Flametouched

by Brian K. Fuller

  On the opposite wall was a door to the roof of the tall structure. General Marsden had instructed her rather severely never to show her face on the roof as it might allow the enemy to spy her position. He had also said, quite bluntly, not to allow herself to be taken prisoner as the Creetisians would most likely make her death a spectacle. In the event of likely capture, he had suggested, face grave, that she throw herself from the Cathedral roof for a quick death on the stones below. This had sent a chill into her heart that assured that sleep would never find her while the war lasted.

  Soldiers went in and out the rooftop door to bring her reports. Whenever the door opened, she looked longingly outside. It had rained lightly that morning, the scent of grass and trees sneaking in through the door a pleasant contrast to the stale interior of her confinement. As the tumultuous morning matured into day, the clouds retreated, bringing sunshine and a sweltering heat that sent streaks of sweat down her back.

  The pop of rifle reports and the roar of cannons gradually moved closer, like the sounds of a great beast coming to devour them all. From the reports, the Creetisians moved implacably forward, and Ki—who stayed outdoors and avoided company—would peek her head around the doorframe to throw her a meaningful look every time the reports got worse.

  Around Arianne were those she loved. Elaine, Orianna, and Missa waited with her in the poorly appointed confines of the cramped room. It was barely wide enough for one person to lay across and about three times as long. Mr. Goodwin waited by Elaine, picking at his fingernails with a paring knife and muttering under his breath.

  Chairs and other appointments would not fit through the trap door. Pillows and rugs were brought in for them to lounge on, as were two weeks-worth of food and drink. Among the General’s other frightening communications was the firm belief that they would only hold the city for a day if luck attended them. When—not if—it fell, they were to hide and hope for the forces committed to the south to return, retake the city, and rescue them.

  But the worst was feeling useless and decidedly unqueen-like. Holed up. Trapped. Unable to give what poor comfort or counsel she might muster to help her nation. The General assured her that her most important task was to stay alive, that what she did or said that day would have no bearing on the success of the battle, and that her survival would mean everything to the larger war and the rebuilding that came after. She tried to believe him but desperately wanted to do something.

  From time to time she would stare through the cutouts in the wall to watch the Eternal Flame in its pot. They desperately wished they could move the Eternal Flame and hide it, but only Lord Ember could heft the pot, and Davon had quite disappeared from anyone’s knowledge. Again. He had contacted none of the other scouts, he had sent no word, and Arianne was furious at him on and off in fitful bouts. How often did he think she could forgive him for running off just when she needed him? To pass the time she imagined what she would say when he did show his face again, mainly to stave off doubts that the reason he wasn’t there was because he had been killed already.

  Captain Gage, who had been assigned to see to her protection, burst through the door. He seemed young for a Captain, but was thickly built, his squarish face sober. “A group of Creetisians have burst through and are in the streets!”

  “Already?” Mr. Goodwin said. “It’s barely past midday!”

  “There are too many of them!” he explained, face pale. Through the open door the sounds of close gunfire and men yelling poured into the room with renewed power. “The militias inside the city are fighting them off and plugging the hole,” he continued, “but it cannot last, Your Grace.”

  Arianne wrung her hands together, heart leaden. Creetisians in Bellshire! The color in her face had long since fled, her skin almost as pale as the dress she wore.

  “Thank you, Captain Gage,” she said, straining to keep her voice even. “Let us know if there is any change in our circumstances.”

  “As you wish, Your Grace.”

  He left, the door scraping shut and dulling the sounds of battle. The faint scent of gunpowder and smoke trailed behind, overpowering the dusty smell of the neglected room where they waited.

  “Will Bellshire really fall?” Elaine asked. “Will the Creetisians come for us, Arianne?”

  Arianne knelt in front of her sister and took her hands. “We must try to have hope, Elaine. We have done all we could. The soldiers will fight to the last man to keep us safe.”

  “But you heard what the soldier said,” she cried. “They will find us and kill us!”

  Mr. Goodwin, eyes fiery, stopped the incessant trimming of his fingernails. The wrinkles on his hands had disappeared. The man turned more supple and spry by the hour.

  “They won’t get you, Miss,” he said, voice as firm as stone. “I was a clerk, but I’ve learned a thing or two about defending myself since then. No one will harm you. No one. Not while I live.”

  Elaine nodded. While Arianne thought Mr. Goodwin optimistic, the absolute conviction in his voice could not be gainsaid. The man was a mystery. Davon described him as an irascible piece of old leather that could scare a dire wolf away from its cubs. The frightening part she could believe. Whenever his eyes were not on her sister, they were as hard as flint, hiding what seemed a deep hatred of the world.

  But when he was with Elaine, he changed entirely, as if she were the world, and one he could live in without bitterness. At first his attentions seemed grandfatherly, but he was undoubtedly growing younger, and she wondered what the exact nature of his gift from the Eternal Flame was.

  Captain Gage opened the door a scant hour later, Ki following him in.

  “They are repulsed,” he reported. “They are gathering for another charge, probably within the hour. We will not hold them.”

