Revenant

by Bevan McGuiness

  As they walked, they seemed to set up a regular wave pattern in the ground. It gradually became stronger until the swell created by their passage was so steep that a person on one end of the line could not see those at the other end. The ground heaved and groaned, creaking with the torment of moving. With every shift, every wave, cracks opened then closed. Once or twice a scream of agony rose above the sounds of the ground as a crack closed on an unwary Tulugma’s foot and ripped it off, leaving the warrior crippled. One crack opened so wide so quickly it swallowed a Tulugma archer whole. She vanished as if by magic, crushed to death in a heartbeat as the crack closed over her. Blood oozed out of the broken ground for a moment before even that vanished as if it had never been.

  Keshik stopped advancing and faced Adrast. Slave could not hear anything of the conversation that passed between them over the sounds of the tortured ground, but it was clear that Keshik was agitated. Adrast seemed equally agitated. The argument continued until a large crack opened up and swallowed three Tulugma whole. At the sight, Keshik raised his hand and gave the sign for a dead run forward. As one, the remaining Tulugma who could move sprinted ahead. The crippled warriors remained behind, their despairing screams lost in the noise of the equally anguished heaving ground.

  Slave ran alongside Maida. It was hard to run over the rolling, shifting ground, made more difficult by the cracks that kept opening up, but they ran as a group and lost only two more warriors in the rush. Overhead, the sky roiled in a turmoil of clashing colours that seemed to be building to some sort of crescendo but no one was paying much attention.

  Suddenly, the ground stopped moving. The now stationary earth beneath their feet was rich, dark, farming soil. It was redolent with fertility, full of goodness, just waiting to be tilled and seeded. Slave saw a couple of the Tulugma lean over and grasp a handful of the soil, then raise it to their faces to savour the scent. Most of the rest of the Tulugma rested their hands on their knees, breathing heavily after the mad rush over the chaotic ground. Keshik left Adrast and walked over to stand with Maida. She was panting, trying to draw enough air into her body to ease the ache in her chest.

  ‘How many did we lose?’ she asked.

  ‘Ten.’

  ‘How far to go?’ Her voice came in harsh gasps.

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘Do we know where we are going anyway?’

  Keshik shook his head as if in exasperation. ‘I am not sure Adrast knows either. This all seems a bit pointless.’

  Slave was thinking the same thing. What was the point of all this? Where were they going? Why did they have to travel through this strange and dangerous place?

  As if in answer, Adrast strode towards them, his face pained with the exertion of the run. He attempted to smile at Keshik.

  ‘We’re here,’ he panted.

  ‘Where?’ Keshik asked.

  Adrast raised his hand and dragged it quickly down, as if ripping the air. A jagged black line appeared, through which came the scent of salt water and fish. Adrast gripped one side of the tear and pulled it aside with both hands. Through the tear, Slave could see a darkened room containing shelves and boxes. It reeked of fish and seaweed. A startled man in the blue uniform of the agents of the Blindfolded Queen stared through the tear in reality at Adrast. His eyes widened in shock as he peered at the assembled Tulugma behind Adrast.

  Keshik stepped through the jagged rent and glared at the agent.

  ‘Don’t just stand there, go and tell your queen she has guests.’

  25

  Quetzalxoitl gripped the railing tightly, refusing to turn to face the irritating woman. Myrrhini stood behind her, arms folded over her flat chest, eyes just starting to show the first signs of flame, the wind whipping her hair around her sun-darkened face. The Blindfolded Queen glared at the Silvered Sea as if demanding obedience from its recalcitrant swell. In the distance to the south, a brown smudge revealed the northern coastline of Apros.

  ‘There is too much you have kept from me,’ Myrrhini repeated.

  ‘There is no reason I should tell you anything, Eye of Varuun.’

  ‘I am no longer the Eye of Varuun. Varuun no longer even exists.’

