"Go, you idiots!" he bellowed.
Cee stood, but only to draw a better bead on the Minister. A bolt hissed past her. She turned, sighted in on the crossbowman, and returned fire. Blays glanced at the field. Torchlight gleamed on swords. Arrows and bolts streamed back and forth. A half-crumbled wall shielding a squad of Spirish troops exploded under a hammer of nether. A team of norren warriors charged the exposed men, heedless of the broken wood hailing down around them. Much too early to predict an outcome, and reinforcements could arrive to bolster the Minister's numbers at any moment, but it appeared Dante's plan had worked.
Blays dove into the shadows. On the neighboring platform, Dante and the Minister were obscured by whirling streams of stars. They lashed at each other like two gods, nether sizzling and bursting like water poured on a raging stove. From the vantage of the netherworld, the flat was awash in blinding silver light, flash after flash strobing across the night. As Blays ran toward them, Dante fell back, his straining face skeletal and ghastly in the glare.
"Where is my star?" the Minister said.
Dante sent a spike of nether at his eye, but the man flicked it aside. Dante grinned, teeth flashing. "It's gone. Just like your insane dream of vengeance."
Light burst so brightly Blays threw a hand over his face. Unable to see, he tripped on a pile of rubble but landed with little pain, still in that place where an object's physical nature reflected only dimly through the nether. Fifty feet away, Dante lay on his side, kicking away. The Minister stood over him with shadows in hand.
"I wouldn't say it's gone. It's just going to take longer. I'll start with you." The darkness swelled in the Minister's hands. Blays got up and ran. The Minister pointed a finger at Dante's forehead. "And everyone you brought with you. Then I'll find out how you got here and use that path to march my armies on Narashtovik. You think you've saved your people from my justice? Fuck you. You've saved nothing."
Nether gushed from his finger. Dante cried out. Nether swooped wildly, like bees afire, and then there was another flash, the largest yet. Dante lay unmoving on the flat. The Minister reached for a knife.
Blays was in mid-air, leaping off a downed wall. The instant before he landed, he exited the nether into the physical world, where flesh was flesh and steel was steel, and buried both swords to the hilt in the Minister's back.
41
Bouncing. That's what he was doing: bouncing, repeatedly, on something curved but also kind of sharp. His head was full of pain and a lot of fog. Wet stuff was falling on him. The stuff was rain. Legs moved beneath him, splashing the mud, but they didn't seem to be his. He knew the boots, though. They belonged to Blays.
Swords rang in the night, along with the screams and shouts that typically accompanied such things. The commotion was a ways to his right, however, so it seemed safe to continue bouncing while someone else did all the hard work. In the corner of his vision, he saw another set of feet splashing beside Blays. Cee ran with them, bow in hand. She looked all right. That was good. She had been very helpful in the last few months. Hard to find people like that.
"Say 'The Minister is dead,'" Blays said to her. "In whatever gobbledegook they speak here."
"The Minister's dead!" Cee cried in Weslean. "But all is not lost! Withdraw to the trunk and take shelter in the rounds!"
Blays chuckled. "That sounded like improvisation. Keep it up."
As they ran, she repeated herself twice more. Dante swung up his head. It was too dark and cluttered with debris to get a good picture, but the section of his brain versed in martial matters observed that two teams of norren were advancing through enemy opposition while staying largely shielded from the Spirish crossbowmen, most of whom were pinned by a mixed squad of Narashtovik and norren archers. Black missiles zipped back and forth across a no man's land of empty space between makeshift fortifications of broken flats. For some reason, Blays appeared to be headed in that direction.
Dante cleared the gunk from his throat. "Why are you running toward the worst of the murder?"
Blays stiffened, altering the tempo of the bouncing. "Because I'm not a fan of you bleeding to death on my shoulder. How do you feel?"
"Bounced."
"Not deathy?"
"I blocked most of his strike. Wouldn't have been able to block another. Is he really dead?"
"Pretty sure."
