Sacrifice of the First Sheason

by Peter Orullian

  Palamon sat up, dreading what he must tell her. “Solera, I don’t believe Dossolum conferred this office on me to simply serve as intercessor.”

  She sat up beside him. The wind soughed lightly through the trees, caressing their shoulders. “Why else, Palamon?”

  He looked at her, feeling the bitterness of knowing his next words would change everything. He had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. “I’ve studied the ways of the Will,

  Solera. And though I’ve not yet rendered much, I’d thought I would always use it to uphold the principles that give life its meaning…”

  Solera’s brow furrowed. “Palamon?”

  He did not want to say it. Even now part of him resisted. But he had procrastinated long enough. “Solera, it is clear to me now. Dossolum granted me this authority not simply to aid others, maybe not even first to aid others…

  “Then why?” she asked

  He gave her a long, pained look. “To carry it into battle.”

  He watched as understanding bloomed in her face, perhaps a hint of anger, but finally a sadness that left her countenance looking tired. She put her head on his shoulder and wept. Silent tears fell and ran down his chest.

  Palamon’s heart broke. It broke because of the change that would follow for all the Sheason and all the creation given life by the hands of the Founders; but more than any of this, his heart broke because here forward, Solera would live her life in fear that Palamon could be killed by virtue of the very gift that set him apart.

  She drew back, her beauty bathed in the moonlight, tears shining on her cheeks. “We will be all right,” she said.

  He wanted to tell her not to worry. But it would be a lie. When the council completed the placing of all Maldaea’s hellish creations and raised the veil, they would move on, and he would be left here in their place.

  Unable to speak, he nodded. And they held each other in their grove of aspen all night. Only when the birds of morn sang out their melodies did they rise and return to their home. A small part of him ached for her to ask him not to carry the mantle Dossolum had given him for this benighted world.

  How can this be right?

  He could only hope that the difference he could make here would justify whatever sacrifices he and his love would be called upon to make.

  Sensing his mortality already coming upon him, he felt the bitter irony of the words he had uttered to Solera only hours ago: I am no martyr.

  He might live…and die…to prove those words false.

  Once in their home again, he caught her in another embrace and said finally, “We will be all right.”

  She pushed him back gently. “I’ll hold you to it,” she said, and smiled. Then, to begin this new—this last—chapter of their lives, she took the vase and went to refresh it with more long-stemmed, fresh-cut grass. The light, clean smell of it, their simple, delicate forms, Palamon decided, were just the right tokens of the years ahead.

  * * *

  Palamon sat at the table near the front window of their home, writing. A forlorn feeling had settled over him. It had been days since the council had departed the world. The door to their house stood open, as it had done all the while. He had listened while the other Sheason said their farewells in the streets beyond that door. He’d been unable to go out and say goodbye—not for bitterness’ sake, but because there’d been nothing left to say.

  It hadn’t been long after that that most of the Sheason departed Estem Salo for new lives in distant parts of this world they’d helped to form.

  Now, an eerie silence had settled over Estem Salo. Once, he could have sat on his front porch and fairly heard the sound of quills moving over dry parchment in the archives a hundred strides down the road. It wasn’t really so, but the palpable feeling of thought and preparation and scholarship made Palamon think he heard their instruments even now recording it all and framing the development of these lands, these people. They were pleasant thoughts.

  At the moment, his mind was as quiet as was the small town where now he and Solera were among the few Sheason left, trying to know what next to do. He hadn’t bothered to return to the Tabernacle. He’d go eventually; perhaps there was wisdom to glean from what the Founders had left behind. But not yet; he couldn’t go there yet.

  But the Voice of the Council had promised to put in place the means for mankind to protect and (perhaps also, Palamon hoped) redeem itself. These things had been written in a single, thin volume discreetly placed on a windowsill during the few hours he had managed to sleep in those first days after the council’s decision to abandon this world. It sat there still.

