“Why are you talking to me?” Urulani said as she shook her head. “What is it that you want?”
Mala drew in a deep breath, considering her answer. “I want to find a home.”
“I had a home,” Urulani said, her dark eyes fixed on Mala as she spoke. “It was a beautiful and peaceful place until you came.”
“I thought so, too,” Mala answered quietly.
“And yet you brought those assassins into my home,” Urulani said, her anger barely contained.
“I could not choose to do otherwise,” Mala said.
“I will never forgive you for that,” Urulani breathed.
“No, you should not,” Mala said, turning away and gazing across the water toward the shore of the river as it drifted by. “No more than I can. So perhaps we are both looking for a home—or for a reason we should be deserving of a home.”
“I have no home,” Urulani said gruffly.
“Yes, you do,” Mala said. “We both do . . . we just have not found it yet.”
The rain broke over the river at once, a torrential downpour that seemed to draw a veil around them. It was so thick that Urulani could barely see that the boat only about a hundred feet in front of them was turning toward shore.
CHAPTER 30
Fordrim of Kesh Morain
DRAKIS PEERED INTO the gray torrent around him, rainwater coursing down through his hair. He wiped his hand over his face again and again trying to keep the water out of his eyes. The downpour was so heavy, however, that he was forced to open his mouth wide just to breathe.
“You’re sure about this?” he called back.
“The Fordrim trade with my clan,” Ishander spoke over the noise of the rain as though he were stating the obvious. “This is where we will find our last chance for shelter. The women will need rest.”
Drakis turned to face forward again. He did not know about the women, but he certainly needed to stop and put his feet on land for a while. He had found the motion of this small boat entirely different from the Cydron and not much to his liking. He was feeling increasingly sick from its motion and desperately wanted to feel some stable ground beneath him.
“Can you see anything?” he asked the dwarf.
Jugar looked as pale as Drakis felt. “The eyesight of dwarves is, may I say, better than most creatures that grace our land and spectacular when compared to the narrower capabilities of humans with regard to a darkened space. It is said that dwarves see better in the dark than in the light—possibly because dwarves can actually see differences in temperature in the darkest of places well beyond the capabilities of humans to perceive.”
Drakis stared at the dwarf. “So . . . what do you see?”
“Not a thing,” the dwarf replied.
Drakis growled in exasperation and faced forward once again.
“It’s this cursed rain!” Jugar complained. “It makes everything look the same.”
Light exploded off to his left, diffused by the clouds and rain, and outlined the dark silhouette of an imposing section of ruined wall. The ghostly, looming shape vanished almost the moment Drakis saw it as the light died. Booming thunder shivered the boat immediately. The rain, shaken from the clouds, fell with increased vigor around them.
“We’re close to shore!” Drakis shouted. Instinctively, his hand went to the hilt of his sword. He glanced back down the length of the boat. “Be ready!”
Jugar sat in the bottom of the boat, drenched, and with his arms folded across his chest in indignation. Ethis showed him three of his empty palms while the fourth shook his empty scabbard.
Then Drakis remembered; both the dwarf’s ax and the chimerian’s blade had been lost to the river at the cascades.
“Well, think friendly thoughts,” Drakis muttered to himself and he reset the grip on his own blade.
Without warning, the keel of the reed boat slid heavily against the sand of the shoreline, causing Drakis and everyone else aboard the small craft to pitch forward. Drakis managed to grab the upturned prow and keep his footing under him, but only just. Then, with instincts born of his years of training as an Impress Warrior, Drakis leaped off the front of the boat, landing with both feet on the ground.
The sand was sodden beneath his feet. Drakis stepped forward at once up the shore and onto firmer ground. He heard Ethis’ footfalls behind him followed shortly afterward by the crash and complaints of the women as their own boat collided with the shore.