  That finally broke Quetzalxoitl’s resolve. She whirled around to face the ignorant, arrogant bitch who insisted on speaking of things she had no right to. ‘Varuun no longer exists!’ she snapped. ‘You are stupider than that idiot you unleashed on my city. Varuun transcends even those Revenants you fear so much. It holds the key to everything, but now that the Acolytes are gone, we are cut off from it.’

  Myrrhini stepped back from the Queen’s undisguised hatred. ‘The Acolytes? How are they important?’ she said.

  ‘The Acolytes, yes. Why do you think the Revenant went there to destroy them first?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘No, you don’t. You know nothing.’

  ‘Not if you won’t tell me anything.’

  ‘Who do you think you are, Eye of Varuun — to stand there and give me instructions? To make demands of me, the Blindfolded Queen! I have guarded my people with my vision, keeping them safe from the world that would exploit and destroy them, and all the while you have been feeding that fear, that hunger for us. And then you befriend the very beast that unleashed it all upon us, and lead him to our home! And now you demand that I tell you everything I have been guarding for so long! How dare you!’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘And the fact that you don’t know even this about our history reveals you unworthy to know anything.’

  ‘You professed ignorance of just about everything when I first arrived at the city. And what was all that about in the Chamber of Kalev? When you blinded me.’

  Quetzalxoitl sneered at Myrrhini. The leather blindfold hid the Queen’s flame-filled eyes and obscured her ‘natural’ vision, but did not prevent her expressions being clear. There was hatred, disdain and contempt on her face as she took a half-step towards Myrrhini. ‘Profess? One can profess anything one wishes in order to achieve …’ She caught herself before she went on.

  Myrrhini’s vision into Eztli-Ichtaca was returning, allowing her a momentary glimpse beyond the Queen’s words. The darkness that had overshadowed the Queen when Myrrhini had first met her was gone, replaced by something else entirely. Something Myrrhini could barely discern before it flickered out of existence.

  ‘So what did you gain from me?’ Myrrhini asked.

  The Blindfolded Queen seemed about to answer when a loud cry interrupted her.

  ‘My queen,’ an agent bellowed. ‘Below decks!’

  ‘What now!’ she barked at the agent.

  ‘We, um, we have, um, guests.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Guests, my queen.’

  Quetzalxoitl sighed harshly — it was more of a snarl — and pushed past Myrrhini, who staggered back slightly under the contact. Myrrhini gave the Queen a hard glare, but she strode away without a backward look. She barged past the agent, flung open the hatch and climbed down out of sight.

  Myrrhini turned her attention back to the approaching Apros coast. She knew next to nothing about the ancient kingdom beyond its age and pre-eminence among the Eleven Kingdoms. Founded first, while the Scaren–Mertian conflict was still raging far to the north, Apros was known as the seat of the world’s culture and wisdom. Apart from that, she was ignorant.

  A low whistling split the air. Myrrhini looked up in time to see a massive black object shoot over her head and rip through the sail. It took a number of ropes with it as it passed on. Cries rang out immediately. Agents sprang into action as ropes tumbled, unattached, to the deck. Orders were bellowed and the ship heeled over sharply. Myrrhini almost lost her balance on the suddenly sloping deck. She grabbed the railing to keep her feet and looked out to where the projectile had come from.

  Beyond the twenty other ships of the Blindfolded Queen, full of Zhan Tien’s Tulugma and the Queen’s own army, Myrrhini could make out another fleet. Larger and apparently
faster, it was closing from the west. Her eyes widened in dismay as the lead ship in the approaching fleet fired another of the massive bolts. It screamed through the air, slamming into one of the Blindfolded Queen’s ships. Instead of tearing through the sail, it smashed into the hull. Screams drifted over the water as the ship rocked and heaved under the impact.

  Aboard the flagship — the Haven of Couatl — Myrrhini listened to the ongoing shouting of orders as the ship continued to come about. It was clear even to her that they were preparing to go into battle. Fear gripped her gut. More of the huge missiles were launched from the attacking ships, most of them crashing uselessly into the water, but some hammered into their targets. The screaming was now coming from more places, but that sound was mingling with others, becoming less strident, less overwhelming. The Haven of Couatl came onto an even keel and surged forward, heading straight at the new fleet. All around her, the rest of the Queen’s fleet was doing the same.

