Courage to Sacrifice

by Andy Peloquin

  “Is here.” Aravon placed the book on the Secret Keeper’s chest, beside the ice saffron blossoms.

  “Take…it.” Zaharis’ gaze lifted to Aravon’s face, fixed him with a piercing stare. “Use it…to live…your life.” The Secret Keeper’s hands faltered, his fingers growing weak. His eyelids seemed to grow heavy, fluttered slowly closed. “Tell…Darrak…”

  “Tell him what?” Skathi pressed. Tears streamed from her emerald eyes. “What do we tell him?”

  With the last of his strength, the Secret Keeper formed the silent words. “I…loved…him…to…the end.”

  One final flutter, a faint twitch of his fingers, then Zaharis’ hand fell onto his chest—onto the flower he’d dedicated his life to finding, and the book that contained his life’s work—and moved no more.

  Silence hung thick in the air above Zaharis’ body. Skathi, Noll, Belthar, and Aravon stared down at the Secret Keeper—their fellow Grim Reaver, their comrade, their friend. For long seconds, no one spoke; none could find words.

  A keening cry broke the stillness. Belthar, sorrow rumbling from his throat, broke down. Sobs shook his massive shoulders and his huge fingers closed over Zaharis’ lifeless fingers.

  Skathi, too, wept, tears streaming from her emerald eyes. One hand joined Belthar’s on the Secret Keeper’s chest, and her other wrapped around the big man’s shoulders, pulled him close. Together, they mourned the death of the man who had been such an important, integral part of their lives since the day they first met.

  Damn, Zaharis. Despite his sorrow, Aravon couldn’t help a small smile. Of course you’d go and make your final words something that noble.

  Zaharis had sacrificed himself for love—the love he’d seen blossoming between Belthar and Skathi. He’d thrown himself at Tyr Farbjodr to save Belthar’s life, knowing full well that he’d never survive the clash.

  Everything he’d done, it had all been for love. Love for his Mistress, and for his divine calling to delve into Her secrets, the hidden mysteries of life. Love of knowledge, of his science and alchemy. Love for his fellow man, for the world he’d wanted to leave behind—a world better off than the one into which he’d been born. Love for his companions, the Grim Reavers he’d fought with every shred of strength to protect.

  And, most of all, love for Darrak. Even after the Secret Keeper had tried to kill him, his love hadn’t waned. Zaharis had so desperately wanted to find the ice saffron—to complete his life’s work, his quest for the Elixir of Creation, true. Yet he’d done it with the hope that proving its existence would earn his Mistress’ gratitude, and a place once more in Her service. At the side of Darrak, the man he’d loved to his last breath.

  Aravon’s smile grew. May we all be so fortunate to find someone who loves us half as much, my friend.

  Cloth rustled and mud squelched across from him, and Aravon lifted his eyes from Zaharis’ face to find Noll rising. The scout’s face was hard, his jaw clenched tight, as if he fought back the desire to join the weeping Skathi and Belthar.

  “I think…” Noll swallowed, hard, cleared his throat. “I think I’ll go pick some flowers, Captain.” Moisture brimmed in his eyes and he brushed it away, almost angry. “He’d have wanted us to bring some back.” He shook his head. “Stubborn bastard always had to prove he was right!”

  “He did, didn’t he?” Aravon gave a hoarse chuckle.

  Noll looked at Aravon. “Turns out, this time, he really was.” The words seemed to shatter his defenses, and a flood of tears streamed down his cheeks. Whirling on his heel, the scout stalked toward the tunnel where the captives had been held—where the ice saffron had grown, deep within the heart of the icy Wastelands, as the Fehlan legends of the Reginkunnr had said.

  Aravon watched him go in silence. Noll deserved a moment to grieve his fallen friends in peace. They all did.

  Slowly, the world swam into focus around the departing scout. The high, dark stone cliffs stood a few hundred yards away, encircling the muddy base of the pit mine, their sheer faces stern and forbidding in the light of the angry red sky high above.

  A sky as red as the muck covering the bottom of the mine. Blood still flowed through rivulets, formed into puddles, stained the flesh of the corpses littering the mud. Eirdkilrs, their braided blond hair and filthy white ice bear pelts dark with crimson. Captive Fehlans, Princelanders, and Tauld, with ragged clothes torn to shreds by axes, spears, and clubs. Flesh pulped, bones shattered, skulls crushed, chests caved in, limbs and necks twisted at terrible angles. Dead beyond Aravon’s desire to count, and far too few still standing. Standing, sitting, kneeling in the mud, or collapsed against the stone cliffs. Eyes gaunt, faces hollow, a look of utter horror, misery, or blank nothingness in their eyes.