  “It’s time, Arianne,” Ki said, face hard and eyes determined. Arianne opened her mouth, not sure of what to say, of what decision to make, but at that moment a snow finch carved of wood fluttered through the door and landed on Ki’s left shoulder. She gasped in surprise. Arianne rose and stepped close to get a look at it. Unlike the finch Davon had carved before, this one sported a swirling pattern on its breast turning in the opposite direction of the one around Ki’s navel.

  “It is from the Khodo Khim,” Ki said. “And this,” she continued, taking the bird into her hand, “this is Ta. Somehow it is. He must be near. We should go.”

  Arianne turned to the nonplussed Captain Gage. “Captain, I must flee the city and seek a safer haven.”

  Water. Melchor wished for a drink more than freedom. His throat burned, inside and out. A blistered red imprint of Queen Arianne’s hand stung his neck every time he moved his head a fraction of an inch in any direction. The burning ejection of the Primal Water from his throat had nearly killed him. He couldn’t talk. Even breathing hurt, and he felt as weak as a sickly babe. But the thirst had risen to the top of his discomforts. His swollen tongue felt like raspy sand against the top of his parched mouth.

  The Ember Guard had bound him to a bed inside a locked room of the Flame Cathedral and had neglected him ever since. He could guess why. The room had no window or light, but the thick stone walls couldn’t completely mask the blast of gunfire and sharp reports of cannon blasts. Like a tide they rose and fell, close then far, weak then strong.

  In vain he pulled at the cords on his arms and legs. Wisely, they had tightly strung each of his appendages to a bed post, and the Ember Guard knew its knots. He could scarcely bend his elbows or his knees, making all his techniques for defeating a binding impossible to use. He hardly had the strength for an escape attempt, anyway.

  Surely the Creetisians would inspect the Flame Cathedral first when they overran the city to see the great mystery of the Eternal Flame. They would find him. If they didn’t hurry, he thought they might find nothing more of him than a pile of dust. Water. He needed it. Never had he thought he could want something so much that it would override every other desire.

  He ceased his struggle
against his bonds, tired of agitating his raw ankles and wrists. Closing his eyes against the dark, he breathed in and out, seeking a refuge from the discomfort within his own mind. And he had much to consider. The Primal Forces were real. Creetisians were ignorant, though they would know their error soon enough. The citizens of Bittermarch didn’t realize what they had. So much power! They could use the Forces, harness them. If they wished it, they could overrun Creetis and unite the continent.

  When the Primal Water had lodged inside him, it had healed every blow that had damaged him and could crush any man. The Voice, he now knew, was something else entirely, something murderous and persuasive, even to a man with hands as soaked in blood as his were. Arianne’s burning palms had banished it from him. He could feel it leave his body, and even in the excruciating rictus of being burned, he thought he saw something, some shadowy form beside him.

  And with the thought of that strange entity something about the light in the room changed. Only a sliver of illumination leaked under the door to keep the room from total blackness, but even as dark as it was, something veiled the light just a shade more. And he felt it, the presence of the Voice, just as he had when the water was in him.

  His eyes snapped open. They had long since adjusted to the dark, and he tilted his head up. Something stood on his chest just above his heart, something human in shape but without weight and without definition. His ropes creaked as he strained against them, but there was no escape.

  The figure, barely as tall as his knee, hopped off his chest. He could feel more than see it next to his head. The Voice, now a whisper, hissed into his ear, but its words resonated through his body.

  Do you yield?

  “To what?” he rasped, voice but a sliver of its strength.

  There was no answer at first, but it came to him intuitively as if his own heart were speaking to him. It wanted obedience. In exchange, it promised power. Had it promised Baron Olivanne Longford the same? And where was the Primal Water? His body hungered for it. He longed for what he became when he swelled with its power.

  It is a simple choice, it whispered. I can help you escape. I can help you guide your countrymen and win this war.

  Melchor tried to think, but it came with more difficultly than swallowing. The Shadow emanated malice, and one thing he knew for sure: bargains always had a price.

  “What do you want from me?”

  A home. Like the Primal Fire, I am a traveler in the hearts of all men, but as yet I have not claimed a servant. Olivanne Longford I would have claimed, but he is gone The time has come for me to choose. Your heart…it is ready. I already fill it. Now let me claim it, and I will give you whatever gift you desire, though in time you will learn that even desire itself is folly.

  “What about Baron Longford? Wasn’t he your servant?” he asked, the words scraping painfully through his tortured throat.

  I taught him, groomed him for the role I now offer to you. I had to shape the Baron’s heart, but yours has already been molded to my liking.

  “Will you take my will?” he asked, wondering what limits there were to this deal he was being asked to make. The Primal Water had made no demands when it filled him; the Voice seemed full of them.

  No. I will teach it. Choose now. Time grows short if you wish to help your countrymen.

  Help his countrymen? Melchor furrowed his brows. Were they not firmly in control? Surely they outnumbered their enemies by at least four to one. But something was different about the muffled sounds filtering through the walls. The tenor of the battle had changed. Had the Bittermarchian armies somehow returned from the south? Impossible.

  Choose.

