Broken World Book Four - The Staff of Law

by Southwell, T C

  By dawn, he had been over every inch of the castle twice, and the first golden rays of sun found him sitting disconsolately on a pile of stones. The silence grew more intense when no birds greeted the morning, and only the faint hiss of blowing sand underscored the leaden stillness of a dead world.

  Chanter scanned the sun-gilded ruins dejectedly and wondered how hard Talsy expected him to look, and whether he should move the stones. As the sun rose, its rays probed the shadows, and he waited for it to reveal any secrets. A glitter of crystals drew his eyes to a shard of gnarled rock half hidden amongst the fallen walls, and he rose to examine it. The grey metal foot held only a remnant of stone, and he gathered up several chips that lay nearby, each containing a fragment of broken writing, a vestige of unreadable law. He knelt and laid them together on a flat rock.

  “How can I fix what is so broken?” he asked no one in particular. “How can I put back what I don’t know? How can I fail the one who is chosen?”

  “You cannot,” a chill whisper hissed in his ear.

  Chanter gestured irritably. “Begone, wind, taunt me not.”

  “Wind am I?” the voice sniggered. “I think not.”

  The Mujar turned to face his antagonist, his eyes narrowing as he gazed upon a forbidden entity of the chaos. Neither wind nor water, nor sand or fire, it mocked him with glowing eyes of melted venom and spoke with a foetid breath of misty blackness. Its form shimmered with heat, rasped the stones with gritty feet, and radiated corrupted light in a patchwork of unrelated elements tortured together by a will that was neither alive nor dead.

  Chanter regarded it curiously. “What are you?”

  “Questions, questions,” it sighed. “I am the new spirit of this world, here to replace the puling Kuran who have fled, and their downtrodden allies, the Dargon. The winds fear me and the creatures worship me. I am Mannon.”

  “You’re no spirit, nor do you live.”

  “Did I say that I lived? I am stronger than that. Life is an illusion, a word dreamt up by creatures so frail that a whiff of my breath would snuff them out.”

  Chanter smiled. “That does not surprise me.”

  “Yet you stand unaffected, breathing me and living still. Do you live?”

  “Yes, more than you. If you’re the new spirit of this tormented land, then go attend to your foul business; I have no time for you.”

  Mannon hissed, its eyes growing more poisonous. “No one spurns me and survives, frail thing. No one defies me.”

  “I don’t defy you. You are of no consequence to me.”

  “Your life is mine.”

  “No it isn’t.” Chanter turned away. “You can do nothing to me.”

  A lash of fire washed over him, and the Mujar glanced back at the entity, which swirled with rage. Poisonous air engulfed him, and Chanter stopped breathing. The monster swelled with fury. Sweet air returned, and Chanter said, “Leave me be.”

  “You will die!” Mannon grated, unleashing a wave of stinging dust that spotted the Mujar’s skin with blood.

  Chanter frowned. “You are not alive.”

  Mannon ignored the Mujar’s strangely worded warning, which would have informed any who knew what he was that they did not enjoy the protection of life. The monstrous elemental drew itself into a more compact form, swelling with sand and rocks to hurl at the Mujar.

  Chanter faced it. “You are an abomination of the chaos, a soulless being born of corrupted Powers that I command.” He gestured in a pulling motion, then clapped his hands. A thunderclap rolled away, and Chanter jerked his hands apart, tearing an invisible substance only he could sense. Mannon sundered into its various elements in a gust of foul stench and a wave of hot Dolana. Pure air gushed forth, along with a flash of fire and a sprinkle of water, leaving a cloud of settling dust and a soft wailing shriek.

  “What are you?”

  “I am Mujar,” Chanter said, “and you do not belong in my world. Those who have life will live, those who don’t will cease to exist. Let not the elements join together and name themselves. Thus it is written in the law, and, now that the world is broken, you who have no life will not mock it.”

  Chanter gazed across the desert, his eyes narrowed against the glare. Turning back to the staff’s shards, he fitted them together, then summoned Dolana and made it whole. Chips were missing from the writing; fragments bearing vital letters lay as dust amongst the stones, and could never be rewritten. Though heavy, he calculated its weight to be manageable for a daltar eagle to carry, especially one with a Mujar’s strength. Assuming that form, he picked up the stone in his talons and rose into the air with strong wing beats, setting off towards the distant valley. Flying low, he avoided the dangers of the upper ethers, where manants patrolled on filmy wings. Sailing just above the tree tops, he was forced to flap constantly to stay aloft with his burden, hoping that no mishap would cause him to drop the stone into some inaccessible place.

