by Tad Williams
Half a dozen men were backed into the corner of the lavish tent, which was so full of lamps the interior seemed bright as day. Behind them, mostly hidden by the guards, stood a smaller figure with dark hair. Barrick could feel the blood racing in his veins-holy blood, god's blood. He leveled his sword calmly, as though he could pierce all the guards with one thrust, which at that heady moment did not feel impossible.
Careful-you will overstep… warned Ynnir's quiet voice, but Barrick could hardly hear it through the roaring triumph of his thoughts. Find yourself, manchild.
Oh, but I have found myself, he thought. And I have found our enemy. "Step out, Sulepis, you coward!" he shouted at the shape half-hidden behind the guards. "You have thrown men's lives at us like they were stones. Will you test your own arm?"
The one who stepped out was not the man Barrick expected. In fact, it was not a man at all, but a woman, strongly built and with her black hair cut short. She was clearly a Xixian but broader than any of the guards. She had a brutish look in her small eyes.
"Who you, little flea?" she demanded, her accent thick, her voice deep and hoarse.
"The autarch's death-and yours if you are hiding him, woman."
The woman laughed, showing discolored teeth. "I not autarch's wife! I am Tanyssa-I am Royal Strangler of Seclusion!" She lifted her surprisingly large hands to show she held a long knife in one and dangled a red silken cord from the other. "Come. I send you to hell."
The old Barrick would have wasted time on foolish doubts about fighting a woman, but this Barrick leaped forward, sword swinging. The guards bunched together in front of him-apparently the strangler's life was more valuable than theirs-and he suddenly realized he had set himself a problem that might be beyond even the skills the Fireflower had brought him. He managed to kill two of them, but the other four had him surrounded and the strangler Tanyssa was doing her best to reach his unprotected side with her blade when three dark shapes slipped into the tent, yellow eyes aglow.
"Do you require any help, Barrick Eddon?" Longscratch asked.
Barrick deflected a blow meant to take his head off and then spun away from the woman's long knife. "I would accept some, yes."
A moment later, the Tricksters were among the guards, ivory rashayi digging into flesh and even through Xixian armor. Barrick leaped over a newly fallen corpse toward the muscular woman. She spun to pull something from a golden chest.
"Where is the autarch?" Barrick demanded, his blade only a quivering inch from her back. Where is he?"
She turned around slowly to reveal she was holding a small piece of clouded crystal in her fingers and grinning like a castle gargoyle. "This to protect Golden One," the strangler said with a note of satisfaction. "Golden One gone now-I use to kill you!" And as Barrick stared in astonishment, Tanyssa popped the murky gem into her mouth like a sweetmeat.
Sand sprang into the air as if from every corner of the tent, a whirling cloud that blinded Barrick, but the sand rushed past him as though the strangler were its target, flowing over her, covering her body in tiny particles of stone. In the rush of air and sand, most of the lanterns blew out. The guards, suddenly uninterested in Barrick and the Qar, broke away and ran shouting in terror toward the tent door.
The thing that had been Tanyssa seemed to be getting larger but also more shapeless, no woman anymore but only a vague figure, big as an Ettin and growing bigger, with clublike hands that sprouted spiky claws. It had eyes like stars behind fog and a mouth that seemed a pit leading down into darkness. An unlucky guard that had not escaped was caught and shoved toward it by one of the Tricksters; the thing snatched up the screaming Xixian with talons that clacked like broken bricks, then lifted him to its gaping hole of a mouth, swallowed the hapless southerner to the shoulders and bit down. As the rest of the guard's still-twitching body fell to the monster's feet one of the Tricksters flung a lamp, but it bounced off the demon's stony skin and spread gobbets of fire along the tent wall.
"Run!" Longscratch shouted as he scrambled for the door. "We cannot kill a Stone Swallower!"
Flames ran everywhere. Barrick pushed his way through the smoke and followed the Tricksters outside. A moment later, with a bellow like a hamstrung bull, the thing that had been Tanyssa burst through the blazing silk in a shower of sparks.
