by Hal Emerson
“He told Tiffenal to kill Goldwyn,” the Prince said, seeing the same memories.
– Geofred stood and Tiffenal felt a spike of annoyance and pure, very unbrotherly anger. He didn’t hate Geofred as much as he hated Rikard – anger, hate, shame, guilt, fear – but he certainly didn’t like him. If anything, he tolerated him. Why did he have to be here anyway? He was ruining the whole day.
“How did you know to look into this line of the future?” Asked Tiffenal, curious in spite of himself. His brother, despite his vast intellect, was only one man and had to focus on certain things in order to see them.
“The Death Watchmen laid a trap in the Roarke Mountains,” said Geofred. “The trap did not succeed – but one of them was left intact. It was pushed over a cliff, and lost its arm along with half its torso, but the skeletal structure of the spin remained in place and so the enchantments held. It reported back, told me that our darling little brother had forgotten to finish it off, and that the Ox Talisman had been passed to another.”
This surprised the Fox – it was an unexpected twist. He liked unpredictable things though … ooooh, what fun they could be!
“They’re only a step away from being provoked into all out war,” Geofred continued. “We need only push them over the edge. It is time to use the secret tunnel, the one Symanta discovered for the Seekers. Go through it, steal a sambolin, and kill the Elder.”
“Which one?”
“Whichever you like,” the Eagle said dismissively. “But one that will whip them into a rage.”
“And then what?”
“Burn Roarke and return here,” Geofred continued, light gleaming off of his tattooed, bald head. “Little brother will come to you – he’ll see you as his responsibility. You know how predictable he is. You should be able to deal with him – if your luck holds of course.”
“If my luck held, you wouldn’t be here, and the little sparrow would be dead.”
Geofred frowned, just a small downward twitch at the corners of his mouth, but it made Tiffenal smile like a cat – PRIDE, laughter, elation – he bared his teeth in a feral grin, gold flashes flickering in and out or his vision, showing him the way the strings of fate were pulling the Eagle even now.
“Just hold them,” Geofred said, turning and leaving the audience chamber. “And we will end this once and for all in Banelyn.”
“Happy massacre,” said Tiffenal cheerfully.
“You disturb even me sometimes,” said Geofred as he -
“… GODDAMN PRINCE WAKE UP!”
Raven snapped out of the memories, though they continued to play through his head, pounding against his skull, and saw Davydd almost standing, every inch of him shaking with the effort of working through the pain of his ruined face.
“Go to them!” Davydd hissed, his expression a terrible mask of burnt flesh and feral determination. The gold lines were growing, spiraling out from his neck, creeping across the burnt flesh, hardening it, blackening it.
“We need the information to be recorded,” the Prince said, “we need all of what Tiffenal knows – ”
“I can do that,” said Davydd, “I have the memories too. Now get the – ”
He cut off as the golden lines glowed brighter, and he cried out, making a noise the Prince hadn’t known a human throat could produce: half mewling cry for mercy, half shout of mad defiance.
The doors burst open behind them and the sound of fighting echoed through – the Prince turned and saw the rest of the infiltration force dispatching the last of the guardsmen, coming toward them led by Lorna; when she saw Davydd her face went a white, ashen color, and her round eyes, normally so expressionless, filled with fear. She ran forward and grabbed him, cradling him in her arms. He looked up into her eyes, tried to say something, but his wounds were too much, the pain of the Talisman too great, and his eyes began to close. But just when it looked like he was about to succumb, he let out a groan of sound that tore from his throat like a living thing, crashing around the audience chamber, and he rose again, pushing himself against Lorna, leaning forward, held up by pure spite and power of will, and stared the Prince dead in the eye.
“Go to Banelyn,” said Davydd. “Warn them. Save her.”
Leah.
“She’s the only family I have left, and I can’t get there as fast as you can.”
The Prince looked to Lorna.
“I’ll take care of him,” she growled softly, her gray eyes showing her concern. “The palace is clear – the city will fall as soon as we can get to Autmaran.”
For a long moment, too long, the Prince looked at Davydd, knowing what it cost him to put this responsibility in another’s hands. And then he nodded, turned, and fled the chamber as the Eshendai collapsed into the arms of Lorna, already clutching at the parchment offered him from the table beside Tiffenal’s throne, beginning to write, the memories flooding through him as the Fox Talisman crept across his skin, etching itself like acid into his flesh.
Chapter Twenty-Five: The Road to Banelyn
The Prince fled Formaux at a dead run, pursued by the sound of alarm bells that showed the city had been altered to the events in the palace. That, or Autmaran had successfully overcome the attacking soldiers at the ambush point and was now invading the city.
Strength continued to flood the Prince’s veins from the three men he’d killed and from his brother, allowing him the energy to outrun the gusting wind that flowed alongside him, his lone companion through the fogged, silent streets.
