Goldenmark

by Jean Lowe Carlson

  “You do Leith Alodwine a vast disservice,” Eluvios continued, staring at Khorel though his body faced the Jadounian. “Losing heart in his designs during our time of trial.”

  “We do not lose heart in Leith,” the Jadounian protested. “But we lose faith in this Rennkavi of such cruel nature.”

  It was as if the Jadounian had spoken right from Khorel’s mouth. Theroun’s attention sharpened, watching this interaction. He could feel testing lances of energy slicking out from Eluvios toward Khorel Jornath, who had erected a firm wall around himself and Theroun.

  Master Yesh’s hard gaze fell upon the Ghreccan. “You will cease, Passiros. State your opinions but leave off baiting Brother Jornath.”

  “As you will, High Master.” The Ghreccan gave a florid bow. His broad-cheeked but handsome face was smug. Theroun surmised that whatever the man had been doing wasn’t technically illegal here, but it was invasive. Khorel Jornath’s face was tight; his jaw set. He actually crossed his arms over his broad chest.

  “Are we such gutless curs?” Passiros faced the hall. The man used none of his wyrria now, but his presence was strong and his voice artful, capturing attention with ease. “Will we fold when Leith asks us to stand firm? If the Rennkavi has been Goldenmarked, no matter his bloodlines, it means the Demon’s Rise is imminent. The character of our glorious Rennkavi is not to be questioned. Many have plainly stated tonight that Lhaurent den’Alrahel is of powerful personality and wyrria. It is our duty to follow him – support him in his every design.”

  Passiros stepped back with a florid bow. A low murmur of voices and minds spread through the cavern. Master Yesh let the hubbub rise, watching with his scarred and sightless hollows. Even as Theroun watched, he could see the assembly becoming divided. Mind-weaves moved through the amphitheater – Theroun could almost see them like silver fishing-lines cast between members of the Brethren as they conversed. Some shook their heads, arguing. Others had the glow of true zealousness. While others had roguish grins and spoke with serpentine gestures that churned Theroun’s stomach – privateers who wanted to use Lhaurent cruel Unification as an excuse to rape and plunder.

  “There is another!” A voice pierced from the rear of the throng with a clipped Cennetian accent.

  Master Yesh raised his palms, urging the space to quiet, his absent eyes training on the Cennetian in the Red Valor uniform. “The Heraldation recognizes—” He paused, his brows knitting, then lifting as a hard smile stole over his face. “Recognizes one of the Cennetian Illianti, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “Indeed.” The Cennetian leaped down from his obsidian crag and shouldered his way to the front, one hand upon his blade. Theroun sensed a battle-hardy presence in that wire-honed frame. Gazing at him, Theroun realized he recognized the fellow. Theroun had accompanied Uhlas into Velkennish once to try and reason with the young Vhinesse during the border-raids she’d commenced upon her inauguration. She’d had a Cennetian High General at her side in the throne hall – the same man who now stood before the assembly, doing Theroun’s hard gaze one better with his sharp copper eyes – Merkhenos del’Ilio.

  “You do not trust us, Son of Illium, to poison your mind from intrusion,” Master Yesh chuckled, though his face was a hard mask.

  The Cennetian gave a vicious grin back, his copper eyes flashing. “Illianti grandmothers pass on their knowledge and recipes, High Master Yesh. All children of Illium learn their grandmother’s tales well. Tales of mind-reading manipulators. And which draughts one can take that make such efforts null.”

  Theroun’s ears perked, to learn that this Cennetian knew a poison that kept Kreth-Hakir out of one’s mind. Clearly a well-guarded family secret, it was nonetheless extremely valuable information.

  Master Yesh chuckled again, but his blind gaze was fierce. “You have something to say before the Heraldation, Son of Illium?”

  “I do.” Without invitation, the Cennetian stepped up the stairs to the bridge over the dragon’s desiccated tail. He didn’t take the dais, but wasn’t far from it. “Comrades! I come from the Aphellian Way with news of dire importance to this assembly. That there are not one, but two Rennkavis! And that I have in my care the second one – a young man by the name of Elohl den’Alrahel, a man strong of heart and stronger in love. A man who puts the atrocities of Lhaurent in their place, who shines with the glory of the true Rennkavi, rather than one who is false.”

