But most of all he cried because, looming large over the arid mountains, looking down on him, was the face of his god.
As Kerberos cleared the range, Emuel went to stand beside Calabash. The ground shook under the force of the dragons’ dance and he stumbled, but Calabash nudged him back on his feet with the tip of its snout, without losing its rhythm. Emuel laughed and began to move in time with Calabash, delighting in the music rolling from the creature as it led the song.
The ancient texts, the stories, the songs, the plays – not one of them had ever talked about this; this act of sheer creativity, of beauty, of pure, unmediated joy. In the legends, dragons were killers, jealous recluses guarding hoards of treasure that they couldn’t possibly ever spend. Like most things he had been taught, Emuel was coming to realise the legends were wrong.
“What are you?” he cried.
Calabash’s voice changed, the clicks and deep thumps coming from its chest now giving way to something more breathy, less frantic. Each new element added to the song’s power. Emuel found himself swaying in time with the dragon, matching its movements exactly, like a snake caught by the gaze of a charmer.Calabash’s wings slowly flapped, fanning Emuel with a cool breeze that dusted the last of the desert from him. When the dragon brought its head low, Emuel leaned forward to look deep into its eyes, and it was then that Calabash let the song tell the dragons’ story.
DEEP WITHIN THE heart of Kerberos, beyond the storms that give voice to its wrath, lies a place of absolute silence, quieter than death, yet it is here that creation begins.
They are tiny at first, no bigger than a thought, because that is what they are; a god’s will. But soon they flicker into true being, a heartbeat clothed in flesh. They hang in the darkness, tiny pulsing lights strung like stars throughout the deity’s firmament. Even now they are calling to one another, the song growing in strength as cells divide and consciousness awakes.
Though these creatures are part of the deity itself, Kerberos marvels at the life within it, at the complexity of thought that develops as the creatures sing themselves into being.
When they are fully formed, the god begins to gather certain minerals from its atmosphere, weaving these around each dragon foetus, until they are encased in rock impervious to all but the mightiest of forces.
It is time to let its children go. Beneath Kerberos’s gaze a whole new world turns, one that has not yet heard the song of its creation. And so, the god sends its children out into the void. Hundreds upon hundreds of eggs hurtle out into space, the vast azure sphere of Kerberos quickly spiralling away from them, only for the larger planet below to gather them into its embrace. With a quick succession of terrific bangs, they hit the upper atmosphere, but it is not this that awakens the dragons, but the heat of the flames that engulfs each egg as it falls, incubating them, completing the life begun by Kerberos.
They seed the earth, the impacts cracking the shells, allowing the dragons to break out and crawl forth. They sing for their brethren, letting the music that filled them in the womb of their god reach out to others of their kind, until they are gathered as one family, waiting for the time when Kerberos will rise over this dead earth and reveal to them His will.
SO ENGROSSED WAS he in Calabash’s story that Emuel didn’t at first notice when the song came to an end. The dragons had settled down and were gazing up at Kerberos. The azure sphere was so close that Emuel could see the lightning storms flickering within the god. All was silent as the dragons waited to hear the voice of their creator. The tattoos still writhed on Emuel’s flesh, as though dancing to some unheard music.
There was a pulse of energy, a pure sheet of lightning momentarily engulfing Kerberos, washing them all in a brilliant radiance that had Emuel closing his eyes and shielding his face. Calabash raised its head and howled, the eerie ululation echoed and repeated across the herd. Emuel staggered as Calabash prodded him with the tip of his snout. For a moment his heart sank as he thought that the dragon was trying to push him away, but then he understood. Calabash was gesturing for him to climb onto its back. Emuel had already ridden the dragon a few times, and the experience had been terrifying; once he was settled, he made sure to press his legs firmly against the creature’s flanks, grabbing onto the bony protrusions that grew from the back of Calabash’s neck.
