A Bright Power Rising

by Noel Coughlan

  Stunned silence turned to anger. “You cannot just return to your old life in Tincranny,” AscendantSun growled. “The Harbinger will not be content with an apology and a shrug of the shoulders from a heretic. They will imprison and torture you.”

  DayFlambeau shied from his glare. “It may not come to that. My lineage might help me if I throw myself on its mercy. It has the means to reinvent me as another and conceal my return from the authorities.”

  It was nonsense. Either DayFlambeau considered AscendantSun and NeverFear to be gullible fools or he was delusional.

  AscendantSun took a deep breath and swallowed his anger. Losing his temper would only serve to deafen DayFlambeau to what he was trying to say. “If your lineage proves less charitable than you hope, what then?”

  “If your conscience demands that you leave us, take sanctuary in Pigsback,” NeverFear urged.

  “I would never betray you,” DayFlambeau assured them. He made hesitant eye contact with AscendantSun. “If I am arrested, I will tell the Consensus the Stretchers killed you and I am the sole survivor.”

  AscendantSun thrust a finger toward him. “And when the legions face us in battle, what you will tell the Consensus then? You made a mistake? The Consensus will repay your lies with death.”

  “That is a risk I must take,” DayFlambeau said. “I have come to the realization I do not believe in the Forelight.”

  NeverFear sighed. “But, you were so convinced.”

  DayFlambeau shook his head. “My conviction was a fraud, and I was both the perpetrator and the victim. I wanted to believe, and I convinced myself I did, but I was living a lie. My faith in the Forelight was merely an affectation.”

  “So you cast aside the god to whom you swore unceasing devotion and slink back to your former master!” AscendantSun snapped. He could no longer dam his anger.

  DayFlambeau frowned. “Your conscience prompted you to cast aside many divisions of devotion to the Golden Light. Why is my change of heart any different?”

  “When I changed my religion, it was not some whim,” AscendantSun muttered. “I changed only once.”

  “Thus speaks the great servant of the Forelight, would-be prophet of an invisible deity,” DayFlambeau mocked. “So devoted to your god that you are willing to break his most solemn commandments. You shall not kill. Remember? You speak of piety as you prepare to sin.”

  The words stabbed AscendantSun’s heart. He could not help thinking of his twin. Would that wound ever heal?

  “Calm down,” NeverFear pleaded, his hands flapping.

  “I suppose you will kill me now that I pose a threat,” DayFlambeau said with a sneer.

  “Calm down,” NeverFear repeated. “Nobody is killing anybody. DayFlambeau, have we your solemn word that you will not betray us to the Consensus under any circumstances?”

  “A promise is not enough,” AscendantSun said, pounding his foreleg with his fist. “He must swear it by the Golden Light.”

  DayFlambeau snorted. “That is not going to happen.”

  “He intends to betray us,” AscendantSun said. “Why else would he decline?”

  “I will not betray you,” DayFlambeau said. “I simply do not see the point in swearing on the Golden Light or the Forelight. I believe in neither.”

  “Perhaps,” AscendantSun muttered. DawnGlow, too, had claimed to have no god. Visions of red blots spreading across his makeshift pall flashed in AscendantSun’s mind. “Perhaps not. In truth, you do not know what you believe. You think you are a Necrotheist, as you once thought you believed in the Forelight. Some minor portent will seize your heart, and it will beat for the Golden Light again, and your rediscovered devotion will be all the more fervent because of your past heresy.”

  “And do you know what you believe?” DayFlambeau asked him.

  NeverFear interjected before AscendantSun could answer. “This repartee is getting us nowhere. There must be some way this can be sorted to everyone’s satisfaction.”

  DayFlambeau said with a shrug, “Either you let me go or hold me prisoner for the duration of the war. I bear you no ill will, but I cannot pretend to serve your false god.”

  “If the Consensus captures you and demands you swear fealty to the Golden Light, what will you do?” AscendantSun asked.

  “How lucky you and the others here are!” DayFlambeau moaned. “How fortunate is the entire race of Ors but me! I am without a god, alone and hopeless in the world. Yes, AscendantSun, I must concede your point is valid. I had not considered the Consensus might force me to pledge my devotion to the Golden Light, much as you wish me to prove my good faith by his name. Let me withdraw for a short spell to the broken furka by the lake and reflect further on this matter.”