  He hadn’t opened the book, which came wrapped in a black, brushed leather case, lashed with another length of hide. The note tucked into the lash has been penned in Dossolum’s neat script; Palamon knew what it was. His heart gladdened slightly to have it. But he would only find any real joy in it much later, though even then, he knew, the hope the Founders offered would be improbable and difficult. Perhaps impossible. But for now, utter silence and aloneness had descended on them like a condemnation.

  Mostly, he preferred it this way. He needed to mourn; before he’d be any good to the people he’d stayed behind to help, he needed to purge the bitterness he felt toward the council. He had spoken with only one man since the Abandonment, as they were calling it: Efram, the man whom Palamon had tried to help some time ago. Efram had told him of a spreading hopelessness in the people. The abandonment had gotten inside everyone…

  As he sat, wondering what he would do next, the sound of boots on the pebbled road rose in the stillness. He stood, knowing whom he would see when he walked out his door.

  From the far end of the main road through Estem Salo, the tall form of Jo’ha’nel approached. He moved with a strange grace, as though he’d somehow escaped the mortality that fell to those left here when the Founders departed. This other Sheason came at him with an intent he could see and feel, and Palamon found himself instinctively readying the Will.

  Then the dark Sheason stopped. “They’ve left you behind,” he said, smiling unkindly.

  “I’ve chosen to stay behind,” Palamon corrected. “The Founders had their reasons for leaving, but I would not abandon this world’s people to their own ignorance. You could help me,” Palamon added. “You are knowledgeable, and you bear the power to draw on the Will; we could help them find their way.”

  The other laughed. “Would you help me rescue those also left behind inside your Founders’ Bourne? We could undo this veil, find unity and peace among those beings created by both Maldaea and Dossolum.”

  Palamon knew it was not a genuine offer. “I have seen the appetite of those given life by Maldaea. There can be no peace between them and those who live south and east. You know this.” He stopped, peering into the hard face of his former brother. “Why have you chosen this path, Jo’ha’nel? Especially now that Maldaea has been sealed away. You have nothing to fear from him. Come. Let us build something here.”

  A silence fell across Estem Salo for several long moments. Then the dark Sheason spoke again, “I told you that you must decide on which side to stand. It is time. Who will you now serve? Those who’ve left you with broken promises, and gone on to start again somewhere else? Or the Founder they have left behind on this world?”

  Palamon’s thought turned first to the image of a young girl crying and holding her dead brother in her lap. Then he saw Efram’s wife, lying dead despite his attempts to save her. And finally, in his mind could see Manoa’s lifeless body on the steps of the Tabernacle. He recalled thinking over and over…not yet. Not yet for violence, and hate. But looking up the road of Estem Salo, Palamon knew the time had finally come for these things.

  He shook his head. “I serve none of these,” he said. “I will serve mankind.”

  Bitterness filled Jo’ha’nel’s countenance. Before Palamon could say or do anything more, an unseen force traversed the space between him and the dark Sheason, ripping him off the ground and sending him
back hard against the side of his house. He fell to the ground, and felt the warmth of blood coming fast from a gash in his scalp. Without thinking or standing, he slammed his fists together in a rage and focused his anger at his new enemy. The earth itself erupted in a violent geyser of rocks and soil that sent Jo’ha’nel shooting ten paces skyward.

  The other landed heavily, but staggered to his feet with a manic look in his eye and a mad grin on his lips. Then he stopped, stood still, and closed his eyes. The earth, suddenly bitingly cold, creaked all around Palamon. His flesh began to blister and freeze, his blood feeling cold in his veins. He fell onto his side, the shallow breaths he exhaled pluming as though he lay in a winter storm. He could feel his heart slowing and ice forming over his eyes.

  Palamon had a fleeting thought. I could let go. If he did, the pain of the abandonment by ancients who’d covenanted to this world…would simply disappear, as his Forda left his body, relieving him of consciousness.

  He would welcome the end of this emptiness but for one thing. Palamon—and Solera—had already made the sacrifices that had caused in him this abject spirit. After it all, he would not throw away those sacrifices by conceding to a Sheason who had forsaken his calling.