  The screams, shrieks, and groans of the wounded and dying reverberated off the stone walls, growing louder with every slow, sorrowful beat of Aravon’s heart. The coppery tang of blood mingled with the stink of the thick mud, bowels and bladders voided in death, guts emptied into the muck, and the acid seeping from torn stomachs and intestines. The stink of battle, as inevitable as the pain, exhaustion, and the weeping of men, women, and children mourning their lost loved ones.

  They could not ride away from this battle, as they had at Hangman’s Hill. Could not hide out in the Prince’s Palace in the aftermath of the carnage of Icespire. The five Grim Reavers still standing were these captives’ only hope of survival. It fell to him and his companions to care for the living, comfort the dying, and bury the dead. Only then could they move on. Only then could they begin the long, arduous trek north.

  Across hostile territory, through lands utterly devoid of food and shelter, Aravon and his companions had to find a way to bring these captives home. The burden of that monumental task weighed heavy on his shoulders, dragged at his pain- and grief-numbed mind.

  He looked to Colborn; the Lieutenant still knelt beside Rangvaldr with his head bowed and eyes closed, shattered arm cradled to his chest. Then to Skathi and Belthar, who had risen, hands clasped together for comfort, and lifted their eyes from Zaharis’ lifeless body to regard the captives.

  A shrieking, piercing cry echoed through the pit mine. Sent a shiver down Aravon’s spine. No sound of sorrow or grief this, but one that rang with fury, rage, and bloodlust. A war cry, loosed from the throats of battle-hardened warriors.

  Ice flooded his veins as his gaze snapped upward, to the top of the mine. There, scores of Eirdkilrs had appeared, giants clad in their heavy furs, wielding weapons of wood and steel. The barbarians’ eyes locked on the carnage in the pit. On the captives still standing, weeping, and mourning their fallen comrades. On the bodies of Tyr Farbjodr and the demon he’d summoned through his magical portal into the frozen hell. On Aravon and the three Grim Reavers.

  Raising their weapons high, the Eirdkilrs gave a wild, howling cry, and charged down the ramp to attack.

  Chapter Seventy-Two

  Aravon couldn’t summon the strength to move.

  The battle with Tyr Farbjodr had sapped the last of his vigor. Rangvaldr and Zaharis’ deaths had drained his emotions, left him hollow, numb with sorrow. Even as his eyes followed the Eirdkilrs on their descent down the ramp into the pit mine, he felt only a sense of helpless hopelessness.

  We’re doomed. Despair wormed into his mind. We can’t win.

  He and five Grim Reavers—four, though Colborn would insist on battling, broken arm or no—couldn’t hope to repel so many Eirdkilrs. At least eighty, though there could be more on the way. Even if the five or six hundred captives still living threw in their lot, the battle would be gruesomely one-sided. No one within Illtgrund would walk away from this.

  Had Aravon faced the prospect of death alone, he’d have thrown himself into combat without hesitation. Dragged as many Eirdkilrs to death with him before he fell to their massive axes, clubs, and spears.

  But he wasn’t alone. His friends—the last of the comrades who had been his family for so many months—stood by his side. They would
fight, and they would die. As would the prisoners he’d fought so hard to free. The Deid, Eyrr, Fjall, Myrr, Tauld, and Princelanders around him would never see their homes. He had succeeded in killing Tyr Farbjodr, yet the victory would ring hollow in the face of so many civilian deaths.

  Yet it was the presence of those civilians that flooded him with one last burst of desperate strength. Grim resolve hardened in his mind, tightened his jaw muscles.

  We can’t win, but by the Swordsman, we will fight!

  He was moving before he realized it. Racing the five steps to where his spear protruded from Tyr Farbjodr’s corpse, the iron spike driven deep into his skull. Ignoring the pain in his chest, his arms and legs, his wrist, and his back, he gripped the spear’s wooden haft and, with a mighty yank, tore it free. Blood and gore sprayed as he whirled the spear around once and brought it spinning around to a guard stance.

  His muscles tensed in expectation of the inevitable flight of arrows. The Eirdkilrs could loose hundreds of shafts in the time it took to descend into the mine. Aravon expected to feel the sting of steel, the thump of an arrowhead biting into his flesh. His armor could only hold out so long.

