The Shadow of War

by Bryan Gifford

  Ada would tear that false peace down.

  He gave a silent thanks to Adriel Ivanne for helping him see the truth. His life was not wasted, not when he could make his death mean something. He would find Iscarius and kill him. Only then could he atone for a life spent in bloodshed.

  Ada tightened his grip on his bow and quickened his steps, prowling deeper into the harsh wilds of Angeled.

  Mithaniel moved his fingers, watching the sparks dance between them. They shot this way and that, full of vibrancy, begging to be released. It was raw, unbridled power.

  His entire existence had been dedicated toward understanding and harnessing his gift. And he had to use it to kill. He was the Forgotten’s weapon, forged to destroy humanity. He’d followed his purpose for centuries without question. But now… well, what good was power if it was only used to destroy? Why would the Forgotten create humanity, only to wish its destruction? It was like a painter who created his life’s greatest masterpiece only to immediately set it on fire.

  “You alright?”

  Mithaniel looked up to see Cain watching him. “I’m fine. Just thinking.”

  Cain nodded and turned his attention back to his whittling. It was odd, seeing the Warrior so focused over a tiny bit of wood. He carved into the ash with his knife, making small, precise cuts to hollow it out. What was he doing, and why had he taken up such a random hobby at a time like this? He’d been working on the damn thing for two weeks now!

  Mithaniel peered through the trees to the sun setting over the distant village. Farmers and merchants bustled about, along with the occasional Aceden in their black armor. Nearby, Sylva swooped down to pluck something from the tall grass. “We still have a few minutes before dark,” he said. “Did you want to train some more?”

  “We need to talk about Markadesh.” Cain worked his knife in the hole he’d created and began smoothing the edges with gentle shaves of the blade.

  “I don’t know what more there is to talk about. I’ve told you everything I know, which isn’t much.”

  “You mentioned Iscarius’ building projects. Could he have had something built recently? A fortress, maybe?”

  Mithaniel shook his head, finally letting the sparks return to a faint glimmer in his palm. “Doubtful. Something like that would take years, if not decades to build. Even with slaves. Somebody would have eventually discovered it.”

  “Well, the slave caravans are moving south. We’ve seen our share of them the last two weeks. Odum wasn’t lying, something is definitely going on in the South.”

  “It’s impossible for him to build a fortress in Kaanos. Not to mention that he doesn’t have the numbers and support there like he does in the other countries. It just doesn’t make sense.”

  Cain thought on this for a moment. “Could Markadesh be a code word? For land or a city or something?”

  “Possibly. But why the secrecy, and why so many slaves?”

  “He’s building something. That’s the only explanation.”

  “It’d have to be something large,” Mithaniel replied, “very large. It would have to be of immense importance to Malecai for him to devote so much of his resources.”

  “You know him better than anyone. What could it be?”

  Mithaniel shrugged. “I’m afraid I don’t know. One thing I do know, however, is that Kaanos is crucial to his plan for dominance. He needs your country if he’s to control Tarsha. Whatever it is he’s doing, I’m afraid that he’s been planning it for years. He’s ahead of us like always, and we need to find a way to close that gap.”

  Cain looked up from his project. “Will Malecai be in Dun Ara?”

  Mithaniel sighed. “Yes. He’ll be waiting for you.”

  Cain leaned back against a tree. “I’m not going to walk into his trap. Not again.”

  “Where else would you go? He certainly won’t chase you, not when he can just wait for you to come to him.”

  “Markadesh. If I can find it, then maybe he’ll be desperate enough to come to me.”

  “That’s insane. Even if we knew what it was, we’d have to then find the damn place. And Kaanos isn’t exactly small, if you recall.”

  Cain jumped to his feet. “What would you have me do? I will not go to Dun Ara. I can’t afford to risk innocent peoples’ lives when I fight Malecai. And I will not needlessly slaughter my enemies. Not again.” He closed his eyes and forced his breath to steady. “Not again.”