  Dealing with the dark figure felt wrong, but he knew that if he couldn’t escape and if the Creetisians failed to win the day, he was doomed. If the strange shadow could offer him power like what he had enjoyed with the Primal Water, then he would take it, take it and rise to whatever position he wanted. He was of strong mind and will, and would not let the odd shadow force him into anything he didn’t wish to do.

  He was about to vocalize his assent, but the creature seemed to know. Without sound or pressure, it leapt back up onto his chest, standing just above his heart. And then it slowly sank into his body, sending a shiver across his skin as if a cold wind had blown in from the north. A shapeless scar, a blotch, bloomed spread across the left side of his chest as if someone had dripped ink on it.

  Only after the dark being had disappeared inside him did Melchor understand the price of the agreement.

  Joy, happiness, desire—all gone. So were anger, fear, and hate. But perhaps ‘gone’ was not the right word. Buried might be better, buried but still alive. What was left was nothing but the rational, the knowledge of what he had to do and why he had to do it, but at the same time, a nagging idea in his brain suggested that any endeavor was ultimately pointless.

  Thank you, the Voice that sounded like his own said. What do you desire that I can help you acquire?

  The Voice had tricked him. He desired nothing, now. He was a blank slate. If life was without joy or pain, and if it was void of meaningful pursuit, what was left? There was only one thing: survival.

  “I need to escape. I need water,” he said, and the words came less painfully now. His body was still injured, but the pain was somehow dulled.

  Then let me show you what it means to be the servant of the Primal Shadow. Pull against your bonds.

  He did, and ever so slowly the ropes passed through his wrists and ankles like a dull knife through hard cheese. In the end, his limbs snapped free, still perfectly intact, and the ropes fell slack to the bed unbroken. The sensation was strange. He thought this should surprise or delight him, but he felt nothing at all. This was as it should be. This ability to escape bonds was expedient, nothing more, nothing less.

  Now for the guard. Shadow is a part of you. It is not strength, but subtlety, not speed, but stealth. It is not endurance or resilience, but stretching and shrinking. See the crack under the door? Walk under it.

  Mentally, he realized this should, at least, sound like madness or folly, but without hesitation he strode forward. With every step he got smaller. His oversized clothes shrunk with him, and small chunks of dirt and rock rose up around him like boulders, the light under the door brightening as it fell upon him.

  “What of the light?” he asked.

  Don’t fear the light. Light creates shadow, just as the joy in men’s hearts creates the pain of its loss. Only the Primal Flame itself can turn us aside.

  He stepped under the door, staring at the guard’s boot heel. The immense hallway of the Flame Cathedral was truly engulfing at his present size. Servants lugged blood soaked soldiers into rooms for care, while others rushed about with water and food. Water!

  Have care of the footfalls, the Primal Shadow cautioned. A careless step could crush you. There is much work to be done. We must find and kill the Queen and keep your countrymen from defeat.

  “What is happening?” he whispered. At his size, it was little more than a squeak.

  Get nourishment quickly, and then go outside. Then you will see.

  Chapter 51

  The fury of the mammoth herd was more than Davon could have hoped for, the rumble of their retreat like an unending thunder that felt at times as if it might sunder the very ground they traversed. Just the sight of him as a giant sabercat sent the beasts into an uncontrolled panic; when he roared, panic gave way to the unthinking instinct all animals possessed to flee from danger. It also created a disorderly mess, a rolling flood of tusk, hide, and churning legs that he struggled to channel in a useful direction.

  Back and forth across the wide prairie west of Bellshire he had loped, inspiring stragglers to better efforts and forcing those that wanted to run off in any other direction than southeast to correct their course. He couldn’t keep them all in line, but if he could get half of them to Bellshire, he reckoned it would be enough. The more wooded areas north of the city complicated things, but he was nearly
there, sending the main clump of the mighty herd right down the road that led to Bellshire’s northern gate.

  It was early afternoon, now. The noise of the herd’s passing drowned out any sounds of the battle he hoped had not already been lost. The Creetisian army vastly outnumbered the force left behind to protect the city. Surely Arianne was well hidden, but if Ki and Ta had followed his instructions, they would have taken her north if the battle had tipped too far in the Creetisians’ favor.

  While the road had made his herding task easier, it had doubled the dust, and he paused to ascend a nearby a hill to get above the obscuring cloud. And there it sat, Bellshire, a host of white tents around the northern side of the city. Nothing was burning inside the walls, though he had noted that the Creetisians seemed to want the towns and buildings intact, no doubt to use them after they occupied the territory.

  From his vantage point, it appeared that the army was marshaling in a field between their tents and the outer walls of the city. The orderly rows of tents were like a large white flag on a sea of green, their soldiers little maggots worming their way toward Bellshire. Davon growled. It was time to give the Creetisians a nasty surprise they wouldn’t soon forget.

  He bounded off the hill. Without his continual prodding, the tired mammoth herd had slowed, some animals foraging for leaves or sucking in water from the stream along the road and shooting it into their mouths from their long trunks. The time for refreshment and rest was over. He inhaled until his lungs felt fit to burst and let loose the longest, loudest roar he could muster, a roar he hoped would reach even the Creetisians’ ears.