My mind was racing to absorb the implications of what she had just revealed. The She’Har language, Erollith, was written using three dimensional structures that resembled a small tree or a bush. The writing system was so complex that few humans possessed the patience to learn it, not that there was anyone to teach it anyway. The She’Har children, such as Lynaralla, were born with the knowledge, and I possessed it only because I had inherited the knowledge of the loshti.
She’Har Elders ‘grew’ their sculpture writings, creating them from Eilen’tyral, a wooden material that was as strong as steel and virtually immune to decay or the passage of time. A completed Erollith sculpture had three axes, moving from the past, called the ‘roots’, into the future, called the ‘branches.’ The three axes were labeled, personal, objective, and subjective, and they could branch even more as the writing grew, creating a written sculpture that looked very much like a living plant.
I hadn’t ever considered where the She’Har might keep such writings, but it made sense that if the Elders grew them they might be located underground, and if that was the case it was possible that there might be a great many such hidden libraries still in existence. Even if they were discovered, humans wouldn’t know what they had found.
The fact that Lyralliantha had taken root above one of them was also an unusual coincidence, and coincidence was always highly suspect when the Illeniel She’Har were involved. Had they known she would find it? Did it contain the information removed from the loshti that Tyrion had received?
And why was Lyralliantha hiding it from her mate? Obviously, the Illeniel’s millennia-long scheme for survival wasn’t finished yet. The knowledge hidden there must be important, or they wouldn’t have preserved it. It must also be dangerous to their plan, or they wouldn’t have hidden it from Tyrion, who had made no secret of his desire to derail everything they had worked for.
Tyrion thought he had lost. Despite his self-loathing and his desire for revenge, no matter the cost, he felt he had been outwitted, and used to resurrect the She’Har. If he learned whatever was hidden beneath Lyralliantha’s roots, he might well decide to use it to destroy them and their plan for good.
And unfortunately, from what I knew of their prophetic plans, that might well mean the end of humankind as well.
I had to do something. But I’ll be damned if I know what it is.
Chapter 31
I kept my own counsel regarding the hidden knowledge Lynaralla had found, though I did share her outrageous plan to help Penny replace her arm. I knew my wife would be flattered, and in fact it moved her to tears. As I expected, she was completely against the idea, but she was touched nonetheless.
The next morning, I went into Washbrook and found the leather and other items I needed to complete Penny’s arm, and then I got back to work. We still had no word from Matthew and Gram, but we had to trust that they were alright. Even so, the waiting was driving Penny mad.
I was walking back to the house around dinnertime when I felt a surge of aythar and a figure appeared on the path in front of me, a young woman, standing just in front of our door. Her brilliant aura gave her away as a mage and I discovered I had already strengthened my personal shield reflexively.
What’s more, she was cloaked in an illusion, one that hid her true appearance. To my eyes she appeared to be wearing a high-quality linen dress dyed in shades of yellow and blue, but my magesight could tell it was a lie. There was no dress at all; she wore a tunic, trousers, and leather boots, though I had no idea what color they were. Her long blond braids were a lie as well.
After a brief moment of shock, I realized her aythar was familiar, before she glanced at me and vanished, reappearing right in front of me. It was so sudden I almost lashed out with a potentially lethal lance of power, only barely managing to rein in my impulse. A lifetime of deadly conflicts had left me with some instincts that were counterproductive to a natural, peaceful existence.
She was tall for a woman—the illusion could do nothing about that. Even so, she had to look up slightly to meet my gaze. There was a playful sparkle in her eyes when she spoke, “Did you miss me?”
My mind was still recovering from the surge of adrenaline, but somewhere behind the scenes my subconscious had already worked out the answer. “Karen?” I asked. “Is that you?”
“Yep!” she answered cheerfully, in her oddly accented Barion. “Did I startle you? You looked like you were about to do something awful to me for a second there.”
I sighed, then took a deep breath, trying to slow my heart rate down. “Just a bit. You don’t look like yourself.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, and then the illusion covering her melted away, revealing a young woman with wild, curly black hair and light blue skin. Like Lynaralla she had ears that ended in tapering points, but despite her strange appearance she was fully human. She didn’t have a seed-mind, as She’Har children did. Instead she had been born as a result of experimentation by the humans of her world. “Is that better?” she asked me.
I smiled. “Much. How have you been? We haven’t seen you in months. We were starting to worry.”
“I’ve been well, adapting to this new world—that sort of thing,” she answered, as if it were a small thing. “I’ve been staying in Iverly for the past few weeks. I love the weather there.”
“Somehow I thought you’d be traveling more.”
Her face lit up. “Oh, I have! I’ve just been spending my nights in Iverly. I rented a small house there, but I move around a lot during the day. I’ve been to every city connected to the World Road, and I’ve traveled to a lot of the towns and villages around them. Lately I’ve been exploring the Southern Desert.”
“That seems like an unpleasant way to spend your day,” I commented.
“It’s beautiful!” Karen corrected me. “I don’t spend all day there, though. I’ll walk for a few hours and then take a break somewhere else. There are some beautiful beaches north of Verningham, or if I need to cool off, the forests of Gododdin are really cold right now. When I feel ready, I can always go back to where I left off and start walking again.”
