And the Lady of the Silver Web, who was the Last, lifted her long slim knife of pure shining greyed silver save that it neither bent nor broke nor pitted nor nicked nor even turned dark, and though still wearing her grey-silvery mask of webbing she commenced to saw through her neck so that the hot red blood ran and then began to gush, in jetting spurts that shone in the firelight like molten rubies, llankets spurting over him who had been Jarik Blacksword and who had destroyed them all and made the world safe and free for the Iron Lords and the reign of the beast-men, forever.
*
“You must slay her,” Dread said in his rumbly voice. “Slay the Lady of the Snowmist Slay her slay — ”
slay slay slay slay slay slay
“We are convinced,” the Lord of Destruction said, “that it was at her bidding that you were abandoned to die, as an infant Perhaps she foresaw that it was you who would come in time to slay her slay her slay her.”
“Then She is not your sister and not my god!” Jarik cried in his pride and his needy needful needing. “She is an enemy. I will keep the Sword. Yourselves leave me the Sword, and will lead me to Kirrensark of the hawk-ships. In return, I shall slay the Lady of the Snowmist, evil Karahshisar. My enemy — our enemy.”
“Aye,” the Lord of Dread said, and the great iron helmet with its attached iron mask nodded.
“How … can it be accomplished,” Jarik asked, “the death of a god?”
“The Black Sword will slay her, Jarik — and those she raises to menace you, though you must have as much care as ever, warrior.”
warrior warrior warrior slay
Jarik said, “The Black Sword would slay yourselves, then.”
Kirrensark Long-haft asked, “Seek you to provoke me, Jarik Blacksword?”
“I came here to kill you, Kirrensark,” Jarik told him.
“I have seen into your mind … minds, No-man’s son Jarik of the Black Sword-and-Oak the Healer! You have no secrets from me.” slay slay
“Yourself has several secrets from me, Lady Karahshisar. Why did you bid that I be abandoned by my parents so that I never saw them and do not know even who they are? Were?”
“I did not.”
“Who am I?”
“I do not know,” the Lady of the Snowmist said. “I have seen into your mind. You do not know who you are. You are an enigma, a Mystery. Know and be sure, Jarik-and-Oak, that neither do the Iron Lords know — and that they have some fear of you.”
“Fear?”
“Fear.”
“Fear!”
“Aye, Jarik. Fear, of you.”
“Are you my mother?”
“No.”
“Am I one of the abandoned boy-babes of Kerosyr?”
“No,” the Lady of the Snowmist said.
“Are you my father, Orrik of Akkharia who reared me?”
“No.”
“Father … I mean Orrik … why do you leave me? Where are you going?”
“To die, Jarik the thrice-obtuse.”
“Strode of Ishparshule-wark, are you my father, who was rearing me and my … my sister, Torsy?”
“She is not your sister, stupid.”
“Are you my father?”
“Of course not. No. Now go. Go and wander in exile. Wander and wonder, Jarik the Treacherous. God-slayer!” Oak! Oak my brother, heal me! Be born and heal us! “Are you my sister, Torsy, who was reared with me as my sister?”
“No.”
“Torsy! I love you — I need you — why do you leave me? Where are you going?”
“To die, Jarik the Helpless.”
“Ah then, Lords of Iron. The Black Sword would slay yourselves.”
“Jarik, Jarik! Jarik the Unthinking! Think you We would place the means to slay Us into the hands of those stupid villagers? Or of a dirt-grubbing little night crawler such as you?”
“What becomes of the youths yourselves bring up here from Blackiron, from time to time?”
“They become Iron Lords. We steal their bodies.”
“Lady God — what becomes of those youths yourself does bring up here from Kirrensark-wark and Ishparshule-wark, from time to time?”
“Each is potentially the father of the next Lady of the Snowmist, for I must continue.”
“But what if something happens to yourself ere a new Milady Snowmist is … grown, Milady Snowmist?”
“Then you and your kind on this world are in a lot of trouble, you murderous wart.”
“I — you — yourself does steal their seed?”
PAIN
“Steal?” the Lady of the Snowmist repeated, with heat. “No, I do not steal, Jarik. In return I reward them with lifelong health — and the wark rewards them with high popularity.”
“It … is true. You do not steal, Lady of the Snowmist. They do.”
“Aye. Then why have you slain me, you blood-handed friendless brain-sick barbarian bastard?”
Heal me, Oak! Heal us!
“Because I keep my bargains, my lady Karahshisar, and I made bargain with the Lords of Iron, your loving brothers who steal the bodies of others and live in them, covered all in iron that is more than iron. And the bargain was that I would come here and do death on yourself. And I keep my bargains. And you made me a slave. A man has his pride! Besides, you did also confuse me, and make me uncomfortable. And what you say is true, my lady God; my hands are indeed covered all with blood, and obviously too it is true that I am a barbarian. And sure I must be a bastard, for I know not who birthed me or fathered me either. Art thou my mother?”
