'Only I can help you. They are coming back to finish the job and you won't be strong enough to defeat them. No power is. Even your precious Ascendants won't be able to stop what He will unleash. Please—'
Jhered barked a single word and the guards stopped and turned Yuran around. The Exchequer marched up to him and grabbed him by the jaw, strong fingers gripping him hard. Jhered made to speak but Yuran saw his chance.
'Guarantee commutation of my sentence or I'll tell you nothing. Let me live and I'll help you to do the same.'
Jhered considered for a heartbeat then nodded minutely.
'What do you mean, "he"?' he asked.
The room seethed with the dead.
Khuran took a pace backwards. None who saw this could fail to recoil. And this was the nucleus of his army. The forces that would march across the tatters of the Conquord and see its remaining defence run in terror. So it was said.
It was also said that these would herald the troops that would fly his banner and sing his name utterly without question. Unconditional loyalty. Belief submerged beneath blind subservience. It was a force given new voice. Small yet but he could see the potential. One would have to be simple to understand otherwise.
But the fact was that they were not his. Not truly. And the man who controlled them, who freed them to new directed life, was a power beyond his thinking. Yuran had brought him as a gift but had left Tsard relieved of a burden.
'Isn't it beautiful?' said Gorian.
'What? A dance of the dead?' asked Khuran.
Gorian stood by him, unafraid.
'Surely beauty can be seen in an irrepressible army. One without fear, which can feast off the earth beneath its feet and fight day and night. It is a perfection no Conquord legion will ever attain. Without thought to self. Without family. The perfect fighting force. And if there are enough of them, unstoppable.'
'But without love or honour too. Without drive and belief. Without a reason to die in service of their king. Without loyalty, an army is nothing.'
Gorian chuckled. 'You're confused by ancient values, my King.
There is nothing sweeter than the second chance. And there is nothing more terrible than the fear of losing that chance. We hold that power over each and every one of these dead people. There is nothing they would not do for us. Is that not loyalty?'
Khuran shuddered. The day outside was warm but deep in the heart of his castle the cold endured. He gazed at the dead, trying not to feel repulsed. The pervasive sense of wrongness threatened to overwhelm him. And his distaste was heightened by Gorian's obvious delight at what he had created.
The dead were confused. A dozen of them standing, walking and seeing in the pre-burial chamber. Thinking and understanding. But in a thrall that kept them silent. Bemused. These were young children dead of the pox the day before and a man whose heart had failed him. Another who had been hanged for stealing livestock, his head fallen forwards onto his chest, and a woman who had died in the act of childbirth.
Their last thoughts had been desperate, agonised and frightened. And now they had been reawakened. Khuran wondered if they thought of this as an afterlife. Because that is exactly what it was. But not the one laid down in the words of any god he had ever read about. There was no glory in this death and certainly no peace. Animated by Gorian and sustained by the rumbling power of the ground beneath their feet and by each other. A circuit, Gorian called it. Khuran didn't really understand. It hardly mattered. The proof was standing before him, dull-eyed people wearing the clothes in which they had died.
Still Khuran fought the idea that this was some trick though he had seen them all lying lifeless. He had felt for a pulse or for the warmth of blood below the skin. They had all been dead and now they all drew breath.
And in the next moment, they dropped silently to the ground and were still once more. Khuran looked at Gorian. A frown passed across the Ascendant's face.
'What happened?' asked Khuran, relieved of a dread he had tried not to show.
'It is a new ability,' said Gorian. 'Tried but sparingly and never on so many at one time. But it works. And I know how to make it better. But to make it overwhelming, I will need help.'
'Help? Where from?'
Gorian smiled. 'Just prepare your country for war, despatch your armies to where we agreed and leave it to me. I'll be back almost before you realise I'm gone.'
Khuran looked at Gorian. Just in his mid-twenties but so authoritative and confident in his power. His eyes shone from a face much coveted by the women of his court. The face of one of the Conquord's dramatic heroes, framed in glorious curled fair hair. He was tall, powerful and dressed in one of the togas Khuran found ridiculous but which he insisted were woven for him. Gorian liked his games and this was a particularly trivial one. And most people did not dare contradict Gorian Westfallen's wishes. But Khuran was not most people.
