by J. F. Lewis
A wolfish grin on his lips, as if despite his protestations to the contrary Kholster knew exactly what was going on inside her head, Kholster shook his head and gave a single barking laugh. “It will take time for them to learn to work with you as seamlessly as they did before Kazan was Second. The others know each other better. New dynamics. New strengths. New weaknesses.”
Another question went unasked as she realized that of course he understood what was likely happening in her mind. He’d been First for so long, gone through changes, not of Firsts, but of others in his Prime cadre of Overwatches, Amber, etc., that he of all people could identify with the weight on her mind and shoulders. Instead of questioning it, she decided not to waste any more time. She could try to get him to explain things to her, but he wouldn’t do so unless he thought she couldn’t figure it out on her own.
“I’m glad to see you.”
“My eyes are always on you, Rae’en.” Kholster uncrossed his arms, the tension leaving him. “And the sight of you always makes me happy. And proud.”
“Always?”
“Even when you are making oaths to brave elven kings with my scars on their back.”
“You saw that?”
Without answering, Kholster embraced his daughter.
“Tell Sargus that our father has discovered a state neither dead nor alive,” Kholster said. “He should be able to figure out what happened once he knows who is behind it.”
“God of knowledge now, too, are you?” Rae’en asked.
“No.” Kholster looked puzzled. “Vander is.”
“Then what are you?”
“I’m Kholster.” He smiled, eyes twinkling in the sunslight. “I was First Forged, though you are now First of One Hundred. I am the enemy of all deities who would play games with the lives and lands of mortals. I am your father.”
“But which god?” Rae’en asked.
“I will tell you, but you won’t understand,” Kholster said. “I am the god who walks like a mortal and lives like one. I am the one who sees their side. I am become, by my two natures, the Arbiter.”
“Arbiter?” Rae’en asked. “What? Like one of the headmen in Darvan or something?”
“I’m keeping the fullness of my role a secret for the moment.” Kholster leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead. “I want to make very sure Kilke understands what I am, and I want to conceal it from Shidarva and Dienox until the time is right.”
Guys? Rae’en thought.
We’re thinking, Kazan thought back.
“Um,” Rae’en said. “Okay, I’ll have to trust you on that. You said you were going somewhere. Can you tell me where?”
“I am going to Port Ammond. And I’d like Sargus to travel with me or to join me there whenever you can spare him.”
“After we finish the current fortifications.” This was so disconcerting. What did a daughter say to her dad, the god, when he came to visit? Did he need sleep? To eat? “Can I feed you before you go?”
“I would appreciate it,” Kholster said, “if you have meat to share.”
“Meat?” Rae’en punched his arm. “Have you seen all the humans and elves running around this place?”
Kholster blanched at that, the expression giving way to a grunt of amusement as he caught her true meaning. How did he do that? she wondered. And when I’m as old as he is, will I be able to read others so facilely?
“They’ve been hunting, gathering, and herding nonstop since we got them settled in,” Rae’en said, “to avoid that same first thought you had.”
“In which case,” Kholster said with a nod, “I am pleased to be your guest, kholster Rae’en.”
“Tell me about this ‘half-born’ brother of mine.” Rae’en led the way down toward the expanding territory of Fort Sunder. She had refused to surrender her parents’ old quarters to the humans and elves, but they’d infested nearly every other space except for the barracks and the wall berths. They’d get used to the barracks in time, but the wall berths were a lost cause with them. “Do I get to meet him? Where is he?”
“He’s busy now, but you will meet him in time.” Kholster sniffed. “I had to wait six hundred years.”
“How?”
“Think of him,” Kholster said, “as the one Aernese child who did not go with us into exile.”
“Where is he now?” Rae’en stopped at the foot of the main stair to let elves and humans notice the two of them and clear out of the way. She wondered if Kholster saw the looks in the eyes of the elves they passed. They were in awe of him, but her they . . . feared? Hated? Maybe it was a good thing she could not decide which.
“Vax is with his mother,” Kholster said.
“What kind of a name is Vax?” Rae’en wrinkled her nose at that.