  Yet none came. It seemed the Eirdkilrs wanted the vengeance for their commander’s death to be up close and personal.

  Suits me just fine! He bared his teeth in a fierce snarl. They’ll find we don’t lie down and die so easily.

  He spun toward his Grim Reavers. Noll was somewhere off in the tunnel, but he’d doubtless be preparing for battle even now. Belthar and Skathi moved only a heartbeat behind him, already arming themselves. Belthar scooped up his massive axe, still stained with Tyr Farbjodr’s blood, and stepped forward to place his bulk between Skathi and the oncoming Eirdkilrs. The red-haired Agrotora scooped up her longbow and reached for an arrow.

  Her hand found only air. The quiver was empty. “Keeper take it!” Her curse echoed off the cliff walls. “See what happens when you shoot your last arrow?”

  She shouldered her bow, dropped the useless quiver, and scooped up Rangvaldr’s fallen shield and sword. Though none of the Grim Reavers could match her skill with a longbow—or a short horsebow, a crossbow, even a sling—at Camp Marshal Aravon had insisted she train with a shield and the short sword every Agrotorae wore. Now that it came time to battle, he was glad he had. She’d need those skills to stay alive long enough to deal with the Eirdkilrs.

  Aravon glanced toward Colborn, found the Lieutenant struggling to his feet. Pain shone bright in his eyes and he cradled his right arm against his chest, but he held his shield firmly in his left. Determination was etched into every line of his Fehlan features as he took his place next to Aravon.

  “Battle plan’s the same as usual, Captain?” A hint of wry humor echoed in his quiet words. “Hit the fuckers until they stop coming, yeah?”

  Despite the howling war cries, the knowledge that death came howling for them, and the exhaustion filling his muscles, Aravon couldn’t help smiling. “Hasn’t failed us yet.”

  “Let’s see what they think of this!” Skathi snarled. She brought her blade down once, hard, on the demon’s neck, severing the head. Passing her sword to her shield hand, she stooped, snatched up the grinning, horrible skull and raised it high. “Hey, you ugly cunts!” she shouted at the approaching Eirdkilrs. “This is what happened to the last tiny-peckered bastards that tangled with the Grimabrandr!” She waved the demon’s horned, serpentine head around, grunting at the weight, and hurled it toward the giants, sending it splashing into the bloodstained muck. “Come and get some for yourselves!”

  Her words had a strange effect on the approaching Eirdkilrs. Instead of goading them to rage, they seemed to hesitate. Their charge into the mine actually slowed, their steps faltering, and a look of mingled uncertainty and wonder.

  Confusion hummed within Aravon. What in the bloody hell?

  The Eirdkilrs’ charge slowed, then stopped altogether. The giants lowered their weapons and exchanged glances. A hint of awe and reverence shone in their blue-stained face.

  Then, to Aravon’s utter surprise, the eighty giants fell to one knee and bowed their heads.

  Silence hung like a leaden blanket over the pit mine. It was broken by muddy squelching from the captives. The Tauld, their massive frames a rival for the fur-clad Eirdkilrs, knelt and bowed their heads as well.

  Aravon’s jaw dropped. He stood rooted in place, frozen by shock and bewilderment. What could have come over the Eirdkilrs that they would react thus?

  “Uhhh, Captain?” Belthar rumbled at Aravon’s side. “Any idea what in the Keeper’s name is going on?”

  “They just…stopped!” Skathi hissed. “Either something’s gone terribly wrong, or terribly right. Either way—”

  Then Aravon heard it: the name, muttered by the kneeling Eirdkilrs on the path into the pit mine and taken up by the Tauld. Like a battle chant, it rose to a roaring crescendo, until it rang off the cliff walls.

  “Gunnarsdottir!” they cried. “Gunnarsdottir!”

  Aravon sucked in a breath. It can’t be!

  Yet it was.

  As the name reverberated through the mine, the eyes of every Eirdkilr and Tauld were locked on Skathi. Skathi, who stood near the demon’s body, shield and sword gripped firmly in hand. Emerald eyes blazing bright with defiance, fiery crimson locks tied back in a warrior’s braids, her unmasked face bared in a snarl as fierce as any Fehlan shieldmaiden.

  No, not any shieldmaiden. Gunnarsdottir, daughter of an ancient Tauld chieftain, fierce warrior, heroine and slayer of the Farbjodr.

