Ashok swung for a faceless skull, but it was mutely blocked by a raised ax. He stepped into it, and drove the tip through the space where the mouth would have been. He shoved until steel came out the back of its head and knocked its fur hood off. He shoved until the guard smacked into the stretchy membrane. It still tried to hit him, but he got his other hand up and grabbed onto the ax handle. What does it take to kill you?
Another monster stepped up to stab Ashok. Devedas intercepted it with a swing so hard that it left the spear splintered and useless. Then Devedas shoulder-checked the creature into the snow.
Everything had a weakness . . . Gravity was one of them. Except for birds, but luckily they weren’t fighting birds.
“Breaking formation!” Ashok shouted. The two of them were hardly a formation, but that’s what they’d been taught to say in training when moving apart. His opponent was bigger and heavier than he was, but Ashok had driven a sword through its face, and that gave him considerable leverage. He jerked the sword to the side, twisting its head around, and then he shoved. The two of them crashed through the crowd, sliding across the snow, toward the edge of the cliff. At the last second, Ashok yanked back hard, pulling his sword free.
The creature slipped on the ice and went to its knees, but didn’t go over the edge. So Ashok kicked it in the chest and sent it rolling over the side. It disappeared in a cloud of ice crystals. He turned back just in time to catch the tip of a spear as it plunged through his thick coat. There was a flash of heat as the edge sliced through his skin. Rolling around the attack, Ashok hacked that creature in the neck. The soft flesh parted, but it still wouldn’t let go of the spear. His boots began sliding across the packed snow as it shoved him toward the edge of the cliff.
Ashok snarled and hacked it in the neck again and again. The rubbery substance came apart beneath the well-honed blade until its head parted from the neck, and hung there, attached only by a flap of skin.
It still didn’t die.
“Move right!” Devedas shouted.
Ashok didn’t hesitate. He threw his body to the side, spear still twisted through his clothing, as Devedas crashed into the monster’s back, sending it flying off the ledge and into space. The spear was yanked out, slicing a new cut across Ashok’s body, just above the first.
The remaining monsters pulled away again, observing.
Ashok could feel the blood running down his stomach. Devedas was grimacing and there was blood running down his scalp from where he’d been struck. They were both panting. He was thankful for the chance to catch his breath, what little of it was available up here.
“Two down. Four to go,” Ashok said. “Ideas?”
“Hack them to bits. Toss the bits over the side.”
He’d been hoping for something better. “Good plan.”
The monsters closed on them a third time. Either he was tiring faster than expected, or they’d grown much faster. The monsters seemed far more confident, and their weapon handling was vastly improved. There was nothing clumsy about them now. A minute of furious combat seemed to stretch on forever. Both sides fought with the savagery worthy of Senior Protectors. Ashok was only able to get in a single solid hit, slicing his blade through a few ribs before the things pulled back again. That one stood there, silently mocking him. Apparently they didn’t have lungs either.
Devedas had done better than Ashok had, and had carved a massive chunk from one of the creature’s legs. The monster was balancing itself with its spear, broken leg dangling in the snow, seemingly as calm as Ashok was. Then he looked over his shoulder to find that they’d been herded to the edge of the cliff.
“They’re toying with us,” Devedas gasped.
Sure enough, when they came for the fourth time, the creatures struck like lightning. Their strength was incredible. Too fast. Devedas’ legs were swept out from under him by a whirling spear shaft. The monster smoothly recovered, raised the spear, and launched it at Ashok. Devedas swung from the ground and intercepted the killing blow, saving his life again.
Ashok stabbed at that monster, but a jolt of pain ran up his arm as his sword was batted brutally aside by another. Ashok fought with all the skill and savagery he could muster, until the flat of an ax bruised his ribs and knocked the thin air from his lungs. Something else hit him on the hip, cracking bone and forcing him down. He swung for a monster’s legs, but it leapt effortlessly over the flashing blade. Nothing is that fast. Something clubbed him over the head, and by the time the lights quit flashing behind his eyes, the monster he’d attacked had stepped on his sword blade, pinning it to the ice.