  AscendantSun responded to NeverFear’s uncertain glance in kind. He acceded to DayFlambeau’s request with feigned nonchalance. He and NeverFear followed DayFlambeau out of the tent and escorted him to the edge of the encampment. There, they waited, their eyes never leaving him as he walked to the ruined stone and commenced his deliberation. His every movement was evaluated as a possible prelude to flight. DayFlambeau appeared oblivious to their intense scrutiny, his eyes fixed on the smashed stone, his face animated by mute debate, his hands dancing to the tune of his conflicted emotions, but his relative indifference might have been a ploy to put them off guard. It was a great relief when DayFlambeau sauntered back to them.

  “I will take your oath,” DayFlambeau said. “I will take it by Aurelian and the other Lights, and the Forelight, and any other deity that you wish. For me, such ostentation adds nothing to my solemn word, but I will take it to put your minds at ease.”

  “An oath by the Golden Light will suffice,” AscendantSun said. Aurelian was the only Light that mattered.

  DayFlambeau waited while AscendantSun and NeverFear agreed on the exact wording, and then flew through the oath with disdain.

  “I will leave in two days’ time,” he said. “Much of tomorrow will be spent making private farewells.”

  As the black fingers of the Stretches snuffed out the sun, the Orstretcherists gathered around the main campfire for their evening repast. After DayFlambeau had quietly filled his bowl with stew and slipped away to his tent, AscendantSun asked for his comrades’ attention. Bewilderment, dismay, even panic, swept through his audience at the news of DayFlambeau’s departure. It took a lot of effort on the part of AscendantSun and NeverFear to placate them. The vow that DayFlambeau had sworn was parsed and analyzed. The discussion entered a purposeless spiral as the participants rehashed variations of the same arguments over and over till conversation petered out due to general exhaustion.

  As the Orstretcherists scattered to their tents, NeverFear asked AscendantSun, “What, if anything, do we tell the Politician of Pigsknuckle?”

  “I have wrestled with that question all day,” AscendantSun said. “In the aftermath of Ashin Carnath’s unfortunate end, Garscap has proved to be a good friend to us, risking his popularity to protect TrueFriend, but he would be alarmed to learn of DayFlambeau’s intention to leave. On the other thumb, if we do not tell him, and he learns of it by chance, we would forfeit his trust and wreck our alliance before it has had a chance to bear fruit. I think it best to inform him and try to convince him that DayFlambeau’s departure poses no serious threat to his village.”

  “It will not be easy,” NeverFear said. “Given your doubts.”

  “The challenge is greater than you realize,” AscendantSun said. “I dare not divulge to Garscap the change of mind that spurs DayFlambeau’s leaving. Born into his faith, the politician could not appreciate the doubts and dilemmas pestering converts like us. He would be unsympathetic to DayFlambeau’s plight. I consider DayFlambeau’s plan naive, but I am as certain of his integrity now as I was when I invited him to convert to Stretcherism. Garscap would be blind to such nuance. If he understood the reason for DayFlambeau’s departure, Garscap would condemn DayFlambeau as a traitor and us as fools.”

  “But we cannot lie to
Garscap either,” NeverFear said. “Lying is a sin.”

  “Agreed,” AscendantSun said. “I’ll tell him DayFlambeau’s motivations are not his concern, and hope Garscap does not press the matter too much.”

  “And if he does, what will you do then?”

  “I do not know,” AscendantSun admitted. “We find ourselves bereft of choice. DayFlambeau cannot be dissuaded. Placing him in captivity solves one problem, only to create another. Our comrades might gripe about what they perceive as DayFlambeau’s betrayal, but most of them would not condone his imprisonment. Others who secretly share DayFlambeau’s doubts might become more inclined to forsake us and join the ranks of our enemies. We have only one course open to us. Unfortunately, it is not a good one.”

  Stares—some suspicious, others hateful—followed AscendantSun as he walked through the silent village to Garscap’s hut. He missed having NeverFear by his side, but he had promised Garscap he alone would enter Pigsknuckle when circumstances demanded, and now was not a time for broken promises.

