Ashlords

by Scott Reintgen

  The floor—blank just a moment before—blooms with pattern and color.

  You nearly drop the candle as your mother moves back to your side. Both of you watch invisible hands finish their ancient pattern. Fractured light shivers over the symbols; then the circle coughs smoke into the air. You watch as the floor vanishes and reveals a secret passage. Mother leads you down it with an undeniable sureness. She has walked this path before.

  You also have the sense that the air has gone silent. Just seconds before, it must have been filled with noise, but now the quiet has taken its place, and the quiet is somehow louder than any noise could ever be. You follow her until your candle casts its light on an altar.

  A figure waits beyond: The Madness.

  You would know the three-eyed god of death anywhere, but down in this deep dark place, he looks like an actual nightmare. A great wolf’s mask sits unnaturally over the proxy’s human head. At the neck, hair weaves itself into skin, sealing the man inside. As the Madness’s chosen vessel, the priest will never show his face again. He wears no shirt, no shoes. His pants are dusty and stained. His entire body looks emaciated, ribs as pronounced as the bars of a cage.

  The sight of him redefines your fears. You do not ask why he is here. You do not ask why you are here. All the pieces of this dreaded puzzle are falling into place.

  Mother says, “I would ask the blessing you gave me be extended to my daughter.”

  The three wolfish eyes leer in her direction. You fight back a shiver as the Madness inclines his head, taking in the request. A rasping voice echoes, “A drop of your blood.”

  She starts forward, bloody palm held out.

  The Madness growls at the sight. “A new wound is required.”

  She hesitates, then takes up the obsidian blade again. She calmly slits the opposite palm and shows it to the god. He gives an approving nod as she holds it out over the altar. In the light of your candle, blood drips over the stones. The Madness licks his lips, tongue slavering.

  You know he is the god of death. He is the way between the worlds. Some call him the Bridgekeeper. Nothing passes up from the underworld without his approval. You cannot fathom why he is here tonight or what Mother could possibly be thinking. This is not a path you ever imagined walking. It is the fool’s way forward.

  “The girl now,” the Madness says. “Her blood must surround the altar entire.”

  You watch in horror. She cleans the knife and turns. She offers it to you.

  “Take it,” she orders. “Pippa. Do as I say.”

  There’s no room in her voice for argument. You exchange candle for blade. The Madness has started chanting and moving. He speaks in an inhuman tongue. The words start out as words, before echoing like the rattle of bones, bounding between worlds with dangerous reverberation. And then the Madness dances around the altar, lost in the chaos of his spell. You take the distracted moment to ask the question that burns brightest in your mind.

  “What is happening?”

  “Trust me,” she whispers. “I’m offering you a gift.”

  She shoves you forward. The Madness continues to dance. You step up to the altar, carefully clear of his circling path. Your hands shake as you take the blade and press the black tip to your palm. The sharp pain makes you gasp, but a bloody streak appears.

  The Madness stops. “Let it encircle the altar. The spirit must attune to you.”

  You eye him before walking in a circle. You let blood drip down in a staggered loop. Twice around before the god lets out a bone-chilling howl. You drop the knife and dart back to the safety of your mother’s arms. His howl does not stop. It grows, pulsing in your chest, and shaking the stones, and calling your spilled blood into the air.

  And then the noise cuts off sharply.

  Mother gasps as a violent slash of blue light tears through the dark. You watch the bright ball glow, trembling formlessly above the raised altar. It shapes itself into a spirit. You see the face, the torso, the legs. The spirit leaps to the right, but an invisible barrier knocks it back. The Madness watches in fascination as the creature beats blue fists against the walls. He howls again.

  The spirit panics. Lashing out again, failing again. But the walls are closing in around it. As the Madness continues to wail his horrible noise, you realize that it’s your blood that is pinning the spirit to the altar. There’s a horrible writhing and everything goes black.

  The world dances away from you.

  * * *

  —

  Until it stops dancing. You’re back in your room, safely under the covers. You have no idea how you got here, or what’s happening, until Mother sits down on the edge of your bed. The secret room and the Madness and the summoned spirit burn back into your mind.

  You wait for her to speak.

  “The gods move between our world and the one below,” she says. “You have always known this, dear. You were not born into war, but you were created for it all the same. The gods derive their power from a trade between worlds. In the underworld, our blood gives them power. They take our sacrifices and use them to rule those forsaken lands. In return, they offer us the powers of their world. Invisible armies. Fire that rains from the sky. The Madness, as you know, controls the passage of spirits into our realm. That has always been his trade. He has the ability to bring souls from that world into ours.”

  You nod mechanically. Your head feels ready to spin from your shoulders.

  “One of those spirits will be gifted to you. For the race.”

  Hearing her words, a truth settles into your mind, a realization about her brilliant performance in the Races all those years ago. Your mother was not simply the most talented rider. No, the truth is far less pretty than that. She cheated to win.

  “You had a spirit for your year, didn’t you?”