  Holding onto this indignation, Palamon pointed a finger at Jo’ha’nel and turned it in a circle three times as he spoke a few words of the conceivers’ tongue. Flame erupted around the fiendish renderer, licking hungrily at his flesh and raiment. From where he lay, Palamon, too, felt the heat, and thawed enough to sit up against the side of his home. The thought that he had taken life spread like poison in his mind, and he shook his head in denial.

  Then, as Palamon watched the conflagration, Jo’ha’nel walked unscathed from the fire, his emaciated body and wide shoulders bearing toward Palamon in a graceful nightmarish gait. The dark Sheason then brayed a few words of his own, the sound fouling the air and driving the breath from Palamon’s lungs. All his senses leapt, sending stabbing pain into his mind, and all leading to a white roaring rush.

  Palamon again thought this might be the end. And he, the only barrier between this vile Sheason and the already hopeless people still hanging onto life across the great wide of this world.

  While he struggled against the onslaught, simultaneously fighting off despair, Solera rushed into the street between him and Jo’ha’nel and raised a defiant cry.

  “Stop this! You have no reason to bring death here. Neither Palamon nor the people you torment and rape and murder have earned your scorn.” She pointed toward the heavens.

  “If you must be angry, it should be with those who no longer walk this earth. But I will not stand idle while you torture—”

  Solera’s words were instantly cut short. Her body rose off the ground as she clutched at her throat. She rotated so that she lay parallel to the road, suspended three strides high in the air…and began to spin.

  It all happened so fast. And even as Palamon struggled to stand, the fire he had called to burn Jo’ha’nel streamed like a sinuous river toward Solera and engulfed her body. She became a whirling maelstrom of flame and hot wind and strangled cries. And in just seconds, the conflagration flared and went out, dropping a spray of dark heavy ash.

  “NO!” The sound tore through Estem Salo.

  Palamon raged. Forgotten were the dull burning thoughts inside the white rushing sound that had filled his mind—worries over Abandonment. The abandonment of the Fathers of their children. Or even Jo’ha’nel’s abandonment of the promise of his service to the people he now preyed upon.

  He would later grieve for those things. But not now. Now, his heart knew only wrath! And with it, the noise and rushing ceased, the hate that exuded from the dark Sheason was pushed back upon him, and Palamon stood.

  He did not waver, but began to stride toward Jo’ha’nel, indignation giving him new strength. A flicker of concern passed over the other’s face as Palamon raised his hands. He thrust them violently toward Jo’ha’nel and sent him flying twenty strides, where he fell roughly onto the road.

  The trees bristled; window glass shattered; birds squawked and fluttered, disturbed in flight. The retaliation continued to emanate from Palamon in waves, descending on Jo’ha’nel in brutalizing blows meant to crush but not kill, to cause an intensity of suffering that would make him plead for the mercy of a fast death.

  Sharp cries of agony rose into the still blue skies

  But as Palamon tried to prolong the attack, his own Forda waned, and like the dark that follows an extinguished candle, his assault abruptly ended and he fell to the road, entirely spent.

  He watched as Jo’ha’nel, lying upon the ground, gave him a spiteful look and managed to spread his fingers out over the dirt. As Palamon looked, the soil there parched, whitened, then burned, sizzling as a thin crust of glass spread over a wide circle around his former brother.

  Palamon realized in horror what Jo’ha’nel had done; he’d drawn the Forda from the very earth, stealing it for his own—one of the basest violations of the Charter, putting matter and spirit out of balance. But with the heinous act, he had renewed himself. Invigorated, he promptly stood, and began to advance on Palamon.

  But Palamon had nothing more to give, his spirit so drained that he could only watch the slow approach of his enemy, and prepare for death.

  I gave my all. I go to the next life content…and to meet you there, my love…

  He closed his eyes, ready for either a crushing blow or some other use of the Will that would end his life, when a hoarse scream shot up the road from beyond the archive. Palamon opened his eyes and managed to turn his head in the direction of the sound. At a dead run came the one man he had met in the lowlands that he had so often spied from his promontory with Dossolum. Efram, who held in one hand a long club and in the other a forked farming implement, and who barreled toward them with fear in his eyes but no shortage of courage.