  Mithaniel stood and rested a hand on the Warrior’s shoulder. “Don’t be afraid of what you can do, what you’re capable of doing. You just have to learn to control it.”

  “And how do you expect me to do that? Every time I use Ceerocai now, it wants to burst free. It wants to destroy. It burned an entire town to the ground. It… I… killed twenty thousand people. I will not let that happen again.”

  Ekran. Mithaniel had heard the stories. An entire town completely razed to ashes. Twenty thousand Acedens burned alive by black fire. The raw, limitless power of Abaddon. That one moment had nearly wiped out Iscarius’ army in Inveira and left the world in fear of Cain Taran.

  Every life Mithaniel had ever taken flashed before him, just as it had countless other times. So many horrified eyes, so many dying screams. So many tears. That was nothing compared to what Cain had done. How would he feel if he’d slaughtered twenty thousand men with his own hands?

  “Alright,” Mithaniel sighed. “We won’t fight Iscarius in your capital. But we’ll need a plan. And please, try and make it a good one for once.”

  Cain smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ve got an idea. Now, let’s get moving, it’s nearly dark.”

  Together, the two stepped out into the hills and continued their journey to Kaanos.

  Adriel sat atop Vanthe’s white courser, its regalia of silver and gold flowing about its powerful legs as it strutted. She felt a fool in the massive, swooping saddle, a flutter of silks and steel. The gaudy crown over her brow didn’t help anything either.

  She looked out over the hills with a sigh. She didn’t much feel like a queen. Yet Vanthe had given her the crown before killing himself. Adriel had been so blind with anger that she’d never stopped to think about who would control Charun if she killed Vanthe. And now here she was, the leader of a broken country.

  Could she still go through with her plans to leave Charun? She’d be abandoning her people if she left for Kaanos. She knew that the war would be in the south, but did that mean she should just leave her people when they needed her most?

  And Vanthe. Her uncle had been a hateful, selfish, and violent man. He’d treated her and her mother with bitterness and contempt. He’d married her mother off to an equally horrid man, sentencing her to a lifetime of abuse and isolation. Vanthe had spent his entire life in the pursuit of money and power, and even in his final moments, he’d admitted as much. So why had he given her the crown?

  Adriel suspected that her uncle had hated her as much as she’d hated him. He’d doted on young Calla—she’d been impossible not to love, even for an egotist like Vanthe. After her death, Vanthe seemed to have blamed the world’s miseries solely on Adriel. He’d beaten and cursed her. Even after her father’s death and her mother’s marriage to Ethebriel, her uncle had still gone out of his way to ensure Adriel knew his hatred of her.

  So why make her queen? Could he have known that she’d find him, that he’d made some elaborate plan for revenge after his death? Could he have given her the crown so that she’d have to suffer Iscarius’ hold over the throne? Or, had her uncle truly hoped she’d right his mistakes?

  Vanthe had left her with more questions than answers. She hated the man, hated what he’d done to her and her family and her country. But there was something else buried deep beneath that anger. Something she wouldn’t dare admit to anyone. Sadness. The last of her family had died with him. She was truly alone now, the weight of the world’s miseries on her shoulders. And now her brow.

  “Your Majesty.” A voice broke Adriel from her thoughts. She’d still
have to get used to people calling her that. Kari approached and gave a practiced bow from her saddle. “The Gray Lands are up ahead… something has happened.”

  Adriel glanced back to the throng of Vilant and Royal Guards behind her. “What happened, Kari?” she asked, trying to keep the anxiety from her voice.

  “It’s best you see for yourself.”

  They crossed the next few hills and soon came to the grim band of gray stone that made up the Gray Lands. Adriel led her retinue through the palisades and trenches that formed the rear defense and approached the southern wall. The doors sagged in their hinges, wood and metal splintered and broken but otherwise still standing strong. Adriel guided her horse over the blood-darkened earth and stepped into the destruction.

  The camps were a mess before—a claustrophobic collection of tents and latrines and bodies. Now, the place looked little more than a midden heap with hundreds of tents scattering the churned earth, torn and forgotten. Freedmen and Vilant roamed the paths, searching through tents and carts and trenches. Smoke curled in the distance, bringing that all too familiar stench. Death.

