The Gardens of Almhain

by Laura Mallory

  The Gardens of Almhain

  SPRING

  Chapter One

  The sky was an endless canvas of poor craftsmanship. One of simple mind might have called it blue, though it was not in truth a pure color, to deserve a pure name, but a glassy composition of weak pastels. There were no clouds, at least none of note. The faded firmament was polluted by streaks of pale yellow and white, none bold enough to give distinction to their existence.

  The only element holding sway over the land, over the three weary travelers who walked a road of poorly packed dirt, was the sun above. Merciless in its midday heat, it boiled the air and seared the flat ground, shriveling further the few meager leaves of white, spiny trees and thorny brush that dotted the desolate terrain. It was a miserable climate, especially for these travelers, in whose memories blazed skies of aquamarine brilliance, of golden dawns and fiery dusks, of crystalline, lofty clouds and rolling green vales. Of swift running rivers, full of silver flashing fish, and meadows bursting with wildflowers and the laughing shrieks of children.

  They had no choice, however, but to continue their arduous journey to its end. There was no return to from whence they came. The Isle of Dusk—fabled Alesia, earthly Sanctuary of the sibling Gods who shared dominion of the cosmos—was no more.

  Isidora Sitha Fiannan, only child of the late Lord and Lady Fiannan, rulers of Alesia, and her companions—Edan, a gangly boy who had not uttered a word in more than a month, and Finnéces, a man of later years whose shoulders were bent and face creased with sorrow—walked on through the Goddess-forsaken land because they had no choice.

  The Isle of Dusk was no more.

  They walked through the blistering heat of day, their heads and faces wrapped against the gaze of the sun, stopping only for replenishment from Isidora’s bottomless flask of water. When the burning daystar sank and flashed away and the temperatures dropped so that their teeth clattered and fingers went numb, still they walked, cloaks and sandals heated at intervals by her waning gift of elemental power.

  Time continued on, indifferent to their sufferings. The sun rose and set, the sky burned and then blazed with starlight. Then, as their drawn faces caught the first hints of dawn in the east, on a day that was sure to be as wretched as all the days before, Isidora halted.

  Young Edan laid a hand on Finnéces’ arm, and they turned some feet ahead, regarding her with empty faces and empty eyes.

  Isidora did not think she had tears left, but she felt them, warm and stinging in her eyes. She lifted a hand toward her companions, fingers stretched toward the sky. Scabbed skin cracked with the movement and blood oozed sluggishly down her palm.

  Her companions did not move, watching her hand instead as she focused within, fought exhaustion and grief and her body’s limits. A spark lifted from her index finger and vanished with a hiss and a tiny puff of smoke.

  There would be no more fresh water to combat the leaching heat of the days, no more warmth to protect them from death in frozen, starry nights. She had drained the last of her reservoir of power, filled before they fled Alesia. Did not know if it would ever return, with the Isle destroyed.

  “We are done, then,” Finnéces said, voice reedy and monotone.

  Isidora let her arm fall to her side. She wanted nothing more than to sink to her knees, to stretch upon the dirt and offer her bones to the sun.

  He will find you, whispered the memory of her mother’s voice. You must walk until he hears your call. Sustain yourself with the gift of your blood. Do not stop, ever, or what hunts us now will follow you, to finish what has begun.

  With all the dignity she could muster from her battered body, Isidora rose to her full height and lifted her eyes to the dawn. Defiantly, she tore off her cloak and threw it to the ground.

  “My lady,” Finnéces gasped, starting forward.

  “No!” she snapped, throwing up a hand. He fell back at her command, stunned by her outburst. Beside him cowered Edan, brown eyes round with awe as he saw for the first time the blue gown of the Goddess’ devotees, the white sash at her waist that marked her High Priestess, and lastly the heavy crystal amulet on her chest that shone like a mirror, proclaiming her heir to the throne of Alesia.

  It did not matter to Edan that neither Alesia, nor the ivory throne upon which their Lords and Ladies had sat for time beyond telling, existed any longer. The boy made a gargling noise and fell to the ground in obeisance.