  “Two Rennkavis?” Master Yesh’s face slacked, his dead sockets seeming to bug from his astonished face. Theroun knew a moment of satisfaction, that Master Yesh didn’t know everything. This Cennetian war-general had trumped the Kreth-Hakir. Theroun’s gaze found Merkhenos’. They shared a fierce glance, a touch of a smile upon both their faces, before the Cennetian looked back to Master Yesh.

  “I speak true!” The man produced a small glass vile from an inside pocket of his crimson jerkin. Capped tightly, it contained a foul brown sludge. “One sip of this antidote and the front of my mind will clear to you, Master Yesh. Or any others powerful enough to find the truth in my mind through my poison’s fog. Shall I? Would you like to know if you have options other than Lhaurent den’Alrahel as your Rennkavi?”

  “Clever, Son of Illium.” Master Yesh’s smile was no longer welcoming. “You are a cagey man from a long line of wary curs.”

  “Cagey to the end.” Merkhenos gave a wicked, rakish grin. “Bastards, every last one of us.”

  While Master Yesh lifted his chin at the Cennetian, Theroun noted that Khorel Jornath held a slight smile of amusement. And a touch of something else, as he looked upon the Cennetian. The two knew each other, Theroun realized. But as soon as he had that thought, he felt it quenched under a drowning weave of quicksilver. Khorel, insulating Theroun’s thought from the assembly. But Khorel’s quick action had confirmed everything Theroun suspected. Jornath and the Cennetian knew each other. Mutual spies of common purpose, friends – or more?

  That thought was surrounded by waves of silver, too.

  A smile lifted the corner of Theroun’s mouth, to know one of Khorel’s secrets at last. Merkhenos had taken a sip from the vial and re-capped it. Wiping his lips, he lifted his brows at Master Yesh, challenging. Yesh frowned, and lifting his chin, appeared to retreat within himself. It seemed personal secrets were rife among the Kreth-Hakir, if one was strong enough to keep them. And this Cennetian Lothren member had more secrets to hide than the Hakir did. At last, a sigh issued from Master Yesh. The ancient man’s chin dropped, his dead eye sockets staring the Cennetian down. “He speaks true. A second Rennkavi has been Goldenmarked.”

  Silence smote the hall; mind-silence, vocal silence. The kind of silence that takes a man when they’ve been stunned dumb. When at last thoughts and whispers moved again, they were shocked. Feeling out with his new abilities, Theroun found them tinged with a strange darkness – and fear.

  “If two Rennkavis walk among us, it can only mean the Demon’s Rise is imminent, Magnus.”

  A slender woman dressed in herringbone leathers stepped through the throng, down to the edge of the dais. But where all the Brethren wore black, her leathers were bone-white, the color of bleached skulls in desert sands. Throwing back her deep hood, she bared her visage. Her hair was a fiery copper, braided into an ornate twist over one shoulder. Her skin was the bronzed loveliness of Cennetia, or perhaps even Lefkani, a bloodline Theroun couldn’t pinpoint.

  Lean as a whip, she had a delicacy about her that was belied by the power that seethed from her person. High cheekbones made her emerald eyes pierce Theroun as her gaze raked the dais. She was breathtaking and Theroun found himself staring, not because she’d put any weaves into his mind, but because of her sheer animal magnetism. Theroun watched Khorel Jornath sink to both knees, bowing his head in a Kreth-Hakir position of ultimate submission – a gesture Jornath hadn’t even shown High Master Yesh. Theroun’s eyebrows rose. And rose even further when High Master Yesh struggled to not do the same as the woman gained the top of the dais.

  �
��Metrene!” High Master Yesh rasped, his breathing ragged as she neared. Reaching out, her fingers slid over his cheek, and Master Yesh came to a shuddering silence. He stared down at her, his scarred lips fallen open. One touch, Theroun saw. This woman had given the High Master of the Kreth-Hakir one touch and he had fallen into silence. Though whether it was from commanding him or the sheer astonishment of her presence in the hall, Theroun couldn’t say.

  The hall erupted in confused whispers, the name Metrene den’Yesh sighing across lips and minds as all eyes fixed upon the dais. Some of the oldest Hakir in the hall had taken a knee like Khorel. Among them was Brother Kiiar, a kind of rapture upon his half-melted face as he gazed at the regal woman in her bone-white leathers.

  “Why have you come?” The low words were Master Yesh’s, his gaze rapt upon the woman as she stroked a thumb over his lips, making him shudder. That shudder was echoed all through the hall as a sigh of rapture passed through every mind. It slid through Theroun like a pleasurable wind, making him gasp, even despite Khorel’s strong mind-blockade.