The roar of the rain filled his ears. The ground beneath his feet had been cleared and was packed down with the rainwater running over it. He could make out patches of fitted stones much the same as he had seen in the roads of Ambeth—remnants of cobblestone roads long vanished. All else remained hidden behind the watery veil. Drakis paused for a time, uncertain how to proceed.
Lightning flashed again, twice in quick succession followed by a third bolt. With each came a moment’s glimpse beyond the shrouding storm; the stark contours of gathered huts up a slight rise to their left, an ancient wall propped up to their right, and an old building ahead of them barely discernible at the edge of a flat pool bordering a wide field.
“Do you see anyone?” Drakis said, raising his voice to carry over the storm.
“No,” Ethis answered back, his own voice straining as well. “But look over at those huts . . . no, farther down. See those baskets piled near the door? Someone lived here and quite recently by the looks of it.”
Drakis nodded as he rubbed the water from his face again. He was soaked to the skin, his tunic clinging uncomfortably under his leather vest. He turned to look back toward the river. Mala and the Lyric had left the boat and were standing expectantly on the shore. Urulani was tying the bow of her boat off to a stone column next to the quay. Ishander was pulling his boat farther up onto the shore, aided by the fact that the dwarf could not stand another moment on the boat and was hobbling painfully away from the river’s edge.
Ishander strutted up toward Drakis and Ethis, his chin held high. “The Fordrim hide from a Far-runner of the Ambeth! I will be generous and make no more demands upon them than we need for our journey!”
“Generous to whom?” Ethis said, folding his arms twice across his chest. “There’s no one here.”
“There is someone here,” the Lyric blurted out so suddenly that it startled the human warrior. “He needs you, Drakis and he hasn’t much time!”
“Mala, what is she talking about?” Drakis asked carefully.
Mala shook her head, uncertainty in her eyes.
The Lyric’s countenance was strange. The rain had flattened her white hair down into straight strands around her face. Her eyes were wide open, however, her gaze shifting in wonder at the still buildings around her. “She was here, Drakis! Maybe she is here still . . .”
“Who?”
“He needs you . . . he’s been looking for you for the longest time but you have to hurry.” The corners of her lips curled up in a faint smile. “There is someone here we need to see.”
“What we need is water and food so that we can go on,” Drakis said. “Losing that boat two days ago left us short of both. Ishander, is there any other place we might resupply?”
“No,” Ishander said. “This is the place where we may find food and water.”
Ethis looked up into the deluge falling around them. “I don’t think water will be an issue.”
“Then perhaps you had best get to filling those water gourds in what remains of our boats as soon as you can,” Drakis replied testily. He hoped it was only the chimerian that was getting on his nerves. There was an indefinable quality about this place that upset him. “Ishander, who are we looking for?”
“We are looking for the Citadels of Light!” Ishander proclaimed.
“No,” Drakis said as he felt his patience fraying. Sometimes he thought Ishander’s ego got in the way of his hearing. “Who do we need to barter with here for food?”
“Clan-mother—or Clan-father,” Ishander said although Drakis thought he sa
w uncertainty cross the youth’s face for the first time. “It is much the same with all clans.”
“And just where do we find this clan-whoever,” Drakis asked.
“Clan leaders are hard to find sometimes . . . we ask the Fordrim!” the young man declared. “Those huts, over there.”
“Why is nothing moving?” Ethis asked.
“Maybe they don’t like the rain?” Drakis suggested through his puzzled frown.
“I know that I don’t,” Ethis replied.
“Just get filling those gourds.”
Drakis turned and followed Ishander up the slight rise toward the line of huts. The packed ground under his feet felt like clay and he slipped often while trying to make his way up the rain-washed slope. It was difficult finding good footing. Ishander stood at the top of the slight rise, both fists balled on his hips as he waited for the older human to catch up to him for a few moments and then, abandoning patience, the youth turned, stalking toward the dark, open doorway of the nearest hut and stepping confidently inside.