  “This is our only chance, Finnéces,” she said through cracked lips.

  “But you are drained beyond your endurance, my lady,” protested the lifelong servant of her family, vigor again in his voice and face. “To summon the Goddess would kill you!”

  Isidora worked her tongue in her mouth until she had saliva enough to speak. “Walking in this desert another day will kill me, my friend. We go no further. Let me do this final thing, then rest.”

  “You do not know that your mother spoke truly,” he said weakly, lips quivering within his scraggly gray beard. Tears filled his eyes, darkening their blue shade. “She was dying, poisoned by the demon’s blood on that dagger—”

  “Her words are all the hope we have!” Isidora cried. The volume of her yell rang in her ears and caused her vision to momentarily whiten. Softly, beseechingly, she said, “We are all that is left. An old man, a boy, and woman. All that is left of Alesia.” Her voice cracked on the last word and she fell silent.

  Finnéces was weeping openly now, hands shaking on the thick staff he carried. If her heart were not already broken beyond repair, the sight of her stoic servant trembling with the force of his grief would have undone her.

  “The man she spoke of will find us,” she whispered, then glanced at the dawn, which was bleeding across the land like a river’s strong current.

  It took but a moment for the decision to be made. And another moment passed, in which Isidora turned her back on the dawn and lifted her palms to the last of the stars in the distant western sky.

  As Anshar was the God of Dawn, so Istar was the Goddess of Dusk. Isidora bore no affinity with the God, or she might have sought his aid in the streams of sunlight rushing across the land. But it was Goddess’ name that had shaped her own. It was Istar whose call had rung in her young mind like a bell so long ago, and it was to the Goddess she turned.

  Since they had stepped foot on this continent that was the God’s domain, the heavenly face of the Goddess, in mourning for Alesia, had not shown its visage among the icy points of the stars. Nevertheless, Isidora could sense it, not its usual cool blue radiance, but its dark absence.

  It was toward the absence of the moon that she focused her will, and sent her call.

  “Aid me, Istar,” she murmured, “I cannot do this alone.”

  A stirring in the ether, a metaphysical turning of divine focus, and all at once, Isidora’s limbs were forced taut, her senses bathed by cool blue light and her lungs filled with dewy fresh air. Power poured into her blood until her skin hummed with it; power that was a gift from beyond earthly elementals. When there was no ounce of flesh or bone, no corner of her soul not filled by the Goddess, Isidora turned to face the rising sun.

  She sent the summons straight into the burning disc, and Anshar casually tossed the call away, scattering it along with the sun’s rays, across every distant land they touched. Just as she had hoped.

  And so her words, precisely worded, were sent and received.

  To you who would hear me, know that the Gardens of Almhain are no more.

  Chapter Two

  Arturo Bellamont de Galván leaned forward in his saddle, squinting across the desert plain before him. Still nothing, for miles upon
miles in all directions. With a muffled oath, he tipped his canteen to his lips, warm water spilling into his mouth. Grimacing in distaste, he swallowed most of it before spitting out the rest in an unconscious prayer for safe passage through the God’s scorched land.

  Riding beside him, Diego Roldan held a hand over his eyes, looking east. The wiry, leather-skinned man saw nothing, for there was nothing, and relaxed into his saddle with a grunt.

  “This wasn’t my idea,” Arturo reminded him wryly.

  Diego shot him a murderous gaze from dark eyes, the left of which was framed by a long, jagged scar he’d acquired many years before. The look had frightened the gall out of many a grown man. Arturo was not impressed. “I’ll freely admit that the plan had merit six nights ago,” he offered with a shrug.

  Diego spat loudly, causing his horse to flick back ears disapprovingly. “Would you rather be crossing the Wasteland, or hanging from your neck in that Argentan border village?” he growled.

  Arturo frowned, dark brows drawing together on his tanned face. “Have a little faith in me, brother. I would have talked my way out of it. They wouldn’t have dared hang me once I told them my name.”

  His partner grinned tightly, displaying startlingly white, somewhat crooked teeth. “You deflowered the magistrate’s daughter,” he said. “Besides, Bellamont is not so widely a recognized name as you would like to imagine. Outside of Tanalon and Borgetza, that is.”