His horse was somewhere outside the city still he knew, but he had no time to look for it. Banelyn was many miles away, and soon his strength would fail. He needed to be as far along the road as possible before it left him and he was forced to rely on his own power – besides, at this rate he was faster than any two horses and could get farther without such hindrance.
He reached the western-facing wall in a matter of minutes and, seeing no staircase up to the top, took a running jump and grabbed a windowsill of the nearest building. He pulled himself up almost effortlessly, and then continued on, climbing to the rooftop, grabbing cracks and crevasses in the stone, barely even wondering at the superhuman feat. He rolled onto the rooftop, came to his feet, and took a running leap that carried him in a wide arc through the air to land in a crouch on the high city wall. He looked over the edge – swampland, bordered by a tall grove of trees.
He looked to his left and saw that the gate was indeed being assaulted by what looked like Autmaran’s force. Shouts and cries echoed through the city, and then the metallic clang of the gate crashing against stone – the Kindred were through.
The Prince took several steps back and then ran forward, launching himself into space. He grabbed a branch, swung on it to angle his fall, and crashed to the ground. His legs absorbed the blow, the strength of the Guardians keeping them from breaking even though he felt shock waves roll through them, hot and painful. He lurched into a run, fear and anger warring within him – anger that in the end, after all their careful planning, things had gone so array, and fear that he had, after all, been anticipated by Geofred.
How is it possible?
How could the Eagle have predicted such a move? How could he have known they would strike at Banelyn?
He can see the future … how do we fight that?
The Prince pulled at the Fox’s memories, searching them, trying to find an answer, but only finding more pain, only finding more buried horrors that made him despair at life, and think again of all that Tiffenal had said, of all the terrible questions he had forced on the Prince.
His knees began to ache as he pounded along the stone road, eating away mile after mile, his breath coming hard and fast in his throat, but his limbs pumping away mechanically, unfailingly. He had to get to Banelyn before they set the siege – he had to get them to sound a retreat. They had captured Formaux, they had killed the Prince of Foxes, that was enough, they should retreat to Roarke, fall back to a defensible position and –
And wait for
Dysuna to come seeking revenge for her brother.
An even deeper fear struck him then as he realized what would happen once word reach the Prince of Wolves that her brother, the only person outside of the Empress to whom she had given her legendary and undying loyalty, had been murdered. She would come for him, killing any in her path. He would have to face her. He would have to kill her too.
And how are you any better than me? Asked the voice of Tiffenal. Kill one to save many. Two to save three, then five to save ten, and fifty to save a hundred …
The words drove deep into the Prince’s mind like splinters, merging with Tiffenal’s memories, all of the centuries he’d spent, terribly alone, unable to give or receive affection without feeling contempt for himself.
Having to watch the love of his life, a girl name Ronya, die.
Shock raced through the Prince then – he had known nothing of this. The event played itself before his eyes, muted and unintelligible, suppressed and buried under the rolling wave of years, long since scarred over.
The Empress had commanded it – when she had learned Tiffenal was in love, she had made a surprise appearance to the city, the first Imperial visit to Formaux in many years. Tiffenal, honored, had come to greet his Mother, only to be punished for his weakness, for such was love. Love was only to be given to the Empress – not to mortal women.
And so began his depravity – so began the life of the man they would come to know as the Untouchable Prince – the one who gave others love in the only way he knew how, the one, the only one, who had the spine to truly care for the people, to make them better with his brutality. For what was a Prince but a father of the people? What was a leader, but a man who had the strength to do what was needed to educate those who followed him, those who relied on him for their morality? How would they know morality if he did not teach it to them in the strictest of ways?
The Prince pulled himself back from the memories, only barely managing to disengage himself before he was pulled under entirely. He’d stopped in his headlong dash, and found himself crying, grief stricken over the horrible life his brother had been forced into. With a huge effort of will he regained his stride and continued on, tears running down his face at his brother’s pain.
More memories played – memories of the first trap he’d made, the first time he’d used the Bloodmages and their dark magic to create a truly deadly enchantment. The joy he’d felt at making something – something that would protect the people of the Empire, something that would make them safe and visit vengeance on the people who rebelled. A vengeance that would show them the power of the Empire and bring them to love it as he did – yes, if he built better traps, showed them all the cleverness of the Children, the way they would be protected if they swore their lives to the Empress, yes, it would all be for them! He would rule as no one had ever ruled before – he would be the Clever Prince the Prince who truly knew how to keep the people safe, the Prince of Springs and Things, the Prince who knew all there was to know about making, about creating, about –
The Prince of the Veil ran, trying to get away from the memories almost as much as he was trying to get to Banelyn. He didn’t know what was happening to him – he felt as if each new memory that ran through his head aged him another year. He lived each day of his brother’s life, felt each sorrow, knew each perverted, strangled joy, and felt a pity and a sadness that he hadn’t thought possible.