  He hurried by the great hall. Its seething residents poured outside to shower him with salivary invective. A few stones struck his armor, flung by childish hands in the midst of the spitting women. They did not care that he was Pigsknuckle’s ally. His kinship to the murderers of their relatives and neighbors was sufficient reason to hate him. Deference to their host—and fear of his wrath—was probably all that prevented them from worse violence. AscendantSun wiped the spittle dripping from his face with a handkerchief. Thankfully, they did not pursue him.

  Garscap’s new wife answered AscendantSun’s rap on the politician’s hut. No halo rested on her disheveled hair. Her eyes were sunken and listless. Her general paleness exacerbated the rash of pimples about her chin. She regarded him coolly.

  “The Orstretcherists’ leader wishes to see you,” she said to the smoky darkness behind her.

  “Then get out of his way,” Garscap growled from somewhere inside.

  A shiver of fear passed through her. She jerked aside as if pushed, dropping the leather flap across the door. AscendantSun lifted it and entered the hut. Garscap was braiding his thorny crown into his hair. The stubble along his jawline was a new development. On seeing AscendantSun, the politician’s sour mood dissipated. His welcome was as cordial as always.

  “AscendantSun, please sit down. Talida, stop standing there,” he said. “Get our guest some refreshment.”

  “Thank you, but there is no need,” AscendantSun said. “I just finished my breakfast. There is a private matter I must bring to your attention.” He cast a meaningful glance at Garscap’s wife.

  “Talida, go for a walk,” Garscap said.

  “I am in no fit state to go anywhere,” Talida pleaded.

  “Bring your halo here.”

  She offered him a circlet of yellow and red cloth. He threw it in the fire. She reached for it, but he held her back while the flames consumed it. Her distressed cries made AscendantSun uncomfortable.

  “Forget Ogresquern,” Garscap said. “You wear the white and blue of Pigsknuckle now.”

  “That cloth was blessed by a saint,” Talida said. “To treat it such is sacrilege.”

  While she knelt sobbing by the fire, the politician did a hasty rendition of the Forelight’s Prayer.

  “That’s better,” he said. He rummaged through bags of possessions till he seized a white and blue halo. “Thus is the cost of love,” he muttered as he pulled his weeping wife to her feet and lashed the halo to her head with fistfuls of her hair.

  “Now get out and bother me no more till I look for you,” he said when he was done.

  “What am I to do?” Talida begged. “Wander through the village like a vagrant?”

  “You have a strange attitude to your village. This is your village now. Your husband is its ruler. It’s time you knew more about it than this hut.”

  After the door flap closed behind her, Garscap muttered, “Women.”

  AscendantSun, at a loss as to what the statement meant, nodded politely.

  “So, what brings you here this beautiful morning?” Garscap asked as he sat down on the far side of the fire.

  AscendantSun tried to make DayFlambeau’s return to Tincranny sound like a trivial matter, but the politician looked troubled.

  “You have not explained the reason for his departure,” Garscap observed.

  This was the question that AscendantSun dreaded. He had spent a lot of time concocting possible responses the night before, but now, beneath the politician’s probing stare, his nerve wilted.

  “I would rather not say. It is an internal matter,” he answered, silently cursing himself as the words tumbled leadenly from his tongue. His reply would not satisfy Garscap’s curiosity. If anything, it would heighten it. “All I can say is that his return to our people poses no risk to your village.”

  A reassuring smile spread across Garscap’s face. “Of course, it’s your own business. I was merely curious. I thank you for your courtesy in informing me. When does DayFlambeau intend to depart?”

  “Tomorrow morning,” AscendantSun answered, doing his best to hide his surprise. “Thank you for your trust in this matter.”

  “If you and I cannot trust each other, our alliance is worthless.”

  The conversation drifted to other matters. The warriors from Stonegarden had requested to stay for an extra week of training while the arrival of the delegation from Beardwood was delayed another week due to the sudden death of its politician. AscendantSun expected that, at any moment, Garscap would steer the conversation back to DayFlambeau’s departure, but the politician appeared to have forgotten the matter. AscendantSun departed Garscap’s hut, relieved and bewildered. He could not believe his luck.