“His mother named him.” Kholster’s eyes went dark and unfocused. “She did not know he was sentient when she did so.”
CHAPTER 7
A FEW IDEAS
With a single day’s practice, Vax and Clemency were swapping from impersonations of Wylant to Kholster seamlessly. Transitioning still was not instantaneous, but they could manage it between blows if they timed it right and added an acrobatic roll to buy time. Around them, the practice area showed signs of abuse from their sparring. Cracks and divots marred the stone, and a particularly impressive furrow ran the whole of one wall. Vax had nearly had Wylant there.
“Very impressive.” Wylant rolled her head to help ease some of the stiffness out of her neck. She reached for a towel to dry the sweat from her brow, intending to head for a bath, when she heard Vax giggle at her.
Right, she told herself. You’re a goddess now. You only sweat because you keep expecting yourself to sweat. Your muscles hurt because you think they should. Physical exhaustion is only a state of mind.
Closing her eyes, she focused on resetting herself. Clean clothes. Clean self. Body fresh and rested. It worked.
“I will never get used to that,” Wylant said to her son and his warsuit. “Now will you tell me why that trick will be so important?”
One of the ideas Clemency and I had, Vax thought.
“You mean those plans you haven’t fully explained?” Wylant mock-growled at him.
If I told them to you, Vax said, they wouldn’t work. I need them to be secret so Uncle Kilke will know what to do.
“Unc—?” Wylant stopped herself and let the comment pass. “If I don’t get to know specifics, what’s the next phase about which you can tell me?”
Take us to the Guild Cities, Vax told her. It will be self-evident.
Banishing the training room to wherever deific constructs went when they were no longer needed, Wylant let Clemency engulf her, still marveling at the sense of power wearing a suit of living armor entailed, even to a goddess. Whether it was the slight increase in height or size or having such intimate reinforcement for any task, the feeling was one of strength and safety.
Her flaming hair manifested on the exterior of Clemency, still in touch with Wylant, but, if magical flame had a penchant for the dramatic, it was echoed and amplified by the locks that signified her godhood. She took to the air, transitioning from that step beyond, where dwelt the gods, to the mortal world. She paused, hovering over Fort Sunder, pleased by the progress being made. Elves and humans crowded together like cattle, but it was working. They were reinforcing and expanding in concert with the Aern. Some looked at Rae’en with baleful eyes, but not at the rank and file Aern or their warsuits.
All of the main pathways had been trodden down, the grass trampled, and the central hub was now a sprawl of bare dirt. Even the hearty purple myrr grass of the plains did not appear to be able to survive all of the people and construction. Atop the original wall marking the boundary of the fortress, the Dwarf, Glinfolgo, argued with Geomancers, elves who represented the overseers of public works back at Port Ammond, and a group of human farmers who had been chosen to represent the interests of the scattered communities to which Wylant herself had appealed when she’d begun prepa
ring for the expected Zaur siege of Fort Sunder.
This is not— Vax started.
“I want to see your father first,” Wylant said. “Just for a moment.”
Her husband sat with Rae’en at the edge of a fire pit, eating cuts of meat that had not been cooked. Kholster waved a chunk of beef liver at his daughter, and Rae’en waved it off in disgust, turning away. Kholster looked up at Wylant then and smiled when he realized Rae’en could not see her. “I love you,” he mouthed, and Wylant fought the urge to interrupt the reunion of father and daughter.
I told Dad that when he goes to Port Ammond, he should find the remains of the Proto-Aern, Vax thought at her.
“Wasn’t it destroyed?” Wylant asked.
If it is, then I’m wrong. But if I’m right, it is still alive, locked away underground . . . Uled has multitudinous ways to ensure his continued existence, Mom. Stop him at one step and he will return at a second. We have to get two contingencies ahead of Uled to stop him, Vax thought at her, or one ahead and force him to make the choice we want.
“And make that one a dead end?”
Yes, or two, but they have to be the right ones . . . consecutive ones. We have to close off the routes out of that set of options without him knowing he’ll be trapping himself.