  “Am I not your High Mistress still?” Metrene den’Yesh’s voice was low, a whisper in the sands of time. Her presence stalked like a panther as she stroked Master Yesh’s neck, giving him a lift of one regal copper brow. Her gaze broke from him and swept the hall, and in that reprieve, Master Yesh took command of himself. Though he breathed hard, Theroun could feel the man re-mastering his impeccable will. She had surprised him with her presence here, but not for long. Impenetrable silver walls rose up around the High Master, and Theroun smirked, wondering who else had secrets. Metrene’s eyes turned back to Magnus Yesh and they locked gazes – vibrant emerald to scarred and empty sockets.

  “I feel the ages turn,” she spoke in a dark tone that echoed through the space. “Though my mind can range far from the blessing of Leith’s Alranstone to which I am bound, I am not content within its granite confines. Threads flow, fast and faster in the weaves of time, Magnus. They torment my mind. I could not in good conscience be absent from this assembly when dire fates manifest.”

  Proceeding to the Cennetian, Metrene den’Yesh reached out, brushing a hand over Merkhenos’ cheek. Theroun heard her whisper, “Fear me not, Son of Illium, your secrets shall remain safe,” before the Cennetian suddenly went down upon his knees with a short cry. She collapsed with him, sinking gracefully to her knees and maintaining her touch as he cried out again in a sound of ecstatic release, clutching his heart. By the time the woman stood, the Cennetian was upon hands and knees, gasping. Theroun felt Khorel Jornath shudder, tension rippling in his shoulders – wanting to go to the Cennetian.

  Again, that thought was sluiced away by Khorel’s quicksilver wave.

  “Two Rennkavis... fascinating,” Metrene spoke softly, a curl of a smile upon her lips as her words echoed in Theroun’s mind, singing like summer reeds. Sighs echoed around the room. Men sank to their knees, feeling the sensation of wind and silk blowing over their skin. A thrill washed through Theroun at this woman’s tremendous power, his cock stiffening. Metrene looked back to Merkhenos, who had come up to his knees and took deep breaths.

  But Master Yesh’s immense frame filled out, challenging the woman, her body wan compared to his enormous stature. “What is your business here, woman? You are no longer part of our Order.”

  “Am I not, my beloved?” Her cunning lips smiled sadly, just a little, her panther-smooth gaze roving over Magnus’ proud frame. “I feel your mind, Magnus, and whom you would support. But know that I have seen much of Lhaurent den’Alrahel. Enough to know that his will is powerful – and powerfully black. Lhaurent holds a natural ability to poison with his will, and whenever he walks through my Kingstone, I feel...”

  Turning her head, she closed her eyes. As if gathering memories, Metrene took a long breath. When her eyes opened, they burned like green fire, furious. “Lineage.”

  The effect of that one word upon Magnus Yesh was tremendous. His face fell into a stony darkness, his body hardening as his enormous hands gripped the pommels of the longknives. Her knowing gaze bored into him as a tense silence breathed through the vast cavern. All eyes were fixed upon Metrene den’Yesh, High Mistress of the Kreth-Hakir, facing off with the High Master.

  I feel your power, Black Viper. Metrene’s sinuous voice slid into Theroun’s thoughts suddenly, though she did not turn to look at him. Like barbed coils upon my tongue. You are like I was once, a wild thing. Khorel tries to help you master your gifts because you have volatility and power – a wrathful combination in the Demon’s hands. Do not think him a hard master. Like I have, he has felt the Demon’s touch. Felt it, and turned it aside by mastering his own darkness.

  The Demon has already tried to possess Khorel Jornath and failed? A stunned silence filled Theroun. But she said no more. Facing Magnus Yesh, she stared up at him from her slim ferocity. Gazing down upon her, the sightless man’s face had taken on an ancient sadness. “Will you so willfully resist me again? Like it was with the Brother Kings?”

  “You were wrong to side with King Alcinus den’Alrahel,” she countered, “despite his many lands, powers, and influence. Just as you are wrong now, with the terrible sequence of events you have fathered here.”

  Magnus Yesh drew up tall, staring her down with his scarred sockets. “The Kreth-Hakir will follow where I lead.”

  “Right to the Demon’s Lair!” Metrene hissed, her voice slicing through the cavern like a braided whip.