  The first few ships were now closing on each other, coming into range of the smaller guns, close enough that the men aboard each vessel could see each other’s faces. The sound of voices changed from incoherent screams to roars of anger and words of challenge. A few more of the huge missiles screamed overhead as the fleets closed and those firing the weapons lost their range.

  Suddenly, one of the attacking ships exploded. Flames erupted from the vessel, sending smoke boiling into the sky. Chunks of wood splashed down into the water — all that remained of the ship; she was as utterly gone as if she had never existed. Myrrhini stared for any sign of survivors, any hint that anyone might not have died in the conflagration, but even as she did, she knew it was in vain. No one, nothing, could have survived that.

  A ragged cheer burst from the agents aboard the Haven of Couatl as she continued to scythe through the waters towards the attacking fleet. The pause from their work did not last long as the officers urged the men on to double their efforts. To Myrrhini, who knew nothing about the ways of the sea, most of the tasks were as obscure as the words used to describe them, but the agents were frantically busy. Sails shifted, ropes were tightened while others were loosed, things were moved, others were lashed down. Everywhere, men scurried like ants, leaving changes in their wake. Smaller men, some little more than boys, scampered up and down rope ladders that stretched to dizzying heights above the deck to attend to the sails or to simply take up position along the horizontal poles that held the sails up. She knew everything aboard the Haven of Couatl had a name, but she had never bothered to pay any attention to them.

  The Blindfolded Queen’s flagship unfurled a huge flag from the main mast. With the speed of the Haven of Couatl’s passage, it was snapped taut in heartbeats, revealing a brilliant red, gold and purple swirl that appeared to envelop an ancient Mertian symbol. Myrrhini gasped as she recognised it.

  Rising boldly from the writhing flames was the pictogram for Eztli-Ichtaca. The stark simplicity of the black pictogram against the chaos of multicoloured flame was bold, unapologetic and uncompromising. But what did it mean? What was the significance of the Blindfolded Queen, and through her the Mertian race, claiming the world of could be as her standard? How could such a shifting, uncertain thing like possibility — fate — be a standard?

  And, even more significantly, who would know what it meant? Did the Queen herself know? Myrrhini recalled her profession of ignorance as to the meanings of the ancient pictograms and her subsequent denial of such ignorance. How much of what the woman had said was lies? Did her dishonesty have to mean treachery?

  The questions washed through Myrrhini’s mind like the Haven of Couatl’s wake. To clear her mind, Myrrhini tried to focus on the agents busy in the prow. They were working feverishly on a device. Just as the ship came into range of the attacking fleet’s arrows, every agent pulled back from the device. It was clearly designed to shoot the round, clear container filled with viscous fluid that nestled within its complicated arrangement of cogs, pulleys and ropes. An agent raised his arm in signal to the captain who raised his arm in response. At the returned signal, the agent grasped a handle and pulled it down hard. There was a creak, then the device appeared to unfold, sending the fluid-filled container hurtling through the air. Myrrhini watched, transfixed, as it executed a low arc, aimed straight at the nearest enemy vessel.

  It hit the ship full on the deck, just in front of the main mast. For a moment, Myrrhini was astonished at the uncanny accuracy of the agents to be able to hit another vessel so far away on the first attempt when both target and weapon were in motion, but her admiration for the skill was short-lived. As soon as the container hit the deck, it shattered, sending the viscous fluid splashing out onto the deck, the mast, and several men unfortunate enough to be caught close by. For a heartbeat nothing happened, then the fluid erupted into brilliant orange and purple flame. It spread faster than she imagined possible, engulfing the ship in what seemed to be little more than moments. The screams of immolating men tore across the intervening water followed by the sudden crash of noise as the ship exploded.

  As with the other vessel, one moment it was there, the next it was gone, with only pieces of wood and tattered sail remnants fluttering slowly back down to the surface of the Silvered Sea. Myrrhini stared, her eyes wide, her hands over her mouth, unable to believe what she had just witnessed. What manner of sorcery was this?