“Which amounts to the same, thing doesn’t it?” Wylant asked.
He cannot answer, because he does not want to lie to you outright, Clemency thought to her when Vax did not answer.
“I don’t track you there, but . . .” A pang shot through her, dappled with suspicion. What could Vax not tell her? The general in Wylant wanted to demand an explanation, but the mother in her wondered if she should trust him and let it go. “We may revisit that. You said Port Ammond and the Proto-Aern are your father’s assignment. What’s mine?”
Well, he thinks I don’t know he feels Uled as a whole is his problem, Vax thought, but yes, the Proto-Aern stage of things is all we need from him on that front.
“That isn’t what I asked you, Vax.”
If you had taken us to the Guild Cities as requested, you would have seen for yourself, but . . . Vax paused for a hundred count. Was he waiting for her to give up on an answer and take them there? If so, he was mistaken. She wanted to go into things with some modicum of forewarning. Finally he answered: Dienox is our part of the plan.
“That wasn’t such a hard piece of gristle, now was it?” Even the thought of his name made her blood boil and her flesh crawl. “You don’t expect me to enlist him, do you?”
No, ma’am. Clemency thought. Just kill him.
“I like this plan,” Wylant said and, with a thought, she left the skies of Fort Sunder and materialized elsewhere.
*
Below Wylant, the roiling mass of combatants left a trail of power like blood scent marking Dienox’s passage. Soaring above the mobs, her fiery hair flared out behind her like the tail of a comet, Wylant sought her prey. From what she could tell, a portion of him would have been present here because of the conflict itself, but the heavy musk of his delight covered everything. He was not causing the turmoil below, but he was making it worse. Dienox’s trail left a path of growing strife and mounting casualties. Blood red afterimages of him marked his progress through the streets below. Let kholster Rae’en and Queen Bhaeshal handle Uled’s armies and the struggles of the north. Conflicts between the longer-lived races tended to drop down to the occasional simmer, even to . . .
Her cooking analogies ran low on her. Cooks did simmer things, didn’t they? Surely there was something they did where they let bread rise or rest or . . . She knew they boiled, fried, grilled, and seared, but . . . Wylant herself could, if absolutely necessary accomplish two (three?) of those food preparation techniques. Not well.
You’re letting yourself get distracted, she thought. And she was. Children crying, dying, the screams. This was no conflict between two armies on a battlefield. Innocent beings bled, died, and became forever altered. Human conflicts had always bothered her. Whenever she had stepped into them in the past she felt as if she made the situation worse. Even when she tried not to hurt them, they insisted on volatility and useless overly emotional reactions. Whether it was an innkeeper wanting to make a point and ending up maimed, or mad Captain Tyree with his need to ignite a small cache of junpowder for a distraction no one needed . . . or these people below.
Dienox had taken the existing uncertainty caused by the shifting of the pantheon and turned it into fear and blame. From there all he had needed was a spark: a fight in the right place or between the correct factions and . . . blood.
Why argue over the gods? Why do anything with regard to them unless the gods asked (demanded?) and even then, why humor them unless it also served human self-interest?
Except Torgrimm. She understood the reverence for him. All he asked was that all mortals treat each other as best they could. Even if you failed, he was calm and understanding . . . and they had him back in his former role now, so why all this conflict? Kholster had not killed Torgrimm, and their statues no longer stood at odds on Pilgrim’s Hill or at Oot.
The humans would not know about Oot, but the Long Speakers at Castleguard would have seen and . . . But there was fighting there, too.
Only part of it was due to the temporary exchange of roles in which Kholster and Torgrimm had engaged. A larger percentage was due to Dienox’s influence, his followers, and his desire for battle and clashing armies. Less than half. Humans were like little bottles of discord and violence waiting to be decanted and splashed upon their fellows. Even Torgrimm’s followers, knowing full well their god did not support the taking of life, would kill in his name.
“You were mortal not long ago,” the voice of Dienox whispered in her ear.
That is becoming tiresome, she thought at her companions. Did you get a location on him?
