Age of War

by Michael J. Sullivan

  Tesh moved toward the window to get out of their way. Standing in front of it, he put his own head to the opening that was too narrow to allow it to pass. He looked down. It was quite a fall.

  But what if it hadn’t fallen? What if it wasn’t dead? Was it on its way back to Meryl’s house?

  From outside, he heard a loud ringing chime. Tesh had never heard that before. Must be an alarm. News of the attack must have spread.

  A Fhrey he’d never seen before entered the bedroom. He actually looked old, with a gray receding hairline and a few wrinkles. How old does a Fhrey have to be to look like that?

  He barked an order in Fhrey, then switched to Rhunic. “Get her up on the bed.” He had a bag with him that he placed beside her. “So, what do we have here? Severe lacerations, and, oh—”

  “What?” Moya asked.

  The healer dug into his bag. “I need water, and I need that gown off, right now.”

  “Dylon, get water,” Moya told one of the Fhrey as she began to untie the keenig’s nightgown. Then she saw Tesh standing next to the window. “Tesh, out! The rest of you, too. Stand guard outside; we don’t need spectators.”

  Tesh left the room.

  Outside, the corridor was crowded with more people. Most of the faces he didn’t know.

  What if it isn’t dead? And if it isn’t, if it’s starving, would it really just leave? We found a shawl…and a cloak.

  Tesh shot up the stairs, taking the steps three at a time until he landed on the top floor where Nyphron’s personal quarters were. Tekchin had pointed it out once, but Tesh had never been inside. He didn’t wait, didn’t pause or knock. Tesh pulled the latch and walked inside. The Galantian leader wasn’t there. The room had no bed, just tables, chairs, a fireplace, and a rack of weapons. Nyphron had a lot of weapons. Also hanging on the walls were shields, swords, spears, and helms. Such wealth was impossible for a Dureyan to imagine, and Nyphron used them as decorations! There were two more doors, so the bed must be in one of the other rooms.

  “What are you doing in here?” Nyphron asked.

  Tesh whirled to see his lordship come in from the hallway. Dressed only in a robe and sandals, he appeared more irritated than surprised. He also looked in a hurry. “Front gate send you? How many are there?”

  “Just the one, I think.”

  “One?” Nyphron looked at Tesh like he was insane. “What do you mean one? They don’t ring the bell for one.”

  “The bell? They don’t?”

  Nyphron pushed past him and started to enter the room on the right. Then Nyphron stopped and looked back at Tesh. “What’s their position?”

  “Their—position?” Tesh asked, baffled.

  Nyphron stared at him incredulously. “Why are you up here if you don’t know anything?”

  The leader of the Galantians’ eyes shifted to Tesh’s swords.

  Behind Nyphron, the interior of the room was dark, and the candles from the sitting room cast a sliver of light, just enough to reveal the corner of a bed. Tesh saw movement. He drew both swords and charged.

  “What are—” Nyphron dodged to one side with the usual Fhrey speed.

  Tesh ran through, kicking the door wide open.

  The raow was there, caught in the lamplight. The thing hissed and lashed out with both claws. The raow was faster than Sebek and no longer trapped.

  “Out of my way,” it hissed. “Need the one that smells of thistles and lies.”

  The raow raked at Tesh again.

  He got his blades up to save a slashing, but the force threw him against the wall.

  It lunged at Nyphron. The leader of the Galantians, clad in his bathrobe and sandals, was caught off-balance. Tesh sympathized. No one over the age of seven expects a raow in their bedroom.

  Tesh didn’t have many options, and, as stupid as it felt, he did the only thing he could. He threw a sword at the creature. This wasn’t a technique taught in the courtyard and it showed. The sword slapped the raow on the back, not at an angle that could have cut it, but the force was enough to catch its attention. Only a split second was bought, but for a Fhrey that was plenty. Nyphron leapt back. He retreated out of his room into the hallway, but the starved raow raced after. “You!” The thing’s voice went shrill with recognition. “Yes, you—you and that other one! I’m out—free again. Oh, yes! And hungry. A feast—a banquet I will have this day before I sleep!”