Who do I pray to now? Barrick wondered as he dragged himself to his feet once more. The gods are asleep! Arrows whipcracked past him. The other Qar were hurrying toward the scene, but although a dozen arrows hit the demon, they bounced away and the thing hardly seemed to notice. Even the Fireflower voices had gone quiet in confusion or fear.
"Turn and run, Barrick Eddon!" Longscratch shouted. "There is no killing a beast like that. It is too strong…!"
"No! It will kill dozens of our warriors if we let it go!" he shouted back. The thing had caught Blackspine's horse and although the Trickster leaped off and escaped, the Stone Swallower was tearing the still living animal into pieces. Shouting as loud as he could, as much to keep out the terrible sound of the horse's death as to steel himself, Barrick picked up his sword and ran forward, then slashed at the thing's arm. It was like attacking a stone wall; the monster scarcely seemed to feel it. Other Qar joined him, jabbing at the thing with spears but achieving no more than Barrick had. The Stone Swallower caught those who came too close and tore them apart with horrifying speed and strength. Barrick picked up a spear and threw it, but it bounced off uselessly. The inhuman silhouette stood stark against the burning tent, a victim in each hand. Barrick couldn't tell if the ruined corpses were horses or Qar.
The beast's bloody, scraping hand closed on him and this time all Barrick could do was hack at it over and over until the demon flung him to the ground like a man harried by biting flies. The fall dashed the air out of his lungs; for a moment blackness flowed over him as though he had tumbled into a cold, lightless river. He felt the Fireflower folding around him as if to ease him into the waiting dark, but then he heard one of the Tricksters screeching in agony, and Barrick swam back toward the light and the world.
As he tried to struggle to his feet, a huge, icy hand curled around him. He smelled breath that stank like molten iron as the Stone Swallower lifted him toward its gaping mouth. Most of the strength had run from Barrick's body as if he were a stuffed doll that had lost its sawdust. From the corner of his eye he could see flames, but now they had sprouted in a most unexpected place-out on the water of the Bay, great flaming banners rippling above the autarch's ships. He could not understand what that meant and, dying, did not much care. A voice drifted up from his memory-not the Fireflower, but old Shaso, berating him: "You always ask to be given quarter when you tire, but your enemies will not care!"
This thing thinks it's already killed me…!
The black maw stretched wide just before him. He knew he would have only one chance. He braced himself in the monster's grip, then shoved his sword as far as he could into the thing's mouth.
His blade vanished, ripped from his grasp by the violence of the creature's convulsion. It dropped him, then reared up over him with a horrible gurgling howl so loud it seemed the sky itself had torn loose from its vault, a seemingly unending howl of fury and pain. It gasped and coughed and gurgled wetly. A bloody, smoke-colored stone fell to the sand beside Barrick. Then the sky, or something just as big and dark, crashed down on top of him and stole the world away.
26
By the Light of Burning Ships "The villagers of Tessideme did not want the boy to go on such a perilous quest, for he was much loved, but Adis the Orphan knew this was the task for which the gods had marked him."
-from "A Child's Book of the Orphan, and His Life and Death and Reward in Heaven"
Briony's moment of hope was short-lived. As the Xixians on the waterfront fled from the attack of the airborne Rooftoppers and their birds, a force of the autarch's cavalry burst out from the town and came thundering down Market Road toward the harbor.
Briony joined Eneas and his remaining soldiers as t
hey wheeled to face this new and deadly charge; all the nearby Qar quickly joined them. Some of the fairies were mounted on horses as beautiful and slender as the sticklike creatures she had seen in ancient mosaics, and the riders were even stranger than their mounts. Some of these new allies weren't even people, but foxes and wolves and wild forest cats whose very presence made the Syannese horses skittish.
"Do not lose heart!" Eneas cried to his men, who had begun to scatter in fear as the alien Qar came among them. "These are allies! Together we will bring the southern Falcon down!"
They met the charging Xixians at the place where Market Road crossed the dock road. As the two troops crashed together, the clamor of steel on steel and the screaming of both horses and men was so heart-breaking that Briony, still a dozen yards back from the fighting, wanted to clap her hands over her ears until the dreadful noise stopped.
