by Matthew Ward
Kurkas shrugged. “You think I don’t know what Lord Droshna is?” He spoke faster, anger beneath the words. “He was my friend a damn sight longer than he was yours, and you better believe I’ll put him in the ground for what he’s done.”
“You’ll never have the chance,” said Josiri. “He’ll kill you.”
“Probably he will. But I owe it to the plant pot and Halvor to at least try.”
Revekah. He’d forgotten about her. Another victim.
“You don’t leave a wolf on the prowl,” Brass put in. “Only makes trouble later.”
Brass was part of this? Brass, who’d never met a duty he couldn’t shirk? Josiri looked about the room, for the first time gleaning the gathering’s true intent. “You’re not asking for my approval. You’ve already decided to go.”
Phoenixes nodded. Sevaka offered a mirthless smile. “That’s about the size of it.”
Altiris stepped forward. “I saw what Lord Droshna’s become. There’s no road back for him.” His tone grew subdued, his expression haunted. “And I need to know what’s happened to Sidara.”
“We wanted to offer you the chance to come with us,” said Zephan.
“What can I do that Essamere cannot? I’ve no authority,” Josiri added bitterly. “The Council’s made that clear.”
“Do you have a sword?” asked Viara.
“Of course I have a sword,” he replied, irritation edging out weariness.
“Then you’ve all the authority and purpose anyone in this damn city ever cares about.”
He snorted. “Is everyone to throw my words back at me tonight?”
“For as long and as often as it takes,” said Kurkas. “There comes a point in every soldier’s life, sah, where you don’t fight because you think you can win, but because if you don’t try you’ve already lost.”
“You’re the only one Viktor might heed,” said Sevaka. “Maybe this doesn’t have to be a fight.”
Talk to Viktor? After all he’d done? What would he even say? Could he even bring himself to speak? “You believe that?”
She grimaced. “No.”
“Then we’re back to me being a man with a sword.” Josiri sighed, uncertain why he still argued. Weariness and fear were so closely mingled about his heart as to defy untangling. “What difference does one sword make?”
“Perhaps it’s not about the sword, but the man who carries it, and why.”
The stale scent of Otherworld’s mists followed Apara into the room. Zephan moved to intercept her, only to be checked by Sevaka’s hand and a shake of her head.
Kurkas snorted. “So much for the watchfulness of Essamere. What do you want, lass?”
Apara went utterly still – a woman re-examining recent choices and wishing she’d chosen otherwise. “To walk back out that door and pretend I never heard the name Viktor Droshna.” She shared a glance with Sevaka. A nod exchanged left both women standing taller than before. “But I can’t. Because if I do, whatever follows won’t be a life. I’ll carry his shadow wherever I walk. So will you.”
There was always that. What more could Viktor do that he hadn’t already? He’d only be finishing what he’d begun on the clifftops at Duskvigil Church. Josiri held the revelation close. Weariness retreated before its warmth.
“I also carry a message from the Empress. She’s aware of what gathers in the south…” Apara tailed off, a shadow touching her eyes, then pressed on. “She regrets that she can promise no aid, and wishes it were otherwise. But she’d have you understand, Josiri, that the Empire is changing in ways she never thought possible, and that this is your doing as much as hers. She says that you, more than anyone, taught her that the sword is not the only measure of honour, and that she will treasure your friendship to the last.”
Josiri had the sense that the morbid undertone was not meant for him, though instinct counselled against enquiring further in public. Still, Melanna was right. The sword was not the only measure of honour. The sword allowed one to fight for what was truly valuable: the faithfulness of friends yet living, and justice for those already lost… whether to death, or to madness. Viktor had taught him that lesson years before.
He took in the gathering. Soldiers. Highbloods. The daughters of a woman who’d persecuted his family. The grandmaster of a knightly order that had betrayed his mother. An ex-vranakin, now pledged to the service of the Hadari Empire. Northwealders all, Altiris aside. They should have been his enemies, but they were his friends.
For the first time since entering the drawing room, Josiri asked himself what Ana would have done. He at once realised the question’s irrelevance. She’d made her choice at Duskvigil Church. How could he do less?