  “Hmm,” Arturo mused, rolling back his shoulders and ignoring the resulting trickle of sweat down his spine. “Two kingdoms out of four. Not bad, I think, for thirty years old. Perhaps in another ten years, I’ll be sung of throughout the Calabrian peninsula.”

  “More songs of dread and praise for the Bellamont the Black,” Diego scoffed. His laughter was like a rasp of a snake, quickly heard and gone. “Perhaps King Armando will send you next to Argenta, to kill a prince. Then you will have three of four kingdoms marked on your tomb. There’s also word that the ruling family of Dunak is involved in a dispute over which son of their late king is to inherit the throne. Perhaps our noble liege has some ideas as to whom he would prefer take the ivory scepter.”

  Despite the sun drawing sweat from Arturo’s body like a woman wringing wet linens, there was a chill moving in his blood. Though they’d had this conversation in jest many times over the past years, this time was different.

  Perhaps it was the God’s light here, magnified by lack of fauna and the level geography in the Wasteland that stretched as a border between Argenta and Tanalon. Whatever the cause, the words sunk through him as easily as so many swords had not managed.

  “What if I say I’m done?” he said, affecting a small shrug.

  He listened to the creak of his saddle, the fine Argentan leather slowly souring in the sun. The stallion beneath him shuddered, tail tossing fretfully to remind his rider of his misery.

  Finally, Diego cleared his throat. “Then you are done,” he said gruffly. “I’ve felt this time coming, even before you started talking of it six years ago—” He spat again. “There comes a time in a soldier’s life when he makes the choice to die with a sword in his hand, or a woman. Perhaps that choice is upon you.”

  Arturo lifted his brows, slanting a glance at his partner. “And what would you do, Diego Roldan, second in command to Bellamont the Black, if I set up with a woman and devoted myself to making babes?”

  Diego shrugged his narrow shoulders. “Take up an assumed name, as you will have to. Then find a woman with plenty of cushioning and move in next door, of course.”

  Arturo grinned, his dark mood lifting at the thought of his partner with a screaming toddler in his arms. “Of course.”

  “Maybe we’ll cross the South Sea, travel east to where no one knows us,” Diego continued, warming up to the prospect. “Maybe Valta, in Greiza. My cousin Kemen set himself up famously there. He has his own vineyard, and twenty acres near the sea. Apparently the king is mighty fond of foreigners.” He nodded thoughtfully. “I think I might get used to growing old and fat among dark-eyed, white-skinned maidens.”

  “You already eat like a horse, Diego, and you’ve got not an ounce of fat on you,” Arturo grinned. “Besides, I was thinking someplace more exotic, where the women have blue eyes and golden skin, and the waters are green and warm. The God has been kind, but it is rumored that the Goddess offers the most succor to aging soldiers.”

  Thin, dark brows lifted. “You can’t possibly mean—”

  Arturo laughed. “Lets make ourselves sailors and find the Isle of Dusk.”

  Diego shuddered comically. “That place is a myth to scare rebellious boys into submission. No man in his right mind would subject himself to a woman ruler.”

  A glint of movement on the horizon caught Arturo’s eye. Distractedly, he replied, “A man and woman rule together, as Lord and Lady.”

  “Forgive me if I fell asleep during that lesson in my schooling days,” Diego retorted.

  The speck of color in the distance was not vanishing as would the mirage Arturo had imagined it to be. Instead, with every long stride of his horse, the shape of it grew. Something was lying in the road. He squinted, and thought he saw blue.

  “Diego—”

  “I see it,” he said.

  Arturo loosened his sword in his scabbard, wincing as the blade protested to its fine coating of sand. Diego Roldan, in addition to being the one man Arturo trusted with his life, also possessed the uncanny sight of a bird. Within moments, his partner made a harsh noise in his throat.

  “Merciful God,” he muttered, casting an anxious glance at Arturo. “I think it’s a woman.”