  The being formed from the corrupted Powers was a symptom of the world’s decay, an entity sent abroad to cause destruction with no more purpose or intelligence than a wandering tornado. These toys of the winds were sometimes unleashed when their creators tired of playing with them, and grew in strength and ferocity to devour stretches of land for no other reason than pure mischance. So Mannon had come into being through purposeless accident, evolving a voice and malice with little else to guide it. As long as there were no laws, the chaos would create worse things yet.

  Talsy gazed at the Staff of Law, Travain on her hip. It lay on its bed of red velvet, the pieces arranged in their correct order. She knelt to run reverent fingers along the lines of indecipherable writing, carved so perfectly into the stone that no stonemason could ever hope to emulate it. The metal that capped and footed it gleamed dull grey, unremarkable, yet also unsullied by time and weather. The seamed grey granite appeared aged, yet the writing remained pristine, as sharp and clear as the day the gods had carved it there, aeons ago.

  She looked up at the people who had gathered in the staff’s room. “Today we right the wrong. Today we will make the Staff of Law whole again, so the gods will be forced to make another decision.”

  Most of the chosen crowded into the room, and those who were her particular friends stood at the forefront. The ones at the back peered over the shoulders of those in front to glimpse the broken staff that few had seen. Shan’s eyes gleamed with excitement and expectation, lingering often upon the languid Mujar, who seemed the least interested in the proceedings. Chanter leant against the wall by a window, gazing out at a dull grey day. The crowd parted to give him access to the staff, but he seemed reluctant to perform the task.

  Talsy looked impatient. “Come on, Chanter, it’s time.”

  He glanced around, his eyes flitting over their expectant faces. “You realise that nothing will change when I do this?”

  “Not right away, but if we don’t, there’s no hope that anything will ever change.”

  He shook his head in rueful admiration of her stubborn fortitude and wandered over to the staff. The people drew back as he knelt beside it, and he looked up at them. “You know what to expect, so don’t be alarmed.”

  Most nodded, and he placed his palms on the floor, summoning Dolana. The clamp of icy stillness froze the world for an instant, and some gasped and staggered when they were released from the Earthpower’s frigid talons. Talsy let out the breath she held and looked at Travain, but the baby cooed, unconcerned.

  Chanter grasped the topmost piece of stone and fitted its broken end into the craggy top of the second piece. He turned them until they clicked together, a jagged line encircling the stone, chips missing from it. The stone welded together, joining into a seamless whole, but for the gaps. He picked up the third piece, whose smoothly cut edge fitted perfectly with the bottom of the second piece, and again the stone flowed together seamlessly.

  The fourth piece required more fiddling before he got the edges to fit together, then joined them, a chunk the size of a coin missing from on
e side. The last piece, bound with metal, fitted imperfectly with the fourth, the missing fragments along the join obliterating an entire line of writing. Chanter melded it together as well as he could and stood up.

  Talsy knelt to stroke the pitted stone as he wandered back to the window to return to his dull vista. She glanced around at the expectant throng, then at Chanter.

  “Restore the laws you know, Chanter.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You can! You said you’d try. Even if we only restore a few, it will help to slow the chaos, perhaps even stop it.”

  “It can’t be done.”

  She jumped up, frowning. “Try! How do you know if you won’t attempt it? Even I know one of them, ‘life and death shall never mingle’. Restore that one, and the staffs of Life and Death will separate, resume their rule over their domains, and that will put back some order at least! It will put an end to the Torrak Jahar and stop the monsters of stone and elements from ravaging the land. Put back the law that prevents crossbreeding, and all the monstrosities will be wiped out.” She glanced at Travain, but hurried on, “You said you could do that. You said you would!”

  He swung to face her. “I never said I could do it. I said it might work, but I don’t know if it will. My power is different to the staff’s. Its fire is golden, mine is blue.”

  “Just try,” she begged. “Please, grant me this wish. If you’ll just do that, then if it fails, we know that we did try.”

  “I risk the gods’ wrath, tampering with their sacred tool.”

  “They wouldn’t punish you for trying to right a wrong!”

  He turned away. “You don’t understand them, or me. Mujar should not interfere, and I have done enough interfering already.”

  Talsy scowled at him. “Chanter.”

  Involuntarily he glanced at her.

  She held out her hand, palm up. “Wish.”

  The Mujar’s eyes lowered, and he sighed, shaking his head. “Wish.”

  “Try to restore the first law.”

  He frowned, and for a moment their eyes locked, then he swung away, shoulders hunched. He gazed at the window as if longing to flee, but turned to face the staff.

