by H. M. Long
“You can trust her,” I reassured my friend.
Sixnit reached out to grab my hand again. There was no self-pity in her words as she spoke, no more held-back tears. “You and I promised to protect Vistic. Together. What if you don’t come back? What will I do? My husband is gone too, Hessa, and who knows if our families in other villages survived. We’re all we have left.”
The question was too deep, too devouring for me to contemplate. But despite the memories that Svala dug up and Sixnit’s pleas, we couldn’t be safe, not truly, until Omaskat’s god was free.
“I’ll find you again,” I promised, clutching Sixnit’s hand. “All of you. In the High Halls or the Waking World.”
Sixnit looked away into the darkness and did not release my grip. When I spoke again, the words felt heavy in my stomach, the simple, immediate truth of them overriding grander thoughts of eternity and gods and fate. “Even if we run, Vistic will still be in danger. So I will remove that danger.”
Before Sixnit could gather a response, chattering and scratching came from the tree above us. I looked up, hand flying towards my hatchet at the same time as Sixnit scrambled back.
Armed and on my feet, I peered up into the boughs of a birch tree. Eyes glinted at me from the darkness, followed by a second, scolding chirr. At the same time, Cadic stomped and shuffled off in the trees.
The head of an axe laced around Sixnit’s throat. A familiar woman with pale red hair stepped up behind her, her eyes cool and hard as river stones.
To the left and right, more Algatt slipped from the trees.
“Break my warriors’ bones,” Gadr offered, sidling out of the shadows to lay his own knife across Sixnit’s throat. The red-haired woman retreated and Gadr backed Sixnit into a trunk, though he spoke to me. “Curdle their minds. But you cannot stop me, and I doubt you have the strength to get far. Your friend will still die, and I do not want to do that. There has been enough innocent blood spilled on my mountains.”
My jaw clenched, stopping an instinctive rush of Eang’s Fire. Gadr’s theatrics were jarring, but I’d known this was coming. All I could do was hope they were truly theatrics and that Gadr would keep Omaskat’s promise not to harm Six and Svala.
But that didn’t just mean trusting Omaskat’s word. It meant trusting Gadr, ancient enemy of my people, with his fraying braid and bare-toothed snarl – not to mention the Algatt surrounding us.
I met Sixnit’s wide, shocked eyes. She clutched Vistic tighter and parted her lips to speak. I knew what she would say, even though she didn’t dare say it. Take Vistic. Run. Leave me.
I didn’t move, heart slamming against my ribs with such force that they threatened to crack.
“Now,” Gadr looked back at the red-haired woman, the same woman I’d saved from the Arpa last week. “Take the child.”
Sixnit erupted. Heedless of the knife at her throat she screamed and struck out when the Algatt woman tried to pry Vistic from her arms. The knife cut in and blood trickled down my friend’s skin.
“Gadr!” I shouted. “Stop this!”
The man wrinkled his nose at me. “Then hand over the child.”
Another Algatt lunged for Sixnit.
I’d just enough time to see a flash of metal before I screamed. It was an echoing, wordless clap of power – enough to stagger, but not to kill. Or so I intended. The new attacker reeled, howling, and off in the night I heard an answering scream – Svala’s signature Eangi cry, cracking and hissing. More cries followed, branches snapped, and metal struck metal.
I had to stop this. I had to stop it before Svala or Sixnit were killed.
The thought had barely unfolded before an Algatt plucked the screeching Vistic from Sixnit’s arms and darted away into the night. Sixnit threw herself after the man, clawing and shrieking like a creature possessed.
Gadr stepped in front of her. He seized her by her clothing and hurled her unceremoniously around the fire, directly into my arms.
We toppled to the ground. My foot struck the fire and sparks exploded up into the canopy. Algatt scattered from the flames and Gadr’s voice carried over the rush, “Go, now!”
The Algatt fled in a thunder of footsteps and victorious howls. Each one tore through me, another strike, another blow to my will and conviction. But I did not let Sixnit go, no matter how she howled and flailed, nor did I run after them myself. I held both of us back until the Algatt and Vistic were gone, and we were alone with the scattered remnants of our fire.
