The Man Without Hands

by Eric Malikyte

“Because...” In the torchlight, he could see tears forming in her golden eyes. “There was so much running through my head during the ascension ceremony. What Byshun had said about father.

  “When I was kneeling there before Geidra, I couldn’t help but be disgusted with myself. I lost my father because of Geidra... To think, I was going to willingly serve my father’s murderers! And then they didn’t call your name, even though you worked so damn hard and almost won their stupid tournament. I just—something snapped in me. I thought about what Byshun had said about him, that he’d been a traitor, and I...I couldn’t let you go out the same way he did.”

  “I’m sorry. I know how hard you worked in the Trials.”

  “I’d do it again. I was looking forward to exploring the surface world...sucks that we’re just going to die.”

  Sage shook his head and grinned. “You think we’re going to die?”

  She nodded. “Sage, no Sulekiel has ever had their exile reversed. We’re both going to die floating alone on the western seas.”

  “At least we’ll go together,” Sage said.

  Reysha smiled, and it was almost enough to ease the rage that now festered inside of him.

  They sat and talked while they waited for the inevitable. It was all they could do to stave off the dread of what was to come. Somehow, even with doom lingering over his head, being with her made it easier. It seemed that was one of her many talents.

  “Too bad we didn’t have the good sense to run away,” Sage said.

  “Leave the city?” Reysha said it like the thought had never even occurred to her.

  He watched her stare up at the torches, biting her lip as if she were rolling the idea around in her head.

  “A life on the run from Shar, Sulekiel, and Masku,” Reysha said, chuckling. “We could find a cave and live out our years there.”

  He nodded silently. His teeth clenched, eyebrows coming together. “It’d be nice.”

  “Geidra called me an insubordinate piece of trash,” Reysha said, her rage seeping into her voice. “She wasn’t wrong... There was a time when I was just like Kirana. Loyal, obedient, naive. My parents followed Geidra’s every order, almost as if they worshiped her as a god. She could do no wrong in their eyes. I agreed for a while.”

  “Until your father died?”

  She nodded. “I was seven processions old. My whole world shattered the day we got the news that he’d died...now it seems the story Dirkus told was a complete lie. What I’d give for the power to kill that bastard!”

  “How many other towns have they wiped out to keep another uprising from happening?” The words ran hot in Sage’s mouth and he found himself grinding his teeth.

  “You know what the worst part is? When he didn’t report in, my mother kept faith that he’d return one day, kept faith in Geidra’s leadership. The Valier kept saying that they’d heard no news. But they knew the whole time! She barely speaks now, barely acknowledges me.” Reysha rattled her shackles. “No matter what I seem to get myself into.”

  “I’m sure there are a lot of us that feel the same way,” Sage said. “How many Sulekiel have been lost to a war that was lost thousands of processions ago?”

  “Padros said something about there still being support for your father in the city,” Reysha said, chuckling bitterly. “Too bad we couldn’t get their help.”

  “Too bad.”

  His fist met with stone, and cracking noises erupted in the stone tiles beneath his knuckles.

  There it was.

  Deep inside him.

  A rage he could not quiet.

  It stirred and it beat at the walls, festering and raging, pleading and begging to be set free. It was the same as it had been earlier, that momentary glimpse of a power that not even the bonds around his wrists and ankles could siphon off. It had given them reason to fear. And—if he could harness it—he could free Reysha.

  “What’s all this racket in here?” A familiar voice boomed through the darkened cell.

  Footsteps echoed on stone tiles, and the echoes hid their numbers. Kiel led in a small group of Valier. Elder Geidra was with them, holding her staff of judgment still.

  “Come to send us off to our deaths already, huh?” Sage grinned. “And in record time too.”

  “Silence, traitor!” One of Kiel’s men kicked him through the bars, knocking him over.

  From the corner of his eye, Sage watched them unlock the gates to Reysha’s cell, then his. The guards grabbed them by their chains and dragged them to their feet. Their pace was brisk, and it was difficult to keep up with the chains cuffed to his ankles. Reysha lumbered behind, trailed by Kiel himself, his black cloak billowing with each step—a fire burning in his eyes.