Drakis shook his head as he neared the top of the slick rise. He called out over the roar of the rain. “Ishander! Come back out of there.”
There was no response from the dark maw of the hut’s doorway.
“Ishander?” Drakis called as he finally managed to crest the rise.
A high-pitched scream cut through the rain from within the hut. The young Far-runner suddenly exploded backward from the doorway in a panic of arms and legs. Ishander slipped on the muddy ground, falling flat on his back and sliding to a halt at Drakis’ feet. He scrambled to get his arms behind him and his legs under him again but the slick ground worked against him. His eyes were fixed wide and his mouth gaping open as if preparing to scream again.
Drakis drew his sword in a single motion from its scabbard, facing the pitch-black doorway. He set his feet as best he could for the expected onslaught but nothing emerged from the darkness.
With a glance at the Far-runner still shivering at his feet, Drakis moved cautiously toward the hut. The rain continued its merciless assault around him, the sporadic flashes of lightning diffused above him.
Rubbing the water from his eyes one last time with his left hand, Drakis took a breath and stepped inside.
The darkness inside was almost complete. His eyes were having trouble adjusting to the deeper shadows. There were shapes in front of him; some on the ground and some sitting up. He opened his mouth to speak.
A dim flash of lightning pulsed through the open window.
The image came at him all at once, burning into his mind.
It might have been a family once. The bloated shapes were of different sizes and still roughly human in form. Dark liquid was pooled beneath them, reaching toward the door.
The stench was overwhelming.
Drakis’ eyes slammed shut as he ducked back out the door. He stood for a few moments with his back pressed against the hut wall, his breath coming hard and fast. He could not get the smell out of his nostrils. He glanced at the foot of the doorway.
The dark liquid from the bodies was mixing in with the rain—coloring the ground around Ishander and the slope they had just climbed.
His gaze went to the openings of the other huts down the row.
Black fluid was spreading over the wet ground from each of the dark openings.
“Back to the boats!” Drakis shouted, his words all but swallowed up in the downpour. He pushed himself away from the hut wall toward Ishander, pulling the youth roughly to his feet and shoving him down the slope. “Back to the boats NOW! We’re getting out of here!”
“What’s wrong?” Ethis called, all of his arms extended at once.
Drakis fell on the slope, sliding for a time before he managed to get his feet under him again. “Plague—or worse—I don’t know! They’re all dead.”
Urulani grabbed Drakis’ shoulder. “Dead? Who’s dead?”
“They are,” Drakis motioned back to the huts. “All of them. We’ve got to get away from here while we can. Ethis, you drag our ‘guide’ back onto our boat while I get . . . where’s Mala?”
Urulani jerked her head toward the dark gray shape looming up through the rain past the huts. “She went with the Lyric toward that building. Something about someone needing their help.”
“Why would they . . . never mind,” Drakis said, the rainwater flying from his hair as he turned his head. “You and Ethis ready the boats. They can’t have gone far. Ishander! You’re with me. We’ll bring them back.”
“Sooner is better, Drakis,” Ethis called out, but Drakis was already running, his form disappearing into the veil of the rain with their young guide at his heels.
CHAPTER 31
Sanctuary
DRAKIS’ FOOTFALLS SPLASHED across the sodden ground. The heavy, obscuring rain relinquished its shadows reluctantly, darker shapes against the gray flatness of the downpour. He stumbled over a body, losing his footing. The shape startled him, causing him to draw his blade from its scabbard at once.
“Drakoneti!” Ishander exclaimed. “I have never seen them this far north before.”
The creature lay facedown in the mud but the massive shoulders, scale-covered skin, and broken wings protruding from its back were unmistakable. The jagged, broken blade of its sword was still in its hand, half obscured by the mud. Drakis spun around in the downpour. More bodies lay motionless in the rain, some human but a good deal more drakoneti.
They were standing in the aftermath of a battle.