  A sudden hush fell over the camps at the sight of Adriel. Some pointed and gaped at her crown, its shining jewels no doubt a spectacle in the sunlight. Most simply knelt in the mud with heads bowed. Adriel scanned the growing crowd come to see their new queen.

  There had been an attack, that much was clear. She could curse herself later for abandoning them, but they were safe for now. They’d survived.

  “Take me to General Dralmond,” she asked of a nearby group of Vilant. They gave an awkward bow before jumping up and beckoning her through the chaos.

  Adriel’s company followed them deeper into the camps, thousands upon thousands of tents and shacks clustered about the many makeshift roads. People dropped their work to line the paths, staring and whispering. Many knelt, and many more soon followed. It was a strange mix of quiet and unease, of hopefulness and uncertainty.

  Isroc rode beside Adriel, his now normally gaunt face even paler. “Are you alright?” she asked of him.

  He turned to her with a frown. “We left these people unarmed and alone. Too few of them even had weapons, let alone the knowledge to use them. Did we do the right thing?”

  Adriel remembered not to purse her lips. There wasn’t much she could say, unfortunately. He was right. She’d left them to fend for themselves while she went out to kill their king. Sure, it had been necessary—she couldn’t afford to leave an enemy at her back if she was going to march for Kaanos. Charun was in a state of chaos, with rebels and Acedens fighting for control over every inch of ground. She’d needed to eliminate Iscarius’ influence over Charun by pulling Vanthe from his throne. Of course, she’d also done it out of anger. Her uncle had sold her country to the enemy and turned a blind eye while the Acedens murdered and enslaved his people. He’d deserved his death. So why hadn’t she been able to kill him?

  The Vilant led them through the last camp and down the road toward the north gate. Here, the gate was in much worse shape. The doors were beaten and pockmarked, with a large battering ram sized hole at its base. Palisades and twisted bands of metal had been placed across the doors to keep them shut, but the hinges were shorn and threatened to drop the massive doors on the heads below. Crowds gathered here, hundreds of people jostling for a better look at their leader. Adriel couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy as people bowed and scraped and cried out her praise. Some even reached out for her as she passed, brushing her horse or legs or anywhere they could reach.

  The crowds parted, and they approached Shara’s pavilion tent which had been moved nearby. The general stepped out and watched Adriel for a moment, with her crooked frown and fists on her hips. “Well, you’ve been busy, I see.”

  Adriel grunted, dismounting. A Royal Guard took her horse’s reins. “What happened here?”

  “We were attacked. Acedens came at night, thousands of them. They stormed the south wall as a diversion before sweeping into the camps from the north. We weren’t as prepared for something like that as we should have been.” Shara stepped forward until the two were close enough to whisper. “We lost four thousand.”

  Adriel cursed. The crown slipped down off her brow. She cursed again and adjusted the large band back onto her head. She wished she could take the stupid thing off but her Vilant and Royal Guard had thrown a fit at the idea. “Their deaths are mine to bear, not yours. I left them undefended and unprepared.”

  Shara crossed her arms. “So, I suppose you’re the queen around here now?”

  “I suppose so.” She didn’t appreciate the woman’s tone. “Thank you for routing the Acedens. Our people owe their survival to you and you alone.”

  Shara frowned. “Yes, well… we managed to capture a few of the Acedens. They’re in the dungeons with the rest of them.”

  “The rest?”

  “Yes. Some of them wish to join us. More than a few, actually.”

  “How many?”

  “Around five hundred. We’ve had some come in before and after the attack, as well. They all want to join us. I’ve put them all in the dungeons; I wasn’t sure what you’d want me to do with them. But the cells are getting full…”

  “Full? How many of them are there?”

  “Including those we captured taking the wall, two thousand.”

  Adriel paused. That was certainly a lot. And a quarter of her prisoners wanted to join their cause… could they all really want to betray Iscarius or were they simply spies like Ada had warned her of?