'Oh no, Gorian. You will not leave my sight. I will lead my people and you will follow me.' 'As you wish, my King.'
Chapter Two
859th cycle of God, 20th day of Dusasfall
The energy map was sick. Grey flecks coursed through veins and infested vital organs. Ossacer could feel the strength of the infection like heat washing over his face. The boy he was tending was gripped by his fever and barely conscious. His body was soaked in sweat though the wind blew cold around the small house in which he lay. Ossacer moved his hands down to the boy's stomach and winced at the picture that his mind's eye read in the fine detail of the energy trails. The liver and kidneys were strained to the point of shutdown. The boy didn't have long to live.
He and Arducius had come to the Morasian port of Okiro on the back of strong rumours of Ascendancy potential there and in outlying villages. But they had arrived in the midst of an epidemic that was sweeping the poor quarter of the port adjacent to the harbour. Something in the water, so Arducius said. And while he tried to divine the source with a fledgling passive Land Warden they'd met the day before, Ossacer was assessing the impact on the local population. The strong could fight it. The old, the young and the weakened were being taken back to the embrace of God in their hundreds.
'Can you save him?'
Ossacer turned to the doorway. The boy's mother stood there. She was a young woman, beauty submerged by her distress. Her voice trembled and the map of her lifelines was riddled with her anxiety. It was almost palpable. Mixed with her fear for her son was her fear of Ossacer himself. Desperation had overcome her suspicion and she had been prepared to let him try. It was the history of the Ascendancy repeated yet again.
She shifted under his gaze. A reaction he was long used to. Eyes that saw nothing but sensed everything, that penetrated to the heart straight through skin and bone. 'If you will let me, I can.'
The colours of her life energy pulsed bright with hope and relief. 'Anything,' she said. 'Please.'
She reached out to touch Ossacer but stopped herself before making contact. He knew what she saw. So normal in most respects. Neat short hair, friendly face a little careworn before its time, and an easy smile. But the shifting colour of his blind eyes and the fact of who he was could not be denied. Ossacer nodded.
'It's all right,' he said. 'I understand. Trust me. Don't be scared by anything you see. I will not hurt him.'
He turned back to the boy and placed a hand on his brow, the heat and damp a shock.
'Stay with me,' he whispered. 'Don't let go.'
Ossacer focused on the sick and dying body before him. The frenzy of energy outside in the harbour and through the port softened and faded from his mind. He sought sources closer to him. He was fresh but knew he couldn't risk too much of himself. There was so much work to do elsewhere in the slums when this one child was saved. Outside the window grew an old olive tree, roots deep, branches twisted and gnarled. Inside, candles and lanterns were lit and a fire was going in the tiny kitchen next door. It would be enough.
Ossacer lifted one hand, palm up, above his head and crabbed his fingers as if
holding a bowl. He opened his mind to the energies of tree and fire and let their maps coalesce before him. The tree, strong, slow-pulsing brown and deep green, shot with the pale shades of youth where new growth awaited the warmth of genastro. The fire a chaotic, vibrant mass of red and yellow, dark at its tips where energy escaped the circuit and bled into the air around.
He remembered how alien and difficult it had been when he was younger, when he and the others had first emerged and seen the true colours of life, the glory of this earth under God. Then, to link with another energy source had seemed all but impossible; to direct it a ludicrous notion and an effort that was instantly exhausting.
Now it was different, natural, though no less tiring in the long run. Ossacer pushed out with his own energy map to link with the sources he wanted. He teased breaks in their circuits to allow the energy to flow into him. He felt the quick jolt of fire and the lumbering power of the olive tree. Within his body, he contained and amplified what he took and reformed it to a map of his own design.