  Why were they in such a hurry to dispose of them? How much sentiment toward Kyrties was there in Yce Ralakar?

  The hour must have been some time after second moon, because he couldn’t make out anyone on the streets other than on-duty Valier, wearing Kiel’s traditional silver and black colors. But then, Geidra could have put a curfew into effect. The Valier wore hoods that covered their faces, but Sage could imagine what expressions they wore.

  To Sage’s surprise, they didn’t take the main gate to the surface. Kiel led them through countless empty caverns, leaving the main part of the city. Eventually, they came to a set of rusted metal doors. Geidra ordered the Valier to open them. The doors groaned and creaked open, revealing a long, twisting tunnel.

  One of the Valier pushed Sage forward. “Move, traitor.”

  The caverns stretched on and on, and the temperature slowly dropped. Kiel and the other Valier lit the way with their auras. They must have walked for hours; Sage’s feet were starting to ache, his headache growing worse.

  They crossed frozen lakes and great caves filled with giant crystals that stabbed down from every which way. Then, the subterranean path twisted, and turned, and they were basking in crimson light.

  “Suppress your Sulen,” Geidra said. “Keep illusions up at all times. I want Dirkus in front, casting a barrier to silence our steps.”

  “Yes, High Elder,” Kiel said.

  Dirkus nodded and took his place beside Kiel at the front of the marching party.

  Reysha glared at him.

  Sage couldn’t feel their Sulen with the shackles around his wrists, which meant his aura would be suppressed as well, but he was certain the Valier had complied.

  The cavern was completely open to the sky. He could see snow piling up on the cave walls When the wind blew, clumps of snow fell onto their path.

  He heard Reysha gasp in awe at the stars above, and he regarded the red glowing circle of Aula’kar, resting in its usual spot, anchored above the tip of Paronis’s highest snowcapped peak. The snow was crimson in its glow, a beautiful sight, but ominous all the same.

  Still, hours later, they left the safety of the snow-caked canyon for the open snow, descending into a rocky path. Trees shot up over the hills that surrounded them.

  His headache and fever had gotten worse, but he could still walk.

  Their boots crunched in the snow and their shadows danced as they marched. The journey to dispose of exiles was always taken in the darkness to hide their movements from the Shar, and Sage had heard that it could take up to three second moons to make it in full.

  The mountainous region known as Paronis was huge, paralleling the northern ocean of Giridesh. If he was right about where they were on the other side of the mountain, then there would be no Masku settlements or cities here, which supposedly meant no Shar. But that didn’t stop Geidra from taking precautions.

  Three second moons might give him plenty of time to plot his escape, provided his fever and headaches didn’t cripple him first.

  He looked at Reysha; her hair glowed like otherworldly fire in Aula’kar’s light.

  I’m going to get us out of this, Sage thought. I promise.

  4

  Second moon had long since risen. Sage stopped when his headache flared again, and bit down
into his lip. Kiel pushed him forward. His foot caught in the snow, and he fell face-first.

  “Get up!” Kiel’s voice sent bells ringing in his ears. The Captain’s hands wrapped around his arms and pulled him to his feet, dragging him forward.

  His vision was blurring. He wasn’t sure he could remain conscious for long. When Kiel forced him to his feet, he thought he saw something in the woods. Shadows moving against the varying degrees of darkness and crimson light.

  Animals, Sage thought.

  “Dropping limp in the snow will not save you from your fate,” Geidra said.

  “Now she speaks,” Reysha said. “And here I thought you were just here to enjoy the show.”

  “I am to perform the ceremony.” Geidra kept her pace in the snow, her black and crimson robes gliding behind her elegantly. “It is my duty.”

  “How many,” Sage said, his voice running hot against his throat.

  “Your father was her twentieth exile,” Kiel said.

  Sage gritted his teeth. “Twenty Sulekiel? You’ve sent twenty Sulekiel to their deaths?”

  “When the law is broken, punishment must be given to the guilty,” Kiel said. “You two broke the law. It is that simple.”