He’s hiding from us, Mom, Vax thought. He suspected you would come for him.
I did not expect so blustery a deity to be this cowardly or good at evasion, Clemency thought in her mind.
Clemency’s voice made her smile. If anyone ever wondered why she found Aernese males so fascinating . . . well, one example was the way a male Aern was not disturbed at all that a portion of his spirit might present itself as female. Wylant did not know why she had assumed all warsuits to be male—perhaps because Kholster, Vander, and the other First One Hundred had all forged armor they considered to be male—and since warsuits did not reproduce that had been the end of her thoughts on the subject until Clemency’s commanding yet decidedly feminine voice first filled her mind. Yet even Kholster himself had warpicks whose spirits he considered to be female without any perceived threat to his masculinity . . .
Mom? Vax thought. Was that thought for us? It didn’t make any sense if it was and—
It seemed to revolve around Kholster, Clemency added. If you would like for me to connect you, I can, but we saw him quite recentl—
No! Wylant coughed. She loved her husband, but the last thing she wanted was to have him in her head. It was weird enough to have Clemency and Vax catching the occasional unintended thought. Sorry. No. I’ll talk to him in person later, once this is all handled. Thank you, though.
Of course.
He’s not a complete idiot, Wylant thought at the two of them. Dienox, I mean. Dienox tried to kill me, nearly succeeded, and even then I hurt him. He knows I’ve been given the right to kill him.
Not that you need it any longer, Vax thought.
Your father disagrees. Wylant frowned as she continued to scan for her quarry.
He does?
His permission would be required if the gods had not already given theirs.
A little mind-quiet, okay? Wylant shushed the two of them as gently as she could. I’m not made for all of this mental chatter like Aern are.
The silent compliance was immediate.
Trust an Aern and a warsuit to follow orders without question, apology, or the need to explain themselves. Even her Sidearms were no
t always able to accomplish the same task, back when they had been under her command. Wylant focused her attention more closely on the ring of conjoined cities below: the Guild Cities. Things were far worse there than in Midian. Plumes of smoke trailed up from fires burning out of control. Lumber, and the city that bore its name, blazed, entirely engulfed, tongues of flame reaching high enough it seemed to set the sky alight: a complete loss.
Everywhere people screamed and fought, Wylant sensed Dienox’s power and traced it like a feeder vine, trying to follow the flow of shadowy impressions back to the source, to the god of war himself. A taste like blood and ash, a scent like burning flesh and the sharp breath of steel, the clang of metal on metal and tearing rip of teeth in flesh, all of these were the way his power felt when used in practice. Sickening, familiar, and, in some ways, exhilarating.
“I’ve had enough of this,” Wylant growled under her breath, as she dropped down to land on the South Gate, where the Token Hundred kholstered by Draekar manned the top of the sealed passages that led in times of peace from the Guild Cities to Bridgeland, Jun cannon and Dwarves by their sides. Bone-steel breastplate caked with blood, Draekar and his Aern had the look of hunting dogs brought to heel when they could see and smell their prey. Below them, crowds of people hammered and screamed at the gates, but the Dwarves stood firm and speechless, watching, judging.
They would help. Later. Once the fighting was over and order had been restored, the gates would reopen and the Bridgeland Dwarves would issue forth with food and medicine, to help minister to the wounded, to the sick, to the hungry, and to help rebuild. But not before. The Dwarves did not fight in the wars of other races, had only ever provided direct assistance to the Aern as far as Wylant knew.
She stood unseen among them and felt waves of disappointment flowing from them as the Dwarves watched the non-rock-eating peoples destroying themselves. It was a power that called to some deep part of her current role. They, like she, were what came after war.
On instinct alone, she expanded her consciousness, seeing, in her mind’s eye, the other end of the great bridge, where the Token Hundred and the Dwarves who stood guard there held a nearly identical silence and position. No war was welcome on the Great Junland Bridge, nor fighting on this scale. They would have none of it, though, if pressed, they would fight to preserve their lands, their people, their . . . peace.