It was curious. He’d always thought that at the moment of death, he’d finally know what it was like to feel fear like everyone else, but there was nothing. Ashok tried to draw his knife, but a spear head was shoved through his hood and pressed against his throat. Strange. He’d always thought that pushed to this point he’d feel something.
“Enough!”
The cold iron departed, ripping away a bit of his skin with it. The monsters pulled back again across the small battleground of packed snow, leaving the two acolytes lying there, struggling to breathe. Devedas got to his feet first. He grabbed Ashok by the shoulder and roughly hauled him upright. One of his legs was nothing but tingling, nonresponsive pain. Involuntary tears were forming in his eyes and freezing there. He had to lean against Devedas to keep from falling over. Neither of them could stand on their own, but they both raised their swords.
The four remaining monsters silently parted to make way for another figure. This one was also dressed in thick furs, and Ashok’s first thought was that the creature’s chief had arrived to finish them. Then the newcomer pushed back his hood, revealing dark human skin rather than a stretched blue skull. “Stand down, acolytes. We start them tame for the challengers. Making it to the fourth incarnation is impressive, but I don’t believe you would last more than a few seconds of their fifth.”
Ashok recognized the speaker. He was tall and thin, but wiry strong, with graying hair and a weathered face. Ashok blinked his eyes and shook his head, but the man was still there. Are my eyes broken? He didn’t think he’d been struck in the head, or maybe the lack of air was getting to him, because Ratul, Lord Protector of the Order, couldn’t be here. Ratul had been at the base of the mountain to see them off.
“Master? Why . . . How?” Devedas stammered. “How did you—”
“Silence.” Their swordmaster was known as Ratul Without Mercy, and he was more frightening than any witchcraft-fueled abominations. “You’ve kept me waiting longer than expected, but I must admit, that was an acceptable demonstration. I am not ashamed to have taught you.”
Coming from Ratul, that was an incredible compliment, and Ashok was pleased to receive it.
His companion, however, was a bit more emotional in his response. “This was part of the test? We nearly died! What kind of brain-damaged fish-eater came up with this?” Devedas shouted as he wiped the blood from his face. Then he realized how unacceptable that emotional outburst was and lowered his head. “Forgive me, Lord Protector.”
Ratul had a way of glaring with his narrow, heavy-lidded eyes that struck fear into all the acolytes capable of feeling such things. “You’re lucky, Devedas. Long ago I cursed my instructor on this very spot for the very same reason. Offense has been given, but not taken. You have faced the guardians of the Heart. Don’t worry about the two you tossed over the side. They’ll climb back up shortly. If these had been men, you might have won. Enough questions for now.” Ratul put his hood back up and began walking away. “Come with me. You have passed.”
“What about Yugantar?” Devedas looked in the direction the other acolyte had fled.
“He didn’t pass. The mountain can have him.”
Chapter 6
Eighteen years ago
“If you’d not been here to guide us, we would’ve frozen to death before we found this entrance. The directions we were given were flawed for this last part. It would have led us to
the wrong part of the summit.”
“Correct, Ashok,” Ratul said as he knocked the ice from the hidden doors. They were cut from the stone and camouflaged so well that they could have camped on them and never known. “The Heart is the most vital possession of the Order. Only those who pass the test may know the true location. It is possible that an acolyte may fail the test and flee the Order. They have already demonstrated their lack of character. They could talk. What then?”
The solution was obvious. “Execute them.”
“Easier said than done in some cases, so it is better to deceive all the acolytes. Those who pass learn the truth. Should you ever speak of what you see beyond this point, your life is forfeit. If you are ever tortured for this information, it is better that you will yourself to die rather than give it up. If you ever tell of this place, you will be hunted down by the entire Order and destroyed, for the Heart is the source of our power.”
