Blood of War

by Remi Michaud

  These changes began suddenly, some said overnight, and no one could understand how such a promising, gentle man—the beacon of light, he was called in the earliest records—could become so...dark.

  Every Grand Prelate since then knew, of course. The reason was in Maten's hands. The scroll described a dream Tosis had had one night, a dream where he was visited by Gaorla.

  “...and almighty Gaorla said unto me that he had children and these children were our gods. Three of these were known to Him. One had yet to walk the land and when He did we would tremble in fear, for his steps would be filled with the blood of the people.”

  Maten shivered despite the heat that poured from the hearth. The scroll went on to detail how Tosis had awoken in a cold sweat, grasping immediately the ramifications of his dream. Tosis had convinced himself it was just a dream, a nightmare brought on, perhaps, by a meal overly spiced.

  Until he had found the statue that Maten now held. He had kept the secret, too frightened of the reaction if he went public with his knowledge, too frightened of the Salosian response.

  For an instant, a long, taut instant, Maten considered hurling this bloody cursed thing across his office. He longed to see it reduced to harmless rubble, bits of unrecognizable plaster that would never be seen, never incriminate (he, of course, had no idea that an identical statue graced a mantle in the Abbey far to the south).

  His shoulders slumped. There was no real point hiding this little bit of evidence anymore—not with the real thing roaming the land.

  He spun, startled by the knock at his door, almost fell over when his feet seemed to rebel at the sudden change in balance. Who in the name of the hells would be bothering him at this time? Bloody fools. He had made his wishes clear: no audiences.

  Gathering himself, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The reek of pungent alcohol mixed with his own unbathed body turned his already sodden and delicate stomach.

  “What?” he snapped, glaring blearily at the door as though he might scald the trespasser on the other side. He clutched the small statue in his hand.

  Three acolytes stepped in, children really—and where was his assistant? Where was Mery? Who would send mere students to him? Was he not the Grand Prelate of the Gaorlan Order? This verged on insulting! The acolytes trembled, eyes wide in ashen faces.

  Before he could speak, they parted and a fourth person strode through the door. Tall, bluff, built like a bull, Kerwal glared at Maten. Arms folded across his spartan robes, Kerwal did not even offer the necessary obeisance.

  Sensing Kerwal's insubordination was but a symptom of a much more serious issue, Maten decided to exercise his authority.

  “What do you want, Prelate?” he demanded. “I left strict instructions that I was not to be disturbed.”

  The three acolytes stared at their toes; one, a young lady of no more than twenty (and rather fetching with her wheaten tresses and perky nose and full lips, Maten noted) wrung her hands nervously before her.

  But Kerwal was not moved. “I'm certain you've heard the latest news? Grand Prelate?”

  Maten heard the distinct pause and it galled. His nostrils flaring, he felt his anger flare white hot. Underneath, he felt stirrings of unease.

  “How dare you?” he shouted. “I will have you flogged for your impertinence, Kerwal. Your prelacy days are over. I'm going to strip you of your titles so that you'll be grovelling at the feet of these whelps!”

  Unmoved, immovable, Kerwal stood glaring. When Maten stopped speaking, his chest heaving great gulps of air, Kerwal said quietly, “Are you quite finished? Good. Now then. You have heard that the Salosian Order has defeated your army. You may also have heard that almost every remaining Soldier of God has defected and now call themselves the Soldiers of Jureya.

  “What you probably don't know is that the king has heard all of this through Sendings, has heard the proofs offered by not only the Salosians but also by several high ranking members of our own order. He has ordered this temple surrounded by the troops he left behind.”

  “On what grounds?” Maten gasped, appalled.

  “We were wrong. Gaorla is not the only god. We are being given the opportunity to repent our ways and to swear new vows to the true religious order.” Kerwal smiled, and Maten wondered if the room had suddenly gone colder. “Well, most of us are, anyway.” He strode purposely across to Maten and plucked from his hands both the statue and the small sheaf of vellum. Scanning the first page quickly, his eyebrows rose. “So it does exist then. Most of us didn't believe it.” He eyed Maten again. “You are to be tried as a heretic and a war criminal. These here-” he indicated the two items he now held, “-should be more than enough to convict you.”

