11.
Keth rode the miles across Aquis in solitary silence, with no one to speak to except himself or his mount. He had taken a fast horse, an animal practiced in crossing long distances quickly, and he switched his steeds as often as Rederick’s order allowed. He had started out the day before Cor, thinking that he should be able to cross the miles at least twice as fast as his Lord Dahken, perhaps even faster as Cor united his small force with the others that rallied across Aquis.
He found that passing into Akor was not as plainly obvious as passing from Losz to Aquis or vice versa. There were no jagged mountains separating the two, no great landmarks to denote where one ended and the other began. He stayed on the western road and tracked his progress by the towns and villages through which he passed. They became sparser and more widely spaced the closer he travelled to the border.
He exchanged his horse for the last time at an outpost that was no more than twenty miles from the border. The captain there, an affable middle aged Westerner, explained that there was indeed a natural border – a wide yet shallow river, easily crossed on horseback. Keth saw concern on the man’s face, and the captain explained that there had been run-ins with men on horseback. They came across from Akor just a few at a time, quickly pillaged whatever they could find and then ran back into Akor. He didn’t know who they were, for they certainly were no Westerners with their dark, yellowish skin and almond shaped eyes.
“Tomorrow I ride into Akor,” Keth had told him.
“I must warn you milord. I dare not send any of my men across the border. There’s rumors of an army of these yellow madmen.”
“We’ve heard such in Byrverus. King Rederick has sent me to negotiate.”
The captain raised an eyebrow in apparent disbelief that such a young man, and a warrior as well would be sent to negotiate with an army, but he said nothing. At sunrise, the men clasped arms, and Keth continued on his way.
He hadn’t yet found the river when he spotted the first horseman perhaps a mile off across the plain. The figure sat upon a horse, completely unmoving as Keth approached. He kept his horse at a walk, hoping that he appeared uncaring as to how quickly he reached the horseman or at least unthreatening. As he closed, he could see that the figure was definitely a man, perhaps slightly smaller of frame than himself. Details began to take shape. The rider wore a leather tunic of sorts that seemed to be pieced together from heavy red and brown patches. His legs and feet were bare and solidly built. A wooden pole of some sort extended from his back about a foot over his head, and he carried an unsheathed sword upon his hip the likes of which Keth had never seen before. The blade could have been no more than two and a half feet long and was curved much like a crescent moon. He wore an odd metal cap, perhaps made of copper due to its reddish tint, with a sharp point directly on top. Even as close as a hundred yards or so, Keth did not hail the rider.
The man then moved for the first time, reaching back to grasp the pole behind his back. The thing was in fact three or four feet long, and Keth felt the sudden need to kick his horse into a gallop as he saw a steel tip glinting in the sunlight. Instead, he pulled the horse to a halt as the rider leaned back and hurled the missile high into the air. At first, Keth was certain the javelin would land nowhere near him and his horse, but as he watched, the slight winds caused its track to curve ever so slightly. As it came plummeting toward him, he very nearly dove from his mount, willing to let the animal be impaled. He watched in wonder as it arced downward and imbedded its tip deep into the ground a mere two feet in front of him.
The horse reared back in sudden fright, and Keth held on tightly to keep from being thrown. Realizing no more would be raining down upon them, the animal finally calmed, though it eyed the shaft warily. In watching the javelin, then regaining control of the horse, Keth hadn’t noticed that the rider had closed most of the distance to him. He drew his sword, cursing himself for not spending more time on horseback and watched as the horseman approached with his own blade in hand.
Keth suddenly felt uneasy and looked round to find two more horsemen approaching on his flanks. Where did they come from? He watched them closely as they rode to him; the men on his flanks each held a spear aloft in the air, holding their horses’ reins with one hand. All three were well muscled under their leather armor, and they were natural horsemen, riding bareback without a saddle. When they had all closed within ten feet or so, the flanking riders threw their spears into the ground and drew their own swords. Keth had never met a Tigolean, but these men seemed to match what he had heard of them.