Heal me, Oak. Heal us, Healer.
“No. How could I be your mother? I bear your seed in my womb.”
“My — you what?”
“I bear your sword in my womb.”
“Are you my mother?”
“No! How could I be your mother, grubber in the soil? I am a god!”
Heal m
PAIN
“But … surely no god can be slain by an earth-grubbing mortal.”
“Ah! It is true, Jarik!”
“Then … ”
“Then I cannot be dead, can I Jarik of the Black Sword, sore confused Jarik Blacksword. I am not dead, then. You have of the gods a second chance, as few men have. Here it is. We must talk, and make a bargain. For I know that Jarik of the Black Sword, Jarik-who-is-Oak, is a man who keeps his bargains, pretending that it is a matter of honor and importance and that he hath pride. Come, I shall tell you more, and show you somewhat.”
And She turned, and paused, as if waiting, a frozen waterfall of shimmering silver. And then the Lady of the Snowmist looked back at him. “Ah. Are you not going to kill me this time, then?”
“I! No! I was too hasty — I must know more, more!”
“There is much to know. Much you do not know.”
“Aye!”
“You know nothing, Jarik.”
“It is true.”
“You know not even who you are.”
“It is true, Lady God. I am no one, for I know not who I am.
“You do! You are Jarik of the Black Sword. Jarik Blacksword.”
“It is not enough!”
“You are Jarik Blacksword, and Oak, who has the In-Sight and scries that he may see the hurt in others, and how to mend it, and he mends it when he can. You are Jarik Blacksword and Oak the Scry-healer, aye — and you are Jilain of the Isle, too!”
“Jilain?”
“What is it, Jarish?”
“She … She is not dead?”
“Of course I am not dead! You have been dreaming. You have been seeing the possibilities of a future, of futures that might be — that might have been. You have been seeing such all your life, and must know that some are true visions into the time to come and some are visions of Might-be. You are that too, then. You have that ability, for which many would give much, and without so much whining and self-pity. You are still Jarik Blacksword, and Oak the Scry-healer, and Jilain Kerosyris, all at once.”
“But — ”
“B
ut! What sort of stupid beginning is that, for human converse?”
“B — that is what I am now, Lady God. It is what I have become. It is not enough!”
Jilain’s voice came, “Only children must identify with who birthed them, Jarik. Men and women are what they become of themselves. How can this one know who her father was?”
“!”
“It is far more than many are, Jarik Blacksword,” the god said.
“It is not enough. What care I of many? I am not many — I am I.”
“This one is this one!”
“It is far more,” the god said, “than many know of themselves, Jarik of the Black Sword.”
“Talk to me not of others! It is not enough! Talk to me of me! I must know more. I must know who I am. Who my father was. My mother. My people.”
“Jarik,” Jilain said softly, “it does not matter to this one … ”
“It matters to me!” Jarik’s voice rose high, threatened to crack. “This one must know!”
“The answer lies within the world, Jarik Blacksword,” the Lady of the Snowmist said, very quietly. “It lies out there, waiting to be found. By you, in the world that must be lived in. In the world that is, and the world that is not to be and is not yet … if we save it, Jarik. If we wrest it and protect it from the Forces of Destruction.”
“And Dread, and Annihilation!” he said, and his voice was lower.
“If we save it from those who would create dread, yes. If we save it from those who would destroy, who would annihilate your kind, yes, and then people — ‘people’ — this entire world with slaves. Slaves who are men raised from animals, beasts who are more than beasts and men who are less than men.”
“We,” Jarik said, very quietly indeed. “Yourself said we, Lady God.”
“Aye, Jarik Blacksword. So I did. We. For you must know that the Iron Lords are not your allies, or worthy employers or gods for the following. They keep no bargains. They steal bodies. They lie. They do murder and send others to do murder. They wish to destroy all Jariks — all anthro-men.”
“They are … They.”
“Aye, Jarik Blacksword. And we are we.”
“Yes,” Jarik said, softly and slowly, pondering as he spoke and staring ahead as though he saw across some vast distance, and through it. “No, they are not my allies. They put the lie upon me. They burned me, raped Jilain — “
“Jarik!” Jilain cried in a voice of fear; it was fear for him. “No no, Jarik,” the Lady of the Snowmist said, “that has not happened. That was but a vision of the possible future. A time-to-come that you might create, if you remain allied with the Forces of Destruction. For presently you are. You have had other such visions of the time to come and the time that Might-be, have you not?”
The time to come? The possible future, he mused. And he pondered. The time that is to be … that might be. Aye-how awful it was, that vision and others! Visions. The time that might be. If I slew Her, those are then the consequences. If I — but She might have put those thoughts, those visions, into my mind! (Minds.) I am not sure! How can I ever be sure? — Oak! Heal us!
“Nevertheless,” he said, for he knew that he must talk, listen, keep talking, continue this conversation (why?); “they were lying to me. They tricked me. I need be keeping no bargain with those men in the masks of black iron. And stolen bodies.”
