but it couldn’t entirely darken the moment, and he still found it in himself to smile.
‘These mountains will be crawling with Krodans soon,’ Vika said. ‘Whither now?’
‘We can find shelter near Gallenpeak. I know people sympathetic to our cause,’ Mara said. ‘You don’t mix with traitors for years without picking up a few contacts.’
‘We’ll stay off the roads, take the wild paths,’ said Fen. ‘These lands are new to me, but I’ll get us there unseen.’
Aren shouldered his pack and took one last look around the meadow, where the risen sun had turned the waving reeds to gold.
‘Then show us the way, Fen,’ he said. ‘We’ve work to do.’
Also by Chris Wooding from Gollancz
THE BRAIDED PATH
The Weavers of Saramyr
The Skein of Lament
The Ascendancy Veil
The Braided Path (omnibus)
TALES OF THE KETTY JAY
Retribution Falls
The Black Lung Captain
The Iron Jackal
Ace of Skulls
The Fade
THE DARKWATER LEGACY
The Ember Blade
Copyright
First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Gollancz
an imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd
Carmelite House, 50 Victoria Embankment
London EC4Y 0DZ
An Hachette UK Company
This eBook first published in 2018 by Gollancz.
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Copyright © Chris Wooding 2018
Map illustration by Neil Gower 2018
The moral right of Chris Wooding to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
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, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (eBook) 978 1 473 21487 3
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Lymington, Hants
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The Ember Blade Page 86