“Hy ching torrah pah,” the first said to him. “Ky meh pan goltha.” Receiving no answer, the man repeated the statements, pointing at Keth’s horse.
“He say you have fine horse,” said the rider to Keth’s right. “He take it now.”
“I’ve come to speak to King Parol, not hand over my horse to brigands,” Keth replied.
This brought an uproarious laugh from the Tigolean who had translated, and it was taken up by the other two. He sharply cut off the laugh and said, “King Parol no need you. Give horse and go.”
“Come take it,” Keth challenged.
He kicked his horse forward, endeavoring to cleave the first Tigolean’s head from his shoulders, but the man was no longer there when the blade should have met flesh. The men rode circles around him in short order, landing blows all about him while laughing as if in a crazed frenzy. Some ricocheted off of steel armor, but others found the grooves between the plates and found flesh. He quickly realized that he was no match for them on horseback, even with his blood coursing through his veins. It did him no good if his enemy vanished before his own blade could strike.
One of the curved blades whistled as it cut through the air straight at his head, and he felt it just clip his left ear as he threw himself off of his horse to the right. He thudded heavily to the ground, the impact jarring him even as it bent the steel plates around his right shoulder. He lost his sword, but only for a moment as he retrieved it mere inches away. Keth stood, clearing his head as he did so, and found the Tigoleans just staring at him in disbelief. That one would choose to fight them on foot was beyond their understanding, and they smiled wickedly as they were upon him.
Only now Keth fought on solid ground, ground of his choosing, and his wounds fueled his Dahken blood. The first rode directly for Keth, intent on trampling the Dahken beneath his horse’s hooves. Keth dove low to one side and brought his sword around in a great backhanded stroke, cutting the horse’s legs out from underneath it. Keth did not stop to watch as the horse screamed and careened head first into the ground, throwing its rider.
The other two Tigoleans seemed content to rain sword strokes down upon the Dahken so as to avoid the same mistake. He fought fiercely, shattering one sword as the Tigolean parried and then removing the man’s leg above the knee. The man fell off the far side of his horse while screaming and clawing at his stump, blood mixing with the dirt and dust of the road. As Keth turned to face the last horseman, the Tigolean suddenly and quickly backed his horse out of reach.
The man lowered his sword and said, “No need kill anymore. You want King Parol. We take you to him.”
“I thank you,” Keth said with a sardonic raise of an eyebrow. He looked about and saw that his horse had wandered some ten or fifteen yards away. His first foe lay dead, both horse and rider broken from their impact into the ground, and the second lay in the road, frantically trying to keep the blood from running between his fingers.
“They all dead,” said the last Tigolean. “Get horse. I take you to Lord Karak. He send you to Parol.”
Karak was another Tigolean, obviously a rich warlord of some sort standing about five and a half feet tall. He was fully covered in steel plates that layered over one another so that only a few inches of any individual plate could be seen. Keth calculated the amount of steel encasing the yellow faced man with a long black mustache and doubted how the man could remain upright, much less move with so much agility.
At his sides he wore two swords, much like Thyss’ in shape, and one about three feet in length and other five.
Karak met Keth in a lavish tent that had to be over twenty feet wide and was full of plush pillows, fruit, wine and naked women. He marched into the tent like a general, greeting Keth as an honored guest, as the Dahken was an emissary from a king, and he spoke perfect, unaccented Western.
“My apologies Dahken Keth,” he said with a deep bow, “for the actions of my men. I’m afraid my warriors sometimes turn to brigandry when away from their masters, but I see you are unharmed. I know you dealt death to two. I promise the third is receiving his punishment as we speak.”
“Thank you Lord Karak, and thank you for your hospitality,” Keth replied with an equal bow. He noted with interest that the Tigolean spoke perfect Westerner with no trace of accent.