Weariness faded. Fear melted away. Even sorrow, his constant companion in recent days, receded. Not gone. Josiri knew they’d never wholly leave him, but they retreated far enough that he could at last think like a man of whom he could be proud.
“I once promised Viktor I’d stop him,” he said. “Whatever it takes. Whatever it costs. So it looks like I’m coming with you.”
Sera accompanied Melanna on the long walk to Mooncourt Temple. The lunassera had come without being called, and sought no explanation for why her Empress was hooded and cloaked beyond recognition. Melanna had the impression Sera knew anyway – had perhaps foreseen this outcome from the day she’d returned from Argatha Bridge. But Sera offered neither judgement nor rebuke as they passed the colonnades of Emperor’s Walk – merely quiet companionship – and bowed low as Melanna headed deeper in the temple alone.
The air beneath the sanctum mound was sharper, sweeter, than at her last visit. When Melanna closed her eyes, she felt the roots of the birch trees burrowing through the soil, as if a piece of her did so alongside. She drove the sensation from her mind, faltering lips giving shape to familiar prayer.
“Blessed Ashana. Guide your ephemeral daughter.”
A chill crept across her shoulders. She drew tight the hooded cloak, worn to shield her from onlookers’ view as she’d hurried along Emperor’s Walk. It no longer fitted as it should.
“Blessed Ashana. Guide your ephemeral daughter.”
“She will not come. You know this.”
Melanna caught her breath at the deep, fibrous voice. So familiar, for all that it had gone unheard so long. Not since he’d led her through the mists to the Celestial Clock, and the meeting place of the gods. The mists took you anywhere, if you knew the route. “So you always say.”
Opening her eyes, she saw a shadow moving against the gloom. An antlered helm, green eyes blazing beneath. A cloak of captive stars atop armour.
“Even my presence courts disaster,” rumbled the Huntsman. “Go, before it’s too late.”
Melanna gripped her hood. “It’s already too late.”
Shame made her hesitate. Shame, and alien exhilaration that couldn’t understand why she sought to hide. Overcoming both, she drew back the hood.
The fire in the Huntsman’s eyes dimmed. His tone grew tender. “She will come. Even if I have to drag her.”
Was that humour in his tone? Melanna had always believed she knew Ashana well enough, but the Huntsman – and their bond – remained a mystery. She’d no chance to ask. He was already gone, and she alone with thoughts that came increasingly hard.
A beetle emerged from between crystal-set roots and scurried across the floor. Melanna traced its passage with a crooked forefinger that no longer bent quite as it once had. Unbidden, the beetle reversed course, rushing up over her hand and burrowing between the woven stems of her wrist and out of sight. The only horror she felt was that she felt none at all.
“Melanna.”
A soft glow from the sanctum’s deeper chambers heralded Ashana’s arrival. And it was Ashana, not the mortal guise she’d worn at their last meeting. Beautiful. Ageless. Stricken.
Melanna fought the urge to flinch away. {{Mother.}}
Ashana rushed closer. Moonlight tingled where she touched cheek and brow.
“Wha
t have you done?” She sounded angry, and sad, and everything between.
{{What I had to.}} There was no banishing the crackle from her voice now. {{I gave Jack what he wanted to save my people.}}
“Do you understand what this means?” Ashana’s eyes touched closed. “Jack is the essence of rebirth, and his nature distorts even his own desires. Those who come to him as queen are never as he first beheld them.”
{{I know.}} The prospect sickened and thrilled in equal measure. {{It’s as though… There’s another “me” inside my head. She’s getting stronger, and I’m drifting away on clouds of pollen. By midnight, I’ll be gone, and she’ll take my place.}}
“Oh, Melanna…” Ashana shook her head, the moonlight dimming. “I can’t undo this. It would end divine truce. This world will fall into war and Third Dawn will come.”
{{I’m not asking you to. This is payment for deeds past, and I will bear it.}}
“Then why have you come?”
