The Fireblade Array: 4-Book Bundle

by H. O. Charles

  A soft knock sounded at his door then, a knock Silar knew well. “Come in! Bloody come in and talk to me, you moody idiot!”

  Another headache ripped through her skull as lightning would tear through the flesh of

  a green tree, and she flopped back onto the bed, exhausted. No one had ever said that being a wielder would be this much trouble, or cause such peculiar images to present themselves before her eyes without cause. Collete had told her confidently that they would pass within the week, and her kanaala lieutenant had said the same. But it didn’t make her feel any more comfortable when each one hit, or any less disturbed when she saw Morghiad naked and doing... things to her.

  Artemi knew that her imagination was running wild with those visions, and that she needed to gain some form of control over them. The King of Calidell might well be her betrothed, but there was no sense in teasing herselfwith what she could not have, though her mind had continued such torments for

  nearly five years. She looked at the dagger on her thigh and touched its cold, silver hilt with a single finger. This was the part of him she could have; it simply represented an acknowledgement of what should have been.

  Sub-Lieutenant Arrian strode in without announcement, breaking her reverie, and proceeded to plonk himself on the side of her bed. His dark ponytail of curls bobbed as he grinned at her. “Still avoiding duty, are we?”

  “If I could share these headaches with you, I would,” she responded grumpily.

  He ruffled her hair in a very patronising manner. “It’ll be over soon. Here, I know you have an interest in all things Calidellian. You’ll probably want to see this.” He handed her a folded copy of The Cadran Chronicle.

  Artemi raised an eyebrow as she

  reclined on a pillow and opened it up. The headline turned her lungs to ice. Artemi sat up again.

  “Big news, that? A king getting married?” Arrian chuckled to himself.

  “He...” Her voice drained to nothing. The article announced that Morghiad had wed the Hirrahan Kahriss Eryth. Two, somewhat inaccurate sketches of the couple dominated the article.

  “Are you alright, Tem? You’ve gone almost as white as the paper.”

  Artemi was not alright. “It doesn’t make any sense.” He didn’t even like Eryth! No one liked bloody Eryth! And he’d promised his heart to Artemi exclusively. Had he lied to her, or forgotten? Was he really that insane?

  ...No other woman but you shall have it, Artemi...

  The sub-lieutenant eyed her closely and took the paper from her hands. “Tell me what fascinating part of your mind is so troubled with this news.”

  She withdrew the silver dagger and spun it in her hand several times. It was so perfectly weighted.

  “This was a gift from him. He offered it to me and I accepted. You know what this means in Calidellian custom?”

  Arrian blinked at her in disbelief. “The King of Calidell... and you? You accepted? You? I thought you said you’d never take a lover, never mind a bloody husband!”

  “When did I say that?”

  The soldier pursed his lips briefly.

  “Ah... er, well. It seems like the sort of thing you’d say. Anyway, I can’t imagine any man would be good enough to break your heart, Tem. Especially not some inbred, arrogant royal. Didn’t he kill his own father?”

  “He’s not...” She stopped herselffrom constructing some sort of defence for his character. “He was kind to me. In an arrogant fashion, but kind even so. And Acher wasn’t his father. Hedinar Kantari was.” Collete had been very good at keeping that gem to himself.

  “Hed – Our Hedinar Kantari?”

  “The very same.”

  A thoughtful look worked its way across Arrian’s features. “I see.”

  Artemi considered the new softness in his tone. She could use it. “You were one of Hedinar’s sworn men, were you not?”

  The soldier nodded as he drew his finger along a pattern in the bed linen. “He was a good friend. Took some of his sworn soldiers with him when he left. Did you know that?”

  Artemi could feel another headache coming on. It was going to be a bad one. She shook her head.

  “I should have gone with him, too.” Arrian sighed heavily. “It was just... I was needed here. Several of us stayed.”