“I am told you seek King Parol, that you are sent by King Rederick himself,” said Karak, motioning to a stack of plush, satin pillows.
Keth sat at the proffered place and sank deeply into luxury that was lost through his plate mail. The pillows only made him feel as if he would not be able to get up again. Karak simply sat cross legged upon the hard ground about five feet away, and he appeared most humble for the obvious warlord that he was.
“Yes Lord Karak. I come with the hopes of avoiding war between two kingdoms that have long been allies.”
“Hmmm,” Karak rubbed at his shaven chin, “I do not think King Parol has a mind for peace, but only a fool would go to war when peace is offered. He will no doubt gain from any peace to be brokered with no cost to his people, whereas war will have a great cost for both sides, and the gains shall be minimal.”
“Lord Karak, you speak from experience?” Keth asked.
“The arts of warfare have consumed my life, and I’ve become very rich and powerful for them,” Karak replied. “Regardless, war is rarely profitable. I invite you to stay in my tent tonight and enjoy any pleasures you find within it. Tomorrow, you shall ride for Theron with an honor guard so that you shall be molested no more. I wish you luck in your endeavor, Dahken Keth, but I have little hope for it. If you’ll excuse me, I have much to attend to.”
With that, Karak stood, a feat impossible to Keth’s eye considering the man’s armor, and he bowed crisply. Keth watched after the man, warrior, warlord, as he walked amongst the tents surrounding his. He thought he liked this honorable man, and Keth hoped he wouldn’t have to kill him.
Keth shrugged off the affectionate hands of the harem as he stood with the tent flaps open, watching everything. There were tents and more tents of all sizes as far as he could see, and he had lost count of them as he rode in to meet Karak. He’d seen armies before, both large and small, and Keth estimated that there were at least ten thousand Tigoleans, footmen and horsemen, massed here. Somehow, he knew that Karak was but one warlord of many, and the bitter realization made the hope in his heart sour in his stomach.
12.
The sensation of having my consciousness in two places at once was so bizarre and so fascinating, and this comes from a man who has used a Steingartner drive in space! The Steingartner creates infinitesimally small singularities that pull everything, including the Herbert Walker or any other ship, toward them at relative speeds equal to the relative density of the singularity. As such you seem to be travelling many times the speed of light, at least to the measurement of a fixed chronometer. This makes you and your ship’s relative density infinitely approach zero grams per meter cubed without actually reaching zero. To the fixed observer, your ship seems to suddenly stretch infinitely toward its destination, therefore stretching you and everyone else within it over light years of distance.
Of course, the fixed observer usually dies from old age before you make it home again. Relativity is a bitch. My parents did everything they could to make me not miss them. My mother recorded a message to me almost every day and saved them all to a drive that I picked up on a return visit to Pollux. She wanted me to watch them as my days moved forward so it would be like she was still around. I never did. I never could, and now I regret that.
I’ve never met God, and right now I’m not sure if He exists. But He can fuck himself.
Let me start over, because I’ve digressed.
Something pulled my consciousness, at least part of it, away from what I was doing. I’d say “physically” pulled, except my body of course hasn’t moved in months. No, let me say “virtually” pulled me. I was fully aware of everything I was watching and recording, but suddenly I was in another place too.
This other place was pitch black with no light at all, and the only reason I had to think of it as a room is that I stood on what seemed to be a very solid stone floor. I blinked and was suddenly blinded by bright white light, no different than the institutional flourescent lighting on board the Herbert Walker, AGS and any number of installations including this one. I blinked several times and shielded my eyes while I waited for my irises to contract, and I saw that I was standing in my standard deck fatigues, complete with rank insignia. There were no signs of the numerous connections that had invaded my body when I sat in the Chronicler’s chair.
A mental image of myself? I thought.
