WoP - 01 - War of Powers

by Robert E. Vardeman

  'I'm too sleepy to think straight,' he said. 'For Ust's sake, can't we talk about it tomorrow?' He shook his head. 'Why can't we just share the damned amulet?'

  'That's no answer,' the princess hissed. Her hand shot from her roll and seized his wrist. Its grip reminded him of the grip of a Sky City eagle. 'I want it to free my City. You want it for. . . carousal, so that you can drink and wench your way through the ages like some little boy who's just slipped over the edge into adolescence.'

  'To learn,' Fost muttered. 'I want to learn.' 'There might only be limited power stored in the amulet. So it is written in the ancient scrolls Rann's men unearthed in Kolinth. So Erimenes affirms. If either of us uses it even once, it may turn into a useless trinket. So who is to have it?'

  Fost twisted his hand from hers and rolled onto his back with a noisy exhalation.

  Moriana reared up like an angry serpent. 'You can't just turn away. Talk to me, dammit. I command it!'

  'You command it?' Fost shot upright. 'By what right do you command it?' His voice shook with outrage.

  'By right of birth! I am Princess of the City in the Sky. I am queen. That's by what right, groundling.'

  'Queen? Queen? Of what? Of all the rocks and rodents in the Rampart Mountains?' He glared at her, nose hovering inches from hers.

  For a long moment they stared at each other. Then Moriana said, 'It looks that way, doesn't it?'

  Fost blinked. Moriana snickered. She flopped onto her back and gave a hoot of laughter. His eyebrows rose. He tried to speak, but a laugh bubbled up from inside him and burst out past his words.

  'I thought you were fighting.' Erimenes's words cut astringently across their mirth. He sounded accusing.

  'No, Erimenes,' Fost gasped, trying to gulp in a lungful of air. 'We're making love.'

  'If that's what you think you were doing, it explains why your companionship has been so markedly uninteresting of late. You could give lessons to a pair of mating felines.'

  Fost whooped and seized Moriana around the waist. Her fists pummeled his back, but not with the full strength she could put into them.

  The courier's mind was clear with a kind of feverish lucidity as they grappled and groped their way toward an activity sure to alleviate the spirit's boredom. They had dissolved into laughter over nothing. Their mirth had been a release from the pressure building between them. In his curious acuteness of mind Fost recognized that for all her apparent determination on settling the question of the Amulet of Living Flame, Moriana had been no less eager than he to delay finding an answer.

  Perhaps because there was no answer. His hand slid into her bedroll, touched the yielding smoothness of bare skin. Her fingers kneaded the great muscle of his thigh. He groaned as his body responded despite the protests of overworked muscles.

  Their bodies pressed against each other as if trying to blend into one. Yet the naked dagger of the unanswered question lay between them.

  Fost felt a twinge in his back, so sharp he cried out. Moriana's mouth muffled the sound. The cramp faded and then she was on top of him.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Prince Rann watched the snow fall.

  The cold wind beat upon the sides of the makeshift pavilion. Tents had been hurriedly stitched together to form the shelter, lances and javelins comprising the uprights and the stark gray rock of the cliff forming the rear wall. It kept the survivors of his party reasonably dry. It seemed to hamper the cold not at all.

  The prince shivered as icy tendrils of wind crept up his thigh. His right shoulder, bound tightly with linen, burned as hot as the brazier that provided the pavilion's sole heat. His side still ached from the love pat of Istu's Vicar, and his ribs seemed an ever-tightening band of iron around his chest. He tasted defeat and apprehension.

  'Haven't you finished that spell yet?' he snapped at the scrawny youth who squatted near the brazier. The youth looked up, nervously running his fingers through his scraggly yellow beard.

  'These things take time, lord,' he whined. 'Just now there is some disturbance in the ether. We aren't far from Athalau, centre of magic inimical to ours.'

  'Don't lecture me, goat-whelp,' the prince snapped. 'Just finish your casting and be quick about it.'

  With a sniff the journeyman sorcerer turned back to the wide half geode propped on a bronze stand to present its polished face to him. Rann suppressed a snarl. Like political power, sorcerous ability passed mostly along the feminine side of the Etuul clan. Rann had some spells, but numbered neither scrying nor the use of the seeing-stone among them. So he must abide with the sorcerer's impudence if he wished to communicate with the Sky City. He viewed the prospect with a feeling as near dread as he was capable of, but call he must.

  He thought of how satisfying it would be to flay the impudent sorcerer. The very notion twisted his nerves and gave him stirrings in useless loins. But he couldn't punish the journeyman mage-he was needed. He must not punish those fools who had let the bear-riders take his elite Sky Guardsmen in the rear and rob him of his vengeance upon Fost Longstrider. If he wished, he could return to the Great Crater Lake and torment a few Ethereals, but they met their sufferings with bland indifference. He might as well be inflicting torment on a brass statue for all the satisfaction it would give him. Tension built unbearably in him, tension of the sort he had ever been wont to ease through the suffering of others. Now it found no outlet.

