She Who Has No Name (The Legacy Trilogy)

by Michael Foster

  ‘Why couldn’t you let me live! Why did you do this to me!’ she cried, and Canyon vanished with a rising wail. His flesh was incinerated and his clothes fell empty to the floor. In his place was a knot of life energy that only Samuel could see and she called it into herself, pulling it in with her will. Her hair whipped about her as she swallowed his essence and the intensity of her magic doubled, surging about her like a storm of sparks and shattered embers. She turned back to Samuel with rage still in her eyes, but when she saw him still standing there, as if struck dumb, she shouted in disbelief.

  ‘Go!’ she implored him.

  Remembering himself, Samuel wobbled to be away, but fell on the final step, slipping in his own blood, for his vital fluid had been pouring down his legs all the while. Instinctively, he tried to take the fall with both hands, but with one entirely gone, he crashed roughly onto the floor.

  Alahativa’s magic then bloomed behind him and the Koian woman’s magic ceased. Rough hands took hold of him and hauled him back to his feet. As they dragged him away, he could see that the Koian woman was lying still on the floor and the Paatin Queen was standing over her, surrounded by a blaze of her own intense power.

  ‘Let him suffer!’ the Paatin Queen called after him. ‘A slow death for him! Nothing terrible should be spared!’

  Everything after that was shades of grey, flashes of light and dark, and moments of silence and screaming. He felt his body being skewered by agony and he did his best to remove himself from all sensation. Heat and cold washed over his skin, fire drilled into his skull and ice into his bones, crushing pressure filled his joints until they felt fit to burst and his breath felt like molten lead in his lungs. His right arm was not wracked by torturous pain—amazingly—which made less sense than anything, for that was the very arm he had seen quivering on the Paatin Queen’s table.

  He remembered being dragged and he remembered the smells of the catacombs. Rough hands pushed and shoved him and then he felt himself being shoved into a narrow hole. There was a moment of peace, and then a flash of lightning.

  He felt the coldness of death enveloping him, forcing itself into his veins but, as his vision cleared, Samuel found himself lying in a stone courtyard, amidst a wild scuffle. He could see Turians fighting Paatin, but it seemed to make no sense. His arm had returned and he could see his fingers wriggling and flexing at the tip of his hand. Strangely, he could feel warm blood seeping from a wound in his chest, yet the pain of that wound was too distant to bother him.

  Some of the Paatin that fought nearby had wings protruding from under their capes, and the Turians that faced them wore the colours of the Ghant defenders. Captain Ravenshood and Grand Master Tudor were there, struggling against their foe, and the battle seemed to be going in the Paatin’s favour.

  Only then did he realise that this was some kind of dream or memory from his past. ‘This has all happened before,’ Samuel thought to himself, ‘but why can’t I remember it?’ He tried to move, but found he was only an observer within his own dream. He had no way to affect what was going on, and so he resigned himself to the fact, sitting back within his own memory and letting it unfold around him.

  Darkness crept in around his vision once more as the blood continued to drain from his middle, until he was blind and the sounds of the battle felt like echoes from far away. He knew the men were still tussling around him, for Turian and Paatin alike were visible to his magician’s senses, even though his eyes had lost their ability to focus. They moved like luminous ghosts cavorting all around, dancing around his dying form.

  Grand Master Tudor, brighter than the others, seemed like a god amongst his followers, and the bolts of magic that bloomed out from him twirled in the air like ink in water, swirling and curling all around. Many others already lay dead around the courtyard, and Samuel could see their life energies creeping out around the courtyard like cautious tendrils trying to escape from the scene.

  It was these he clasped onto, for the energy felt akin to his own—warm and inviting in the bleak coldness all around. He remembered when Master Glim had died and he remembered the thrill of life he had felt when he had absorbed that tiny mote of his teacher’s energy. So he grasped the dying embers of energy in the room and began calling them towards himself.