  “Your laws are meaningless,” Sage said.

  “Your father felt the same,” Geidra said. “Look what that got him. Be thankful that I haven’t taken your hands as well.”

  Sage looked down at his marching feet. “You probably don’t even care what happens to us, or what fates those others you murdered had to face. You’ve been High Elder for, what, four hundred processions? Hasn’t it struck you that we haven’t been attacked by Shar in all the time we’ve been here? Does the possibility that the Masku aren’t who you think they are even run through your mind? No. I’ll bet it doesn’t. I’ll bet you want to keep us down in those caves so you don’t have to give up your power!”

  Geidra swung her hand back at Sage’s face, knocking him into a tree. “Silence!” Her eyes were wild, that graceful, authoritative facade eroding from her face, transforming into unbalanced rage. “Your words fall on deaf ears! You are a dead man! Don’t you get it, you stupid child? You ask if I think about the fates of traitors, yet the answer should be obvious to you! You think I enjoy what’s become of our people? Hiding in caves like animals? This answer too should be obvious.”

  Sage wrenched himself up, using the tree for balance. A faint grin etched itself across his face. “If my words fell on deaf ears, then you wouldn’t have hit me.”

  “Shall I incapacitate him for the rest of the journey?” Kiel asked.

  “No.” Geidra shook her head. “I...I just lost my temper, that’s all. Let’s keep moving.”

  “It’s more than that,” Sage said, coming to his feet. “I’ll bet each time you’ve done this you’ve been completely quiet. Content to listen to your prisoner ramble on about their fate. This time is different, though.”

  “Oh?” Geidra turned around and began to march ahead. “Pray tell, Sage Son of Kyrties, soon to be dead.”

  Kiel grabbed his arm and dragged him into a fast-paced stride.

  “You fear me,” Sage said.

  Kiel stopped in his tracks and started to laugh hysterically, followed by his men. “What? You think the High Elder fears a boy bound in abaniel chains?”

  “You weren’t at my trial, Kiel, so shut your mouth and look at how your Elder isn’t laughing.”

  Kiel looked like he was about to hit him, but then he caught Elder Geidra’s stern, yet haunted, look. “She and the other Elders saw me do it, saw me reach out and gather my Sulen even with these chains. You should have seen her face.”

  “If that’s true, then show me this power now.” Geidra marched up to him; they stood face-to-face. “Go on, break through those bonds. Tap into that power. I will allow you one chance to kill me.”

  He had been trying the whole time, trying to rile himself up, to make himself feel the same anger he had felt earlier—but it wasn’t enough. He stood there in the snow, glaring into the woman’s eyes, trying to reclaim that feeling he’d had in the Tower of Judgements. But all he felt was emptiness.

  Geidra’s lips curled into a sadistic, satisfied grin.

  “That’s what I thought,” Geidra said. “It was nothing more than a fluke.”

  Kiel motioned for them to move forward. “We’ve wasted enough time. We shouldn’t remain in one spot too long.”

  Sage thought he caught more movement in the woods, this time in the trees. An icy hand wrenched at his spine, paralyzing him mid-step. A nameless fear filled him.

  “You smell that?” One of Kiel’s Valier asked, sniffing the air.

  “Hey, yeah, what is that?”

  Kiel’s head tilted up, his nostrils flared in and out. “Smells like—”

  A white light flashed through the forest, bouncing off Kiel’s barrier and knocking him into Sage. Both of them sprawled out against a tree.

  Sage’s head swam. Crude voices echoed through the air. The Elder screamed, more flashes, smacking sounds, and then, sounds like animals scurrying through the snow in the direction they had just come from.

  “Damn it! How did they sense us?” Kiel bolted up and rallied his men, his head frantically scanning in the reddened darkness. “Where is the High Elder!”

  Sage looked around—even with the pounding of his head and threatening darkness at the walls of his vision, she was nowhere to be seen. Reysha came and huddled beside him. The other Valier returned their hoods to cover their faces, but he committed each face to memory.

  “Sir, did you see them?” one of the Valier asked.

  “I never—” another was on all fours, recovering his dignity. “I never thought I’d see one.”

