Knight Chosen

by Tammy Salyer

  So he did what seemed appropriate. He remained tucked up on the chamber floor, hoping not to be killed.

  A hand grasped his shoulder and shook him, breaking through the fear he very much wanted to surrender to. The pale Knight loomed over him, speaking, but Jaemus couldn’t understand. “What?” he yelled over the din.

  “Are you all right?” the man asked, speaking in Elder Veros.

  “Er, I’m not dead,” was all he could think to say, because in this situation, “all right” hardly seemed the term that fit.

  “Come with me. You can’t stay—”

  A Ravener launched himself at the Knight, forcing him to release Jaemus’s shoulder and defend himself. In stunningly fast movements the Knight jumped aside, swinging fists, dodging strikes, and was soon grappling with the Ravener. The shorter Knight had risen as well and provided an arm to assist the wounded Knight. These two fought as one body, their combat skills remarkable despite having no weapons and one being injured.

  The having-no-weapons situation, however, did not last long for any of the Vinnric Knights. The first Raveners to attack them had been felled into bloodless heaps, and their wickedly sharp blades claimed and used against them. The sight of the pale Knight cleaving through the neck of his next foe made Jaemus light-headed and nauseous. He had to look away, struggling to clear his mind of a picture that hideousness. The Knights and Raveners alike seemed to have forgotten him anyway, and it appeared that if he remained lying motionless where he was, he might be mistaken for dead. As strategies went, he could think of none better.

  The two Verities seemed to be locked in combat, becoming a vortex of flashing and pulsing in a chaotic crescendo that rhythmically swelled and ebbed throughout the chamber, as if Jaemus had fallen into the heart of the Glister Cloud. If the beings were equal in power, they could not destroy each other. But, if he understood it right, they could destroy each other’s vessels and thus end their worlds and everything that was part of them.

  Helplessly, he scanned the immediate area, debating with himself whether he preferred to die standing on his feet or cringing on his belly. Through slitted eyes, he spied Evernal’s body and the mound of celestial Fenestrii, Balavad’s Scrylle, and satchel Ulfric had dropped nearby. Such simple objects had started this whole inter-Cosmos war. Perhaps they could be used to prevent another—if anyone survived, that was. Like him, for instance. The Verities fighting here weren’t his own, after all, and if they destroyed their realms, Himmingaze wasn’t going anywhere—at least not right away.

  Decided, he scrambled to his knees. A sickly pale Ravener spotted him immediately and lunged with blade raised. Before Jaemus could so much as force out a cry, the golden-haired Knight had removed the Ravener’s head. The felled creature didn’t bleed.

  Jaemus decided it would be best to stay on his belly and writhed and inched the last few paces to the artifacts. Hastily sweeping them into the satchel and slinging the long strap over his neck, he looked toward the chamber’s entryway and calculated how fast he could get there and back to the hold he’d last seen Cote and the Glisternauts in. Wishful thoughts were in abundance today, it seemed, and he began to suspect he could make it if the furor here kept the Raveners and Vinnrics occupied.

  Fate dealt him another slap, reminding him wishes were rarely reality, when his movements attracted yet another Ravener. Jaemus turned to spot the approaching enemy, close enough for him to realize, That’s unusual. Their tongues are forked like the mythical slangarook—idiotic last thoughts, but he hadn’t exactly had time to plan them out . . .

  The Ravener loomed and Jaemus sucked in a breath and closed his eyes, felt warmth jet over him, which he assumed to be the swing of the hooked blade coming at his neck, then smelled that pungent sea-breeze scent again. Notably, however, he did not feel the cut of a sword.

  Opening his eyes, he realized what had happened. The two Verities had parted once more, and only Vaka Aster still stood. The ghastly Verity’s body lay on the floor, withered and smoking putridly. The Ravener that had been about to strike Jaemus lay nearby. Dead or stunned, Jaemus didn’t know, but diminishing sparks from whatever Vaka Aster had done to him bounced from his carapace like hot grease.

  Around the chamber, Raveners and Vinnrics alike stood utterly still and stared at the two Verities, some with weapons held in midstroke. Disbelief dominated every face. Jaemus felt an urge to whoop with joy he could barely contain. It was over, right? Until he caught the eyes of the pale Knight, which, though a somber golden-brown, were locked in an expression that looked all wrong on that stern face. Fear.