  Tesh followed. Outside the room’s doorway, Nyphron crouched like a wrestler, looking nervous as the raow salivated and curled its claws. “Such a sweet-looking face.”

  Then the creature stopped, its sight drawn to the stairs.

  Tesh reached the door’s threshold just as Sebek appeared with both blades drawn and a determined look on his face.

  “Sebek, it’s the—” Nyphron said.

  “I know—I know,” Sebek replied.

  Nyphron fell back as Sebek stepped up. The creature turned his attention toward the threat with two blades.

  “Where’s a cage when you need one?” Sebek asked.

  “I admit, trapping it seemed like a good idea all those years ago—not so much now.” Nyphron said. “The real question is…can you take it?”

  Sebek didn’t reply immediately.

  “I think not,” the creature said.

  For the first time that Tesh had witnessed, Sebek did not initiate combat. The raow did. The fight was inhumanly fast and vicious. Blades against claws slashed and jabbed. Sebek got in a cut, but the raow raked him back across the thigh, winning a grunt. Tesh had never seen Sebek touched in a fight. Wounded, Sebek moved wrong, shifted slower, weaker. The world’s greatest warrior was going to lose. With one sword left, Tesh considered helping, then he noticed something strange. The raow broke off its attack to avoid getting too close to a lamp.

  It prowls beyond the fire’s light,

  Steer clear of lonely hills at night,

  The sunset shadows you must race.

  Maybe there was a reason that tale was told through the generations, and not just to keep children close to home.

  The raow lunged, and Sebek was hit again. This attack caught him across the chest. The claws tore his armor free so that the metal plate flapped uselessly, the broken wing of a bird of prey. A fast second strike stabbed Sebek with three dagger-claws. The Fhrey staggered to one knee. But the raow didn’t want him.

  It has a deal with Meryl, Tesh thought, and, surprisingly, it plans to honor it.

  The raow turned to kill Nyphron. “What a face,” it whispered.

  Leaping up, Tesh pulled the wall lamp down—a clay cup filled with oil, its burning wick protruding from a spout. The lamp shattered when it hit the floor. Oil splashed, and the fire followed it, but little of the liquid got on the raow. The slow-to-burn oil merely pooled around the raow’s feet. Tesh was frustrated to see that the resulting fire wasn’t large, not even dangerous. Anyone could have stomped out the flames or just stepped aside. Instead, the raow shrieked in terror. Wide bulbous eyes filled with panic; it ran—and ran the wrong way. The raow fled into Sebek. Lightning pierced the raow’s chest, the tip passing all the way through its body. The Fhrey pulled himself up by the handle of his sword, and then Thunder answered, coming around and severing the raow’s head. It fell, bounced, and rolled to the stairs where it had just enough momentum to fall down the first step, then the second, and third. On it went while Nyphron, Tesh, and Sebek stood around the oil fire listening to the thump, thump, thump of the raow’s head bouncing its way down the steps.

  In the gathering cloud of black smoke, Sebek dropped both swords and fell to his hands and knees.

  “Tesh, get Anyval.” Nyphron moved to Sebek’s side and helped his friend move away from the fire.

  “Who?”

  “He’s our healer. You’ll find him down on—”

  “It
’s okay. I know where he is. You were the second target tonight.”

  Tesh ran for the stairs. His legs felt rubbery. Training had helped, but nothing matched the demands of the real thing.

  “Second?” Nyphron’s voice stopped him. “Tesh, did you come up here because you thought that thing was going to kill me?”

  He nodded.

  “You saved my life?”

  Tesh wasn’t sure if that was a question or not. “Yes.”

  Nyphron looked puzzled. “Go—go on! Get Anyval.”

  Tesh ran down the stairs. As he descended, Nyphron shouted down to him, “Then wake everyone in the Rhist. That bell you heard ringing is from the parapet at the front gate. It means they’re here. The fane’s army is here. The war has started.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Lighting the Fire

  When people discover I was in the Battle of Grandford, they assume I am a hero because they think that about everyone who was there. That is the nature of myths. But the truth is, in the whole battle I only had one lousy job. One! And I failed. Well, maybe not failed, but no one could say that what happened was a success.