  With an oath of his own, Arturo sheathed his sword and spurred his horse just as Diego did the same. The beasts, though not long in either man’s company, were nevertheless some of Argenta’s finest, and leapt with the command into a thundering gallop.

  The closer they came, the more apparent it was that, indeed, a woman lay in the road. Beside her crouched two figures, hovering protectively over her body. One of them, a man with white hair springing at all angles from a lined face, scampered to his feet to stand before the other two. He held a wooden staff upright as a meager weapon of defense.

  They reined their horses a mere fifteen paces from the travelers, sending up clumps of dirt and a spray of fine dust. Without having to articulate the need, his partner stayed mounted while Arturo leapt to the ground. In situations of delicacy or diplomacy, they had learned that the scarred and weapon-laden Diego was not a comforting sight, especially to unarmed laypersons.

  Arturo walked slowly toward the old man, who was visibly shaking with fear as he held his staff to strike. “We mean no harm,” he said clearly, hoping that the man, so obviously foreign, spoke the language of the peninsula. He pointed at the woman, whose face was covered by a scarf. “Is she dead?”

  The old man flinched. “Not… dead,” he said in thickly accented Common, “very… eh, damaged.”

  “Will you allow me to examine her?” Arturo asked, gesturing to articulate his words. “I’ve medical training.” It was a lie, but still, he’d treated enough injured men in a lifetime of warring, himself included, that he considered himself knowledgeable of general injury and ailment.

  The old man’s arms quivered as he fought to keep the staff upright. “Are you… messenger?” he asked haltingly, with a fierceness and hope that was surprising.

  Arturo glanced back at Diego, who shrugged minutely. “Yes,” he said, turning back to the man, “I am a messenger of King Armando, whose lands these are.”

  That, too, was a lie, for the Wasteland belonged to no kingdom. Still, they were close to the northwestern border of Tanalon. If a few lies were necessary to prevent the old man from attacking him, and unnecessarily losing his life, then he would lie, and atone later.

  Relief spread across the lined face, so acute that the staff dropped from nerveless finge
rs. “Come, come,” he stammered, waving him forward. “Please… must help.”

  Arturo signaled for Diego to dismount, and though the old man caste a wary glance at the scarred soldier, he did not protest. They walked to the prone figure, beside whom still crouched a filthy boy not more than thirteen years old. At some garbled words from the old man, the boy looked up at Arturo in hopeful worship.

  The stare made him uncomfortable, not only because a lie had caused it but because no man, woman, or child had ever looked at him with such an expression. Fear, despair, hatred… all of them he was accustomed to. Not hope bordering on adoration, and certainly not twice in as many minutes.

  Arturo shot a bemused glance at Diego before crouching beside the woman. She was breathing, which was encouraging, though the rise and fall of her chest was somewhat erratic. The blue gown she wore was almost unrecognizable as a garment of finery, but upon closer inspection he could see that beneath the dust, travel stains, and ragged tears, there was gold threading in the seams, and long slits on each leg that revealed a hint of once lovely ivory satin.

  Whoever she was, well-bred or no, whatever she was running from or to, it was clear that in another day she would die of exposure. Already her companions were showing signs of deprivation. They carried no food sacks, and only one canteen, which from its horizontal position and opened cap, was long empty.

  They would have never made it across the desert. It didn’t seem prudent to point out that they were heading in the wrong direction, on an ancient, purposeless road that ran the whole blistering distance of the Wasteland. Had they turned east across open land, they would have reached a border town of Tanalon in two days. If Argenta had been their destination, it was two days north and three more west to reach the mountain pass.

  Arturo motioned stiffly for the boy to lift the scarf covering the woman’s face. What was revealed made his stomach clench in dread and shock. Dread for the bruised skin beneath her eyes, the hollow pits of her cheeks, the white blisters on her lips; shock because in spite of her being very near death, she was undeniably lovely. Her skin shone the palest of gold, and her hair was the most unusual shade of brown. Curling, dark honey, with thick strands of copper and gold interwoven. It reminded him suddenly and vividly of his family estate on Tanalon’s southern shore, and the blazing sunsets he had witnessed with the whimsical eye of youth.