  As they reached him, he swallowed them into his own presence and they became part of him. It was exciting, rejuvenating. He could taste the very nature of the people who had died here, feel their final terrified thoughts, see their final blood-curdling visions. It was frightening, yet somehow irresistible, for his only desperate thought was that of his own survival.

  He beckoned for all the wasted power in the room to come to him, and obediently the streamers of life did come. Slowly, they crawled through the air towards him, and each one that entered him gave him back a tiny spark of life.

  The effort seemed futile however—like raking leaves on a windy day—for, with every speck of energy he gathered into himself, more spilled from the gaping hole in his chest. He called and called, wishing he could scream out to the world and have it obey him, for everything was just happening far too slowly for it to make any difference. Soon, he would die.

  Then he felt something cold upon his finger and with a sudden shock, all the lingering energy in the room seemed to rush in towards him. With the power of the Argum Stone to assist him, he could gather all the power he needed as simply as wishing for it. He gathered all that wayward life force into himself, healing himself, undoing the awful harm done unto his body.

  The power of the ring was incredible, and with it he could call to everything—not just the fading spirits that wafted from their battered shells, but the more vital energies that hid within fleshy casings. As he called, more vibrant power came flooding into him.

  The world around was still darkness to his blinded vision, but these clusters of life energy shone out to him irresistibly. He only had to direct his will towards them and they entered him one by one.

  As he surveyed the courtyard, he spied a clot of shadow lingering near the doorway, clogged with blackness, and so he turned his attention away from that—for it was not worth considering. A cluster of brilliant power across the room was far more appealing and so he focussed upon that with vigour.

  As he began to gather it, the spot blazed like a bonfire in a sudden wind. He turned his gaze away momentarily, for the brightness had dazzled him, but so, too, had it excited him. The more the energy blazed and struggled, the more it enticed him. The outer strips of life began unravelling and tumbling in towards him and he found that a deeper, sweeter power was hidden underneath. He drew that in as well, relishing in delight as he devoured it.

  All he could think was I can live! I can live! as he swallowed all the energy in the room.

  He had forgotten the battle that had earlier waged around him and it seemed as if all the sounds of fighting had vanished, lost amongst the sound of power rushing in his ears. He knew he was still lying there on the hard stones, and that this was all some kind of fantasy that one felt just before death, but it seemed so strange and real.

  A sound caught his ear and he returned his attention to that last bloom of light that had proven so nourishing. There was hardly anything of it remaining, yet it called out to him in a pained and pleading voice, calling his name and asking for him to stop. Its voice sounded familiar, but dreams had a way of making things seem confusing. After another moment, the room was silent and everything was again dark and cold and quiet, and he knew the dream had ended.

  Tucked away in the darkness, Samuel felt a burning in his eyes, but for some reason he could not force himself to weep. All he wanted to do was wallow in his misery, for he now realised what he had done, and he knew what had become of Grand Master Tudor. He damned himself for being so weak and for giving in to the evil that lurked inside him. He damned himself, for it had felt so good.

  ‘Father!’ came the voice of a child. ‘Wake up! Get up!’

  The image of a dead man, lying on a hard
floor and staring—masked in blood—filled his mind. He refused to let the memories of that dark night come back to him and he pushed them from his mind as they struggled at the edge of his attention. Instead, a vast city came into view through the clouds of his dream. It was set beside a glittering sea and surrounded by great pale walls that were beyond comparison. Cintar, it was called, and this city was the jewel of Amandia; perfect in every way and envied by every ruler who had ever come to behold it.

  A seething host filled the lands around that city and they threw themselves against the walls without respite. In turn, swarms of gold and blue adorned men amassed on the walls and defended their city with arrows and stones and vats of boiling oil. Magic leapt from wall to ground and was returned in equal portion, but it seemed the battle was evenly matched. The city could not be taken, yet the invaders could not be dispelled.