He projected this map on to the boy and drove its energies through his veins and organs. It was the map of health, a pure construct that overwhelmed the infection. The grey flashed to brightness and then was gone. Ossacer kept up the tide of health until no trace remained of the disease. Only then did he relax and release himself from the energies and let in the sounds of the day once again.
Ossacer sat back on his haunches and breathed out heavily. He shook his head at the exertion and wiped a hand across his brow. In the bed, the boy was calm. His fever was gone and he slept. Ossacer smiled and turned back to the mother. She was in the doorway still, her hands clutching hard at the frame. In the room, the lantern and candles were extinguished and in the kitchen, the fire smoked, its last embers dim. There was new growth on the olive tree despite the cold of dusasfall.
'Let him sleep,' said Ossacer. 'And boil all your water until we make the supply safe.'
She nodded mutely, unwilling to come near him even though she must be desperate to go to her son. Ossacer stood up.
'I understand your fear. I see it every day. But you must forget what you have been told. This is what the Ascendancy can bring to you, to the whole Conquord. We are not against God, we act with God and do his work. We seek only to help. I was born to heal.'
'Thank you,' she managed, her voice choked with a confusion of emotion. 'I just—'
'It's all right,' said Ossacer. 'All I ask is that you think about what you have seen here today. What will you tell your son, your friends? That your son has been cured by an evil that must be stamped out, or that by God's will, he has been granted another chance at life, a chance he so richly deserves? Think. We do not ask for thanks, only acceptance.'
He bowed his head and walked past her towards the front door. Harkov, general of the Ascendancy Guard, intercepted him. He was an instantly comforting figure. His strong lifelines surrounded a commanding frame. Harkov was a former palace guardsman respected by Paul Jhered and hence the perfect choice to lead the Ascendancy Guard. His natural energy map oozed authority and control.
'Trouble at the fountain,' he said.
'Bad?' asked Ossacer, putting a hand on Harkov's arm and relaxing his mind. The world faded to black before him. Harkov led him out into the chill day.
'Bad enough. It's Koroyan.'
Ossacer sighed and sagged, feeling suddenly tired. 'Will that woman dog my footsteps forever?'
'Unless she meets with a nasty accident,' said Harkov.
'You don't mean that,' said Ossacer.
'Not all the time.'
'Where's Arducius?'
'Three guesses,' said Harkov.
'Then we'd better be quick,' said Ossacer.
The two men were joined by another six Ascendancy guardsmen, each armed with gladius and shield and with bows slung across their backs. Their livery, fed, with the Ascendancy crest of sun over tree in a pair of cupped hands, was becoming a common and accepted sight throughout the Conquord. Made up of ex-levium and palace guard for the most part, the Ascendancy Guard were quickly gaining respect. They were also making powerful enemies.
It was a short walk to the fountains through slums that stank of death. The streets were tight and full of fear. Refuse was strewn across muddy cobbles. The stench of sewage was strong. Ossacer felt a little anxious. This far from the heart of the Conquord, not all the advances it boasted had penetrated to the poorest. It would ever be so.
The tension travelled in waves through the latent energies surrounding them. And in a few paces, he could hear it too. The wind carried the harsh sound of angry voices.
'The fountain's crowded,' said Ossacer. ‘I can see the interference in the energies above it. Heat and emotion carried on the wind.'
'Don't leave my side,' said Harkov. 'This might get ugly.'
'If Koroyan is there, it already is,' said Ossacer.
They hurried down a right-hand turn. The fountain was at the end of the alley. Ossacer could see the confused mass of people in the lifelines. Beyond them, the lively blues of the fountain waters. Harkov signalled two of his men to move ahead while he slowed almost to a halt. Ossacer searched the blaze of human energy, searching for Arducius's map. So hard to divine.
'Where is he?'
'He'll be all right,' said Harkov.
Ossacer's heart was pounding. He fought himself to calmness. Energy signatures ceased their flaring and resolved to detail once again. But he still couldn't see Arducius. There was shouting, a brief scuffle and into the silence that followed walked Ossacer with Harkov. The general filled in the detail.