  “You are getting better,” AscendantSun said as he offered a hand to the prostrate Mogod Kulum.

  “Not good enough,” the Politician of Stonegarden muttered.

  A few of the Pigsknucklers chuckled, but none of the Stonegardeners dared a smile. Their politician was a proud man and not one to forgive a slight, however innocent.

  Mogod’s pride was the main reason for the Stonegardeners extending their sojourn at Leaftea. The politician was determined to best an Orstretcherist before he departed. His persistence was admirable, as was the rate of his improvement, but it would take a miracle for a Mixy to defeat a fully equipped legionary in single combat.

  “Again,” the politician said as he retrieved his spear. “Perhaps my obsession with beating you is pigheaded, but we are the guests of a village where calling someone pigheaded is considered complimentary.”

  The Stonegardeners’ laughter was hearty and unrestrained. The Orstretcherists expressed their amusement with chuckles and smiles. The Pigsknucklers’ reaction was mixed, some taking it as innocent fun, others expressing their displeasure at being the butt of Mogod’s joke with icy silence.

  From the edge of the crowd, NeverFear waved at AscendantSun.

  “There will be time for a rematch later,” AscendantSun said. “In the meantime, I want you all to break out into your pairings and take turns sparring with my comrades. I have to go.”

  He jogged over to NeverFear as the crowd dispersed. AscendantSun’s eyes widened as NeverFear whispered in his ear, “We must make haste. Garscap has cornered DayFlambeau in his tent.”

  AscendantSun cursed his naivety. He was foolish to presume Garscap would drop the matter.

  By the time they reached the tent, DayFlambeau stood outside, arms folded, waiting for them. He winced as he spoke. “I had a visit from your friend, the politician. He insisted on knowing why I am leaving. I tried to stall him till you arrived, but I had to tell him in the end that it was none of his business. He was not very happy when he left.”

  “Should we tell him the truth?” NeverFear asked AscendantSun.

  “Garscap may be suspicious, but he can be little more than that. Tell him the truth, and we confirm his worst fears. Tell him nothing, and he has little more than conjecture.”
r />   “So we say nothing?” NeverFear asked.

  “No,” AscendantSun said. “We confront him about his interrogation of DayFlambeau. Garscap needs our help. We are his best hope against the invading legions, and he knows it. Without our training, his warriors would be wiped out by a couple of squads of legionaries. Garscap will not want to alienate us. He will act contrite and keep his suspicions to himself. After DayFlambeau has left, the matter will be forgotten.”

  AscendantSun and NeverFear caught up with Garscap when he was halfway back to the village.

  Garscap smiled. “Good day, my friends. To what do I owe this pleasure?”

  AscendantSun covered his mouth with his hand and cleared his throat with a cough. “I understand you visited DayFlambeau.” His tone was polite and casual, even nonchalant.

  Garscap scratched the back of his head. His cheeks reddened, though his smile remained fixed. “I’m sorry about that. I am in the wrong. I admit it.” He raised his hands and shrugged. “Curiosity got the better of me. I intended no offense.”

  AscendantSun smiled at NeverFear’s eyes darting nervously back and forth between him and the politician, as the silence dragged. What would NeverFear have said in AscendantSun’s place?

  “No offense taken,” AscendantSun said. He stared hard at Garscap. “If it doesn’t happen again.”

  Garscap’s smile wavered for the briefest of moments before it widened. His head dipped slightly. “It won’t. I promise.”

  “Then let us speak no more of this matter,” AscendantSun said.

  NeverFear gave a cautious nod.

  Garscap’s head bobbed enthusiastically. “Thank you,” he said. “I must go. I have pressing business in the village.”

  The Ors watched the politician walk away. When he was some distance from them, NeverFear asked, “Do you think he got the message?”

  “Hopefully,” AscendantSun said. “For all of our sakes.”

  The next morning, pouring rain did not delay DayFlambeau’s departure. He kept his final farewells to his comrades light and quick. More heartfelt goodbyes might cause awkwardness, given the circumstances of his leaving. The other Ors were cordial, but DayFlambeau sensed a chasm opening between him and them. How quickly fast friends had become strangers. He departed the camp with only the rain for company.