  —THE BOOK OF BRIN

  Like most of the men of Alon Rhist, Raithe had no idea what the ringing bell meant, but he guessed it wasn’t good. In his experience, sounds of unexpected announcements like horns and drums were never followed by welcome news, but he was also Dureyan. He had been trained from birth that anything new—especially if it was loud—was a threat. Raithe was the first to the top of the parapet above the front gate because he was already on his way there when the bell began ringing. He’d gone to find Malcolm, to talk to him about Meryl, but when he didn’t find him, he decided to return to his ritual. Each evening after training, he climbed up to look out over the river at the land of his birth. He usually just leaned against the wall, stared, and asked why? He never expected to find an answer, but he felt the question needed to be asked for all those who no longer could. That he should be the only one left to mourn the passing of a clan he had so desperately wanted to leave was more than ironic; it was sickening.

  While Raithe was the first to reach the parapet, he was far from the last. Drawn by the sound, dozens came up, asking one another what was happening. Once on the parapet, no one asked anymore. Everyone could see the lights.

  Raithe remembered being on the wall at Dahl Tirre, looking out at the multitudes of the Gula-Rhunes. All those campfires had been a frightening sight, a multitude of flickering yellow stars. This was different, and Raithe didn’t care for the change. Out beyond Grandford were fewer lights than in Tirre, but these were arranged in neat, straight, evenly spaced rows. Raithe wasn’t an expert on warfare, but he guessed that such precision wasn’t a good sign.

  “Thought I’d find you here.” Malcolm nudged in beside him as the space along the front wall grew crowded. “Not so many as before, eh?”

  “Is that all?” Farmer Wedon asked, standing on Raithe’s left.

  The farmer had spent the winter becoming First Spearman Wedon of the Second Cohort of the Rhune Legion, but Raithe still saw him as the wheat farmer he’d first met in Dahl Rhen. The same was true of Tope Highland and his three sons, all of whom were assigned to the forward principal line as members of the First File, First Cohort. Bergin the Brewer and Tanner Riggles were back spears. Bruce Baker and Filson the Lamp were part of Moya’s special Archery Auxiliary. They all gathered around to peer out at their first glimpse of the enemy they had heard so much about.

  “How many do you think there are?” Bergin asked.

  “Don’t know, two thousand, maybe?” Tope said.

  “Roan?” Engleton called down the line of spectators. The woman in her leather apron stood staring like the rest of them. Did she ever stop? “Are my shoulder plates done?”

  “Almost,” she replied.

  Raithe could have answered for her. For the past six months, almost was nearly all Roan ever said. Even if she hadn’t started on something, even if the inquiry was the first she’d heard that something was needed, or wanted, the answer was always almost.

  “Do you think they’ll attack tonight?” Grevious asked. The carpenter from Menahan was one of the last to reach the parapet, but he arrived in full armor and gear: chest and shoulder plates, iron helm, leathers, shield, and spear.

  Bergin saw Grevious and looked worried. “Are we supposed to be suited?”

  Grevious shrugged. “Just playing it safe. Don’t want to be scrambling at the last minute.”

  “Should we be forming up? Does anyone know?” Heath Coswall asked. “Wedon, you’re First Spearman, what are we supposed to do?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “They just got here,” Raithe replied. “Doubt they’re planning a night assault after a long day of walking. But tomorrow is likely to begin early.”

  “We gonna wait for them, or are we going out to attack? Anyone know?” Kurt, one of Tope’s sons, asked. He was about the same age as Tesh.

  Raithe looked around. He was tall enough to see over most everyone’s heads. Tesh wasn’t there. Back with Brin again. Kid picked a lousy time to fall in love.

  Heath was leaning out over the edge, trying to get a better look. “Wish they would attack tonight. I’m tired of waiting.”

  “Let’s hope they don’t agree,” Raithe said. “There might only be a couple thousand out there, but we have less in here.”

  He looked up at the Spyrok. It was dark.

  Why hasn’t Persephone ordered the beacon lit?