“You said you’re renting a house in Iverly?”
She nodded. “The breezes there are amazing. I like it since it doesn’t smell nearly as bad as some of the other cities I’ve visited.”
I wouldn’t have been surprised if Matthew had given her some money before she had left, but renting a house seemed exorbitant. I wanted to ask how she was paying for it, but the question seemed indelicate. Had she returned to visit, or was she here to ask for money?
She must have read something from my momentary silence, for she answered my question before I could figure out how to ask. “I’m a courier. Whenever I stop somewhere, I ask if they need something delivered. I’ve just been doing it haphazardly thus far, but I’ve thought about offering to check certain cities on particular days and times.”
Now I understood, particularly since I had often disguised myself as a tinker. People in towns and villages often asked me where I was headed next and would sometimes pay to have messages delivered. Nobles often did the same, and if she was willing to carry things from one kingdom to another, they likely paid her a handsome fee. Ordinary couriers took days to weeks to deliver such things, but she was able to complete such a job in a matter of minutes. It was easy money for a Mordan wizard.
“Well I’m glad to hear you’re doing well,” I told her. “Everyone will be glad to see you.”
“How is Matthew?” she asked suddenly.
Ah, I thought, I knew it would come around to him. I smiled. “He was well the last I saw him, though we’re worried about him right now. He went to assist the Queen’s men in dealing with a new threat. He’s probably somewhere north and east of Cantley.”
As far as Penny and I had been able to determine, Karen and our son had developed some sort of relationship, though Matthew was far too taciturn to share any of the details with us. When Karen had suddenly decided to travel, we had worried t
hat meant they had decided to go their separate ways. Now I wasn’t so sure.
Her expression shifted briefly to one of concern before relaxing. “New threat? Nothing too dangerous, though, right?”
“We aren’t certain,” I admitted. “We had a large attack here not too many days ago and we think something happened near Cantley. Gram and Matthew went to lend assistance to the Queen’s forces, in case things were worse than they expected.”
“But he wouldn’t be in any direct danger,” said Karen, sounding as though she might be trying to convince herself. “I mean, there are soldiers with him, and he’s your son, so he wouldn’t be directly involved in any fighting.”
I wanted to reassure her, but the truth was that Penny and I were both on pins and needles while waiting for news. “He’s strong,” I told her. “I wouldn’t have sent him if I didn’t think he was capable of handling it. Sir Gram is with him, and there’s no more fearsome knight in Lothion. I trust the two of them to keep each other safe.”
“You’re sure?”
“There’s nothing certain in this world, Karen,” I told her. “But I believe in them. Come inside and have some tea. I imagine you’re hungry too. Penny will be delighted to see you, and Gary has been beside himself worrying about you. I’ll send word for him to join us.”
Karen hesitated, wavering between her desire to go find my son immediately and her need to see her father. Gary was an android, but he had been created by her biological father and possessed the man’s memories. Her real dad was dead, but Gary loved her as if he was her true father. Finally, she nodded.
She received another shock when she saw Penny. Their embrace became faintly awkward as Karen realized my wife only had one arm to return the gesture. That resulted in a whole new line of questions and explanations.
Alyssa had dinner ready, so we ate before getting too deeply into the subject, but eventually we finished filling our bellies, and we began to talk of more serious matters, filling her in on recent events. Karen became steadily more agitated as we told her of Walter’s death, Penny’s injury, my near death, and then my desperate battle outside the gates of Washbrook.
The more we talked, the more I realized it had really been a terrible couple of weeks. It was hard to resist the urge to downplay the gravity of everything that had occurred. Of course, with Irene and Conall there, I needn’t have worried. Anytime I began to sugarcoat things, they stepped in with some new inflammatory statement to make things sound worse. My two younger children seemed oblivious to my warning glances.
Gary remained calm throughout, and when I thought we were done, he glibly reminded us of the attack on Rose before launching into an explanation of his recent attempts to create a way of locating ANSIS. It made sense, though. As a father, he wanted to make sure she knew as much as possible about the dangers facing us, and by extension his daughter.
That might have been the end of the day, but three men, Matthew, Gram, and Sir Thomas, appeared as we were clearing the table. Matthew and Gram looked tired and dirty, while Thomas was clad entirely in the plate armor I had made for him years ago. That armor always looked clean, since it never rusted, but a rancid smell of sweat and old blood emanated from the gambeson he wore beneath it.
“We’re back,” announced Gram.
Sir Thomas made a shallow bow when he saw me. “Your Excellency, it has been too long since last we met.”
Matthew said nothing.
Chaos descended as everyone in the room began talking at once. Penny reached Matthew first, but the others weren’t far behind. Soon all three of them were surrounded while being peppered with questions.
Matthew only endured it for a few seconds before pushing his way free. “I’m tired. You can get the details from Sir Thomas.” Making for the exit, he came face to face with Karen, and for a moment the look of annoyance on his features changed to surprise as his eyes widened slightly. His sullen expression returned almost immediately, however. “You’re back,” he said flatly to Karen, and then he left.