  Aboard the Haven of Couatl, the agents were shouting and yelling in excitement. Those involved with the device in the prow were gathered together, slapping each other on the back and cheering.

  Another ship erupted in flame, then another, as the rest of the Queen’s fleet unleashed their savage weaponry upon their enemies. Within a horrifyingly short time, the attacking fleet was reduced to a small handful of ships desperately heeling around and trying to flee the implacable death spat across the waters at them — death that took no prisoners and offered no mercy.

  Myrrhini had no words, no thoughts that could express how she felt. Horror, relief, savage joy at the death of an unknown enemy, all warred within her for supremacy, but none prevailed. Her knuckles went white with her grip on the railing as she continued vainly to scour the debris-littered sea for survivors.

  ‘Myrrhini.’

  The voice that broke into her concentration was as unexpected as it was shocking. Myrrhini could not turn around in case it was a mistake, but when he repeated her name, she spun and threw herself into Slave’s arms. He caught her with the preternaturally fast reactions and strength she had come to know and held her too tight, as he always did. When she pushed against him, he let her go. She stepped back to regain her breath from his crushing embrace.

  ‘How did you get here?’ she asked.

  ‘The Elbar of the Tulugma.’

  Myrrhini frowned. ‘That makes no sense. What’s an elbar?’

  ‘A Reader, like from Leserlang, but different.’

  This did not help much, except to confirm that it had to be sorcery of some sort. For the moment, however, it would do. She flung her arms around him again and felt Slave’s great strength as he returned her embrace.

  ‘You are alive,’ she whispered into his chest. ‘How are you alive?’

  ‘How are you? I saw you fall; I heard your bones break. You were dead before you fell.’

  ‘The Blindfolded Queen rescued me and brought me here.’

  Slave gave a growl, as if considering this piece of information and not finding it to his liking. He sniffed. Not a simple inhalation, but a deliberate use of his sense of smell, like an animal.

  ‘Is that Myele Powder?’ he asked.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘An explosive chemical.’

  Myrrhini eased herself out of Slave’s embrace. ‘They just used that —’ she indicated the complex device in the prow of the ship ‘— to fire a container at a ship. The ship exploded, but it was not a powder. It contained a thick liquid.’

  Slave nodded. ‘I’ve read of such things, but never seen one.’ With a frown, he started
to walk towards the device, but when he got close, several agents moved to block his passage.

  ‘What do you want?’ one snarled.

  Slave narrowed his eyes. Myrrhini, walking beside him, looked up at his expression with alarm but he seemed under control. Her eyes dropped to where Slave’s hand was under his jerkin, resting on the Claw hidden there.

  ‘We’d like to look at … that,’ Myrrhini said, waving at the device.

  ‘You can see it from there, just fine,’ the agent retorted.

  Slave gave a disdainful sniff and walked away. Myrrhini followed him with a glare at the rude agent. He looked away from them as if dismissing them and had already begun preparing the device for another shot at the now retreating enemy fleet. Slave did not look back, heading instead for where the Blindfolded Queen had just stepped onto the deck. Quetzalxoitl returned Slave’s gaze and made her way towards him.

  ‘You,’ she hissed. ‘I never wanted to see you again.’

  Slave did not reply. Myrrhini was about to speak when a sudden flicker of sight into Eztli-Ichtaca made her stop in shock. What she had Seen had to be impossible, yet despite only getting the briefest glimpse into what might be, what could yet be, the impression was undeniable. The Queen was contemplating the most hideous betrayal imaginable.

  Quetzalxoitl raised her hand and made a sharp stabbing motion at Slave. There was a sizzling sound like burning meat and a brilliant shaft of golden light slashed through the air towards him. He moved in a way that was both faster than Myrrhini considered possible and yet flowed like water. His Claw sliced across in front of his chest while he turned sideways to allow the bolt of magical force to pass. The Claw met the magic with a blinding splatter of colour. Myrrhini was frozen by the sudden attack and Slave’s response.