“Jarik!” Jilain’s vice cried in excitement and pleasure. “Oh, Jarish!”
Oak! Oh, Oak!
Snowmist said, “Then you will surely join us. For now you know at least of the War, the War that is among the gods on the earth — how can you walk away from it?”
“We cannot, Jarik,” Jilain said, and he noticed that he much liked her voice; surely taken from a dove.
“We cannot walk away,” Jarik Blacksword said, “Lady Karahshisar. Yourself speaks truth, Lady God. We will join yourself now in the War.”
And Jarik held forth his arms, and turned up his palms, open and empty. “Lady; Lady God … restore thy bracers to my wrists.”
*
The god said, “It is not necessary, Jarik. They were to protect me from you. And to … ensure the obedience to me of an agent of the Iron Lords. For they would kill us all.”
Jarik chewed at his lip.
“They were a comfort to me, Lady, Lady Karahshisar. They were a — a security. Wearing them, I belonged. I mattered. I have never belonged, not in all my life. Wherever I was, I was a foundling. A visitor. Adopted. A guest; one apart. Found on the beach. That is my true name. My name! There is no mother, not even the name of a father for my name.” His arms were still outstretched; he moved them a bit, as though in supplication.
Jarik said, “Restore the bracers of Silver Mist.”
And Jilain, too, stretched forth her arms, palms open and upturned. And they two stood there thus, supplicants to a god in a silvery mask, and her in armor, a god born of mortal man — and birthed by a god.
And the mist came, like silver and day-fog and pearls, and it was chill when it touched their hands and their wrists and began to circle there to wreathe them. It crept about their upturned wrists in little tendrils, all smoky and wraithlike, and the tendrils spread and joined and became opaque, and then solid, so that there were bracers locked on their wrists then, thin and long and without lock or fastener or seam. The Bands of Snowmist. Up from wrist along forearm they extended, and they were longer than twice the length of Jarik’s smallest finger.
And Jarik Blacksword was comforted by their presence, by their temperature that was his own. By the security of their presence on his thick forearms of a man of weapons. They made him part of her company. Part of Her. Part of the company of the gods on the earth who had created (?) his kind and sought to protect them that they might inherit the earth; a part of the company of gods, the Forces of Man. He belonged.
“You have joined me now, Jarik Blacksword.” So spoke the Lady of the Snowmist.
“Aye.”
“And you, Jilain Kerosyris.”
“Aye. We are joined, this one and Jarik and yourself.”
“Then,” the Lady of the Snowmist said, “you cannot slay me.” And her voice sounded weak.
“No,” Jarik said quickly. “I cannot slay yourself, Lady God. It is all well then, isn’t it. I could not slay you with the bracers on me — I could not slay yourself Without them, now! I could not slay you! I could not have slain you! I could not have done it! Tell me that I did not — Oak! Oak, heal us — Oak, Healer, heal her!”
And then Jarik opened his eyes at last, and looked down, and there before him on a table all padded and draped in white splashed with crimson darkening into brown lay the body of the Lady Karahshisar of the Snowmist, whom he had stabbed with the Black Sword of the Iron Lords because he had pride, and was confused, and felt bound by a bargain dishonorably made with the dishonorable. And he knew that at last these dreams were done.
This, Jarik knew, was reality.
Chapter Fifteen
“It is not true to say that everything that may be good or bad must be either good or bad. There are intermediate hues between the contrarieties of black and white.”
— the Guide
“Oak! Will She — ”
“Oak?” Jarik assimilated, realized, understood — insofar as that other identity was understandable. He turned to look at the speaker, who was Jilain. “I am Jarik.”
“Oh.” She blinked, pausing to make the transition within her head and to begin anew. He saw that she wore a different tunic, without skirt or leggings. This one was a pale green containing more blue than yellow, again sleeveless and low of round neck. It ended midway down her thighs. She wore nothing else save the amber pendant he had given her.
“Oh,” she said again. “Jarik! You have been Oak. Once you — you had stabbed the Lady of the Snowmist, you became Oak, all at once. You gave orders — Oak did, that is. You — Oak saw how She might be healed, he said, in his — in your mind and in hers. But … you never remember being Oak, Jar
ik?”
Jarik stared at her, feeling weary. “No.” He looked about, feeling no less disoriented than he had during that succession of visions.
They were in a different place. A different area, since he saw that they were still within Cloudpeak, within the keep of the Lady of the Snowmist. And She was there.
On the white-padded and white-draped table before him, beneath a large strange focusing light that was many-faceted and closed, a lamp that breathed no air and showed no flame or flicker — there lay Her he had stabbed. The Lady of the Snowmist remained masked, but naked. In a way; She was wound about with a huge bandage that encased Her as previously her armor had done. This time that “armor” of pastel cloth extended only from loins to ribcage.
The Lady of the Snowmist (War of the Gods on Earth Book 3) Page 17