Second Kiss

by Robert Priest

  Zero’s sword arced through the air quick and hard. Automatically, Xemion’s blade rose to block it. With the force of that impact, more of the dark energy erupted into his body. Thrice more she brought her blade down on his, and with each impact the urge of the sword — the urge to win at any cost — flowed into him stronger and colder, silencing the voice of protest within. Still Zero came at him, connecting here with his shoulder, there with his forearm. In the last exchange they came face-to-face and Xemion saw close up the utter, unrelenting coldness in her eyes. It froze something in his spirit that shattered and exploded with her next blow. He suddenly saw her with that vision he’d had in the Nexis. He saw her under-self and her over-self. He saw all of the fanned out, contrary versions of her that there were or ever could be in all the worlds. His hand tightened on the hilt of his sword, on every sword in every world. Spell and spellbinder shifted. The dark energy reversed its polarity and began to flow from him into the blade. He no longer needed to be fooled and subdued by these shallow facets of her face, this wisp of grace that fluttered so falsely before him. She was a dream-thief. She had taken his dream and made it her own. She had betrayed him entirely. And if she had to, she would kill him.

  How foul she looked to him now as he closed in. His last shred of reluctance fell away and, as he hacked closer to her, the cheers of the crowd seemed to die down. That larger self, that myriad self he had experienced inside the Great Kone, merged into him now. He drew on that snakelike, hideous part of himself that wanted nothing more than to destroy, and he swung at her with all his might. Zero stared right into Xemion’s soul just as his sword cut its terrible arc through the air on course for the narrow of her neck. At the last second a shiver went through him and into his blade and he pulled it off course.

  But his blade had not completely avoided its target. Zero hardly felt the wound at first. On the upper left side of her face, just above the brow, there was a small cut — only the very point of the sword had caused it, but it crisscrossed exactly that straight, diagonal scar that was already there. In the very instant that the first trickle of blood ran down her cheek, a vision flashed before her, a scene that seemed to spring from every cell in her body. The thin, sharp edge of a large, wide blade, like that of an axe, coming straight at her, striking her. Someone’s eyes looking eagerly on. A pain like she was being cut in half. In that moment all that had been spelled away by the waters of forgetfulness and the touch of Vallaine’s red hand outside the Great Kone began to come undone.

  Zero touched her fingers to the wound on her brow, looked at the fierce face and upraised sword of her opponent, and let out a kind of screaming sob. Shocked by the pain in that cry, Veneetha Azucena held her open palm out to Xemion to signal him to stop. She then asked Zero, “Do you yield?”

  “No!” Zero pressed her palm against her cheek and signalled with the other hand that she wanted to hold. She hunched over, frozen for an instant. When the crowd saw this, many of them began to boo and hiss and urge her sarcastically to fight him.

  “Zero, you must answer me. Do you yield?” A visible shudder shook Zero’s body as she tried to regain control of herself. But more memories were breaking free from the sea bottom of her amnesia, clear and fresh and raw. A red sky. A red river. Those eyes again, red and even redder at the centre. So many, so quickly, she could barely even see.

  Even through the shouts of “Fight! Fight! Fight!” even through the dark energy, which coursed up the sword and into his arm, Xemion could see the agony in her eyes as she finally answered “I do.”

  The crowd bellowed with disapproval. But Veneetha Azucena wouldn’t be swayed. She stepped in quickly, raised Xemion’s arm over his head in a signal of triumph, and loudly declared him the winner of the Tourney. The horns blared, the crowd reluctantly accepted the verdict and cheered, and as Xemion sheathed his sword he was lifted by the kitchen Thralls, who began to pass him from hand to hand overhead. As soon as he had taken his hand off the hilt of his sword a great wave of exhaustion hit him. Just as the spell he’d said in the Nexis had drained him, this second spell was taking its toll now. His body went limp in their arms and only for one fading instant did he see her as she fled the arena, a look of shock deepening in her face.

  “Xemion! Xemion! Xemion!” they cheered. “He is victor. He is lord. Hail, hail the shining sword.”