  At those words, Maten heard the tramping of boots. Kerwal stood aside and a dozen soldiers bearing the king's emblem marched in.

  A wave of vertigo as though the floor, his immaculate hard-wood floor, had opened beneath his feet. Maten staggered. He had arrived late last night with a small retinue. They had ridden several horses to death, horses that, fortified with copious amounts of arcanum had raced faster than the wind. He had arrived only days after the disastrous defeat near Grayson. He was exhausted, completely spent, and totally bent on pulling himself and his order out of the ashes of this calamity. His mind simply could not assimilate what Kerwal told him. He thought he would have more time. How can Threimes have acted so quickly?

  Unless...

  Unless the king had already been prepared to take these steps. Maten knew of the king's secret heresy. He knew Threimes had within his possession a banned book—Maten's agents had been watching him for years. Could it be that Threimes had harbored more than an illegal book all these years? Could he have been harboring sympathies toward the Salosians? Maten could hardly credit it. The king certainly felt animosity toward Maten but that had to do with the necessary questioning and sentencing of his heretic daughter. Surely the king understood that it had been necessary. Surely the king had been devout; he had always been present for the religious observances and he had always taken part with seeming enthusiasm.

  But now... No, it had happened too quickly. The king had been waiting for this moment. That was the only answer that made sense. The book that Threimes had kept hidden had, Maten believed, been kept so the king could keep himself abreast and aware of the situation with the heretics. Only a fool discarded a source of information.

  Perhaps he had kept the book for other reasons? Maten shook his head, dumbfounded at not seeing it earlier.

  “He can't do that,” he muttered weakly.

  Kerwal raised one eyebrow. “Oh? Odd then since he has.”

  The last coherent thought the deposed Grand Prelate had before heavy iron shackles snapped shut around his wrist, and his mind cracked and fragmented into insanity, was that he wished he had not sent all his troops with Thalor.

  Chapter 59

  Three days. Three days since the battle ended. Three days of meetings and gatherings, of stuffy chambers and drafty halls. Three days with almost no sleep and little time even for food.

  Three days since he had sent a summons to Kurin that had been promptly ignored.

  Most of the issues, all the major ones certainly, that arose in the aftermath of the battle—the reparations of the damaged Abbey, the accommodations and provisioning of the greatly expanded population, the disposal of the dead—had been, or were in the process of being, resolved. Now he was left in the more mundane, and unenviable position, of seeing to day-to-day life at the Abbey. This task should have been Goromand's, as Abbot, but the old man would not hear of being seen as supreme as long as Jurel—Jureya—remained.

  He sat straight, ensconced regally in his golden throne, as befitted his status (not knowing much yet about the ways of the gods, he was still relatively sure that slouching and dozing during an audience was likely a no-no) and kept what he imagined was an imperious look on his features as he faced the row upon row of Salosians who populated the benches before him—and actually served
to frighten many. At least this day he was not quite so intimidating. He had eschewed his armor in favor of a pair of black linen pants, and a silk shirt with golden embroidery that was reminiscent of his armor.

  Smokeless torches, those arcane sources of illumination, had been rekindled after the battle, and the gold and greens of the great council hall glowed warmly in the soft light. Rank upon rank of petitioners approached him, under the watchful, benevolent gaze of his Father high above.

  Most were soldiers; Mikal's and former prelacy Soldiers, offering their obeisances to their God. Most followed up these declarations of faith and fealty with simple requests that he could easily grant: his blessing upon the soldier, the soldier's spouse and children, upon favored friends. Some he could do nothing about. A few soldiers asked if he could bless their arms or armor for more strength, or better accuracy, or more protection, and after the third refusal he managed to think up a good response to any further requests of this nature: “Unswerving belief will be all the blessing you ever need.” A few glanced askance at him when he uttered these words. They were not sure if he jested with them, or if he was just plain refusing them outright. Most, after some time to think about it, came to believe that Jurel—Jureya, right—was offering them something more than a simple spell to protect them in battle; he was offering the wisdom of the gods.