'Koroyan is with Vennegoor and twenty or so Order guards. Arducius is facing them behind a line of our people. No swords are out but it's getting twitchy. Trouble is that citizens are crowding in quickly. If this goes the wrong way, we'll have nowhere to go.'
'We'll be fine,' said Ossacer. 'Just get me next to Ardu.'
Harkov's men put their shoulders to the gathering crowd and forced a path through to the fountain. The multiple images in Ossacer's mind thinned. He could see Arducius now. His aura was calm, his body map even. But within his frame, the brittleness of his bones was a dominant shifting pale grey. A sickness not even Ossacer could cure.
Around him, the guards showed more signs of stress while across from them, just a few yards away, the Order flooded his senses with their anger. Conversation broke out around them and Arducius looked round as he approached.
'Can't leave you alone for a moment without trouble breaking out,' said Ossacer.
'Nothing I can't handle,' said Arducius. 'Glad you're here though.'
The two of them moved in front of the line of guards. Before them, Chancellor Koroyan stood haughty and disdainful.
'Ah,' she said. 'The blind one too. Fresh from peddling your perverse healing, no doubt?'
Quiet spread again among the crowd, now several hundred strong, in the tight square which housed the fountain. Ossacer could feel them wavering. The Chancellor remained a dominant figure and despite the work he and Arducius had done here, their security was by no means guaranteed. Everyone listening and watching was an Order devotee.
'You are of course welcome to accompany me and talk to some of those I have helped,' said Ossacer, raising his voice loud. 'Ask them how they feel about my work.'
'It is interesting, and I think all of us would be fascinated to know,' said Arducius. 'What exactly is it you are doing here?'
Ossacer sucked in a breath.
'Risky, Ardu, very risky,' he whispered.
'Best get it out of the way now.'
Indeed, Koroyan did seem a little taken aback at the invitation but she recovered quickly and strutted into the gap.
'Is she still wearing the old robes of state?' asked Ossacer.
'Still. Lot of grey in her hair since last time though.'
'Good people of Okiro, of Morasia and the Conquord,' said Koroyan, indulging them with a smile. 'Faithful servants of the Omniscient. I am glad that you have had the opportun
ity to see at first hand what these so-called Ascendants can do. They can heal your sick, but what do they use to do it? And what else can they do that they would not be so pleased to demonstrate?
'I have seen what they can do and it chills my blood that they are allowed to walk among you. They can raise waters that could drown you all in your beds. They can summon gales that would flatten your homes. They play with the elements as if they own them. They do not. This earth is the province of God the Omniscient. None of us has the right to call on the powers of God and use them as our own. Can you possibly feel secure with them moving amongst you?
'The Omniscient cares for you. And this tragic disease that has afflicted you means that you are utmost in my prayers and in my thoughts. Curious, is it not, that the Ascendants choose to come here at the very outbreak of disease. Almost as if they knew it was going to happen.' Koroyan shrugged. 'Who knows, perhaps they are so powerful that they could sense the coming of the disease. Or perhaps they are the cause of it. After all, what is more powerful than live demonstration. They would not command your attention if there was nothing to improve, no?
'I denounce them. They are criminals under the Conquord's mistaken protection. They are heretics under the Omniscient. These people must be stopped. All here who worship Him know this and know the penalty. They should burn.'
There was a movement in the crowd. Anger stirred and voices were raised. The majority in support of the Chancellor but not all. None risked a move to action with guards flanking both parties.
'This is becoming a trial,' said Harkov quietly. 'I suggest you choose your next words very carefully.'
Arducius jumped on to the lip of the fountain, raising himself head and shoulders above the crowd which quietened quickly. Ossacer could see the confidence radiating from him, a warm green ripple in his aura.
'We've been here five days now. Five days in which we have sat with you, eaten with you, prayed with you and, yes, used the abilities we have to heal the sick. I recognise many of you as I look around. Some of you once heading for a premature return to the earth, are now walking, with your strength returning.
A Shout for the Dead Page 2