It moved his legs faster, and squeezed his heart, pumping the blood through his veins like the never-ending fire that consumed the sun. His breath came in gasps, in pants. His vision was red with anger, his nose full of all the terrible smells of the world, his ears hearing only the harsh, discordant sounds of his own breathing gasping in terrible counterpoint to his booted feet striking the paved road as he ran faster than any horse could go.
Mother did this to you brother, he thought. She did it to you, and to Ramael … and to me. She ruined all of us – and you never had a chance to break free.
He felt guilt then at his own chance – who was he among the Children to deserve a way to break out from this terrible spell? Who was he to escape the reign of the God Empress, the Tyrant, who ruled the hearts and minds of her subjects with an iron fist that would be with them through their lives and into their deaths as well? Why him? Why hadn’t it been Tiffenal? Why not Ramael?
Tiffenal would have been just like Davydd, he realized, seeing the way the Fox Talisman had burned into Davydd’s flesh, seeing him transform before his eyes into the very image of the brother he had just killed, one of his red eyes now tinted with burnished sunlight, liquid grace, terrible luck.
You weren’t lucky enough to escape Mother.
Mother. The Empress.
“She deserves to die,” he breathed to himself. And as he said the words, he felt them to be true, down to his very core.
Ramael would have been just like Tomaz.
He knew now what Iliad had meant, all those months ago. He knew now how the Talismans were meant to be turned back to their true purpose as Aspects – they were meant to be transferred, meant to be given to those who would use them for their true purposes, who exemplified the good of mankind.
The memories finally, blessedly, began to fade, and his mind began to calm, though still his vision burned before him as if it would consume the whole world in the conflagration of his hate; his wrath for the Mother who had tried to have him killed, who had turned his brother into something worse than a monster.
Fatigue hit him then, like a wall, and he faltered. The last of the memories disappeared from him, leaving him cold and empty, with only the impressions of what his brother’s life had been still flowing through him – scenes repeating themselves endlessly, over and over, in strange and wondrous loops that both fascinated and terrified him, wondering at the horrendous marvels Tiffenal had devised in the name of their Mother.
He continued to run, but knew he would soon have to rest.
No! No, I cannot rest, there is a trap at Banelyn! I have to warn them, I have to be there to help if I can – I CANNOT LOSE LEAH!
And as if in answer to his desperate plea, a lone village sprang up from out of the mists as he ran forward.
A horse. I need a horse now.
He went to the main inn of the village – the place was emptying, all of the people inside nearly gone but for the all-night drunkards, and even these were beginning to nod off in their cups.
He burst through the doors with a cry of anger, pushing his body to respond faster, making his mind work quickly through the pain he felt, through the haze the memories had left.
An inn-keeper – behind the bar.
He crossed to him, only realizing once he was there the sight he made – covered in sweat and blood, with rents torn in his armor by Guardian swords and chunks gouged out of his skin still seeping blood.
“A horse!” He cried to the man, stumbling forward. “I need a horse – NOW!”
“I – I – I don’t know if there are any left in the stable out back,” the man said, looking panicked as he held up in his hands in desperate supplication. “Just the ones the Defenders rode in on when they stopped for the night.”
“That will do,” he said.
He rounded the building at a sprint, and saw the stable looming just behind it on the far side. He went to it, threw open the doors with a bang and strode to the nearest horse, pulling down a saddle from the wall nearby.
“Oy!” Cried a voice from the hayloft. “What the hell you doing waking us up innkeep, we paid for this loft to sleep in, and by the Empress, we plan to get our sleep if we have to –”
The man broke off and the Prince heard the sound of steel being drawn from a sheath. He jumped back with a hiss just as the Defender who’d been speaking leapt down from the hidden hayloft and landed in a heap next to the Prince.
The Prince reached through his Talisman and felt the lives of three more men up there. He had no time for this. He turned to the first man who was pulling himself from
the straw he’d landed in.
The Defender, dressed in the brown and red with the Imperial trilliope on his breast, raised his sword and swung, looking as if he were trying to provide a warning blow of some kind to simply scare the Prince off.
Instead of backing away the Prince stepped forward, caught the wrist, twisted it over his shoulder, and broke it.
The man cried out in pain and his companions above shouted in alarm and jumped down as well.
The Prince turned, pulled the sword from the man’s hand, and struck him on the temple with the hilt. Already dazed from the pain in his wrist, the man went down without any further ado, collapsing to the floor in a heap.
The others landed nearby and drew swords as well.
The Prince had no time for clever maneuvers here – all he could do was fend off their swords with hasty swings as they attacked together. One of them came too close, and the Prince lanced out with the stolen sword and cut the man’s thigh – he fell to one knee, the muscles no longer working properly, and dropped his sword, crying out in pain, trying to staunch the sudden flow of blood.