  As they had been erecting this rough shelter against the buffeting winds, a creature had darted from its burrow beneath their boots. Quick as a serpent he had snatched up the small furry thing and snapped its neck with a convulsion of his hands. The killing had given him momentary satisfaction, but only momentary. The death had been too quick, too painless. It offered nothing of catharsis.

  Now he sat twining his fingers together with a force that threatened to snap their joints. He prepared himself for abasement before his cousin, for he had failure to report and assistance to beg. It was almost enough to make him start to scream and never stop.

  'Lord Prince,' the youthful mage said obsequiously through his snout. 'Our Most Gracious Majesty, Queen Synalon, awaits your pleasure.'

  Squinting at the youth in disgust, Rann entertained the thought of seizing him by the scruff of the neck and thrusting his face into the coals. Perhaps he could sear off a few of the pimples scattered like pustulant rubies across his visage. He shook himself and moved to stand in front of the geode.

  Its surface glowed with the likeness of Synalon. She lolled on her jeweled throne, fingers idly stroking the feathers of a large raven. Her scarlet gown opened to the navel, baring slices of creamy breast. Rann's tongue danced across his lips. She smiled, knowing the consternation it caused him to see her thus.

  'Well, cousin,' she purred, 'we trust you've only triumph to report?'

  The very silkiness of her tone indicated that she trusted no such thing. Rann swallowed hard.

  'I regret, O Mistress of the Clouds, that my expedition has met with a temporary setback.'

  Synalon nodded, her eyes half closed. The prince cleared his throat. 'I would not trouble Your Majesty, save that I must request you release to me more troops.'

  'More troops?' She arched a brow. 'What exigencies might you encounter that a half-company of our finest Guardsmen are insufficient to deal with?'

  Rann swallowed gall. 'None, Sky-born,' he said, 'yet I no longer possess half a company. Only twelve men remai n, twelve out of fifty.'

  'How is this?' Tersely Rann told her of their losses to storm, thulyakhashawin and finally to the bear-riding nomads. 'It distresses us that a handful of barbarians could slaughter our elite with such ease.' She plucked a morsel from a bowl at her elbow and offered it to the raven. The bird gobbled it down, regarding Rann with an unwinking crimson bead of an eye.

  Rann fought down a grimace. Her affectation of the royal 'we' irritated him, and he despised her poison-taloned pets.

  'They came upon us from behind, Majesty.' 'Indeed.' Her hand ruffled the feathers behind t
he raven's head. 'The foremost of our chieftains permits himself to be taken in the rear by a passel of savages. Is this the man we trust to bring us victory?'

  'My life is yours,' the prince said. He bowed his head. 'You'll not get off that easily,' Synalon sneered. Rann looked up in alarm. 'It is your fate to serve the Throne of the City. Though we need them for our own preparations, we will release to you another fifty Sky Guardsmen.' She stroked the bird's beak. It croaked delight at the attention. 'See that you do not disappoint us again. Bring us the amulet - and my sister!'

  'Your Majesty,'he almost gasped.'I assure you .. .'With a wave of her hand, Synalon broke the connection as the words left her cousin's mouth. He sat back, boiling with rage as sweat streamed down his face.

  The journeyman magician sat by with folded hands and an unctuous expression. 'Does my lord require anything else?'

  'Yes,' Rann snapped. 'The stink of the latrine trench begins to affront my nostrils. Do something about it, Maguerr, or I'll bury you to the neck in it so that you may fully appreciate the savor of the sewage.'

  He smiled at the boy's expression of horror. It made him feel somewhat better.

  The travelers had tramped so long through a fog compounded of

  tedium, exhaustion and bone-stabbing cold that it took them some minutes to realize they had come to the other side of the mountains.

  The storm had gone its way. The swollen sun squeezed into the eastern sky, turning the far mountains to copper. At the faint caress of winter sunlight on her cheeks, Moriana raised her head.

  'Ooooh!' A long syllable of wonder rolled from her lips. She clutched at her companion's arm. 'Fost, look. Look!'

  He lifted his head and blinked. Weak as the morning sun was, it dazzled him after the long night. Tinged with pink, the icefields stretched away forever southward: the Southern Waste. And that meant to the east lay .. .

  He swiveled his head towards the sunrise. Moriana turned with him, and her gasp rose with his. High mountains formed a bowl beyond which stretched the Gulf of Veluz like a sheet of beaten bronze. In their amazement they took no note of the distant water. A nearer spectacle claimed their eyes.

  The glacier filled the bowl between the mountains. It was no blank whiteness like the icelands beyond but was an enormous swirl of bands of color, dark on light. Brown, white, black, yellow, dull red and green cast back flecks of sunlight here and there so that the whole sparkled and danced in the sun. It reminded Fost of candles he'd seen with different hues of wax poured together in colorful whorls.

  'Is that the glacier?' Moriana asked breathlessly. 'I thought it would be dull and white.'