  She clenched her teeth against the oncoming pain, and the odd images of Sunidaran fighters battling eisiels. “Would you do something for me? And for his son?”

  The sub-lieutenant blinked at her. “What?”

  “Go to him. Tell him about his father, that you knew him. Find out why he’s married

  this woman.”

  “Artemi, he’s a king! They have to marry for all sorts of reasons. It’s probably just some political stunt or other. And what could I tell him about his father that he doesn’t already know?”

  She rubbed at her temples in an effort to think clearly. “He barely knew Hedinar, so you could tell him a great deal. And I know something is wrong over there. I can feel it. He wouldn’t have done this out of choice. Please?”

  Arrian frowned at her and stood to pace the room. “You want me to go all the way to bloody Calidell, to find out if he still cares for you?”

  “I want you to find out if Hedinar’s only surviving son is safe, and not being blackmailed!” A flurry of images crashed into

  her mind at that point, causing her vision to glitter with brilliant points of light. She couldn’t help but cry out at the pain.

  The soldier came to fuss over her, and rearranged the pillows at her back. “Alright,” he said wearily. “Collete won’t like it, though. And you have to come with me and the other men who swore an oath to Hedinar. There were a few of us. We’ll travel when you’re feeling better.”

  The pain was sending her into unconsciousness, but she managed to mumble that she couldn’t return. And then her ability to move deserted her, and yet more images piled into her mind. Only this time she saw Hedinar, with his dark blond hair and imposing height. The resemblance between he and his son was quite striking, but his face was marked with

  concern. She felt as if she knew him, as if she had known him very well. But that was impossible. The vision faded to grey, and for a moment Artemi bathed in the tranquillity of darkness. She felt as if she were travelling, moving through some sort of untouchable space and immeasurable time.

  The darkness fractured, and light poured into the vacuum, forming yet more images. But this time they came with sounds, smells and sensations of rough or smooth. She was wandering through a red desert, with dust swirling about her bare knees. The acrid tang of it filled her mouth and dried her nose. She had been walking for days, and had not seen a single person, tree or any living thing. At length she fell into stasis - a sort of perpetual unconsciousness brought about by starvation

  and thirst. Periodically she awoke from it to search for sustenance, but eventually met her death in the wastelands. She’d never escaped them. When she awoke once more, she was a child playing in the mud.

  She learned to farm sheep, to sing and dance; she grew to a woman and matured into her powers as her family had expected her to. Then, one night, the memory of her death in the desert returned to her, and she collapsed to the floor from the shock of it. After thirty years, she was killed by the stray sword of a brigand who’d chosen to raid her village, but that was not the end. Her next life was as a priestess in one of the great temples to Achellon, where she’d been deposited once her family found they could not marry her off safely. Her memories returned to her again, and she began

  to understand that she could not die, that the actions she took in this life would be recalled by a thousand identical women in the future. She’d offered her deepest thanks to Achellon for her gift, and had then walked into an inferno of her own making to see if she would return.

  Artemi returned, but each time her new life began, her mother’s would be lost. At times this produced doting, possessive fathers. And at times it produced neglectful, angry and bitter men who would soon
er have been rid of her. Unable to cope, a number of them disposed of her while she was an infant. Artemi came to realise that her re-birth was a curse upon her numerous parents, and sought to find ways of living as long as possible. She learned how to fight and how to hide.

  Her mind walked through the array of

  memories: living in remote caves, in bleak houses at the edge of deserts and on windswept islands in the middle of the ocean. And then, some six-thousand years into her existence, a man had come for her. She’d met him before, when she’d ruled a small principality in a lush land known as Fri’sinta. But somehow he had tracked her down again in her new life, and he had a curious proposal for her. He had said there were others like her - men and women who were reborn again and again, men and women who could use Blaze. He called himself The Daisain, and he had been remarkable.