  * * *

  —

  Persephone knew she had to be either dead or dreaming. As she didn’t have any experience with being dead, she chalked it up as a dream. Her first clue was that Reglan was sitting next to her. They were on the raised stage in Dahl Rhen’s lodge, but in the wrong chairs. He was in the Second, while she was in the First.

  “Bad times coming, Seph,” her dead husband said. He looked thoughtful. She could tell by how he sat leaning forward, his hands clasped together the way he always did—had—when something terrible happened. “Very bad times. You need to be ready, girl.”

  She spotted the silver ring on his hand. “Are you mad at me?”

  He looked down at the metal band, smirked, and shook his head. “Surprised you wore it that long.”

  Persephone heard a roar and turned.

  “Don’t look at it!” Reglan shouted.

  “What is it?”

  “You know what it is.”

  She didn’t, but she thought she should. There was something familiar in that sound, and the feelings it generated were both powerful and contradictory: tremendous hope and unmeasurable sadness. “I don’t know. Tell me.”

  “I can’t,” Reglan said. “I’m surprised I can talk to you at all. Usually, it’s only one way—I watch; I listen; I talk, but you don’t hear. You must be very close to death. The walls between the worlds can get thin then. Still, I can’t tell you what I don’t know.” He rocked back in the Second Chair and rubbed his old hands up and down on his arms. “I don’t think I ever actually sat in this chair.”

  The roar again. Persephone shivered at the sound but didn’t look.

  “You’re running out of time, my love. It’s coming.”

  “What is?”

  Reglan only smiled. “You always worked too hard. You put others before yourself. Never learned to be selfish. That’s your problem. Sometimes you have to. Sometimes if you don’t, bad things happen.”

  “Like what?”

  He pointed toward the sound of the roar.

  “Reglan, tell me. What is that?”

  “I told you, I don’t know. But you do. You don’t want to see it, but you will. And when you do, remember this: Truth lies in the eyes. The eyes are windows, and the view through those eyes will be the same.”

  * * *

  —


  Persephone woke up feeling like her stomach was on fire—not so much a big bonfire as a bunch of little flames dancing all around, searing her skin. The dream had left her muddled, and it took a long moment to realize she was on her bed in Alon Rhist. Padera’s was the first face she saw, which meant Persephone had nearly died. Nothing short of that would have forced Padera to make the trip from the city to the fourth floor of the Kype.

  “Welcome back, honey,” the old woman said with those familiar withered lips and squinting eyes.

  “Ow,” Persephone whimpered.

  “I bet.” The old woman nodded, her lips rolled up in a sort-of-smile.

  “You’re awake!” Moya sounded as if Persephone had just performed a great feat. “Thank Mari, and Drome, and Ferrol!”

  “Not leaving anyone out, are you?” Padera chuckled.

  To her left, working at a small table that hadn’t been there before, an unfamiliar Fhrey was cleaning up bloody rags. His was the first gray hair she’d ever seen on a Fhrey. Brin was there too, scrubbing the floor near the window with a bucket and brush. They all smiled at her.

  “She’s going to be fine now,” the old Fhrey said.

  Persephone tried to sit up and failed. Sharp, stabbing pains ripped through her torso.

  “Don’t move!” Padera scolded.

  “We just got you stitched,” the Fhrey said in a far more sympathetic tone. “Don’t ruin our nice work.”

  Persephone saw that the Fhrey’s hands, upper arms, and shirt were stained with blood in various stages of drying.

  “How bad am I?” They had the covers pulled to her neck, and she was frightened to look down. “It cut me, didn’t it? I remember that.”

  The old woman nodded. “Three deep slices opened up your belly. Muscle and skin mostly. You’re lucky.”

  “Don’t feel lucky.”

  “You passed out before the sewing. You were lucky.”

  Persephone had never suffered any serious injury. Even as a child she’d never gotten more than a scrape or a bruise. The rest of her life had been that of a sheltered chieftain’s wife. Persephone liked to think she avoided harm because she was smarter than others, but she also had to wonder if perhaps she just hadn’t lived as fully. This was different. She was alone in her bedroom and something had come after her.