Why was I so stubborn? Why did I think I should ride to war like a man? She was terrified.
But even the bravest of these knights must be frightened, she suddenly thought. Even Eneas himself. It didn't matter why she was here-she was here.
Briony had little time after that to think about anything except staying alive, dealing enough blows to defend herself, or to help an ally in need-she saved a bulky, bearlike creature from a mounted spearman by hammering the Xixian's helmet with her sword and knocking him out of the saddle. The bear-thing did not stop to thank her, but only hurried off to another part of the fray.
She stayed back from the thickest fighting where her smaller size and reach would be a disadvantage, striking only when she had to. If the southerners managed to push past on just one side, Briony's company and their allies would be caught between two halves of the autarch's forces and quickly squeezed to death. Torches were streaming toward Market Road from the fields and the town-hundreds, maybe thousands more of the autarch's foot soldiers still making their way to the battle. Eneas was too deep in the battle to see it, fighting for his life-without a miracle, there would be no escape from this nightmare except death.
Then the bay behind her exploded into flame.
No, not the bay, Briony saw as she struggled to turn her startled horse. Tongues of fire ran up the mast and along the furled sails of the nearest Xixian ship; as she stared, a dozen more vessels, large and small, kindled one after another. The flames seemed to leap across the bay like living things, two or three southern ships catching fire at a time until dozens were ablaze and the wavering red light of their burning fell across the battlefield as brightly as if the setting sun had returned. All around her, voices called out in surprise, wonder, and horror.
In the midst of this apparent world's ending, both sides again flung themselves at each other in the scarlet glow. With their means of escape now gone, the Xixians fought with growing desperation. The line of battle moved like a living thing. One moment the Qar and Syannese seemed poised to overrun the Xixians and drive them out of their own camp, then a few moments later the shape of the struggle convulsed again and the Syannese and the Qar became the desperate ones as they were forced back to the edge of Brenn's Bay.
A crackling arc of fire leaped out from behind Briony and set one of the nearest Xixian tents ablaze. A dozen more fiery streaks followed and several struck buildings along the waterfront, setting flames in their rafters and roofs. A few even reached the town's watchtower and within moments it, too, was blazing like a great torch.
Fire arrows! Where was this attack coming from? The water? The bay was black and shiny as pitch, ships and water both striped with smears of shuddering, blazing light. The autarch's ships were all on fire now, the survivors swimming for their lives-who could be shooting arrows?
Her answer came a moment later as long, dark shapes began to slide up onto the beach, dozens of long, low boats pushed through the shallows by dark figures who whooped and shouted as they dropped the boats and came running up from the water, some already loosing more fiery arrows into the Xixian camp. Why were they helping? Who were they?
Skimmers! she realized in astonishment as the first of the long-armed newcomers came sprinting up the beach and threw themselves onto the nearest Xixians.
"Egye-Var!" they screamed, jabbing with their fishing spears and slashing with strange swords as short and heavy bladed as butcher's cleavers. The southerners staggered back in dismay at this latest and most unexpected assault.
Briony felt a cry well up in her own throat. "Erivor-and Eddon!" she screamed, spurring her horse back into the thick of the fighting.
Barrick watched the girl crawling through the maze as though he were a bird hovering high above her, distant and detached. He could see how hopelessly far she was from the way out, but he could not find his voice to tell her and was not even certain he should bother. The black-haired girl looked familiar but he could not summon her name. That disappointed him, although he did not know why.
She is precious, a voice told him. More precious than even you know. It was the blind king speaking, he knew, but he did not understand why this nameless young woman should mean anything to him.
First of the last, the king told him. Last of the first.
What did that mean? Why was it so hard to think?
Do not forsake her, the king said.
He tried to ask, What do you mean? But nothing would pass his lips. He might have been some mute creature, a bird, a horse, watching things far beyond its understanding.
First of the last, the voice said, quieter this time, farther away. Last of the first. Marriage of the dead. Hope for the living…
What does it mean? But still he could not speak; the words were only in his own head, only in his own lonely, friendless thoughts.