Ratul did something with his hands, it seemed as if he were tracing invisible pictures on the stone, but whatever it was was hidden from view by his fur coat. The door should have been frozen solid, but it slid open with the grinding of stone against stone. Steep stairs led down into the mountain. Ratul started down and they followed. It was good to get out of the wind, but Ashok didn’t like how there was no visible mechanism for opening the heavy door inside. Regulated magic was legal, but he had an instinctive personal distrust of the craft. Magic was made using the leftovers of broken ancestor blades and the remaining life spark of long-dead bearers.
“From this point forward, nothing you see can ever be spoken about with anyone who is not a Protector of senior rank or higher. You have already given me your oath. Whether it be a chief judge, the highest arbiter in the Capitol, the Thakoor of your house, or if the Forgotten himself descends from the heavens in a rain of fire and asks about this place, I don’t give a damn, you will not speak with them about the Heart. Understood?”
“The Forgotten is imaginary, Lord Protector,” Ashok pointed out.
“Damn, boy, you are a literal sort. Come on.” Ratul started down the stairs.
The acolytes followed. Ashok was still having a hard time walking. His joint made a clicking noise in his pelvis with each step, and the pain was grating. The cuts on his chest burned, but the blood had dried to his undershirt enough to form a sort of giant cloth scab, so he was in no danger of bleeding to death. Devedas was keeping pressure on the laceration in his side, but the wound on his head was still slowly leaking through his hood. He was looking deathly pale and had vomited a few minutes before, but Ratul had denied their requests to stop long enough to tend their wounds.
Devedas slipped, stumbled down several steps, but caught himself on the wall before falling completely. Ashok grabbed him by the arm and helped him stand. Since one foot was numb, that almost caused both of them to go tumbling down the stairs. Some mighty Protectors they were.
He’d never been good at offering encouragement. “Keep going. It’s not far now,” Ashok said anyway.
“You don’t know that,” Devedas whispered.
“I can still hear you,” Ratul said from below. “Your bodies are frail. Bones break, blood spills, and the Law is deprived of yet another valuable enforcer. That’s what the Heart is for. When your own proves insufficient, it will beat on your behalf . . . But the boy is right, Devedas, it isn’t much farther.”
The magic door ground closed behind them, plunging them into complete darkness. Footsteps told him that Ratul was still descending. Devedas muttered something incomprehensible, and then the two of them limped along after their instructor.
The blindness was unnerving. The stairs continued. There seemed to be hundreds of them. Normally Ashok was so focused he would have counted, but now he was too tired to think. Something was making his nose itch. The mountain had been almost sterile. In comparison this placed smelled old. It was quiet except for the scrape of their boots against the stairs, their gloves along the walls, and Devedas’ labored breathing. Ashok was taking a lot of Devedas’ weight now as the older acolyte was having a hard time staying conscious. “Stay with me, brother,” Ashok pleaded as Devedas’ head wobbled around on his neck. If he went limp, they would fall. “I’m not strong enough to carry you.”
Below them, Ratul began to whistle a tune. Then his footfalls changed. He’d left the stairs and reached a level surface. That gave Ashok hope. There was some rattling of metal on metal, and then the scrape of a firestarter. Thankfully, an orange light appeared. The glow spread as Ratul took the torch and touched it to a big fire pit. Whatever was in it was dry and immediately ignited. By the time he got Devedas to the bottom the chamber was filling with light and heat. His skin prickled. They’d been cold for so long that the warm air felt like being stabbed with thousands of needles.
“Bring him this way.” Ratul ordered as he walked further inside and lit another fire pit. Ashok was having a hard time keeping up. “I was told there used to be lanterns here that never went out, but all magic breaks down eventually. The lights died generations ago, yet we make do. I sense a parable about society there.”
Ashok stepped on an uneven part of the floor, and for whatever reason, that was enough. The strength went out from his injured leg. It crumpled beneath, and the two acolytes fell down. He hit the ground with a grunt. “Oh, what now?” Ratul muttered as he came back. He roughly rolled Devedas over and lowered an ear to his chest. “Hmmm . . . This one is worse off than I thought. He’s bleeding to death and doesn’t have enough sense to complain about it.”
“He did complain, Lord Protector. However, you didn’t listen.”