  His vision was perfect - a world free of tyrannical rulers and cruelty. A world where Artemi and her kind would be an immortal force of guardians who kept order. Working

  for the greater good was a much higher duty than preserving the lives of a few parents, he’d said. And it had been no small burden. There were seven of them to complete this task, two women and five men: Artemi, Mirel, Khasha, Romarr, Tallyn, Vestuna and Dorlunh. They’d met in the thick Dekusu forests of Sokiri, and all had been relieved to find they were no longer alone in their guilt. They became a family that could not be outlived by a single member.

  Each one of them took on a role within this family -The Daisain was the overbearing father; Artemi and Mirel his mischievous daughters; Tallyn their older brother; Romarr fussed about them like a worried mother, in spite of his muscular physique; Dorlunh was their slightly peculiar uncle; Vestuna was the more normal one; and Khasha was the

  youngest son who spent most of his time daydreaming. And this family learned to fight beyond swordfighting. They learned to balance and run and leap like the cats of the forest, to listen as an owl and see as a hawk. They discovered a way to hide Mirel and Artemi’s Blaze abilities - something which had lasted across their subsequent lives.

  Three of the men had previously been blacksmiths, and so they made their own weapons together. They forged gale swords and spin daggers, heart arrows and true spears. Each one was a thing of beauty, so finely made and delicately balanced that only the most skilled warriors could have used them effectively.

  But The Daisain was not happy with their progress. Something was missing, he’d

  said. He intensified their lessons, he sent them out on missions to kill rulers he deemed errant and, worst of all, he turned their training into a competition. The Daisain had said only one of them could be the Over Guardian, the High Sentinal. To do this they’d have to reach something he called attainment. Whatever it was, none of them ever achieved it. Regularly, they killed each other as part of their ‘practice’, or died from the accumulation of injuries they were expected to endure. Each time, the Daisain would depart for several weeks to relocate them as infants. And each time, the training would begin anew. At last he took to executing them before they regained their memories, in the hope of minimising the influence of their failures from the lives before. That was when they became The Dedicated,

  The Kusuru Assassins.

  The memory of her final night in the Dekusu Forest with her family was the most painful for Artemi to retread. Aged only sixteen, she’d returned from her most recent mission, back to the grand house they’d built. The great pillar trees and feather vines had brushed at its roof tiles with their familiar noises; the purple spur flowers had filled her nose with their summer scent. Her gale sword was still encrusted with the blood of the tyrant king she’d so recently dispatched, and Artemi was excited at the prospect of gaining The Daisain’s approval. She had marched up to the door and had thrown it open, shouting, “I’m back, ladies!”

  But no one had answered her greeting. The whole house was eerily silent. She’d run

  through the kitchen, across the cellars, up staircases and into bedrooms, but found no one. Artemi had paced down the garden, calling out the names of her kin, and none of them called back to her. Then she’d seen the legs, Romarr’s legs, lying amongst the soft leaves of the vegetables. His body had been decapitated.

  A few yards farther dawn the lawn, she’d discovered the bodies of Dorlunh and Tallyn. She’d knelt at Tallyn’s side and stroked the edge of his shirt tenderly. He had always been her favourite brother, with his quick wit, ready hugs and mischievous smiles. Artemi had placed her head onto his hard, young chest and had begun to weep, when someone approached her. She’d raised her eyes in sorrow, but had been too slow to react to the

  grasp of The Daisain and two other Kusurus. They’d hauled her off to the cellars and tied her up for interrogation.

  “Why did you kill them?” The Daisain had thundered at her.

  “I didn’t... I’ve only just returned... I... I found them like that.”

  “We know it was you. It had to have been you!” Khasha spat, shaking her by the arms.

  Artemi had felt a touch of fear then. “I swear I did not. Whoever did is still out there.”

  Vestuna looked across at Khasha then. “Mirel’s the only one left...”

  “No, it couldn’t have been Mirel,” Artemi protested. Mirel was her closest friend and sister. She would never have done this.