{{Because I wanted to see you while I’m still myself. Because kindness must be repaid, and sacrifice honoured.}} Melanna’s thoughts drifted, unravelling in the soothing scent of root and moss. She drew them back. Just a little longer. {{The fate we feared has come to pass. Viktor Droshna is lost to the Dark. Those who were once my enemies mean to stop him, but cannot do so alone. They need help. Light must drive out the shadow.}}
Ashana narrowed her eyes. “You’d have me aid those who sought your death? Who persecute their own kind for the sin of worshipping the moon over the sun?”
{{I owe Josiri Trelan a debt, and I… }} Melanna swayed, her thoughts wandering. {{… I can no longer repay it.}}
“No,” said Ashana, her voice cold. “I will show them no kindness.”
{{Then you let the Dark reclaim its hold on the world!}}
“That isn’t certain, even now.”
Melanna read the lie in the Goddess’ eyes. The desperate hope.
{{We did this, you and I! Your fear. My ambition. We garbed ourselves in righteousness, waded in blood, and created the very future we sought to deny! And so I ask: does the Goddess who raised me as her own, who taught me the value of honour and of life, pay her debts?}}
{{Lady Orova.}}
Rosa awoke, old fears of treachery rising to the surface. But there were no blades in her darkened bedchamber. Nothing at all save a shaft of moonlight through drapes dancing in the breeze. It shaped a cloaked, hooded figure beside a balcony door left ajar.
“Who’s there?”
She sat up and reached for an absent sword. Guest though she was, certain privileges lay beyond the pale.
{{Melanna.}} A dour chuckle rippled through the gloom, the rustle of leaves in the wind. {{I appreciate I may not sound like myself. I’m breaking a promise to be here, so perhaps I’m not even myself at all. Perhaps I only think that I am.}}
Rosa heard it now, the familiar voice beneath the buzzing consonants. Little cause for ease, given all else. The Empress had no need to creep about her own palace, much less gain ingress via the balcony – itself no small feat. Wrapping the bedclothes about herself, she rose.
“What do you want?”
Steel shone in the dark. Rosa cast about for something, anything, that might serve as weapon. The sword remained at middle guard. Between that and her hooded robes, the Empress resembled a sepulchral guardian, struck from stone to stand watch over a tomb.
{{This sword used to stand for something. For some, it was hope. For others, honour. What hope I have is spent. The rest I give to you, so that what remains of my honour may mean something. It can never make up for what my pride has done to your people. But I’d have this sword stand for hope again, one last time.}}
“I don’t understand.”
{{Viktor Droshna recruits an army from the dead of Eskavord. Your wife and your friends mean to stop him. I’d help them if I could, but I cannot. And so I offer my sword. May it shine for you as it once did for me. That in bringing hope to others, it might again find its fire.}}
Melanna scabbarded the sword and held it out.
Rosa stared blankly, racing emotion dispersing sleep’s vestige. Grim satisfaction that her accusations about Viktor had found validation. Sorrow that her oldest friend had fallen so. Fear for Sevaka…
Determination most of all.
She took the sword. Lighter than she’d expected. “Eskavord is three days’ ride, and on bad roads. Even if I leave at once… What if I can’t get there?”
{{Have faith.}}
Rosa snorted. Divinities had never offered her comfort, only pain. “In whom?”
{{In the end…? In the end, I don’t know that it matters. We have to trust to ourselves, and trust the deed that follows. Glory in victory. Fortitude in defeat. Honour always. Whatever the price.}}
“I don’t understand.”
Melanna drew back her hood. Amber eyes glinted beneath a brow of knotted stems. A mane of briars and black roses spilled across her shoulders. Where the cloak parted, it revealed neither flesh nor raiment, only woven frond and willow-stem in the likeness of woman’s form.
Blood rushing cold, Rosa stumbled back. “What happened to you?”