No, Barrick Eddon.
The voice sounded different this time, closer-and it was a woman's voice. Could it be the dark-haired girl? Was she aware of him at last?
Come back to us, Barrick Eddon. Come back. It is not time for this journey yet. The roads are wrong. The darkness began to slip away like sand through an hourglass and a different, brighter world began to appear behind it.
"No!" Barrick cried, finding his voice at last. "She'll be lost! She'll be lost…"
"She still has a chance," someone said to him-another female voice, this one deeper and also more familiar than the first. "Do not give up hope."
A face was looking down at him, a pale oval with black eyes and an expression so calmly patient it might have been carved in marble-Saqri, the queen of the Fay.
"Hope…?" he asked. He felt light-headed, but at the same time his body ached badly. A shadow, he remembered-a great shadow had fallen over him and pushed him into the darkness. "So dark…!"
"It is all one thing," Saqri said. "What you saw, what you fear, what you fought. All one thing concealed in a thousand, thousand guises. And that one thing is oblivion. Remember that, Barrick Eddon. The worst that can happen is that you cease to exist. Is that so bad?" Saqri had shed her battle armor and now wore a robe of shining white silk. A smaller Qar woman stood beside her, her angular features and animal eyes making her seem both less human and less frightening than the queen. "This is Sunset Pearl," Saqri said. "She is a healer."
Urayanu, the Fireflower voices murmured. She of the Strengthening Touch.
"What happened?" Something was missing. How had he come here?
"You destroyed the Stone Swallower, then you fell."
"That thing, that woman or… monster… Who was she?"
Saqri shook her head. "Some minion of the autarch's. But the stone she had from her master-that was a great weapon indeed. A broken bit of tile, a small piece of Silvergleam's ruined moon-palace-a kulik Khors, as some mortals named them. As the greater Tiles can open a door across the roads of Grandmother Void, so too can one of those bits of stone. But it only opens doors to a very unpleasant place, and when the way is open, one of the things that lives there comes through to inhabit the body of the Stone Swallower. That is what you saw. That is what you fought." She turned to the other Qar woman. "Ho
w are the manchild's wounds?"
"The worst was that the thing fell on him in its death throes," the small woman said. "He will survive, my lady, but he needs rest."
"And that he will have. Thank you, Sunset Pearl." Saqri reached down and touched her cool fingers to Barrick's brow. "You did a brave thing, manchild. You set yourself against a terrible, pitiless foe who would have killed many…"
He suddenly remembered what had been happening before his encounter with the Stone Swallower. "The autarch-all those soldiers-what happened? Did we beat him?"
"The southern king is no longer in the camp by the bay," Saqri told him. "But I think you guessed that already. He has taken his strongest forces and gone into the depths, so the danger is as great as ever. We and our unexpected mortal allies only had to fight troops he left behind, though even those were many times our number." She told him of the success of their plan, how the bird-mounted archers and the Skimmers with their flaming arrows and their small, silent boats had astonished the Xixians. "Only the surprise of our cousins' attacks saved us," Saqri finished. "The southerners broke and the survivors fled into the hills, so for the moment we are safe." She shook her head so gently her glossy black hair barely moved. "My husband was right. He often told me that one day we would fight beside our sundered kin again. I was certain he was only hoping for something that could never be."
"And you?" Barrick asked. He was tired and in pain, but he felt a stronger connection to the queen than ever before. "Are you well, Saqri? Have you rested?"
"I have just risen from a hundred years spent in unwilling sleep, Barrick Eddon. I will not need to rest again until my race is run." She touched her fingers together to form Spider's Sleep, which announced a moment of change. "Time is important to us now… and time is short. I am going now to meet with the mortal soldiers who aided us and talk with them of what will come next. I would be glad to have you with me." She looked at him for a long moment. "But I think Sunset Pearl would be angry with me if I brought you out. You have been near the edge and are only just back." She hesitated, something he did not remember seeing from her. "Unless it is that you miss the chance to speak with your own kind?"