  “Well, it’s either Mirel or you.” The

  Daisain knelt at her side and withdrew the gale sword from Artemi’s back. “I’m sorry, butI have to ensure my survival,” he’d murmured. Then, without so much as a whisper, he’d cut through her throat and ended her life.

  When she’d returned to the house, twenty-three years later, she’d found it empty and mould-ridden. She’d walked forlornly through the overgrown gardens and picked through the possessions of several childhoods. A creak on the rotting stairs had interrupted her thoughts, and she’d padded to the hallway to investigate.

  “Tallyn!” Artemi had thrown herself into his arms and hugged him tightly.

  The man had grinned at her broadly and nuzzled her hair, before lifting a hand to touch her cheek. It had fizzed against her skin

  with his kanaala abilities. “I’ve missed you, Tem. Life’s just not the same without a naughty little sister around.”

  She’d smiled broadly back at him. “Or an overly conscientious big brother.”

  They’d hugged each other for a moment, and then Tallyn’s tone had grown more serious. “Come with me. We can’t stay here any longer. It’s not safe.” He’d led her out to the forest, and they’d walked several miles until they’d reached a small cave beneath a rocky outcrop. “I’ve been waiting for you,” he said as he seated himself on the rain-smoothed floor. “Vestuna came back a week ago, and Khasha a few days before him. It’s not good, Tem.”

  “Then you know The Daisain killed me. He thought I’d murdered you.”

  Tallyn nodded wearily. “We all died that day. The Daisain, too. All of us except Mirel. ”

  Surprise and confusion caused her shoulders to tense and her mind to cloud. “Mirel? But she doted on you just as much as I did. Why would she...? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It was her, Artemi. While you were on your little mission to assassinate King Fennah, she regained her memories early. It was an accident. Something she found, perhaps she heard someone whisper the words. I don’t know. Anyway, when she woke up... she was raving. She couldn’t cope with her memories of the training.”

  Artemi breathed a sigh. “None of us knew how we would cope with it until now.”

  Tallyn pulled a frown. “No.”

  “But why kill you and the others? Why not just the Daisain?”

  “She became obsessed with attainment. For the last week that was all she would talk about – how the High Sentinal had to be you or her. I suppose in the end she just wanted to remove the competition. But she will come after you. I’ve heard that her condition is not much improved.”

  Wrapping her arms round her knees, Artemi fel
t the cold of the cave rocks work through her clothing. “It’s all over, then. Our

  family.”

  He nodded. “And now we have a dangerous problem on our hands.”

  Something prodded at her curiosity. “Do you know why she said it had to be me or her?”

  Tallyn grinned broadly and very nearly emitted a burst of laughter. “She was jealous of you Artemi. She always was. But think back – how many lives have you gone through during your training here?”

  She tried to add them up. It was a little confusing when so many of the memories seemed so similar. “I’m not sure. Maybe ten?”

  Tallyn guffawed. “For me it was nearer twenty, Romarr was probably the same, Vestuna and Khasha more like twenty-five and Dorlunh thirty. You and Mirel lived longer than we did, and killed us more often.”

  “I’m not sure that is something to be proud of,” she murmured.

  Her long-time brother shuffled around and put one of his sword-strong arms across

  her shoulders. “Vestuna had a vision about you both. Did you know that? Attainment is real, he said. And it will be one of you. Perhaps her madness and zeal will lead her to it first, or perhaps it will be your honest heart and sheer obstinacy that’ll take you there. But you must be wary of her. Vestuna said she would try to send you mad with hurt first.”

  And that is exactly what Mirel had done in each of her subsequent lives. Every family that Artemi was born into, every friend she became close to, was at risk of falling under Mirel’s sword. With time her punishments became more cruel, and on numerous occasions Artemi’s loved ones were subjected to torture before her very eyes. And so Artemi had vowed to live with fighting men and women, to leave her families and assume