  And though everyone in the amphitheater trembled from this vicious utterance, Magnus Yesh stood before her like a stone now, unmoved. “Go, woman. Take your vile white weaves and go, before I am of a mind to make you do so.”

  And to this, she laughed. Like flails raining down upon the entire assembly, it wasn’t a force even Khorel Jornath could deflect. Pummeled beneath that scourging, cries came from the hall, Theroun grunting from the mercilessness that assaulted his flesh. But her caressing wind and silken voice trembled Theroun just after, a sluice of bedchamber sighs arresting him as she spoke, turning away from Magnus Yesh.

  “I fear for you, my beloved. I fear for you all...”

  Theroun was left with a hunting melody in his mind, a sound like mournful reeds as Metrene den’Yesh moved like a bone-white ghost across the platform and down the obsidian stairs. Halting, she gazed at the mummified dragon. Reaching one hand out, Metrene set it to the dragon’s bony cheek-ridge above its grinning row of fangs. The fine diamond dust brushed off upon her fingertips like shimmering chalk. Closing her eyes, she pulled into her core until Theroun could no longer sense that she even existed at all. But Theroun realized he still felt her thoughts – connecting him in a faint spear of stunning opal light with Khorel Jornath and Merkhenos del’Ilio in a private conversation.

  Khorel Jornath, Merkhenos del’Ilio, Theroun den’Vekir. Harken. Your clear wills arrest me. The three of you have other designs than the support of a madman. And so I need you to do a duty – and be my spear. She breathed it through the three of them. Finer than spider’s silk, it siphoned into them like a single hair upon the morning breeze. Be my bones. Be the righteous weapons you all were made to be, against the Demon’s Rise. For time quickens now, and we have run out. Stand with me – as One.

  With that, Metrene pushed something through them all, like a breath of wind. And to that call, the dragon’s bones woke. Theroun jolted; his hands went to his weapons, but the creature hadn’t moved, not exactly. But it was as if that thread of life from Metrene had proven that the beast wasn’t in fact dead – only in a fugue so deep it appeared so. As Theroun watched, shocked, the mummified lizard took a single inhalation with its emaciated ribs, then let it out through a flare of slitted nostrils.

  A gust of heated air roiled over Theroun, the creature returning to stillness as shocked gasps filled the underground space. With a stroke to its scaled cheek, Metrene whispered in a thought that only her mind-linked could hear, Farewell, Agni, fiercest of the Protectors. Slumber on. Dream good dreams of battle and vanq
uishing.

  Turning, she threw up her hood and stepped down the obsidian stairs, a pale specter against all that black. Retreating through the parting throng, she moved through one of the towering archways and vanished – as if she had never been.

  * * *

  The Heraldation ended at last, too many hours passed in the fathomless dark. Theroun’s eyes felt like ground glass, and he’d taken countless cups of kaf-tesh the acolytes brought around. Though High Master Yesh had made up his mind about following Lhaurent den’Alrahel, debate had raged for hours. The Kreth-Hakir had a pseudo-democracy, and all would be heard before the assembly concluded. Analyzing the situation from every possible angle, calculating every outcome – especially in regards to Metrene’s warnings and her effect upon the dragon, that everyone had presumed was as dead as Theroun had thought it was.

  Khorel Jornath had held Theroun’s thoughts in a vise-grip the entire time. Shards of obsidian crunched under Theroun’s boots now as they retreated up the winding stairs toward the obsidian Alranstone, Brothers Kiiar, Caldrian, and Arlo behind them. Up ahead, Theroun saw Merkhenos walking alone up the stairs. Khorel picked up his pace, as if to gain on the man’s egress. The Cennetian arrived at the obsidian pillar, glanced down to Khorel, then bent, adjusting his boots – stalling. Khorel hurried up the last four staircases, gripping Theroun’s shoulder and placing a hand upon the Alranstone at the exact same time the Cennetian did. Brothers Kiiar, Caldrian, and Arlo had slapped hands to the Alranstone also – all six of them spat out together into the ocean-cave.

  A grey pre-dawn glimmered off the ocean at Ligenia Bay, reflecting in the tiger-striped crystal of the Alranstone. As Theroun turned, he saw Merkhenos clasp arms with Khorel with a wide smile, then do the same with Brothers Kiiar, Caldrian, and Arlo. Turning to Theroun, he gave a chuckle. “General Theroun den’Vekir! Will wonders never cease. We meet again.”