“I’ll get him back,” I vowed, again and again. “I’ll get him back. Trust me.”
Finally, Svala staggered from the shadows. Her axe – my axe – was bloodied. So were her nails; she’d used her bare hands to claw at her opponents. But her own injuries were superficial. It was her time in the ice, and the fatigue of Eang’s Fire, that weighed upon her now.
She leant against a tree across the scattered fire from us and looked at me with the shuttered, taciturn eyes of someone who had long ago experienced the worst life and the gods had to offer.
I watched her over Sixnit’s head and wondered if, some day, I would wear the same world-weary expression.
“Take Sixnit south.” My voice didn’t sound like my own. It was cold and jarring, though I tried to soften it for the sake of my friend, shuddering in my arms. “I know where Gadr will take Vistic. And I know that Omaskat will be there, at the White Lake.”
“Where the sky bleeds into the mountain,” Svala added. She closed her eyes for a few seconds, gathering herself, then we pulled Sixnit upright, together. My friend had ceased to cry, but her silence was worse.
“We’ll meet you in Iskir,” Svala offered. “If you haven’t come within a week, or if it’s not safe, we’ll head on to East Meade.”
“East Meade?” I repeated the name of my home, only half understanding. “Did…”
“Someone warned them in time,” Svala explained. “I saw it in my visions. And West Meade is nearly untouched. We will be safe there, for a time.”
I raked at my eyes with a free hand, though I had no tears to shed. My father. My sisters. My cousins. Alive. The thought buoyed me and broke me with imaginings of them still living and breathing in this world. I wanted to race to them, to protect them, to hide in them and weep together for all we had lost and all that might have been. But I could not, not yet.
Svala came closer, dropping into the Eangi’s sacred tongue so that Sixnit could not understand. “Remember who you serve, child.”
My traitor’s heart went deathly still.
“And if we do not see you again, we will await you in the High Halls.” With that, Svala turned to Sixnit and extended her hands, compassion wheedling into her eyes. “Come, child. We are all in the hands of the gods.”
I let Sixnit go. She did not look at me anymore but went to Svala, who put an arm around her shoulders. The space between us opened, wide and suddenly uncrossable – they together, in body and in faith, and I alone in both.
Sixnit looked at me then, her grief and rage and regret fading under the dull mask of a woman who has lost everything.
“Bring him back,” she said.
I swallowed my grief, turned my feet towards the mountains and the waiting milk-white lake. And then I began to run.
FORTY-ONE
I dropped low as I entered the forest, ducking branches and traversing loam on soundless feet. I’d passed Gadr and his Algatt horde, some five-hundred strong, an hour ago as they poured into the valley of the White Lake. Though we were allies now – as sickening as that thought was – I’d avoided being seen and had made no attempt to catch sight of the captive Vistic. That would only grieve me more.
Instead, I rounded the valley and made for the Arpa’s hidden camp while the crunch of Algatt boots diverted north, making for the eastern shore of the lake beneath the placid, brooding mountain.
As I neared the camp, Styga materialized from the shadows beneath a pine. I threw up my hands and halted.
“I’m here to kill him,�
� I stated. “Nothing more. Then take my life, if you want it. But let me stop him first.”
The being of shadow and starlight considered me. Behind them, I could hear the Arpa moving, their uncanny quietness all the starker amid battle preparations.
Styga’s star-speckled cheeks were obscure in the night. “Yet yesterday you fled at his side.”
“He had information my goddess needed,” I returned. The lies came far easier in the face of Styga than they had with Svala and Sixnit. “I serve her, not you.”
“Ah yes, lest I forget,” Styga unfurled a toothless, abyssal smile. “Then play your part, Eangi, and give me no reason to question you.”
We strode into the Arpa camp together. I kept my gaze level as I passed armed ranks of tainted legionaries, forcing my attention not to linger on them. I did not stop walking until I came to Telios himself.
“Give me weapons,” I requested.
The zealot smiled.