Emuel’s stomach turned over as the creature lurched forward, but he managed to stay seated. He looked back to see the herd following, the ground they had anointed now churned beneath their feet. Their advance was slow at first but soon they gathered momentum, the scenery rushing by in a blur as they raced into the mountains.
Foothills flashed past at breakneck speed, the dragons easily negotiating the rise and fall of the land as they climbed ever higher. When they had set off, Calabash had led the herd, but now others raced past the dragon and its rider, all respect for their leader forgotten in their urgent desire to reach their goal. Emuel was jerked around on the dragon’s back, though he managed to maintain his hold, even with hands that were beginning to ache from the effort of hanging on. In what seemed like no time at all, they had left the foothills and were beginning to climb the mountain range itself. Calabash didn’t once slow as it threw itself through ravines, crawled along the edges of precipices and curled its way around jagged peaks. For much of the journey Emuel closed his eyes, but when he did open them, once, he found himself staring up at dozens of dragons negotiating the ceiling of a hollow in a cliff face above him. Or were he and Calabash on the ceiling, and the other beasts on the floor? Emuel quickly shut his eyes again.
After several hours the rolling motion of Calabash’s back slowed, and Emuel looked around to find that they were now high amongst the peaks. There was almost no further for the dragons to climb. It was bitterly cold, the air so thin that Emuel’s chest laboured with each breath. He pulled his cloak tighter around himself as the dragons passed through a shallow valley and onto a plateau. All that lay above them now was the wide open sky.
The dragons came to rest here and stood for a time, silently contemplating the sky, before − as one − unfurling their wings. Emuel wondered then why the dragons hadn’t simply flown to this place far above the world. In fact, now he came to consider it, he had never seen the dragons use their wings for flight.
Calabash staggered to the left, momentarily unbalanced, and Emuel realised then that the dragons had never before flown. They were like newly-hatched chicks, ready to test their wings for the first time by throwing themselves from the nest.
The eunuch found that he no longer wanted to be on Calabash’s back, but before he could dismount, the dragon was on the move. Emuel considered throwing himself to the ground, but it was flowing so quickly beneath him that the moment he hit, he’d break every bone in his body. So he clung on, tears streaming from his eyes, as he watched the edge of the plateau rushing towards them.
Ahead, the first wave of dragons threw themselves into the air and dropped from sight. Emuel sent up a prayer, putting himself into his god’s hands, and he was still whispering the benediction when Calabash’s feet left the ground and the sky took them.
They fell.
Emuel clung on tight as the wind howled about them. All around them dragons were hurtling towards the earth. One, with scales the colour of a cornfield, collided with a spur of rock, shattered stone following the senseless dragon down, its useless wings entangled around it. Emuel cried out as he saw more dragons broken on the side of the mountain, unable to bring their wings to bear in time. Calabash hit a pocket of warm air that lifted them for a moment, holding them seemingly motionless as dragons continued to rain down around them, but with a crack and a sudden drop in pressure they were soon falling as quickly as before.
“Fly!” Emuel shouted. “Damn it, fly!”
Not that he expected his encouragement to do any good. However, almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth, Calabash banked to the right and began to spiral down in a controlled descent. Other dragons were now also gaining the
use of their wings, rising on updrafts, or gliding towards the plain below. They began to spread out, breaking into groups of two or three as they dispersed along all points of the compass, calling to one another as they went, their cries gradually becoming fainter and fainter.
Calabash pumped its wings and turned towards the west, Emuel easily shifting his weight with the dragon, becoming used to the feel of the creature beneath him. A flock of dragons ahead of them were now little more than dark specks against the setting sun. Emuel watched them wink out one by one. A moment later, two dragons flew in to flank Calabash. One had scales the colour of sunflowers, the other was a silvery grey with eyes as bright as diamonds. They called to Calabash and the dragon nodded to acknowledge their presence, before turning to look back at Emuel.