“We’re going to have to work on that unflinching honesty of yours, Ashok.” Ratul effortlessly hoisted Devedas up and put him over one shoulder. “Wait here. I must get him to the Heart immediately.”
The master carried off the other acolyte, leaving Ashok alone.
He lay there on the hard floor for a time, flat on his back, letting his exhaustion seep from his body into the mountain. Ashok was incapable of fearing for himself, but it was interesting to discover that he could be worried about someone else’s fate. He didn’t want Devedas to die. Ashok had never had a friend before. Well, at least if you didn’t count Angruvadal, but he wasn’t sure if an ancient magical killing machine could actually be considered a friend.
The fire pits cast just enough light to see the high ceiling of the chamber. This place may have started out as a cave, but it had been worked and polished until the walls were smooth. However, there was large, rectangular section on the wall above him that was intricately carved and casting odd shadows. It took his eyes time to adjust enough to figure out what he was looking at.
It was a map.
Ashok had seen many maps. Mindarin used them during his lessons and had several posted in the training room. He’d seen maps of house borders, of the trade routes between them, even maps of all of Lok, where great rivers were lines and cities were nothing but specks. Only this wasn’t like any map he’d seen before. He couldn’t figure out what house’s lands it was showing. Something was wrong with this one, he couldn’t place his finger on it, but the map seemed totally unfamiliar. Legal borders changed over time, but coasts and mountain ranges didn’t.
Then he picked out a few familiar shapes that would not have changed over time, like the Gujaran peninsula, and the western blob that was Uttara, the northern and westernmost parts of their nation respectively. “Impossible . . .” Ashok muttered as he forced himself to stand up. His leg burned and threatened to betray him again, but he needed to get closer. Ashok found another torch on the wall and lit it from the fire pit. He placed himself directly beneath the gigantic map and held up the flame.
This was a map of the entire world.
Their nation, the entire world of man, took up but one small corner. There were several other lands across the seas, some far larger than theirs, and hundreds of islands in between. As he moved the flickering torch back and forth, he realized there were tho
usands of carved dots casting tiny shadows. A quick check of the one continent he was familiar with revealed that the holes seemed to represent cities, with the bigger the shadow, the larger the place. Most seemed to correspond to the seats of the houses today, though there was no Capitol in the center, and there were a few dots where there was nothing today, but most matched . . . They had to be cities. When he went back to examining the rest of the map, he realized there were thousands of dots, spread across every landmass except for the ones at the very top and bottom. “Impossible,” he said again.
Ashok couldn’t say how long he stared at that map, memorizing every line, staring upward until the muscles in his neck began to ache and he got dizzy. It was easy to lose track of time when you found something so incomprehensible.
“It is rather impressive, isn’t it?”
He hadn’t heard the Lord Protector return. “Is Devedas—”
“That boy is too stubborn to die. As determined as he is to make up for his father’s failures, it wouldn’t surprise me if someday he was given my office.”
Ashok turned back to the carving. “I don’t understand this.”
“Of course you wouldn’t. This map comes from the time before the demons fell to the world.”
It was forbidden to speak of the time before the Law in anything but the vaguest of terms. The acolytes only learned of it in passing, because it had been a dark and wicked time, so corrupt that it still influenced lawbreakers today. “The Age of Kings?”
“Before that, even. The houses were tribes back then. Fighting the demons is what forced us to name a king. It wasn’t until long after we drove the demons into the sea that we discovered kings could be nearly as bad.”
“We haven’t been taught much about those days.”
Surprisingly, Ratul didn’t yell at him for concentrating on frivolous, useless things, and to the Lord Protector anything that wasn’t fighting or preparing to fight seemed frivolous. Instead Ratul joined him beneath the map. “In ancient times, man had settled across the whole of the world. We were one of nine continents. There wasn’t one nation like there is now, but hundreds of them, a multitude with different ways, different languages, traditions, different color skins, they even had different laws. They fought wars against each other, traded goods and thoughts, even animals. It was routine for man to travel across the sea in mighty ships.”
Son of the Black Sword Page 6