Irene stared after him. “Why is he such an asshole?” Angry she started to follow him, but Moira put a hand on her shoulder.
“Leave him be,” Moira told her younger sister. Then she went to Karen’s side. “He’s upset.”
“I haven’t seen him in months—,” muttered Karen quietly. Her aythar shifted, as though she had reached a decision.
“Karen, wait!” I called to her, worried she might disappear. “Don’t leave. I need your help.”
“Now?” asked Karen.
“Tomorrow,” I replied.
She started to leave again, gathering her aythar, but Moira caught her arm. “We need to talk.”
The two young women left together, followed by Gram, who apologized, saying he needed to see his mother and sister. Alyssa went with him. That left Sir Thomas alone with the rest of us.
Thomas shrugged and gave us a faint smile. “Is there anything left to eat?”
***
“Those two saved our asses,” said Thomas. “The—what did you call them again?”
“Ungol,” I supplied.
The knight nodded. “The Ungol caught us at night, overwhelming our sentries and storming our camp. We were completely routed. We had no idea they could see in the dark. If your son and Sir Gram hadn’t shown up, our losses would have been much worse.”
“How many did you lose?” asked Penny.
Thomas sighed. “We thought we had lost almost everyone, but once the sun rose and we went back, we found a lot of the men who went in different directions. We still lost almost half of them, though. The Ungol are brutal fighters.”
“What about the people of Brodinton?” I inquired.
“We found them the next day. The Ungol had turned north, heading into the forest. They were being kept captive by a smaller group. It appears they were using the people of Brodinton to haul the spoils from their town, mainly food and livestock. We think they may have a village in the forest somewhere, but we caught them before they reached it. The Queen has scouts out searching for it even as we speak.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Matthew seemed out of sorts. Did something happen during the fight?”
Sir Thomas rubbed his chin, scratching at the stubble there. As long as I had known him, the man had preferred to remain clean-shaven, other than a modest moustache. He was one of only a few surviving members of my original Knights of Stone, and perhaps one of my favorites for his soft-spoken demeanor and quiet mannerisms. Other than his size and athletic physique, few would realize his martial profession if they met him out of his armor. Thomas had none of the arrogance so common in the nobility, and neither did he have a commanding presence. If he were dressed in simple clothes, a stranger might easily mistake him for a well-spoken commoner—perhaps a dockworker or a smith, given his build.
The knight thought carefully before replying, another trait I liked about him. He never spoke rashly. “The battle your son fought was bloody. From what I saw in him afterward, I would guess it was his first. Is that correct?”
“Actually, he’s been in several big fights, though most of them were in another dimension,” I explained.
“Other dimensions? What was he fighting?” inquired Thomas.
“Mechanical monsters for the most part, from what I understand,” I answered. “A year or two ago, he fought one of the Dark Gods that escaped my original purge. He’s shown his metal in some very stressful situations already.”
“But he never fought men?” prodded the knight.
“Ah,” I groaned, understanding at last. Destroying monsters was one thing, but murdering your fellow man was an entirely different thing. I should have realized immediately. How jaded have I become that it didn’t even occur to me? “How bad was it?”
Thomas grimaced. “For most of us, it was brutal, like any war. Most of the men saw friends cut to pieces next to them, and it’s never pleasant seeing another man’s face as you push a sword through his ribs. I’m not sure what it’s like figh
ting with magic. He didn’t have to kill anyone with his own hands, but he slaughtered a lot of them with some sort of magic spinning blades. Then at the end he cornered one of the surviving mages, cutting down his guards and capturing the dwarf magic user alive. Some of that was pretty bloody.
“The dragonfire was the worst, at least for me,” added Thomas. “Seeing men burned alive has to be the most awful thing anyone could see, or hear—or that awful smell.”
His description made me wince. “Don’t remind me.”
Thomas nodded apologetically. “Sorry. If there’s one thing I don’t miss about the earth-bond, it’s being able to use the fiery magic of the sun-sword.” He patted the enchanted blade that leaned against the side of his chair. “Anyway, you can be proud of your son. I’m sure he’s regretting it now, but he turned it around for us. I honestly thought it was you at first.”
I chuckled. “We do look a lot alike.”
“Nah, not your appearance, his presence. He dropped out of the sky and just stood there, like he owned the place. Then he lit the sky up, like it was daytime. He ignored everything they threw at him. A few times it looked like he was dodging arrows, if you can believe that. Whatever it was he was doing, nothing fazed him. From the moment he put his feet on that field, you knew it was over. The Ungol had already lost. They just didn’t know it yet.”
The knight meant it as a compliment, but his description sent shivers down my spine. I had been in that position too many times. Whether he admitted it or not, my son was probably suffering for his decisions. And I was the one who had allowed him to be there. I shook myself to clear my head. “How about Gram? You almost make it sound as though Matthew did everything.”
Thomas smiled. “That was a sight to see. It was like the old days had come back. He was the one that stopped their rush, him and that big sword of Dorian’s. I knew Sir Cyhan had trained him, but hearing it and seeing it are two different things. Me and William did our best to help him, but…”
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