* * *
At the northern edge of the woods, I came to a halt. I tested the Arpa sword and Algatt shield I had commandeered, then set them both aside and unfastened the Eangi collar from my belt. Its metal was cold as I wedged it about my throat, its warped curls of bronze digging into my flesh before they settled atop my collar bones. The weight of it was both foreign and familiar, unsettling and steadying. I told myself that it was a symbol of what I’d left behind, of my people and my place among them. But to everyone else, I hoped it would reinforce my pretense of the devout Eangi, blindly faithful unto death.
Nonetheless, guilt clogged my throat and the collar chafed. But I was not afraid. I kept my thoughts shallow, narrow. I had only three goals today: buy Omaskat time, reclaim Vistic, and escape.
To my right, the Arpa marched out of the trees in ordered, regimented lines. Telios led them, moving with a self-possessed, gratified stride in the pre-dawn light. Two other noteworthy figures joined him: the Archeress and Rioux, who had slain Oulden in the High Halls. I stiffened at the sight of them, but neither approached me.
Styga slipped up to my shoulder. Before us, the first rays of the rising sun struck the solitary peak above the lake and illuminated a scattering of high waterfalls, reminding me of Mount Thyr, of Eang and Albor.
“I cannot help you against the Watchman,” Styga said. “But we will keep the battle away from you for as long as we can.”
We both looked up as the clatter of hooves sounded out above the march of Telios’s men. Mounted Arpa clattered up to the shores of the White Lake from the west, helmets affixed, backs straight and plated armor flashing in the dawn light. Styga’s head tilted and Telios turned, his expression unreadable at this distance.
My chest tightened. These were Polinus’s men – I saw the commander front and centre, Castor and Quentis to his right, and Estavius to his left. And there, beside Estavius, was Nisien.
I eyed Estavius briefly, thinking again of his amber blood. The sight of Quentis made my nerves flutter, but I was armed and under Styga’s protection; I doubted he would try to touch me. In the end it was Nisien, his dark eyes squinting across the Arpa lines from beneath his helmet, that captured my attention. I had to warn him of Lathian and Telios.
Without a second thought, I left the tree line and sprinted toward him.
“Hessa!” At the sight of me, Nisien dropped down from his saddle and pulled his helmet from his head. He stared from me to the distant line of Arpa, then he seemed to forget them entirely. His gaze focused on me, tracing my mail and the wild crown of my hair, and the Arpa sword in my hand. “I wasn’t sure you were still… Why are you here?”
I embraced him. It was a strong embrace, a sister’s embrace, and I could barely think through the pounding in my ears. “Nisien, you can’t be here. You need to—”
“What are you doing here?” He cut me off, repeating his question. His free arm wrapped around me, but it lacked vigor.
I stepped back, the urge to tell him the whole truth burning in my chest. But I couldn’t risk it. I pointed my sword across Telios’s Arpa to where the Algatt lines gathered, out of sight. “Today I… I kill Omaskat. But Nisien, listen to me. Did you do as I said? Did you devote yourself to a northern god?”
“Omaskat?” Nisien repeated the unfamiliar name. I realized with a pang that I had never told him of my original mission, let alone the pretense I played at now. The confusion in his eyes slipped into wariness. “Who is that? I— No, I didn’t.”
Just then Estavius dropped down next to us, his head also uncovered. Our gazes met in momentary acknowledgement and a mutual, knowing kind of appraisal, then he asked Nisien something in rapid Arpa. His gaze flicked from Styga to the other legionaries.
Telios. I had to warn Nisien about Telios.
At that moment Polinus strode out to meet the other commander, who was silhouetted against the rising sun in a fringed helmet. The two men met a dozen paces away from us and began to speak.
I grabbed Nisien’s arm just as he heard Telios’s voice. His muscles turned to stone beneath my hand.
Estavius followed his gaze and his lips set in a thin line.
“It’s Telios,” I told Nisien, worry suffusing my voice. “Nisien? I know who he is. He’s here at Lathian’s bidding, and you are all in grave danger. Nisien?”
The horseman took a compulsive step back, but not at the mention of Lathian. His eyes were locked on Telios, now in heated conference with Polinus. Rapid Arpa passed between them as Styga drifted over, their starlit features a fading glow in the dawn light.
My hand dropped away. “Nisien, listen to me.”