  Great carapaced beasts lumbered across the pastures to heave themselves at the walls, and the armies parted to make way for them. Enormous boulders flew at the beasts, but the beasts seemed resilient to everything. Then, the vision faded and the roar of the battle subsided.

  ‘Hello?’ came a voice and Samuel found himself standing in his room within the palace. At first, he could not tell if this was still a part of his dream or if he had actually awoken—somehow freed from his nightmares.

  The Koian woman was leaning in the doorway, with guards visible at her back. She looked straight towards him, and he tried to answer back, but that image, too, faded and the Koian woman disappeared from view.

  He caught flashes of her after that, standing in her room, or sitting idly in the gardens, or lying in her bed in the middle of the night. Each time, she would look up, as if startled by his presence, before the scene would vanish and he would be left wandering in senseless dreams. He struggled to return to her, because for some reason he could not stop thinking about her and she was the only thing that made sense in this world of pain and anguish.

  Where at first she had confounded and annoyed him, he now found her intriguing and compelling. What he had considered to be her stubbornness and ignorance now seemed to be strength of will and innocence. Where once he had thought of her as alien and unsightly, he had grown to find her beautiful and fascinating.

  More and more, he caught glimpses of her life in the palace and it seemed that the days were passing ever so quickly, for, every time he saw her, she was dressed differently, or the sun lay in different parts of the sky. Still, he strived as much as he could to stay by her side, for the alternative to being with her was unthinkable: the deep and silent void that lingered at the edge of his conscience, threatening to engulf him.

  At times, she seemed to feel him, and she spoke as if to him, but the words were always muffled and unintelligible. He tried to speak back to her, but the sound caught in his throat. All he could do was hover at her side and follow her as she wandered forlornly down the halls, ever shadowed by Shara and a pair of watchful Paatin guards.

  She visited the Emperor at times and Samuel saw them sitting and talking in muted tones. Although they often laughed and talked pleasantly, they both seemed distracted by a longing in their hearts. When she left the Emperor’s room, she was as quiet and lonely as before.

  ‘I miss you so,’ he heard her say, late one night as he hovered by her bed. It seemed incredible that he could hear her voice. ‘Oh, my Love. How foolish I have been.’

  He tried to reply, but he had no mouth to speak. It seemed he was only a dream within a dream, and such things could never capture the wind to craft words from their throats.

  He stayed with her intermittently throughout the days and nights. He could not control the duration or the frequency of such stays and, as soon as he started to feel he was gaining a hold on this existence, everything would fade away into the distance as he was drawn back into the darkness, forever infuriating him.

  She talked to him in all her quiet moments and he could not ever imagine leaving her side. She spoke often of the baby growing in her swollen belly, and he remembered their shared moment of tenderness. All he could do was damn himself for not realising his love for her sooner and he hoped that, perhaps, this dream would end and he would wake beside her, safe and well.

  ‘Have you forsaken me already?’ came another voice in his dream, and he imagined Leila looking at him with sadness. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, regaining her strength and smiling once again. ‘I forgive you, Samuel. Our life together was wonderful, but all things must change eventually. Be with her...be happy. I could not wish anything but happiness for you. You know I will always love you, and I know, in your way, you will still always love me. That’s all I ever wanted. My life was short, but you made it wonderful.’

  He imagined her turning softly and stepping away into the shadows, and he could feel what seemed like tears welling in his eyes, although they were hot and burned their way down his cheeks. Thoughts and dreams and reality had no boundaries any more, for without being able to wake, all such things had become as one.

  Time seemed to pass like wandering aeons and, at times, Samuel broke from his dreams of the living and floundered more and more on the edge of waking. Less and less, he was able to visit the Koian woman and more often he found himself yelling in pain or caught in the nightmarish delirium of a fever. At one point, he realised he was screaming and the taste of blood was filling his throat. He scrambled to his feet and ran forward into the inky darkness only to strike his head on sheer stone, knocking himself straight back into unconsciousness. Another time, he thought he was free and escaping from the city, only to realise, as the blackness returned, that it was but a delusion—any images that came to him were now fantasy; only the blackness was truth.

