The Sentient Fire (The Seven Signs)
Page 101
Vardic was suspicious. This bastard, however well spoken and refined he may be, had conquered his lands. Conquerors only want one thing: power.
“And what do you get out of this?” he asked.
“Besides the taxes and the troops,” Dargorin smiled, “not much. I reserve the right to add your lands to the network of roads we are building in the Empire, which will benefit both of us. I get Right of Passage for Imperial troops, of course, and your fealty to me as your Emperor. Also, I will take one artifact from your Hall of Conquest as a token of my own triumph.”
“You ask of us the thing we have never done as a people. Thardin has never bent the knee to an outside ruler. The people will not stand for it,” Vardic said.
“The people,” Dargorin replied, “will do as you do. I want you in my corner, Vardic the Frost Bear. I would like to have your military knowledge and experience on my Council, and your sons would make fine additions to the Imperial Army. Not to mention the glory and conquest they would experience in the field with us.”
Vardic knew he had no choice. If he resisted, this man would simply behead him and make the same offer to his eldest son, then move down the line until he received a favorable answer. At least he was being civil about it.
“I will ask one question of you first,” Vardic said, “and if I don’t like your answer then by the Gods you can kill me and move on.”
“Ask,” Dargorin said, making a polite gesture with one hand.
“Why? Why have you come here, to the frozen north? Why do you conquer my people, and so many others? What does it gain you?”
Dargorin took a deep breath, looking down at his feet for a second, then looked up and met Vardic’s eyes.
“I wish to bring order. I will build libraries, not just in Galania, but in every land. I will establish courts where even the most downtrodden can receive justice. I will build roads that connect our cultures, so that we can share ideas and sciences. I will establish schools. It is my genuine wish that Alderak be united under one banner, for the good of all. This I swear to you, Vardic Arynthaal.”
“And the artifact you spoke of…you wish to take Ice Shard, I take it,” Vardic said, not able to keep the slightest amount of outrage from his voice.
Dargorin, though, laid a hand on his shoulder, and Vardic almost started in surprise at the gesture, “No. I hold Ice Shard now because I thought that it was appropriate that if you gave me your oath today, I would receive it with the sword of your station, and pass that sword back to you, as befitting a Lord to his Vassal.”
Vardic was…surprised, to say the least.
Dargorin placed his hands back on the pommel of the oversized long sword, and stood a bit taller as he asked in an voice fit for an audience chamber, “Vardic Arynthaal, would you accept me as your Emperor, to provide you with the protection and support of the entire breadth of the Galanian Empire, and give me your oath of fealty to the same?”
Vardic stared at the Emperor for what could only have been a couple of seconds, but seemed to stretch out into eternity. He glanced to the faces of his family, trying to read their feelings from their expressions. His wife was fearful, his sons bleak, and his daughters cringing – except for Nalia, that one was stronger than the lot of them. She stared suspiciously not at him, but at the Galanian Emperor. Finally he turned to look back into the eyes of this Dargorin. He seemed, for all accounts that he was a tyrant and a conqueror, sincere. He took a deep breath, and made the only choice that he could have.
Vardic Arynthaal became the first Thardish King to bend the knee, and Thardin was annexed into the Galanian Empire.
****
Maarkov lay in darkness for an eternity. He had no way to tell the passage of time, and at first he hadn’t cared. He couldn’t feel his body, couldn’t even move his eyes or speak.
The girl had stabbed him through the throat, transfixing something back there that he needed in order to function, apparently, even being half-dead the way he was. Gods, but the girl had been good. He hadn’t had a fight like that since he’d been training, and that had been ages ago. He had reveled in the contest, even when she’d run him through. He’d enjoyed it right up until the point she’d left him paralyzed on the hill, staring up at the sky.
She had no way to know that he was alive – or aware, that was probably a better word for what Maaz had made of him – and had walked away, thinking him dead. Which, he supposed he was, when it came right to the point. So he’d been left.
He’d heard her argue for his burial. He thanked her silently for the gesture. It was more than anyone had done for him since his mother had died, and he thought that maybe she’d cracked something inside of him when she’d done so. Such compassion, and from a self-proclaimed enemy, was more than someone like him deserved.
Better if he’d burned, though.
He wasn’t sure if he’d feel the pain of it too acutely, but he was fairly sure that if he burnt down to nothing, he’d finally be free. For the one millionth time since his burial in the cold earth he wished that he’d had the strength to try it on himself years ago. But he hadn’t. So here he lay.
He found that he could sleep, which was a blessing. One couldn’t sleep forever, though – not unless they were fully dead, and Maarkov was not. So he laid here in despair during his waking hours. He had nightmares in his sleep, and woke to a nightmare as well.
It was enough to drive a man insane.
Maarkov would have laughed if he could move, or breathe.
Then, after what might have been days or years, he felt a rumbling in the earth, and a cold dread crept into his belly. Slowly, the dirt began to loosen around him. Then it began to fly off of him, lifted into the air as if the earth had simply decided that it should spit him out.
His brother stood over him, appearing tired and wasted. His skin was pinkish, as if it was newly grown. Sometimes when Maaz healed himself or Maarkov, the skin would be pink like an infant’s for a few days until it finally took on the pallor that it usually had. It was as if their bodies sucked the life out of everything, which was fitting in Maarkov’s mind.
Maaz stepped down into the hole, and poured a bit of water into his mouth. He felt the Soulspark jump into his throat when it happened, and feeling returned to him in a flash as he felt his cuts healing, the flesh knitting together of its own accord. He sucked in a deep breath, the air sweet on his tongue, though he wondered why he did it, exactly. He didn’t need to breath. Perhaps it was just a habit, picked up during his time actually having to practice it.
“Get up and get out of this hole,” Maaz rasped, “We have work to do.”
****
The End
OF
BOOK ONE
OF
THE SEVEN SIGNS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
D.W. Hawkins lives in Savannah, Georgia. He spent over nine years in the military, and has served in both Iraq and Afghanistan. He is married to a beautiful woman, has a baby on the way, and has a Pit Bull who is thoroughly convinced that she is actually a Chihuahua.
You can visit him here: www.dwhawkins.com
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He hopes that you enjoy reading his work as much as he enjoys writing it.