  Jo’ha’nel shifted his ireful gaze up toward the intruder, a wicked gleam in his eye as he seemed to relish the chance to murder another of these pitiful men. But before Jo’ha’nel could render the Will, Efram hurled his pitchfork at the dark Sheason, as though he’d practiced doing so.

  The farm tool sailed through the blue sky, spinning slightly, Efram’s aim seeming true. Jo’ha’nel, so caught off guard, watched as fascinated as Palamon, until it was too late, and the sharp spines pierced his upper leg, driving the iron tines deep into his flesh.

  Maldaea’s first Sheason looked down at the wound and howled, the force of it sending a rush of wind from his mouth. It blasted Palamon’s cheeks and neck. But before Jo’ha’nel could look up to send Efram to his earth, the farmer beset him, pummeling the malefactor with his wooden club. The dark Sheason fell and writhed, trying to roll away. Efram kept on him until Palamon spoke.

  Too weak to call out, he coughed the words, “No…stop.”

  Efram’s arm paused high in mid-blow, and he slowly lowered his cudgel as though suddenly returning to his senses. He heaved deep breaths and came to a knee beside Palamon.

  “You look bad. Are you in pain?” the farmer asked.

  “I’ll be all right.” He looked at his home, and felt—even then—that it was not a place to which he ever wanted to return. But it did hold something he needed. “In my house, on the windowsill there is a ledger. Bring it to me.”

  Efram moved quickly, and returned a few moments later with the gift from Dossolum. He handed the ledger to Palamon, who took it and held it tight against his chest. Whatever words it contained would be the last he would have from his friend on the council—a mixed blessing.

  “What about him?” Efram thrust his cudgel toward Jo’ha’nel.

  “I will kill him myself,” Palamon said, his voice like the dry husks of Efram’s fields.

  But when he looked up, the dark Sheason was gone. Efram stood staring down the road, a bit slack-jawed. Jo’ha’nel would return, but not today.

  Palamon then looked at the road a few strides away, dusted with black ash…the rema
ins of Solera. The reality of her death descended on him in a crushing wave, and he cried out.

  He did not know how long he lay there, lost in his grief, before he found the presence of mind to say, “Take me to the Archive,” and point south. He knew he would mourn more later, but he could feel his own life ebbing, and all that had happened, including Solera’s death, would come to naught if he didn’t take some immediate action.

  As Efram picked up Palamon and carried him to the archive, the servant of Dossolum felt a dark revelation take root in his heart: Jo’ha’nel had abandoned one of the first tenets of the Charter of this world, something written upon the walls of the archive almost from the beginning: the power to render the Will had to be drawn from the spirit of the one calling its use. But it wasn’t as much the fact that Jo’ha’nel had violated this sacred trust—though that would have earned him the severest of punishments had he done so when Dossolum yet tarried here—but the fact that the Founders had spoken this principle so early on, having it recorded…as though they anticipated a world where its inhabitants would have need to make use of the Will.

  Why?

  Palamon found his thoughts tied up in secrets he couldn’t untangle. And though he finally left them alone, an uneasy feeling remained deep in his heart, as he wondered what Dossolum might have known from the very beginning.

  Inside the archive, the stillness did not help Palamon’s mood—this had been a place of thought and great industry. Indeed, if there were answers to questions like those he’d just let go, they would have been pursued and ultimately discovered here.

  Efram gently sat Palamon down at a table.

  “In the cabinet,” he said with a strained voice. “The cedar box.”

  The farmer went straightaway, returning with the Sheason’s personal case. Palamon opened it with trembling fingers and drew out a sprig drawn from a special grove quite distant from the Tabernacle of the Sky or Estem Salo. He placed it on his tongue and allowed it to dissolve. In just moments new energy spread through him, bringing fresh pain as his body awakened to its own damage; he welcomed it as a reminder that he had survived.