  28

  Lighthammer Remembers

  As evening fell, Tiri Lighthammer staggered and drank and coughed his way from Two-Spell Well to the beginning of Phaer Point where the tunnel led down to the sea. There was something wrong and he knew it. Zero should not have lost that match and he had begun to suspect foul play. But it was more than just that. He felt a deep dread and knew somehow that there was more at stake here than winning or losing a tournament. At the entrance to the tunnel, he commanded the guard to let him through. The guard, like most of the people of Ulde that evening, had had too much to drink. Lighthammer made his way on foot down the long tunnel and into the cavern. Two other intoxicated guards came to attention as he approached the inside of the newly installed Lion’s Gate.

  “You are both drunk,” he shouted at them.

  “So are you, sir,” one of them shot back a little cockily.

  This enraged Lighthammer. “What’s your name?” Despite his drunkenness he said it with such a sense of authority that the man came immediately to attention, if only in a notably unsteady way. “I’m sorry, sir, my name is Ilygadryth.”

  “Ilygadryth what?”

  “Ilygadryth Feyn, sir.”

  “Do you know, Ilygadryth Feyn, that I lost seven brothers right here fifty years ago because some fool like you did not take his job seriously enough? Now you get yourselves sober right now. You are on guard duty, and if I catch you in this condition again, I will have at you with my blade whatever the rules about it may be.”

  Neither Ilygadryth Feyn nor the other guard replied. Both of them gulped.

  “Now where is Glittervein?” he asked.

  The guards looked at each other. “We have not seen him,” said the one who had not yet spoken.

  “Not at all?” Lighthammer asked, clearly upset.

  The man shook his head.

  “Well, who is keeping watch over the harbour then?”

  Ilygadryth Feyn jerked his thumb up in the direction of the gatehouse mounted high on the sea wall. “We have a man up there,” he said in as sober a tone as he could muster.

  “And one who watches from the bird’s nest by Uldestack,” said the other.

  “And that’s it?” Lighthammer roared.

  Ilygadryth Feyn nodded.

  The second guard said, “Most of them are out … celebrating. It is, after all—”

  Such was the ferocity of Tiri Lighthammer’s glare the man stopped speaking instantly.

  “Let me out,” Lighthammer ordered. The two looked at each other, puzzled, but the lever was pulled and the signal was given to the gateman. The massive iron grill at the entrance to the cavern slowly rose to let the old man through. In the sky beyond the towers, at the ends of the Lion’s Paws, that luminous red planet hung over the harbour, the full moon at its side. This gave the horizon a ruddy glow that seemed to summon Lighthammer forward. Still drinking and coughing so hard he frequently had to stop walking and double over with the effort, he made his way along the east side of the inner harbour, all the while looking suspiciously about. When he reached the end where the east side of the Lion’s Paws nearly met the west, he stood on the receiving dock beyond the stone tower and glared out across the water. Then he took out his telescope and scanned the horizon.

  For a while the old soldier gulped down mead as he teetered, occasionally reaching out to steady himself on the gate with one hand. He continued scanning the horizon, the telescope moving back and forth. After a while he stopped and lifted his flask, noticing again the strange portent of the heavenly bodies above. The same red planet had hovered by the moon fifty years ago, on that dreaded day when he had lost s
o much. Lighthammer put away his telescope, took a deep breath, and let the image of his younger brother come to him. He saw the two of them as little boys in their childhood home, playing swords and dreaming of being great heroes some day. Then he saw him again, many years later, on the floor of this very bay, cut open, gutted, lying in his own blood, a look of horror frozen forever in his eyes. Lighthammer lowered his gaze and let two bright teardrops splash down into the water. The tide, he saw, by the light of the moon and stars, was ebbing away already. Looking down into the dark flow, he coughed and spat and coughed and spat again. But finally the time came for the other thing: the hardest thing. That other face he had to remember.

  He closed his eyes and allowed himself for the first time in a long time to look back into the bright eyes of his baby daughter, so full of promise and trust. It was the day he had departed for the war, and the last day he would ever see that little cherub of his, for the Pathans had spared no one, not even children, the most brutal of deaths in their vengeful rampage after the Battle of Phaer Bay. Lighthammer stared into those innocent eyes for as long as he could and let the memory and the pain come. It had not lessened in the last fifty years. If anything, it had grown stronger. When his own time came to die, his family line would end with him. But maybe if those Thrall gods were really up there in their heaven, maybe on that day he would look again into her eyes.