"How sure?" Dante said. "Last time he walked away from having a six-hundred-foot tree chopped out from under him."
"Fortunately, when I was in the palace, I got some practice stabbing him in the heart. This time, I was much better at it. And did it ten times instead of once. Then cut off his head."
"I always thought the secret of your success was your thoroughness."
Blays' head jerked around. He veered toward a cluster of branches. There, Mourn and a dozen norren had gathered to prepare for their next push.
Blays set Dante on his feet and walked up to Mourn, breathing hard. "Time to do some fleeing."
Mourn looked between the humans. "Have we done all that we came to do?"
"And then some."
The norren drew a horn dangling from his neck and lifted it to the rain. The note was long and shrill. It was repeated by the horn of Narrinor, Dante's captain in the field. Dante leaned against an upturned floor as he waited for the troops to withdraw. The retreat was swift, and given the conditions of the field, extremely orderly: either the Minister's men had already begun to pull back, or the loss of their commander had set them adrift.
Somburr arrived, bloodied but intact. Ulev was missing, as was one of the monks. The sergeants ran a hasty headcount. They were down fewer than ten percent.
"Where's Ast?" Dante said.
Mourn shook his head. "He fell in the charge."
A thought hung between Dante's ears: a descendant of those destroyed by Narashtovik had finally been killed by the same.
At that moment, he had no time for guilt. "Do we have everyone still standing?"
Narrinor stepped forward. "A few are unaccounted for. But if we stay any longer, we'll all join them."
Dante's head was still foggy and thick. But it was clear even to him that they stood in the middle of an enemy capital—one they had just partially razed—and that a hundred miles of forest stood between them and land that wasn't under the direct control of the Spirish. He nodded at Narrinor. Narrinor gave the order and they withdrew from the wreckage of the tree, jogging toward the small reserve force at what was left of the roots.
As they met with the rest of their soldiers, a few bolts sailed from the neighboring loren, along with plates, sticks, and lorbells. Dante was helped onto a horse and they headed west, following the road. A handful of norren lagged behind to watch for pursuit.
Dante tried to stay awake, but he had nothing left. He slept in the saddle.
When he woke, the sun was up, the rain had stopped, and so had they. The troops sat in loose circles, eating lorbells and rubbing their eyes. Some looked unsure. Others looked shocked. The events of last night felt like a dream. Dante eased himself from his horse, every muscle aching, and walked into the middle of his people.
"We have taken Cellen," he said. "The Minister has fallen, along with his people's ability to make war. I'm not proud of what it took to accomplish that. But I am proud of you. You volunteered for an impossible task. One that might well have killed every last one of us. In doing so, you have saved Narashtovik from horrors far worse than we witnessed last night. I thank you. And so do all our people."
He lowered his eyes. There was no applause or cheers, but he saw a few smiles. When they were ready to resume travel, he gave his horse to a soldier whose wounds hadn't yet been seen to by one of the monks. The road was so muddy the troops found it easier to walk beside it.
Blays caught up to him. "Nice bit of morale boosting there."
"It never feels like enough," Dante said.
"I'm sure that constant self-dissatisfaction is what makes you such a fine leader."
"Th
en is your constant self-satisfaction the reason you've never looked for a crown?"
"That sounds more than plausible." Blays glanced up at the loren they were passing beneath, the shadows of its flats crossing his face. "You didn't use Cellen to bring down the tree, did you?"
"Do you want the truth?"
"I can't know that until I hear it. Either way, I get to blame you, so there's that."
"But you already know it, don't you?"
They looked at each other. "What was it like?" they blurted at the same time.
Blays laughed. "I saw a bunch of stars. Like I was walking across the night sky. Only I didn't have a body. It didn't even feel like I was me."
"Like Arawn's field?"
"Sort of. Different than they say. More like...how the wind must feel. Separate from it all, yet able to touch everything at once."
"For me, it was like being presented with a world of doors," Dante said. "Each door opened to a world of its own. Inside was anything I could have imagined."