The rains lifted for a moment, revealing with reluctance more of the carnage around them. The ground was strewn with the dead, many of their carcasses badly bloated and disfigured.
Drakis shuddered.
Curling around the dark form of the tower was the monstrous, enormous shape of a dragon. The dread creature lay lifeless on its side, its neck twisted so that its maw gaped open toward the sky. Rainwater ran from the corner of its mouth, and its half-open eye was milky and lifeless. The body was still held fast to the ground by ropes and netting fixed to several of the many iron rings driven deep into stone and earth in the ground. The stench from the dead beast was overwhelming.
Mala stood by the dragon’s head, rain matting down and darkening her auburn-colored hair. She was shivering despite the warmth of the rain, her hand resting on the dead dragon’s horn.
Even through the rain, Drakis recognized the creature at once. It was the gray dragon that had nearly killed him in Ambeth . . . the dragon he knew as Abream, the companion of Pharis.
“Mala,” Drakis shouted. “We’ve got to leave here now!”
“She led me to him,” Mala said through her chattering teeth. “She knew he was ashamed . . .”
“Who?”
“The Lyric.”
“The Lyric! Where is she?” Drakis thought to call out the Lyric’s name but realized that he did not know what to call her. “Mala, who is the Lyric supposed to be today?”
“She . . . she called herself Rishan, then went that way,” Mala said, pointing toward the base of the building shape before them. “She went in there.”
Drakis could see a dim frame of light through the pelting rain—a passage of flickering warmth in the dead world around him. The edifice ahead of him towered upward, its top quickly disappearing into the gloom. He slipped slightly in the mud and then pushed on through the dead around him, towing Mala behind him as he rushed up the rain-slicked steps and into the open portal.
The short hallway was covered in ornate carvings, a delicate latticework arch over his head. It was broken in several places, the pieces remaining on the floor where they had fallen.
The hallway ended in a series of short steps leading down to the floor of a large circular room. The chamber was illuminated by fires burning in three big braziers of stone, each fixed atop a pillar carved in the shape of a dragon with their heads all facing the center of the room. Each had its head turned slightly to the left, exposing an eye socket that looked directly down on a dark and life
less crystal nearly five feet across—a dead Aether Well!
Atop the crystal stood the Lyric, her wet hair glistening in the light, a long staff held across her body with both hands. She wore a thick robe of light tan trimmed in gold and silver, though the cloth itself was badly stained in places.
“Who did you say she was today?”
“Rishan,” Mala answered. “Keeper of the Past.”
“Keeper of . . . what?”
“The Past.”
“Rishan,” Drakis called out into the chamber in a voice that was remarkably calmer than he felt. He descended the staircase with Mala at his back. “We need to leave now. Be a nice Keeper and come with us now, yes?”
“I will not come!” the Lyric answered. “I am the Keeper of the Past and you are a stranger to our lore!”
“I don’t suppose you’ve met this ‘Rishan’ before,” Drakis muttered back toward Mala.
“Not yet,” Mala replied.
“Pellender!” The Lyric cried out, gazing toward the top of the stairs. “You have returned!”
Drakis turned to follow the Lyric’s gaze.
Ishander stood at the top of the stairs, staring back at the Lyric, the color having drained from his face.
“We had become concerned for you, old friend,” the Lyric said with a broad smile, her voice lower than usual. “Did you find the Citadel of Light? Did you find the Key?”
“Well at least she recognizes you,” Drakis said to Ishander.
“No,” he replied. “She recognizes my father.”
“Your father?”
“My father was Pellender,” Ishander continued, warily descending the stairs. “This was the way he came to the Citadel of Light—he was a friend to the Fordrim.”
“And now you have returned to us,” the Lyric said joyfully. “All the Fordrim bid you welcome and offer you the hospitality of our clan. You shall want for nothing. We looked to the Koram Devnet, but we had begun to lose hope of seeing you again. It seems the knowledge that dragon gave you was accurate after all!”
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