  He took out his telescope again and searched the horizon, but it didn’t stop more tears from welling up in his eyes. There was a sound like the light tread of someone on the dock behind him, but before he had the chance to react, there was a loud crack and a sudden piercing pain at the back of his skull. Tiri Lighthammer toppled forward into Phaer Bay.

  29

  Why Don’t You Take It

  The celebration of the equinox and the first Phaer Tourney in half a century continued in the great ballroom of Castle Phaer overlooking the Bay of Ulde. This was the very castle where Xemion had been taken by Lethir. The same castle from which, fifty years earlier, the Phaer generals had watched the slaughter of their troops on the tidal flats below. But like so much of the devastation of that day, the castle was now being reclaimed and redeemed. A new history for it was being sought. In the past two weeks the finest marble craftsmen, the stone Nains of Ilderhaven, had been employed to shape new slabs to take the place of those shattered by the weight of the mammuths the castle housed in its days as a stable. And last week, when seven cedars in the sacred grove of Thorne had been mysteriously felled, the timbers were salvaged to rebuild the lofts that now surrounded the banquet hall, and gave a small throng of children in attendance a bird’s eye view of the proceedings.

  The original architects had designed this magnificent chamber to contain and feature the Great Stone of Urgarud, a massive grey meteorite that had jutted up from this spot since long before the last time the glaciers came and went over the world. A platform had been built around the stone. Aligned symmetrically about it were rows and rows of stone tables, each of them at least forty feet long. Lit from above by a galaxy of glittering chandeliers, the tables hosted a vast number of merrymakers, many of whom had been celebrating the Phaer Tourney with repeated toasts.

  The lavish banquet had just come to an end and the honour guard was about to present arms. Holding swords of gold over their hearts in the Elphaerean salute, they came to a halt in unison in front of the platform where Veneetha Azucena sat as the Queen of the Equinox, smiling down at them. There was a sharp command from the sergeant-at-arms followed by a stomping of feet and flashing of metal as they withdrew their weapons ceremoniously and came to attention before her.

  Xemion, wrapped and trembling inside Vallaine’s cloak, struggled to remain alert at the front table. He had finally eaten, but he still felt weak, hungry, and sick. That look of terror and betrayal on Saheli’s face kept flashing at him like a distant fire behind dark, rushing clouds. He had saved her from Montither, but had he lost her himself? His muscles jerked with strange, cold spasms and his hand would not stay still. It kept twitching toward the hilt of the sword, which still hung at his side. But he resisted. The immensity of what he had done when he made the sword was becoming clear to him. He dreaded ever touching the weapon again.

  Veneetha Azucena was newly attired in her splendid evening regalia. A purple cloak hung from her shoulders, streaming down and about a shining breastplate, which had been custom made for her. On her head a peaked bronze helmet supported a high red feather, once a symbol of Elphaerean leadership. Still seated on her throne, she commanded her honour guard to be at ease. Then, taking a quaff of green ale from a tall cup, she did her best to address the crowd in a manner befitting the celebration at hand.

  “We have just passed our first equinox in this ancient capital, my friends. We were told by no less a personage than Prince Akka Smissm that we would not last. We were told we would be routed and slaughtered and enslaved. But look at us; here we are today, safe and thriving in our ancient home. We must not gloat, but those who once enslaved us are now locked in the death throes of their own civil war.”

  There was a great cheer and much thumping of cups at this news. When the noise had subsided, Veneetha Azucena continued.

  “But let us not rejoice in the misfortunes of others, for we all share this same blue planet. The Pathans call it Ov; the Nains call it Arf. We Freemen call it Eph, and I am even told that the Kagars call it Earth. And so, I do not name any of them enemy, for with such a common name for our common home, I am hopeful that one day there might be enough commonality to find peace amongst all of us. That is the Phaer way. To peace amongst all our peoples!”