  She catches the accusation in your tone. “As did many of my competitors. I was the only one who understood the power I wielded. By the time the others realized what could be done, I’d already run circles around them. It is not cheating to use the tools you’ve been given.”

  “Then…the years of the Madness…”

  “Are the years in which the god of death and passage involves himself. He offers gifts in exchange for blood. The gift will come at the start of the race. Command it well.”

  Your heart is pounding. The Madness is something you’ve always dismissed. It’s only happened four times in the history of the Races. The odds were against it until Mother invited the fickle god into your year. Now everything feels like it’s slipping from your grasp. The Madness will bring events you cannot predict or control. Those under its effect have won the Races easily, but others imbibing on his power have lost the Races just as tragically. Your jaw clenches as you realize the risks Mother’s created with her meddling.

  It could ruin everything.

  “Others will benefit from this?”

  She nods. “The Madness will seek more deals tonight. He favors no one.”

  “Then you are a fool.”

  Your mother flinches. Even you are surprised by the venom in your voice. She has invited chaos where you had created order, but what is worse is that she treated you like a child.

  “Think,” she replies desperately. “Who is the one rider the Madness will never help?”

  Realization washes over you. The burning rage fades ever so slightly. You know that she’s right. There is one rider that no Ashlord deity would ever consider helping. The only rider who belongs to a group of people who refuse to worship any of the pantheon.

  “Adrian Ford.”

  Mother nods. “We’re not in front of the cameras now. Be honest with yourself: He’s the greatest threat you will ever face. Before he joined, I would have never dreamed of inviting the Madness. It’s possible you could have won. Consider the spirit another tool in your arsenal.”

  The
final realization hurts most of all. She didn’t trust you to win on your own. The daughter of champions, destined to follow in their footsteps. It doesn’t matter that you’ve won every single amateur race or that you train harder than she ever did. At the end of the day, your mother thinks that Adrian Ford could beat you.

  Driven by that unnamed fear, she might have ruined everything. It takes effort not to shout at her or to dismiss her coldly. The die has already been cast. There’s no fighting it now.

  Your voice is iron. “Tell me what will happen.”

  “The spirit that comes will want one thing from you: freedom. It has lived its entire life bound to the gods in the world below. The Madness transferred that ownership. It is bound to you. All you must do is make a deal with it. Offer freedom in exchange for victory.”

  You nod to her. “And then what?”

  “Then you ride, sweet girl. Use the spirit wisely. Beat the Longhand.”

  She pauses meaningfully before taking your hand.

  “And win the Races.”

  Martial appears an hour before I’m scheduled to leave.

  Yesterday was my last day with all of them. Farian and I walked around the entire city, laughing and eating the kind of food they would only ever serve in a city like Furia.

  After, I sat down with Martial and Ayala. A final strategy session. They both had some great ideas. I let them talk me through it even though I have my own plan now.

  Change the game.

  If I’m going to win, I have to win my way.

  Ayala is scheduled to escort me in thirty minutes. She’s the last person I’ll talk to before the Races begin, which is why I asked Martial to wake up early and pay me a private visit. I can’t share my plan with Ayala. It would break her heart, and I’ve actually started to like the woman. But Martial? He’ll understand exactly what I’m going to do and why I’m going to do it. And I need him if my plan is going to have any chance of working.

  “Good morning,” he says.

  “Morning.” I usher him in and lock the door. I’m about to unload my plan when he shakes his head. Quietly, he leads me into the bathroom. He runs the dueling faucets in the massive bath, filling the room with noise, before giving a nod.

  “Never know who might be listening.”

  I lower my voice to a whisper. “I need your help.”

  “I figured you had a plan of your own.”

  “I know where the course is.”

  He lifts an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

  “During the revelation, I kept getting distracted. I was seeing the edges of the map and not focusing on the highlighted course. It just looked so familiar.” I pull the folded map from my back pocket and point to a western corner. “It looked familiar because it is familiar. My cousin married a girl in one of these mountain villages. We all had to travel there in secret for the wedding.” I trace a section of the map with a finger. “This is the course.”

  Martial looks at me uncertainly. “That’s great, Imelda. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but most of the other riders will know that, too. If they don’t know where it is, they’ll probably have redrawn the course from memory. That’s how the Ashlords are trained. Most of the good ones can take mental pictures. They go home after the revelation and draw the whole thing. Some of them are trained so well that they don’t even have to draw it. They just have it in here.” He taps his temple. “It’s a standard talent among their kind.”

  I shake my head. “My advantage isn’t knowing the course.”

  He frowns in confusion. “Now you’ve lost me.”

  “My advantage is how well I know the outskirts. The Gravitas Mountain chain, Martial. I rode through these areas during the week of my cousin’s wedding. The two families rented out phoenixes from a nearby ranch. Weddings are boring, so I spent most of my time riding. I’ve been through some of these passes before. I know the terrain.”