"Anything?" Blays rubbed his chin. "So could you have made yourself a hundred feet tall?"
"I didn't see that one," he laughed. "But I wasn't looking for it."
"What were you planning to do with it? Before I screwed everything up?"
"I don't know."
"Bullshit. You always have a plan. Ten plans. Which was it?"
"I would have lived a thousand years," Dante said. "And when Cellen returned, if I'd found it, I might have lived a thousand more."
Blays gazed across the forest. "Why?"
"To live a thousand years." His boots crunched on the snow. "And, if I were doing my job, to keep Narashtovik safe all the while."
Blays gave Dante a sly look. "You were tempted, though, weren't you?"
"Why would you ask that?"
"You're right. As usual, I already know the answer." It began to rain again and Blays pulled up his hood, concealing his expression. "But you didn't."
They were quiet a minute. "What happened in the palace with the Minister?"
Blays explained the number of surprises he'd run into. "Next time I'm about to stab someone in his sleep, you might remember to tell me he's the most powerful nethermancer in the world."
"He wasn't," Dante said. "I'd just worn myself out. And I had no idea he was a nethermancer."
"I'm not sure if that makes it better or worse."
"He was asleep. It shouldn't have mattered if he was an elephant."
Blays grinned and shook his head.
After a few miles, Dante thought to finally loon Nak. "It's finished."
Nak cheered so loudly Dante yanked back his head in pain.
"We're not out of the woods yet," Dante replied. "Literally or metaphorically. Narashtovik won't truly be safe until I seal the tunnel behind us. Even then, the Spirish will want revenge more than ever."
"What did you do this time?" Nak said.
"What I had to. I'll tell you when I'm home. I don't know all the details myself yet."
He closed the connection, picked Cee from the crowd of norren and soldiers, and walked beside her. "So how did you find it? We could have searched that field for a year and still missed it."
She tipped back her head. "I have my ways."
"I see. Sheer luck."
"Hardly. I saw a body curled around something, holding its hands to its chest. Figured there was only one thing more precious to a person than their own life."
A slow frown spread across his face. "We're lucky he didn't hand it to the Minister before the tree fell."
"Was it just luck?" She laughed wryly. "I figured he meant to run off and use it for himself."
"Why didn't he? While the tree was falling? Do you have to be in touch with the nether?"
"I don't know. And we never will."
He supposed she was right, but that didn't stop him from thinking about it as they continued to march. He got no closer to the answers.
Mourn's pickets came in. They'd ambushed and killed a couple Spirish scouts dogging the procession. At a bridge over an icy stream, Dante waited on the other side for the troops to cross. He ordered them to get off the road and head overland. Once they were on their way, he moved into the earth and smoothed away their tracks in the mud. To anyone following them, it would look as if they'd trudged up or down the stream in an effort to hide their passage. The enemy scouts could waste hours searching for leads that weren't there.
Over the day, they moved further and further from the road. The rain swelled from a trickle to a storm, washing out their tracks. With little chance of being spotted except by chance, they sheltered the night in a loren, allowing the soldiers a full night's sleep. In the morning, the scouts reported a few strangers in the vicinity, but they turned out to be citizens foraging for something besides lorbells. It was possible they hadn't yet heard of the devastation of their capital.
Dante continued the trek. Within a few days, the last of the lorens stood behind them. With Ast gone, Dante wasn't certain he'd be able to find his way back to the tunnel through the mountains. Fortunately, Somburr corrected their course. After a long leg of pine forests and snowy hills, Dante gazed across a valley at the tunnel.
It was already afternoon, so they camped outside it, meaning to be rested for the long march to the great hall halfway across it. In the morning, once everyone was inside, Dante called to the rock and sealed the last thirty feet of the tunnel with a plug of solid stone.
A bit of ice had formed around the vents, but there was no sign it had been used by others. After two days of travel, they emerged into a clear, cold morning and breathed the Gaskan air.