  Once again she lifted a full glass of the green ale that the absent Glittervein had generously sent in his stead, and drained it. The crowd followed suit. She signalled to have the goblets refilled, and when this was done she toasted again. “Peace to us. Peace to you. Peace to the Pathans and Kagars and Cyclopes alike.”

  “Peace.” Almost everyone but Xemion repeated this and they all chinked their glasses and drained them to the dregs, as was the Elphaerean custom.

  “And now it is my delight,” Veneetha Azucena announced, “to welcome the winner of our inaugural Phaer Tourney. Please, a courteous welcome for Xemion of Ildewood.”

  Xemion swallowed hard. He didn’t know what to do. He felt like vomiting or fleeing. Instead he rose unsteadily and made his way toward the platform as the crowd cheered. The kitchen Thralls, including Lirodello, who was sitting with his arm wrapped comfortingly about the still-dazed Imalgha, were particularly ecstatic, as were some scruffy unattended Thrall children who had snuck in.

  “He is victor. He is lord. Rah, rah, the shining sword,” they chanted. “The beast is beaten, gouged, and gored. Rah, rah, the shining sword.”

  Xemion mounted the steps to the stage and stood with his head half bowed looking around the room for Saheli. He couldn’t see her anywhere. He looked up at the lofts where the eager faces of the young children beamed down at him, their eyes full of hope and awe. He began to sway unsteadily and this caused one of the Thralls to yell “Have another drink!”

  “There’ll be plenty of time for more drinking anon,” Veneetha Azucena intoned with an indulgent smile, “but first, a more solemn moment is upon us. Here we have the winner of the Phaer Tourney, and for the first time in fifty years the ceremony of the sword is upon us.” She turned toward Xemion. “Xemion, please withdraw your blade.”

  Xemion’s hand jerked toward the hilt in obedience, but then he froze. He looked out at the gathering and saw Tomtenisse’s madly glinting eyes, his head nodding up and down in reluctant approval. And there beside him was the gruff Belphegor doing his best to maintain a look of disdain. Lirodello was comforting the still-smouldering Imalgha, his arm half-pulled out of its socket by the attempt to get it around her massive shoulders. He, too, nodded approvingly and gave Xemion a thumbs up. But still no Saheli.

  “Xemion?” Veneetha Azucena persisted.

  Without looking at her, Xemio
n reached for the buckle that bound his hilt to his side and undid it. Slowly he lowered sword and scabbard to the floor, his head hung over in shame.

  “Whatever are you doing?”

  “I do not deserve this honour,” he began, but one of the little Thralls yelled out “Yes you do!”

  There was then a great chorus of “Yes! Yes! Yes!” followed by the loud thumping of goblets upon the stone tables. With some effort, Xemion signalled for them to be quiet, a request, which with some additional gesturing from Veneetha Azucena, they finally obeyed.

  “I have won fraudulently,” he said, but his voice was so quiet most of the Thralls didn’t hear him and, taking it to be some further gallantry, once again set to banging their goblets on the stone tables.

  But Veneetha Azucena had heard him quite clearly. “What do you mean?” she asked curtly.

  Whatever his reply might have been, it was lost in the crowd’s next roar. Something uncanny was happening with the sword at Xemion’s feet. It was slowly swivelling around so that the hilt, which had landed on the floor pointing toward Veneetha Azucena, was now slowly reorienting itself toward him.

  There were screams of terror. Veneetha Azucena shouted “No!” There was a metallic hiss and the sword pulled itself out of the scabbard. “No,” she shouted again but there was no denying what was unfolding before her. Her eyes flashed with rage. “This is spellcraft.” She spat out the word as though it were a curse.

  Before Xemion could even nod his head in acknowledgement, the weapon jerked across the floor and affixed its hilt to his heel. Instinctively, he kicked it away and it spun halfway across the stage before it stopped suddenly and shot back to his heel. The crowd by this time was almost in a panic. None had seen such spellcraft in all their lives and it was terrifying to them. Veneetha Azucena withdrew her own sword and shouted “Stand away!” to Xemion. But even as he backed away from her, the sword dragged itself along at his heel. Once again he kicked at it, but this time the sword rose in the air in an elegant arc so that its hilt came down, butting against his palm like the nose of an eager dog.