  Jurel was privately very satisfied with this. On the surface his words were straight forward enough, but there was enough ambiguity built in that it left interpretation open to the listener. Jurel, for example, never actually came out and told anyone where the unswerving belief was to be aimed. Many, of course, thought it was meant to be aimed at him. A few, the more astute ones, came to think that perhaps the belief should be aimed at the cause for which they battled. And a very few, the ones he took note of, had a vague understanding that their belief should be in themselves.

  It was all very satisfying.

  Between supplicants, his gaze rose back to the general assembly before him. Each time, he searched the crowd for one set of eyes, one mane of raven black hair. He had done so a hundred times today already. He never saw her, had not seen her since the battle. He told himself it was for the best, but the bitter disappointment ate at him.

  Some petitioners were priests of the old Salosian Order and they too had their own requests. Requests that Jurel could do nothing about since most were the province of other members of his strange family. He could not help this man speak with his wife who had been dead these past five years. He could not promise a better crop yield the next year. He could not explain why sunlight was so important to life, or how mountains formed. And he most certainly could not explain to the Maoran adherent how time and causality worked. Jurel barely understood the question, let alone the answer.

  One petitioner, however, late on the third day, startled him.

  As a Valsan departed, downcast that Jurel could not help her and her husband get with child, Jurel's eyes rose to the next in the waning line. Kurin stood before him, ramrod straight, not at all cowed as the others had been by the presence of the God of War.

  “Kurin,” Jurel said, a smile growing. “It's nice to see you.”

  Kurin strode forward without answering. Instead of kneeling as all the others had done, he stepped up on the dais and glared silently from the depths of his cowl. Without warning, his hand swung whip-quick and Jurel rocked back in his seat, gasping as stars danced in his vision. His gasp was echoed by hundreds of others. Then the hall went deathly still. Too stunned to speak, Jurel gaped at his one-time mentor as his vision cleared. He raised a hand to the stinging heat in his cheek, not really quite believing yet that Kurin had slapped him.

  “Chaplain,” Goromand remonstrated. Having risen from his seat with more alacrity than his age suggested was possible—and indeed with more alacrity than he had displayed in the past two decades—he stepped quickly to the foot of the dais. Not quite daring to step up on a level with Jurel—Jureya, Jureya; it would take him a while to get used to that—he motioned Kurin to step down. “How dare you strike our lord? Have you taken leave of your senses?”

  Without breaking eye contact with Kurin, Jurel waved Goromand back. Uneasy, incensed, Goromand complied, taking his seat in the front row. Gathering himself with a deep breath, Jurel repressed his first instinct. He had too much history with this man to end it that way. Besides, as Jurel had said some days before, he only killed in battle. This could hardly be construed as such.

  “What have I done to displease you, Kurin?” he asked quietly. Shuffling and creaks broke the stillness as everyone leaned forward to hear.

  Kurin's cowl was like a portal to a deep abyss. His fists were clenched, white-knuckled with alien rage; his shoulders were taut, battle-ready. He trembled with the potency of his fury. “Where did you go?” he hissed.

  Taken aback again, Jurel stammered, “Wh-what do you mean?”

  “You abandoned us, Jurel. You left us to die.”

  “I came back. We won.”

  “You left when we needed you most,” Kurin shouted. A few anonymous grumbles of agreement reached his ears. “You ran away from your greatest duty. Your return was not enough to save us. It took the fortuitous arrival of Grayson's men to turn the battle.”

  Holding calm to him like a thick cloak on an icy day, Jurel responded with a composure he did not feel. “Would it have made a difference if I had not left? We would still have been outnumbered, we would still have endured the same siege. Perhaps Grayson would still have shown up at the same time. Or maybe he wouldn't have and we would have been overrun.”