  “I’ll talk to them. I may or may not arm them, but either way we’ll need all the help we can get. Prepare the camps to move out.”

  “We’re finally leaving this place?”

  “Yes. Our work is done here. We’ve liberated the wall and killed the king. The Aceden forces are moving south, and the resistance fighters will take back what they’ve lost. It’s time we march for Kaanos. It’s time we end this war.”

  “Well, Silas and I have been itching to leave.” Adriel thought she saw a bit of a smirk on Shara’s usually scowling face at mention of the Warrior. “We’ve been preparing our people to leave for quite a while now. We can have everyone ready and on their feet by the end of the week.”

  “Good. The Alliance needs us.” She swung back into her saddle and guided her Royal Guards back through the growing throngs. The crowds burst into another round of fanfare, cheering and applauding.

  Adriel ignored their shouts, quashing that bubble of fear that threatened to rise inside her. Tarsha was dying and Iscarius was certainly making his final moves. It was up to her to stop him.

  Tarsha needed her. Her people needed her. And somewhere out there, Cain Taran needed her.

  Cain held his small piece of ash up to the morning sun, eyeing his handiwork. He was getting better; the etchings were starting to look like something other than scratches. Not perfect, of course. He had a long way to go before it was worthy.

  Mithaniel watched him pocket the carving as he walked, brow perked. No doubt the man wondered why he’d taken to woodworking. Let him keep guessing. He didn’t think the Iscara would understand. Besides, Cain enjoyed those confused looks.

  “Just over that ridge,” he said, pointing ahead.

  Mithaniel nodded, and the two worked their way up a steep hillside.

  A month of traveling at night. A month of avoiding the many roads and villages along the Setlon, not to mention sleeping in bushes or abandoned barns. Even after greatly rationing their provisions, they were nearly down to crumbs. They’d need to stop for supplies. And soon.

  Fortunately, they’d mostly managed to avoid Aceden caravans and patrols, but nearly all of them were headed south as well. Something was indeed happening in Kaanos; of that, Cain was sure. The fate of his home country would determine Tarsha’s survival.

  And here they were at last. Kaanos.

  Cain climbed onto the hilltop and gazed out over his homeland. The familiar rolling hills. The swaying plains. That w
armth of a spring wind. Despite the trials that he knew he must face, he found himself smiling.

  He was home.

  They were on the move at long last. With so many weeks spent at the Gray Lands, Isroc was beginning to wonder if they’d ever leave the place. Tens of thousands of people had taken a serious effort to coordinate and prepare, not to mention the outrageous amount of food they required. In all his years as a soldier, he’d never seen anything like it.

  They moved through the hills like a colossal snake, lethargic and labored. Eighty thousand people. So many displaced from their homes and families and dependent on Adriel and Silas and Shara. Where did he fit into all of this? No one seemed to need him anymore.

  He turned from the caravan to Adriel who rode just ahead of him on her fine white charger.

  She looked so regal in her white silks and leathers. She even wore a new black and white cloak, its silver-worked length flowing over her mount’s regalia. Golden crown on her golden head, she looked every bit the queen. Adriel was Commander of the Vilant and Queen of Charun. And what was he?

  Adriel waved off her attendants and turned to study him with those bright blue eyes. “Come with me.”

  She reined her mount about and Isroc followed, a retinue of Royal Guards riding in a formation around them.

  Isroc glanced back at the Guardsmen again. That was Harin! The grouchy old man rode at the front, his large frame shining with black and gold armor. He wore an officer’s knot of silk about his pauldron. Had Adriel really managed to tame the man with some shiny armor and a fancy title?

  The group rode down the length of the caravan for a time. People looked up at Adriel as she passed, eyes filled with hope and wonder. Many still called her praise or reached out for her.

  They eventually came to a section of the caravan quarantined by rows of Vilant who stepped aside for their queen. Adriel led Isroc toward Silas and Shara who rode along, chatting amiably. Isroc recognized that stupid grin on Silas’ face. The poor bastard.