  “The Shar.” Kiel said it like a curse.

  “Maybe it’s my father.” Sage grinned. “Come back from the dead for revenge.”

  “They’ll follow the caverns back to the city,” Kiel said. “We have a new priority.”

  “What about these two?”

  “Knock them out,” Kiel said. “We’ll come back for them when the fighting’s done...if we survive.”

  Reysha jumped back, trying her best to get into a fighting stance with the shackles restricting her movement. “The hell you will!”

  “No!” Sage struggled to his feet, scrambling to reach Reysha but his restricted movements were too sluggish. One of the Valier punched her in the back of the head, and her body fell limp.

  “You son of a bitch!” Sage said, hobbling to attack the Valier.

  But Kiel was a blur, and Sage felt a sharp spike of pain spread through his temples. His vision melted, shapes scurried and cried, rushing up the slope...

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  TAKARUS

  He woke to his sister quietly nudging his arm in the dark. She held a finger to her lips and pointed to the window. There were shouting, cursing, crashing noises coming from outside; flashes of light brightened the edges of the drapes around his chamber window.

  Takarus sat up, crept to the window, and peered outside.

  It all felt so surreal...as if he’d been woken from a nightmare.

  The torches had gone dark. His eyes strained to see in the pitch-black, waiting for something, anything to happen. Finally he saw a single flare in the dark, and then another from a different location. Light scattering in moments, fires raging and then quieting, shadows racing, fleeing, striking. Unintelligible growling seemed to be coming from the walls, followed by shouting and screaming from beyond the window. In one flash, he thought he caught sight of a silhouette, something covered in spikes and horns and scales, its head impaling an elderly Sulekiel woman before fading into darkness again.

  He couldn’t move; his body was shaking.

  No, he thought. Not this. Not now.

  In that brief moment, he’d seen her blood spill from her wounds as died with her screams filling the city. Something deep inside Takarus gripped at his spine and yanked him away from the window. Crawling o
n the floor and mumbling like a mad fool.

  His father’s words filled his mind. No one saw them coming the night the city of Adros fell.

  “No!” Takarus said. “They’re here! They’re really here! Sage swore they were a myth!”

  “Silence, brother,” Kirana whispered, huddling close to him. “Do you hear that?”

  Now he could hear the Valier downstairs shouting and cursing. Then there was a booming sound, and the floor and the walls shook violently.

  And then silence.

  “Is it really them?” Kirana said, unable to say their name.

  Takarus nodded; he couldn’t stop shaking. “It’s them. We’re going to die. The city will fall.”

  “Brother, get ahold of your senses,” Kirana said. “We need to find Father.”

  “What use is it?” Takarus whispered, his hands cradling his head. “I’m too weak...they’re already in the tower. I couldn’t even pass the Trials. We’ll die. We’ll all die.”

  “Fine, I’ll find Father myself.” Kirana quietly approached the chamber door.

  “Y-you’re really going to leave me?” Takarus asked, fear jumbling his words.

  Kirana sighed, shaking her head. “Of course not. Hurry up and get over here.”

  Takarus crept up behind her, ready to flee at the first sign of trouble. She unlatched the door and pushed it open slowly. The sounds stopped as soon as his door came creaking to a stop.

  “There’s nothing,” Kirana whispered.

  “What?” Takarus said, creeping to the edge of the doorway.

  Then, there were more sounds: scuffling, thumping, and heavy breathing.

  “No...” Takarus whispered. “They’re there. They’re coming up the stairs.”

  Panic rose up within him, seizing his limbs with iron shackles. What should he do? He was unworthy of becoming a Valier, how the hell was he going to face them?

  As he stood there, consumed by his own fear, the room brightened with an intense crimson light. Takarus saw them then—upright, drool dripping off razor-sharp black and yellow teeth, out of grinning mouths which had no lips. Pupils glowing yellow against a black film where there should have been white. Scales ran down their bodies, three-fingered claws snapping closed, ready to tear out his throat, and their heads were covered unevenly in horns gleaming in the crimson light like untreated metal.