Thorn-touched cheeks twitched. {{I am Empress no more. A greater realm calls me to be its queen and I must go, else all shall be lost.}}
Rosa blinked. Though she comprehended little of what she beheld, she readily grasped the cause. Not so long ago, a similar fate had almost been hers. A pact with the divine that asked nothing in barter but one’s humanity. A Queen of Thorns, where Rosa had so nearly been Queen of the Dead. And for the first time, she wondered what other common ground they might have known. At Govanna Field, her humanity slipping away, Rosa had thought only of retribution. Melanna Saranal, the treacherous Empress of the East, had chosen a harder path.
“I’m sorry.” The words were useless, but she felt bound to offer them.
Parting the drapes, Melanna reached for the balcony door. {{Farewell, Lady Orova.}}
Rosa started forward, urged by sensation she couldn’t name. “For the past. For the harm levied against my countryfolk. For betrayal…” She swallowed, the words hard for all their necessity. “You have my forgiveness… For whatever it’s worth.”
Melanna halted, frozen in moonlight. Lips the texture of cracked leaves formed a smile. Then she passed beneath the drapes and into the night.
Rosa, no more than a pace behind, found the balcony empty of all save a discarded cloak, and black petals dancing on the wind.
In the distance, a clock chimed midnight.
Lunandas, 19th Day of Dawntithe
In the end, it may not be hope of victory that drives you to fight, but the knowledge that doing nothing is worse than defeat.
from the Saga of Hadar Saran
Sixty-Three
The marchers didn’t belong in the mists. A hundred or so in all, they moved with purpose and at speed, unhindered by those of their number who wore blindfolds, or were carried. Shields and tabards were not the mournful whitish-green of the etravia parting about them, but retained an echo of ephemeral colour. Hunter’s green and King’s Blue. As Calenne drew closer, leaving the becalmed vortex and the horror of Revekah’s pyre behind, she recognised a face at the column’s head.
“Josiri?” She hurried through the etravia, disbelieving the evidence of her senses, but desperate to attract his attention. “Josiri! Can you hear me?”
He marched on, his gait awkward in armour she’d never seen him wear, companions gathered close. Calenne recognised other faces now. Sevaka. Altiris. Kurkas. The knight who’d brought her to the pyre. All following a black-garbed figure striding beneath an unfurled banner of sword and eagle, a firestone lantern burning atop its pole. Calenne knew her as well, though the meeting had been brief. Apara Rann. She looked as though she wished she were somewhere else.
Why were they here? Where were they going?
Calenne quickened, her vaporous form drifting over wall and debris until she was foursquare before the column’s l
ine of march.
“Josiri!”
Still the marchers strode on, strode through her. Ephemeral flesh contesting a space held only by anchorless soul. Overcome with nausea, Calenne dragged herself from their path and back to the roadside. As she did, an unfamiliar marcher moaned, staring this way and that before breaking ranks and bolting for a crumbling doorway. The knight’s file-mates caught her, blindfolded her, and dragged her back to the column.
“Otherworld is no place for the living,” said the Raven from his perch on a nearby wall.
“Why are they here?” asked Calenne. “What is this?”
He shrugged, eyes on a column already halfway swallowed by the mists. “I’d say they want to be somewhere in something of a hurry. Time and distance don’t work the same as in the living realm, not if you know the paths, and dear Apara always had a knack.” He tapped his cane on the ground. “As to the ‘where’, I think you might hazard a guess.”
Obvious, in hindsight. “They’re going after Viktor.”
“So one assumes.” The Raven glanced over his shoulder to the smoke of Revekah’s pyre, just visible across a building of a style Calenne didn’t recognise. “I can’t say I rate their chances.”
“Then help them.”
“I told you, I can’t,” he snapped. “I made a bargain not to interfere in the ephemeral world. If I break that pledge, there’ll be worse to fret about than Viktor’s trifling sins.”
This time, Calenne heard something else beneath the anger. She pressed on, voice thick with contempt. “To think, I used to be afraid of you. All those tales about the Keeper of the Dead. I slept with lanterns lit when I was little, afraid you’d snatch me into the shadows.” That was before Zanya and her mother’s death, of course. The Black Knight Viktor Akadra had haunted her dreams thereafter. “I wish I’d known then that mighty Raven was nothing more than a frightened old man in a crumpled coat!”