  Erimenes answered her. 'It is indeed a glacier, my dear. Its progress scoops up earth and rock from the ground below, which accounts for the bands of differing shade. Additionally other, lesser glaciers flow into it from the surrounding mountains, causing the most remarkable patterns. Observe.'

  'Enough,' Fost growled. His heart had begun to hammer his ribs in excitement. Then his gorge rose at a horrible thought. He ripped Erimenes's jug from his satchel and shook it violently.

  'Come out of there, you poor excuse for a ghost,' he shrieked. When he unstoppered the bottle, blue mist flowed forth. The fog became a miniature tornado with dancing light-motes like the sparkles out on the ice. But Erimenes was a little bluer than usual, from motion sickness.

  'Wh-what's the matter?' asked Moriana, confused at Fost's behavior.

  'The city - the force of the glacier must have pulverized it to dust. We've come all this way for nothing!' Fost raised his arm to smash the jug.

  'Wait!' cried Erimenes. His spectral arm swept out from his side. 'Behold,' he said.

  One broad band near the center of the bowl glowed pale blue. It was to this the spirit pointed. Fost squinted. He realized the ice was not tinted but lay clear, its blue the blue of the cloudless sky above. Is it my imagination? he wondered, or do I glimpse shapes within, spires and minarets and bulging domes?

  'Behold Athalau,' Erimenes said with pride. 'Behold my home. The magic of Athalau has not diminished. The glacier is hollow inside.'

  The ice-locked shapes showed clearer now. The structures of that fragment of Athalau they could see had an airy, almost fragile look, similar to that within the City in the Sky, but without its subtle and disturbing distortion. Yet it must be monumentally strong to have withstood the pressure of countless tons of ice across the years. His respect for the power of the city's builders grew as he stood looking on a tableau literally frozen for eternity.

  His limbs began to quiver. Adrenaline excitement buzzed in his ears, and his veins sang impatiently.

  'Erimenes! How do we get in?' Weariness fell from him like a dropped cloak.

  'Do be patient,' the sage said, turning an airy smirk in his direction. 'I've gone fourteen hundred years not knowing how I might once again return to my home. You can wait a while longer.'

  'Untrue!' Fost shouted. 'Merely thirteen hundred ninety-nine. And besides, I know I'll have to wait to enter Athalau -we're a good day's travel away. What I'm asking is, how will we get in once we're there?'

  'Now, now.' Erimenes wagged a finger. 'You must trust me.'Trust you?' Fost bellowed. 'I'd sooner trust a starving wolf.' The spirit looked hurt. 'After all I've done for you,' he sighed, 'such ingratitude is wormwood indeed. Well then, if we're going to fall to mistrusting one another, how can I trust you? How do I know that, once I impart my knowledge to you, you won't abandon me here to sit alone throughout eternity with no companion save the howling wind?'

  'He's right,' Moriana said. 'We can wait to learn how he plans to gain entry to the glacier. He would hardly have brought us this far without knowing how. We have to trust him.'

  She didn't add, as we have to trust each other. He eyed her measuringly and saw the same calculation in her eyes. She was hearing the call of the Amulet of Living Flame as keenly as he. The reckoning could not long be forestalled. A shadow crossed the day.

  She leaned forward, rising on her toes to kiss his lips. 'We've almost made it,' she said. 'Against all odds, we're almost there. They'll sing of us, Fost. The bards will commemorate us for generations.'

  The problem of gaining entry to the city in the glacier still worried him, and to his mind no empty strophes sung by weak-wristed poets could match centuries of brawling, lusty life. He couldn't rid himself of the certainty that she intended to have the former rather than the latter. But he shrugged his doubts aside and returned her kiss boldly. Then arm in arm they started down the mountainside.

  Nightfall found them within a few miles of the glacier's edge. As a parting gift Jennas had given Fost a pack filled with supplies. From this they took a tent and a bit of firewood, more priceless than jewels in the treeless waste. Fost and Moriana dined on a haunch of meat they found in the pack. When the fire died down, they climbed into a bedroll to share the warmth of their bodies. Their lovemaking was still more fervent than that which, the night before, had marked their reunion. Tomorrow they would enter Athalau - providing Erimenes knew the way in. Tomorrow, or soon after, they would possess the Amulet of Living Flame. And then must be answered the question of who should have it.

  So their bodies writhed together with restless urgency, knotting, spasming, resting limp with repletion and then building eagerness, thrusting and receiving, until their strength was gone and they slept, undreaming, too tired to brood that this time might have been their last.

  Fost had to tilt his head far back to see the top of the blue ice wall. It hadn't occurred to him it would rise so high. The chill seemed to beat from it in waves.

  He turned away to hunker by the fire Moriana had built at the glacier's foot. She toasted the last remnants of their meat on Fost's metal spit. Excited, they had risen with the sun and marched on without breaking fast. Within three hours they had reached the farthest extent of the glacier-swallowing sheet of ice. Now was time for resting, eating and taking counsel.