Once my eyes had cleared enough that I could raise them, I found a white man little older than myself regarding me intently from a featureless throne that appeared to be made of gold. It was smooth and polished so that the light from overhead reflected almost painfully. The man had chiseled hard facial features with close cropped black hair and goatee beard, both of which were lightly speckled with gray. He seemed fit and about my height at a few inches over six feet, though it was hard to be sure seated as he was.
I’m in a Vault, I thought. I thought I faced Garod, but I became sure when he spoke.
“Chronicler, I brought you here for I must speak with you,” he said, and this time his voice did not threaten to deafen my senses and rattle my brain as it had the first time I encountered him. I simply stood, silent and impassive, and I think it angered him. “You show me no respect, Chronicler. I lead the gods, and We have bestowed a great gift upon you.”
“What gift?” I asked, and I’ll be honest – I asked somewhat petulantly.
“Near eternal life of course. The ability to see everything on and around Our world. Powers of the mind like none of your kind have ever known.”
“You’ve also taken my life from me,” I replied.
“We did not force you into this. We offered you something great, and you accepted, no more. What life did Paul Chen have? His family dead and gone. No wife, no home, no love. Did you not search for something greater than yourself, and did you not find it here?” he asked, and while the questions sounded reasonable, I still felt enslaved.
“Oh, I’m pretty sure I’ve found something greater than myself. There’s a secret here, a big one, and I’m going to find out what it is.”
“Leave it, Chronicler,” Garod said to me, his tone final. “Push no further into the past. Those Chronicles are locked away for a reason. There is no need to bring them out to light.”
“Chronicles,” I muttered and then said louder, “data files, logs. None of you are who you claim to be and neither are the Loszian gods. I’ve seen everything the previous Chronicler saw, and I know Dahk called his existence here a penance. He said you all committed sins.”
“Leave it be!” Garod shouted, slamming his fist into the arm of his golden throne, and it complained and bent under the assault. He stood and thundered at me, “I demand it!”
“Or what? You’ll kill me? That’s a sin as well, Garod. Murder,” I replied.
For a moment, the anger fled from his face, and he looked at me with calm eyes. He then said quietly, “Morals are for mortals, not gods.”
“Maybe, but I’m not sure you believe that,” I replied, “or you would have continued with whatever ‘mission’ brought you here. That’s it, isn’t it? Your penance is to watch over and protect what you’ve created, and also to make su
re it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. The Others, the Loszians came here to conquer that, to take it away from you. They’re part of the ‘mission’ now, aren’t they?”
Garod slowly sat back into his throne, which was now suddenly as if it hadn’t been damaged at all. “I shall say no more,” he said quietly.
“Then I am free to return to my tasks as Chronicler?” I asked, and then added as an afterthought, “Jared?”
He cocked his head quizzically for just a moment, as if he didn’t even recognize the sound of his own name. Perhaps he didn’t, because it had been thousands of years from his perspective since he had heard it. As the realization came to him, the understanding of the implications of my knowledge, the anger returned to him. For a brief moment, I cringed inwardly with the fear that he just might have been considering obliterating my existence. He flicked his wrist with a sneer of disgust, and I found myself wholly out of the Vault.
* * *
“What do you think, Doctor?” said someone I couldn’t see.
A face came into view directly in front of me and hovered for a long time. It was silhouetted by bright white light, leaving the face dark and featureless. Honestly, it was a point of relief while looking into the intensely bright lights, so I focused my eyes on it as long as I could. Eventually the image began to sharpen, the blurred edges finding fine formation, and I could start to make out the nose, cheekbones, brow and eye sockets. After a number of additional heartbeats, I looked into the face of Hightower. He looked concerned. And sad.
“Doctor?” said the voice again, and it sounded very familiar. It was a man’s voice, oddly accented, but concise, military.
“His muscles have begun to atrophy,” Hightower replied, and I think I felt his cold hand on my wrist, checking my pulse.
The Cor Chronicles: Volume 04 - Gods and Steel Page 9