The eunuch patted his mount’s flank and settled himself more comfortably upon the gently rolling back. Twilight seemed so far away now, yet Emuel found that he no longer missed it. This place – this world of dragons and burgeoning potential – was his home now.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
IGNACIO AND THE remaining members of the Order of the Swords of Dawn began to sing hymns. For Silus, it was the last straw.
“You know what? You can take that elsewhere. I mean it.” Silus backed up his words by drawing his sword. He didn’t care that he and Ignacio had been through so much together, that they had once fought side by side; if he didn’t stop with the ‘Holy Holys’ and ‘Most Blessed on Highs’ right now, he was going to get a sword in the guts.
“But He has come to show us the way,” Ignacio said, a beatific smile on his face. “He has come to bring judgement to this godless world.”
“Ignacio, if you do anything to make matters worse I will stand by these people and I will fight you.”
Silus stared into Ignacio’s eyes, trying to find some remnant of his old friend, but the ex-smuggler’s gaze remained curiously blank.
Shaking his head, Silus went back to helping look after the wounded and the dying.
The Swords had gone through the settlement like a whirlwind, killing virtually everything in their path. No wonder Vos had prevailed against Pontaine in the last war, Silus considered, when Katherine Makennon had such men at her disposal. The Pontaine army, as organised and well-equipped as it had been, just didn’t have a chance against an enemy with such a capacity for cruelty and a lust for slaughter.
He found Katya tending to a little boy with a nasty head wound. His right eye had been gouged out; Silus tried not to wince when he looked at the bloody cavity. Zac was sitting on the ground nearby, smiling to himself as he ran sand through his fingers, seemingly oblivious to the suffering around him. Sometimes Silus worried about his son’s emotional health.
“Do you know where your parents are?” Katya was asking. “When did you last see them?”
“They ran,” the boy said. “I couldn’t keep up. And then they were gone, cut down.”
Silus could see the anger on Katya’s face, the desire to turn on the people who had done this and make them pay, but for the sake of the boy she remained calm as she sponged blood from his brow.
Above them, on the crest of a dune, Bestion was praying, facing the direction of the risen god, his forehead to the sand in submission. He’d been crouched in this manner for several hours. Silus was saddened to see the priest abasing himself in this way. He could remember a man with dignity and compassion, a man whose faith bound him to the community he served, but all that had gone. Now Bestion blindly looked to Kerberos for answers.
Bestion finally rose and brushed off his robes. Silus raised his hand when the priest looked his way, but he didn’t respond. Instead, he headed in the direction of Ignacio and the Swords, there to confer with them in a huddle. Silus was horrified when Ignacio shook hands with Bestion, welcoming him in amongst the fanatics.
This had not gone unnoticed by Kelos.
“That,” said the mage, sitting down next to Silus, “is not good.”
“Looks like they’re recruiting,” Silus said.
“Think we should stop him?”
“I don’t think we can.”
“What are we going to do, Silus? We can’t just stay here. We certainly can’t hang around with the Swords for much longer. Do you think that if we asked nicely they’d just let us go? Though, now I come to think of it, it’s not like there’s even anywhere to go on this godforsaken world.”
Dunsany wandered over. His arms were stained red to the elbows, and Silus couldn’t remember ever having seen him look so tired.
“You know what?” he said. “I’m beginning to regret that we ever stole the Llothriall in the first place.”
“No regrets, Dunsany,” Katya said. “If we had stayed in Nürn when the Chadassa attacked, our son would never have been born. Trust me, I don’t blame you for what has happened.”
“As ever, Katya,” Dunsany said, “were I differently inclined, I’d gladly steal you from this brute.”
“Hey!” Silus protested. “May I remind you that this brute has saved you on several occasions, thank you very much.”
“By the way,” Kelos said, “has anyone seen Illiun?”
“I think he retreated into the ship,” Silus said. “No doubt he’s on board somewhere, having a nervous breakdown. I’ll give him another hour and then I’ll go and have a word, try to make him see some sense about the ‘entity.’”