  Martial frowns. “Look, Ayala should have told you this….Really, you should know this from watching it every year. The course is enclosed. They raise these huge metal barriers around the whole area. From start to finish. So you can’t get out. And what good would it really do to get outside the walls? The paths on the course are always more direct than going around.”

  “Not for what I have planned.”

  I reach into my other pocket and pull out a small square of paper. The instructions I’ve written on it are absolutely thorough. I hand the slip to Martial and watch as his pale eyes scan the contents. The longer he reads, the wider his eyes get. When he reaches the end, he sets a hand on the marble frame of the bathtub to keep himself steady.

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “It will work. I just need your help.”

  He’s stunned. “You’re asking a lot of me, Imelda.”

  “Don’t just do it for me, then,” I reply. “Do it for my family. Do it for Farian.”

  He takes a few steadying breaths and finally nods.

  “I’ll send the letters today. What happens if they figure out what you’re doing?”

  “They won’t. It will work. Trust me, it’s going to work.”

  “Great. Then what? What if it works?” he asks. “Ashlord law…”

  “Is very clear on the subject. The crime I’m committing can’t be extended to anyone but the person who commits it. I spent half the night going through their standard book of laws just to make sure it wouldn’t echo back to my family.”

  The water’s still running loudly behind him. I hate asking this of Martial, but if there’s anyone who will understand what I’m trying to do, it’s him. He reads the instructions two more times, shreds the little paper, and tosses it into the bath. We both watch the flowing water snatch the paper, curling and darkening it before sucking it down to the sewers.

  “It’s risky.” He smiles, looking ten years younger. “But if anyone can do it…”

  We go over a few more details before he leaves. His absence makes me nervous. All that’s left is execution. No more planning or dreaming or hoping. I just have to do the impossible. I have to make something out of nothing. Farian’s always called me the Alchemist.

  It’s time to take the title seriously.

  Ayala arrives. She spends five minutes fluttering around the room like a mother hen. I smile at her. It’s the closest I’ve come to feeling affection for any Ashlord. She’s nervous. Today marks the last ceremony before the Races begin.

  Today is the Longest Ride. It’s a classic Ashlord tradition. The one time in this whole process where cameras aren’t permitted. It’s a raw moment of showing strengths, revealing weaknesses. All the riders are packed into a massive carriage and ushered to the racing location. Ayala explains that conversation inside is forbidden. It’s a sizing up, a staring down.

  Who will break? Who can’t handle the heat?

  She explained that it’s symbolic. Ashlord myth claims the bravest warriors used to ride in carriages that took them through the underworlds. For that reason, our ride today will have no windows. That way the symbolic warriors will not have to see how vast and dark the underworld really is.

  I take my box of ashes and follow Ayala through the streets. I’ve put on all the provided gear she gave me, except the boots. Farian will get a good laugh when he sees that.

  I should be nervous about the crowds that watch us march past, about the voices that call out my name. But I’m more worried about making my plan work. I’ve only been riding with my horse for six days. There’s a relationship now, but that doesn’t change the fact that he could spook over something completely random. My plans should mitigate some of the potential damage.

  But there are still so many ways to fail.

  The crowd of reporters parts for us. Ayala walks proudly at my side. She’s all confidence, even though I’ve given her no reason to believe I can win. I smile to a Divid
ian reporter and give a polite wave to everyone else. Most of the other riders are already standing in the great square. The temple bells ring out from their gilded towers. The waiting carriage is massive. Everything about it screams opulence. As I eye the riders, the crowd, I realize how normal all of this is for them. They’re accustomed to riding in finery. They’ve never known a life without riches. Each of them had one hundred thousand spare legions to spend on this event. My family would kill for that kind of money. I stand there in line with the others, and I have never felt so sure of myself.

  Pippa’s the last to arrive. For the first time since meeting her, she looks disheveled. Nothing horrible, but her hair’s not perfect, and her eyes are a little bloodshot. Her mother and father stride beside her, unblinking as the cameras turn their way. I watch Pippa for a little longer, and it’s clear she’s not at the top of her game. That’s a good thing. Ideally, the eyes of every spectator will be drawn to an exciting, competitive race. Distractions will help me.

  The Brightness doesn’t appear this time, but an official opens the carriage door. Her voice rings out over the gathered audience. “Bravos. Enter!”

  The strapping rider raises a fist to the cheering crowd and ducks inside the carriage. Its frame shakes as he vanishes from sight. The official calls another name and I know mine will be called soon.

  Ayala leans close and whispers, “I believe in you, Imelda. Show them what the Dividian can do.”

  I don’t nod or whisper back. Instead, I stare at the gathered crowds and wonder what she means. What the Dividian can do? How will the world ever know what we can do? We’re made poor and her kind keep us poor. We’re supposed to do as much with half as the Ashlords do with double. I find the face of a young Dividian girl in the crowd. She’s standing with her father. He wears a finer suit than my father ever wore, but even these city-born Dividian observe the gathering of Ashlords with awe. The Races have always been a spectacle. One more chance to see the glory of the people we are made to worship. The Ashlords and their gods.