  At times, he thought he could hear a scraping, like some clawed creature pawing at him from beyond a wall, and a whispering sounded at the edge of his perception, sometimes forceful and insistent, at other times pleading and desperate. At one point, he felt that the wall around him had collapsed and that the whispering thing was now upon him, but it was all dreams and nightmares, fever and illusions. All he wanted was to return to his love, but the pain behind his face would not allow it.

  He awoke more and more frequently, and it was only at these times that it was truly dark and quiet. He took such opportunities to explore his surrounds, crawling around on the hard stones and moaning for someone to help him. No one came to his aid and he could only collapse flat back onto some rags on the floor and wait for unconsciousness to take hold of him again. Each time, a tiny vestige of his strength returned, and soon he hoped to be able to hold onto his awareness long enough to discover what had happened to him.

  He found himself surmising that he must be immured again in the Queen’s catacombs, buried beneath Mount Karthma and, along with the thought, came a strange and sudden euphoria, for he realised he was fully awake.

  He scrambled desperately to find the door, clawing away in all directions at the stone, only to realise that one hand was passing through air while the other met rock. Fumbling his fingers about his body, he discovered a wet stump just below his right elbow, and remembered what had happened.

  Carefully, he raised his stump and explored the wound with his fingers. It had hardened and was dry in some places, but was seeping in others. Testing the extents of his prison, he felt around with his left hand held out before him, searching for the door. Eventually, he realised that he must have already made two or three circles around the chamber without finding anything. There was no door to find and the cell was scarcely large enough for him to lie in. Testing his suspicions, he ran his palm over the rocks, standing on the tips of his toes and reaching up. There was no ceiling above him that he could feel and the rocks seemed to lean in, as if narrowing inwards to form a chute.

  It seemed that he was in the same cell that had been Balten’s home for so long, in the deepest recesses of the Paatin Queen’s catacombs. He was without an arm and without his ring and, even if he had either, he was separated from freedom by a
mountain of magic-defying stone.

  He was lucky that he had survived being thrown down into the cell in the first place, for the fall could easily have broken his neck, and lucky that he had not then bled to death as he had lain unconscious. If what had happened to Balten was any indication, he would be left without food and water until he rotted. Unless someone came to save him, he would be down here indefinitely—but all his friends had already fled the city.

  The Emperor was a prisoner of the enraged Queen and the Koian woman, pregnant with his child, was in no condition to come to his aid. Was that one of his feverish delusions? Did he really love her? Now, awake and coming to terms with his predicament, he was not very sure of anything.

  Realising his throat was crying out from thirst, Samuel stopped down low and licked around the base of the wall for tiny droplets of water. It was hard work, but he could feel the coolness on his tongue and it tempered his thirst to some degree. His stomach was aching for food, but there was simply nothing to eat. He patted around on the floor with his remaining hand for any scraps his captors may have thrown down, but there was nothing but hard stone and grit. Not even bugs ventured around the cell, and even his magician’s sight had failed him, leaving him in such an inky blackness that he had never thought was possible.

  It was curious that his rendered arm caused no pain, for he imagined the wound should be worse. The only feeling was a deep throbbing in his bone, but the weeping end gave no sensation at all. Often, he forgot about the injury and thought he could feel his fingers wiggling on the end of his hand in the darkness, but any attempt to clasp his hands together quickly taught him the truth of the matter. His arm was gone and it would not be returning on its own any time soon.

  He slept on the hard stone and awoke whenever he imagined he heard something, but, as he sat perfectly still, cocking one ear towards the trapdoor above, there was nothing to hear. He talked to himself and murmured away in the darkness to pass the time, singing songs and humming tunes. He guessed a few more days might have passed in the meantime and the terrible realisation kept coming home to him that very shortly he would starve to death.