“And how do you feel about it?” Katya asked.
“I don’t know,” Silus said, looking up at Kerberos.
He thought that he would be pleased, that it would give him hope to see his god again. Yet he had reached out to Kerberos and felt nothing. “I don’t think I understand Kerberos anymore.”
There was the clash of metal on metal and Silus looked up to see a commotion amongst the Swords. The group parted as a blade flashed, revealing two figures engaged in combat. One was Ignacio, the sword in his hand dancing with consummate skill; the other was one of the silver-eyed men, handling his weapon as though he wasn’t entirely sure as to its use. Someone had armed the artificial man, Silus was sure of it. The sentinel wouldn’t have done this of his own volition; otherwise, surely, he would have attempted to block the blow that sheared away much of his left arm.
There was a cheer as the sentinel finally managed to land a blow, though it was more through random flailing than intent. A group of settlers had gathered to egg the sentinel on. The loudest of them was Shalim, who stood at the head of the rabble, his fists bunched at his sides, his face scarlet with anger. No matter how loud he shouted, however, the silver-eyed man was not built for this manner of combat. When the sentinel tripped over his own feet, Ignacio dispatched him by removing his head from his shoulders.
As viscous blue blood pumped over Ignacio’s boots, Shalim and his comrades fell silent.
“Which one of you is responsible for this?” Ignacio said. There was no reply. “Perhaps you didn’t hear me. I said, which one of you is responsible for this? Which one of you blasphemers would stand against the Swords?”
There was still no response.
“Brother Auden, kill the gentleman with the blond hair. Perhaps that will encourage someone to speak.”
“Ignacio, no!” Silus was on his feet and racing towards them. “Stop this, now!”
“Silus, perhaps you have forgotten that as a fugitive from the Final Faith you have no say in this matter. Brother Auden, you may continue.”
“And I said no!” Silus unsheathed his sword and forced the acolyte’s blade to the ground. Brother Auden looked back at Ignacio, not quite sure how he should respond.
“Ignacio, where exactly is this getting us?” Silus said. “We’re all stranded on this world. There’s nowhere for any of us to go, and, thanks to the Sword’s actions on the ship, Illiun and his people have lost everything. How do you hope to punish them any more than they already have been? Just let them be.”
“The Lord of All has spoken, Silus. These godless people must be punished.”
�
��Really, Ignacio? I mean, really? When you first joined the crew of the Llothriall you were one of the most godless men I’d ever met. You’d often rail against the Final Faith and how they used to make you and your brother’s lives as smugglers so difficult. Yet here you now stand, wearing the symbol of the crossed circle. What did they do to you, Ignacio, to make you change your heart so radically?”
“I saw the light. The Lord of All spoke to me.”
“No, I’m almost certain that He didn’t. Trust me, you don’t know the first thing about the deity.”
“It is true that Silus has a great affinity with the Allfather,” Bestion said, stepping into the quarrel. “I have witnessed it myself.”
“Ignacio, you were there when I channelled the power of Kerberos to destroy the Chadassa,” Silus said. “I know the Lord of All, and I know that He wouldn’t want you punish Illiun and his people in His name.”
“But they reject God,” Ignacio said.
“That is their choice. It doesn’t mean they are a threat to the Final Faith. Are you sure that Makennon would be so concerned about this lifeless place when she has more than enough on Twilight to worry about? Besides, we have bigger concerns ourselves. Like how to get home.”
“The Lord of All will guide us home.”
“And He told you that, did he?”
Ignacio’s silence was answer enough.
“Then why don’t you talk to Him?’ It was the black-haired woman Silus had seen conversing with Ignacio earlier. “Perhaps you can succeed where we, His most devout soldiers, have failed?”
Though the woman clearly meant this as an attack on Silus, he realised that she did have a point.
Twilight of Kerberos: Wrath of Kerberos Page 9