  Aravon’s eyes darted to the demon’s head, and to its truncated body lying in the mud beside the now-collapsed archway. Then back to Skathi.

  The cry of “Gunnarsdottir!” echoed louder, now taken up by the Fehlans within the pit mine. They, too, knew the story of the shieldmaiden. No one looking at Skathi now—and the blood staining her face, armor, and shield, and at the monstrous corpse at her feet—would doubt that she could very well be Gunnarsdottir reborn.

  “Captain?” Skathi hissed. “Are they saying what I think they are?”

  “Yes.” Colborn spoke in a quiet voice, never taking his eyes off the kneeling giants. “Somehow, they think you’re the shieldmaiden of legend reborn.” A low sound—half-grunt, half-snort of amusement—echoed from his lips. “Rangvaldr would have loved to see this.”

  “What the fiery hell do I do, Captain?” Skathi asked.

  Aravon’s mind raced. A plan, desperate and foolhardy, flashed through his thoughts. Any Legion commander would have brushed it off as lunacy. Perhaps even had him whipped in an attempt to beat sense into him.

  And the more he thought about it, the wider his grin grew. Lunacy, certainly. Desperate, absolutely. Destined to fail? On that count, he couldn’t be certain. Half of the things they’d pulled in the last months had been equally irrational.

  “Uh oh,” Belthar rumbled. “Captain’s got that look on his face again.”

  “Ugh.” Skathi snorted. “The one that nearly gets us all killed, then happens to work out at exactly the last second, you mean?”

  “That’s the one!” Belthar shifted, his boots squelching in the mud.

  Long seconds passed as the four Grim Reavers stared at the kneeling Eirdkilrs and Tauld.

  “So, about that plan, Captain?” Skathi asked.

  Aravon’s smile stretched so wide his face hurt. “You’re right,” he told Colborn. “Rangvaldr would have loved this idea.” He turned to regard his three companions. “Here’s what we’re going to do…”

  Epilogue

  “Wait!” Prince Cedenas Toran sat up straighter in his wooden armchair, a look of dumbfounded amazement on his face. “They just let you go?”

  “Not only that!” Triumph shone in Noll’s eyes. He paused in his recounting of events only long enough to drain his goblet of Nyslian icewine—his fourth since he began speaking, and his thirtieth since their return to Camp Marshal the previous night—and stuffed a piece of cold roast chicken i
nto his mouth. “When she demanded they give us and the captives food, clothing, and supplies, they bloody well obeyed!”

  The Prince was too stunned to notice Noll’s loud, open-mouthed chewing. He stared at the four Grim Reavers in surprise. “Keeper’s teeth!”

  “That’s what we all said!” Noll nodded, smacking loudly as he polished off another goblet of wine. “Every step of the freezing cold journey back north and through Snowpass, that was pretty much all we could say!”

  Even now, nearly two weeks after leaving the Sawtooth Mountains behind, Aravon could scarcely believe he and his Grim Reavers had survived. Not only survived, but brought all five hundred and fifty-six surviving Fehlan and Princelander captives through Eirdkilr-held lands without being slaughtered.

  “One of the Tauld explained it to us,” Belthar said around a mouthful of venison. “Gunnarsdottir isn’t just a hero of legend; she’s revered, almost worshipped in the same way we Princelanders honor the Swordsman, Derelana, or the Watcher.” His heavy brow furrowed. “And there was more to her legend than Rangvaldr told us.”

  Prince Toran cocked his head. “More?” His expression grew pensive. “More than just her sacrifice to bring the mountain down atop the Farbjodr?”

  “Aye.” Belthar rumbled. “According to the Tauld version, she had hair the color of fire, which she wore pulled back into warrior’s braids like every shieldmaiden.” He glanced at Skathi’s red hair, which now hung loose and flowing around her shoulders. “But the real kicker was what happened as Gunnarsdottir fought the demon alone. As she lay dying, her body torn to shreds by the Farbjodr, its teeth feasting on her flesh, in her anguish she called on Bani and the ancient magic of Fehl. With her last breath, she vowed that she would return, on the day when the Tauld needed her most. To save her people from annihilation again.”

  Aravon’s eyes strayed toward Skathi. The archer had stayed utterly silent throughout the retelling of events, her face buried in her mug. Doubtless to hide the flush of scarlet that stained her cheeks any time the matter was mentioned.