  “Unlike you, my quin, I am not caged in any form. I am free. How does it feel to be a slave to your own creation?” The voice of Balavad sounded wrung from the air like festering ooze from a bandage, coming from everywhere. “Yours is the nature most corrupted by this sundered existence. You will see this truth better without the distractions of your realm. I am patient, and I will help you.”

  As if commanded, the Raveners commenced their attacks, and the Vinnrics had no choice but to engage. Vaka Aster stood an arm’s-length away, and the being glanced over Aldinhuus’s shoulder at Jaemus as if to ensure his safety, then turned away and grew still. The halo surrounding Aldinhuus flared again, forcing Jaemus to lower his eyes.

  As his vision adjusted to the glare, he noticed the body of Mylla at his knees. Her face looked so peaceful, and he took a moment to appreciate that. She’d died in horrible pain but had perhaps found rest after all. Wherever she was, it had to be better than here. May you pass safely into whatever you Vinnrics consider the next phase, he wished at her and prepared to stand. Now was his chance to run for the ship hangar and Cote.

  Her eyes popped opened, scaring him almost to death.

  Were these Knights impossible to kill? It certainly looked to be the case. Her head was turned to the side, looking at something behind him. She was . . . was she trying to speak? She caught his astonished stare, and her eyes pleaded with him.

  “Glunt . . .” she whispered.

  “It’s not Glunt, it’s—” He cut himself off and leaned closer to her. “Sorry, not important. What can I do?”

  Her gaze snapped back behind him, and with a sudden certain fear that he knew what he’d see, he jerked around.

  A Flesh Caster stalked toward Vaka Aster’s back, pointing the sword taken from Evernal—but Jaemus saw the way the being’s eyes blazed red and knew better than to believe he was just a Flesh Caster. It was Balavad, in a new vessel, and nothing stood between him and Vaka Aster except Jaemus and the downed Knight Evernal. With darting glances, he searched for someone close by who could help, but the melee was too fierce, the other Knights scattered amid it.

  “I’m about to do something very heroic,” he whispered—to Evernal, to himself, he wasn’t sure. “And I already regret it. Preemptive regret. It’s a thing.”

  The Flesh Caster-turned-vessel hadn’t noticed him crouched over Evernal. Just as Balavad lunged, Jaemus sprang over Evernal’s body into the blue halo at Vaka Aster’s back, shoulders angled to shove the celestial being aside. He thought wildly, Being incinerated by blue starlight will at least be more memorable than the dozens of other ways I’ve nearly died in the last few Glister cycles. Avoiding being swallowed alive by a fleech is at least some consolation.

  Chapter 52

  ENOUGH.

  Vaka Aster’s voice boomed, nearly shattering Jaemus’s skull.

  By the Glister Cloud’s gleaming, he thought, that was loud! I suppose being a celestial sprite lends one extra volume.

  He gazed around, taking in a view he couldn’t quite make sense of

  Oh my . . . the sky, it’s so enormous. . . . Where am I? I can see every star in the Great Cosmos. It’s so . . . it’s so . . .

  Hold on, is that a sword sticking out of me?

  Chapter 53

  “Wake. Wake now, Knight of Himmingaze.”

  Jaemus twitched at the voice, a gruff and unfamiliar one. Is this another Verity? By the
Cloud, I hope not. I can’t take another one. His eyes remained closed as he pondered how he might have come to be lying prone on the most uncomfortable bed he’d ever been on. Wake? Does that mean what I hope it means? I’m not dead? Because I should be dead. I saw a sword—

  His eyes flew open. “—hairy haberdasher’s dangling balls of yarn! Have I been stabbed?”

  He remembered the explosion of light after he’d lunged at Vaka Aster—What was I thinking? I’m not a hero!—then the strange sensation of flying through the Cosmos, then, and this was really the main thing, the sword that had appeared to be growing from his stomach.

  “Oh thank the water and lighting!”

  Jaemus blinked, barely able to make out two hazy forms in front of him. After another blink, he had to force himself to believe that he was staring into the eyes of—

  “Cote?” he sputtered. “Is that really you?”

  “It’s me, Jae. I’m here.”