Very soon, they looked on Narashtovik. Though rumors had flown, Olivander hadn't revealed the nature of their mission to the people. Their return was met with simple curiosity. Until they reached the Citadel. Then, cheers poured down so loudly they threatened to shake loose the walls.
As the others were fed, bathed, and otherwise treated to whatever they needed, Dante was hustled upstairs to the Council chambers. One of the many perks of command. The other nine members were brought in, along with Captain Narrinor, who had witnessed much of the battle Dante hadn't been privy to. Over the next several hours, Dante, Somburr, Pinya, and Narrinor explained exactly what had happened during the venture, particularly what had taken place once they'd decided to move on Cellen.
There were few inquiries until it came to when Blays had died outside the palace.
"Pardon the interruption." Olivander leaned over the table. "You say he died?"
"That's correct," Dante said.
"But I saw him walking around the courtyard."
"We'll get to that." Dante went on with the explanation.
He'd only reached the point where he and Somburr had leapt down from the tree when Olivander leaned forward again. "So you decided to chop down a tree housing thousands of civilians?"
"Correct."
The big man shifted. "Do you think your judgment might have been clouded by the fact Blays had just died?"
"Of course it was."
"I make this point because this entire conflict was spawned by an atrocity our people once committed against theirs. Now, in the course of defending ourselves, we have committed a second."
Dante gazed across the table. "Would you have done differently?"
Olivander pursed his lips, then laughed wryly. "Yes. I would have. But only because it never would have occurred to me to attempt such a thing."
"And we're agreed there was nothing more important than stopping the invasion of Narashtovik?"
"Of course."
"At that point in time, it seemed like the only option with any chance of success. Decide for yourselves if I made the right decision."
Olivander sighed. "This isn't a trial. We're just trying to understand what happened. Please, continue."
Dante did so, through the felling of the tree and the subsequent search for and discovery of Cellen.
"That's how you did it." Tarkon whooped, glancing around
the table in merriment. "That's how you brought Blays back."
Several of them laughed in wonder. Wellimer, the young defector, creased his brow. "Is that true?"
Dante folded his arms. "Do you know another way to return the dead to life?"
"It's just—"
"Consider the context," Somburr said, rolling his eyes. "A mere two hundred of us. In the heart of enemy lands hundreds of miles from home. Closed in on by a man whose talents could rival anyone here. Who had immediate access to several hundred soldiers, the capability to summon hundreds more in a matter of minutes, and many thousands within days. At that moment, in that place, it was more important to remove Cellen than to put it to any specific use."
"But it's Cellen," Wellimer insisted. "An object capable of anything. To use it to restore the life of a single person..."
Dante got to his feet. "I am the leader of this Council and the city it is pledged to protect. May you question me? Yes. Always. That is how we improve. But I've just done the impossible. And you're quibbling with me that I should have done better?"
Silence shrouded the table. Tarkon was the first to laugh. "Shades of Cally."
Those who had known the old man laughed. After a moment, Dante did too.
* * *
As Olivander had said, it wasn't a trial; no punishments were handed out. Instead, they scheduled a feast to honor those who'd put their lives on the line for the city. It was decided to send a diplomatic mission to Spiren—even to offer reparations, if it was possible to do so for such a tragedy—but later, when the weather in the mountains had grown calmer. And, hopefully, so had the tempers in Corl.
Before the feast, Dante prepared a speech, a longer version of the one he'd given to the soldiers the day after the battle in Weslee. But when the time came, and all the eyes in the hall fixed on him, he had only one thing to say:
"As long as I live, it will be in service to this city, my home."
He sat. Olivander had much more to say, and said it well, but Dante had little mind for it. Instead, he was adrift in himself. Some had been lost, including the lives of Lew and Ast, and others had been gained, but for the most part, things were little different than they'd been before the emergence of Cellen from its thousand-year slumber. It seemed wrong to suffer so much strife and earn so little progress. As always, it felt like less justice had been meted out than was deserved. Not for the first time, he wondered why Arawn would allow such bad things to happen and offer so little in the way of consolation.
The Black Star (Book 3) Page 63