The wind picked up, just enough to rustle stray hair across my face. Estavius stepped in front of the other man and blocked his view of the commander. He spoke to him closely, his words low and even. It was not unlike how I’d seen Nisien speak to a frightened horse.
The rest of the legionaries kept their eyes up and ignored the exchange, faces concealed behind their helmets. Except for Quentis. He’d urged his horse out of the line and now stared past us, at the lake, with a revelatory light to his gaze. When I caught his eye, he raised his mixing bowl in greeting and laughed – the laugh of a man who has just discovered a great and unexpected treasure. Whatever he had thought he’d find here, this was not it – and he was overjoyed.
Footsteps signaled the commanders’ approach. Estavius pressed his forehead to Nisien’s and stood to the side, shoulder to shoulder with the Soulderni. The picture of the Arpa legionary, Estavius adjusted his helmet under his arm and nodded in salute.
Nisien did not. His expression was blank, save a momentary twitch of violent, sickening hatred across his upper lip.
Unexpectedly protective, I turned, placing myself in front of my friend as the commanders drew up.
“Nisien.” Telios recognized the horseman. His eyes flashed on either side of his nose guard – malice, satisfaction and hunger.
My hand tightened on my sword.
Polinus either didn’t notice the tension between them or didn’t care. He turned from Telios and bellowed instructions to his second and third, leaving the other man to cast his gaze appraisingly over the line of cavalry.
Nisien abruptly grabbed my wrist and tugged me close, dropping his voice so the other men couldn’t hear. “Do not trust him. Run, Hessa, get out of here as soon as you can.”
Before I could reply, he jerked on his helmet and mounted up. Estavius remained in his place a moment longer, exchanging a stare with Telios.
Telios’s eyes flicked between the two younger men, a glance so subtle that I might have missed it. Was that… jealousy? Suspicion?
Finally, Telios strode back towards his men, Styga at his side. Polinus mounted up and directed his horse down the line, shouting orders in Arpa that made the men sit up straighter.
I caught Estavius’s eye. The legionary murmured in his improved Northman, “Telios is the worst of men. Stay away from him.”
“You don’t mean to fight with him, do you?” I asked. I wanted to ask who he was, a
nd how he’d found the magic that I had, but souls were on the line. “Lathian has possessed them, all of them, Estavius. You have to leave before he takes you too.”
The legionary’s expression was grim. “Telios is still Arpa, and Lathian is our god. We fight first and speak of Telios later. I must go, Hessa.”
I remained still, my chest full of dread for both Nisien and Estavius. But the weight of the Eangi collar at my throat drew me back to my task; I was here to help Omaskat, save my people and Vistic. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else could matter.
“Look after him,” I murmured to Estavius. “Whatever you are.”
My last words earned a startled, subtle smile from the legionary, but it was quickly replaced by gravity. He ducked his head, short curls bobbing around his temples, then put his helmet back on. The last thing he looked at was the lake over my shoulder as he swung up into the saddle.
I glanced at the helmeted and silent Nisien once more before I returned to Telios’s cohort. With every step, I pushed more and more distractions aside. By the time I drew up to the lines of soldiers, I was single-minded again.
I leapt up onto a boulder. Shafts of dawn bored into the valley, illuminating distant Algatt heads in halos of red and blond.
Light glinted off raised weapons as the Algatt roared and yipped. I could not see Omaskat and Vistic, but Gadr stood chanting before their round, locked shields. He himself had no shield and bore a long, ornate two-handed axe.
Horns sounded, beginning in low, unhurried growls and ending in sharp, jarring cracks. The sound ripped through my ribs and set my teeth on edge, dragging me back up Mount Thyr, back to the shrine where I had knelt and begged for a second chance from a goddess who could not hear me.
If I’d fought beside Eangi today, my people would have responded in kind. Our horns would have wailed and our people raised their eerie, melodic war cry.
But Algatt faced Arpa now, and they were no ordinary men. They did not shout. They stomped no feet and beat no shields. No one prayed. The Arpa remained in their line of rectangular shields, helmets closed, chins dropped, legs poised. The only sound came from the snap of banners in the wind.