  Still gripped by panic, Jaemus reached for his midsection, frantically running his hands along his belly. He expected to find cold steel but touched only the fabric of his flightsuit. “But I . . . I was skewered like a fish on a giant sword. I could swear it.”

  “Aye, ’Gazian. You were indeed.”

  His sight had mostly cleared, but he wasn’t at all sure if that was a good thing. A man’s head, as solid- and dense-looking as a battering ram, with thick black curly hair pulled back in a rope, loomed just above him on the opposite side of Cote. The man peered into his face, and Jaemus recognized him: one of the Knights aboard the warship. He was sure he’d witnessed him lop at least six whole Raveners into a collection of Ravener bits all on his own.

  But that wasn’t what held his attention. Stabbed, dear Cloud, that’s not how things were supposed to go. Against the will of his stubborn, leaden tongue, he asked, “Am I . . . am I dying?”

  Cote responded, “No, you’re okay. Somehow, by a providence that I still can’t fully believe is real, you’re okay.”

  The black-haired Knight leaned back, scrutinizing him. Jaemus kept his eyes on the stranger’s face as he waited for what looked like was going to be bad news, noting details he’d not been able to see on the warship. Like most people’s, this Knight’s eyebrows came in a set. Unlike most, instead of a gap midway over his nose, his brows connected in an unbroken line there, but were split neatly over the left eye in a long, deep scar that ended in brambly mutton chops. He was easily the hairiest being, man or beast, Jaemus had ever seen. The other thing that stood out on his face was the nine-pointed star in the center of his bouldery chin.

  Finally, the Knight said, “Nay, you’re not dying, you’re not. Why would you be?” He grabbed one of Jaemus’s hands in a grip that felt as strong as a mounting clamp for a Himmingazian shuttle, then stood, pulling Jaemus to his feet, too.

  “Wait!” he yelled, preparing for the assault of agony that must surely be the side effect of being speared through the middle. But it didn’t come.

  Instead, he perched on legs he would have expected to start quaking and spill him back to the ground. When he realized they held him no less sturdily than ever, his curiosity quickly outgrew his alarm. A quick, cautious glance at his belly revealed his own blood, already dry, and—and now this was really the main thing—no marring of the skin visible through his suit. Why no gaping wound blossomed from his belly was a question he decided could wait until shock and a lingering suspicion he was in the throes of some kind of death hallucination could be either confirmed or denied.

  The Knight was watching him bemusedly, and Cote rose beside him, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder. Unsure what to say, Jaemus took in his surroundings.

  They occupied a chamber of some sort that looked like it had been blasted to pieces, and the roof was caved in. A bit like the Creatress’s shrine, he thought. Though this place looked battered by violence rather than time. A doorway with a broken timber door barely hanging from its hinges led toward another space beyond, but it was too gloomy to see much of it.

  The space was filled with what seemed to be all or at least most of the Glisternauts who’d been aboard the Bounding Skate before it had been swallowed by the warship. They all looked well enough, if confounded and scared, and a few flashed him smiles when they saw he was able to stand. The impression he was left with, more than anything, was that he was among a group of refugees.

  “Let’s see if I have this right,” he began shakily. “Not only have I survived being impaled, I’ve also miraculously healed completely, we are safely off the wicked sprite’s ship, and we are now in . . . let me guess, Vinnr?”

  The Knight said, “You’ve got that right. I pulled the sword out myself, I did. Star Spark, Mylla’s sword. Would have destroyed Ulfric, and Vaka Aster, and all of Vinnr if you hadn’t stepped in front of that Ravener before he could strike. Brave man, you are, brave and,” he appraised Jaemus, “tougher than you look. What they say is true: thin skin knits quick, it does.” With a lighthearted slap on Jaemus’s shoulder that nearly sent him tumbling to the floor, the Knight asked, “What I most want to know is why the Knights of Lífs’s Order bear Vaka Aster’s mark.” His misshapen eyebrows rose questioningly.

  The entire monologue was so outside of Jaemus’s scope of understanding that he could do nothing but remind himself to close his mouth, which he’d realized was agape. Then it began to dawn on him. “You think I’m a Knight, like you? Of Lífs? No, see, I’m no Knight of anything. I’m a Glint Engineer.” Even as he spoke, his thoughts fixed on a very important question. Healing? How could I be healing? That blade went all the way through me!