  With a snort, Kurin waved away the argument with a derisive flick of his hand. “We'll never know now, will we?” he scoffed.

  “What could my being here have done that was not already done by the very capable commanders I left behind?”

  “I don't know!” Kurin burst out. “Maybe you would have...” His mouth worked soundlessly for a moment as he searched helplessly for the right response. His head turned as if seeking a hunter over his shoulder. “You could have...I don't know. I'm not the bloody god here.”

  Jurel's instincts kicked up, sending him an almost premonitory understanding. Vague at first, it began to solidify as he considered his hurt old friend.

  “I could have saved you sooner from Thalor?” he asked, his voice quiet, barely more than a whisper.

  Kurin gasped, staggered back as though struck. His breathing came in quick, ragged bursts.

  “He tortured me for weeks,” Kurin rasped at last, his voice cracking. “Every day I hoped you would come. Every day I prayed for it. I deserved that much, didn't I? Weeks, Jurel. He did things to me that you cannot begin to imagine.

  “And when you did not come, when the torture continued and those who were jailed with me began to die, I began to lose hope. I began to believe that I was wrong. About you, about my research, about everything. Within me coiled a feeling of betrayal that I tried to ignore, tried to explain away as nothing more than foolishness. But as the days passed, I could no longer ignore it, Jurel. You left me there for weeks.

  “When you finally did come, I was too far gone in my anger. Anger at Thalor mostly. But you too.”

  He raised a fist, his bitterness heartbreaking to see. “And then you went and took away my only outlet by calling your brother to take that monster away. I wanted him. I wanted to watch him suffer and squirm. I wanted to hear his shrieks as he heard mine.”

  “Would it have helped?”

  “Yes, blast you. YES!” But there was a shadow deep within his rage. A single miniscule grain of doubt.

  “Really? Do you think you have it in you to do what he did? Would you become like him to satisfy your desire for revenge?”

  “He deserved it.”

  Jurel allowed a small smile to twist the corners of his lips. His eyes remained as hard as granite. “No doubt he did. No doubt too that my brother is doing far worse to his ghost than you could ever imagine.”

  Jurel rose and as he did so
he called forth into himself. Jagged blue lights rippled along his arms and torso, down his legs, and where they passed his black shirt altered, became his armor. By the time he stood tall, he once again wore the armor of the God of War. Calling forth again, blue energy blazed in his hand, stretched and crackled until he held his sword of light.

  Not immune to Jurel's sheer force, Kurin winced.

  Jurel reached out gingerly with his thoughts, brushed Kurin's mind. As gently as feather down, he pushed past the dark, roiling cloud of Kurin's bitter rage, past the very recent memories distorted by the foreign hatred that clouded him. He felt a buffeting at his mind: Kurin's attempts to push him out, but it was as a field of grass trying to hold back a herd of bison.

  “I'm not here to hurt you, Kurin,” Jurel spoke gently into the man's mind. “I'm here to help you.”

  Beyond those most recent memories—he ignored those memories of the last few days and proceeded back until he saw...

  Until he saw what Kurin had survived at Thalor's hands.

  “Get out!” Kurin shrieked silently, the vaults of his mind ringing with frantic outrage. “Get out of my mind!”

  Jurel began to sift through those memories, allowing himself to live them while trying to screen Kurin from them, knowing he could not keep it all out, hoping he could keep enough.

  “I need to know, Kurin. I need to know what happened to you. What I let happen to you.”

  What he saw, appalled him, gored him with grief. Thalor had not been gentle with Kurin.

  “No. No, Jurel. Please.”

  Numbly, Jurel watched. He watched as a man followed Thalor into the tent where Kurin was bound hand and foot to a rough table of unfinished wood. The man set a large leather bag beside Kurin's head. Clinking tinkled like wind chimes as the man rooted around in the bag.