  The Knight’s misshapen eyebrow bunched in a momentary scowl, then arched in a look that said Have it your way. “Strange jest. I think I may not be onto your people’s humor, Knight—or should I call you Mystae? That’s the Himmingazian Order, if I’m not mistaken, eh?” He reached out and grasped Jaemus’s right elbow with his left hand and placed his right on the center of his chest. “Name is Stave Thorvíl, Knight Corporealis of Vaka Aster. Let me be the first to welcome you to Vinnr, Knight of Lífs Glunt Un-gee-nur.”

  “It’s not Glunt, it’s Jaemus, Jaemus Bardgrim.” Ordinarily by this point, he might have been annoyed at how badly everyone garbled his name and title, but his mind was too awhirl with unbelievable notions to care. He had to repeat them, as if doing so was the only way he’d believe them: “This isn’t Himmingaze and . . . just to reiterate, I’m not a Knight. And I’m definitely not a Mystae.” To Cote, he said in Himm, “They think I’m one of them, a thing they call the Knights Corporealis, esteemed protectors of the Verities.” He forced a chuckle and looked at Cote to back him up on his assertion he was no such thing, but his life-mate was looking . . . less than agreeable. In fact, the way his forehead was stepped with wrinkles showed he was toying with a thought he wasn’t altogether comfortable with.

  Stave went on. “Heh, all right then. You’re trying to tell me the people of your realm, they’re just quick healers, they are. I suppose I’ll have some time to get used to you. No telling how long it’ll be until Vaka Aster sends you back. You speak fair Elder Veros, though, for a man who’s not a Knight, I’d say you do.” He gave Jaemus a conspiratorial wink. “Suppose all Himmingazian folk do that too then, do they?”

  “He was ordained by Vaka Aster, not Lífs.”

  They all looked toward the resonant, clear voice. The female Knight from the warship, who’d clearly been injured but seemed hale now, was approaching from the far side of the chamber. She wore a satchel—Jaemus saw it was the satchel, the one that had contained all the celestial artifacts—over one shoulder, and carried a Fenestros in her hand.

  Stave paced to her and wrapped his arms, both bulking through the armholes of his sleeveless brown tunic with more muscles than Jaemus had in his entire body, around the woman. Her height almost matched his, but his width swallowed her frame completely. “Glad you’re back, love. How was the hunting?”

  She stepped out of his embrace, and
said, “We captured enough for another day or two, and there are still two parties out. The commoners, and our Himmingazian guests, won’t go hungry.” Then she looked to Jaemus, kindness softening her middle-aged face. “You’re something else, Master Himmingazian. A truly unique spirit. I don’t think any language has the words to tell you how much gratitude we all have. You saved worlds.” Her lips moved when she spoke, but her voice, he realized, seemed to be coming from the celestial stone. “I am Safran Glór.”

  The admiration in her eyes made his cheeks flush, and he stammered, “It . . . it wasn’t anything—I mean, it was, but—”

  He cut himself off as she poked curiously at the exposed flesh beneath his torn flight suit.

  “Whoa, quit tickling,” he said.

  She removed her hand, then held the Fenestros up toward his face. Its surface shifted from a swirl of gold and white to a smooth, glasslike finish. He saw his reflection perfectly in it. The high collar of his flight suit had been torn and rumpled, and new fell away from his face exposing his chin and neck. In dark blue lines on his chin, as clear as his nose, was a nine-pointed star. His mouth fell open again.

  “It’s true,” she said and lowered the celestial stone. “You’ve been ordained by Vaka Aster and gifted the Verity’s celestial spark.”

  “Um—about that. I . . . I’m not sure I like the sound of it. What exactly does ‘gifted with a celestial spark’ mean?”

  “It means Vaka Aster has chosen you to be one of us,” answered a new voice, coming from the tallest and palest of the Knights from the warship. “I’m Mallich Roibeard, Stallari Regent, at least until Ulfric rejoins us. And I speak for us all when I say we will never be able to thank you enough.”

  Jaemus felt as though his mind was about to lift off on a jaunt into the Cosmos again and abandon the rest of him. “I think I need to sit down. Not feeling too sparky at the moment.” His legs spilled him to his rear, but Cote held on to him, easing him down. He mumbled, “Can someone please explain what’s happening?”