  Crayash manifested in a roar of fire that made most of the spectators cringe and beat at spectral flames, crying out in fear. Travain gurgled and reached for the flames with chubby fingers. The manifestation winked out, leaving many embarrassed people glancing furtively at their neighbours as they regained their composure.

  Chanter approached the staff, stood over it and wrote fiery words in the air, speaking them aloud at the same time. “Life and Death shall never mingle.”

  With a flick of his fingers, he sent the burning blue words into the stone. They settled at the top of the staff, overlaying the etched words, but did not fit into the law’s lines. The blue fire dimmed, sparkled and died. A collective sigh of disappointment and despair came from the chosen, and Talsy’s heart twisted in anguish.

  “Try again!” she cried. “Your words didn’t fit into the words on the staff. Use the language it’s written in.”

  Many people looked hopefully at the Mujar again, but he shook his head. “I can’t do that. The laws are written in the gods’ language, and I don’t speak it.”

  Talsy leashed her frustration and kept her composure when she longed weep. “Then we must wait for the gods to restore the laws.” She turned to address the assembly. “They will restore them, for why let the world die when it can so easily be saved? All we have to do is wait, but we still have hope.”

  A few nodded at her assertion, but there was no hope in their eyes as they filed out. Chanter returned to the window to stare out, folding his arms.

  Talsy approached him and touched his elbow. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?”

  “Regret.”

  “You’ve broken your last regret already,” he said, “now you offer me another?”

  “What did I do wrong?”

  “Obedience, remember? You made me do what I didn’t want to, which I told you was wrong and futile.”

  She sighed. “I know. I was desperate. I still am.”

  “I don’t accept your regret.”

  Talsy stared at him, realisation dawning upon her like a sunrise of amazement. “I’ve offended you! You’re angry!”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought Mujar didn’t get angry.”

  He turned to face her. “You don’t know Mujar, though you think you do. We carry a terrible rage inside, which gnaws within us and tears us apart when we’re tortured.”

  “I didn’t torture you!”

  “You forced me to do something against my will, asked for a wish you knew I didn’t want to grant, but had to, for I have sworn to grant your wishes. When you asked me to search for the staff, I was merely reluctant, but this time I was very much against it. I warned you, and you ignored me. You resorted to formality, to the sacred words that bind Mujar to their honour. I could not break my promise, but you broke yours. You’ve abused the bond between us, and the power I gave you.”

  “You can deny my wishes. You did when I wished for a child!”

  Chanter shook his head. “That threatened your life, therefore I could not grant it, but this merely went against my own wishes.”

  “What does this mean? What are you going to do?”

  “Nothing.” His mouth twisted bitterly. “Mujar never do anything. Isn’t that what you Lowmen say?”

  “How can I make it right?”

  “You can’t. You have destroyed the trust between us. I can no longer rely on you not to wish for bad things.”

  “Don’t be angry, please. I only wanted to save the world, to put back what Tyrander destroyed. Is it so bad to want that?”

  “No.” He smiled and touched her cheek. “But your reasons are selfish and your methods are wrong. You’ve changed. Gone is the innocent, unselfish girl I knew. You want the world restored for your son, and you’ll go to any lengths to achieve that. I’ve done as you wished and made the staff whole. More than that I cannot do, yet you would make me do the impossible, and grow angry when I refuse. If there’s a way to restore the laws, this isn’t it. Once you thought I was a god, now you order me like a servant.”

  Chanter swung away as she opened her mouth to protest, and the rush of Ashmar made her stagger back. The Mujar leapt into the air and transformed into a sleek falcon that arrowed into the cold skies. Talsy rushed to the window to stare after him, her eyes stinging with unshed tears. Travain gurgled and waved chubby arms, smiling. Talsy lowered her head and cuddled him, resting her cheek on his silken white hair. A footstep made her turn as Kieran emerged from the shadows.

  She scowled. “Why were you spying on us?”

  He shook his head. “I wasn’t spying; I just didn’t leave with the others. It seems you’ve managed to do the impossible.”

  Her composure crumbled, and she rubbed her eyes. “He’s right, I did order him around. I was wrong.”

  “Yeah, and you’ve changed, especially since Travain was born. Just remember, without Chanter, he’d have killed you. I know you think he’s perfect, and with him you don’t feel so reliant on Chanter. I know you resent Chanter’s longing for freedom and the fact that he doesn’t love you like a man should, but he’s not a man, and nor, for that matter, is Travain a Trueman baby.

  “You, on the other hand, are a Trueman girl, not a Mujar, and you don’t truly understand him. No one does. What’s more, you’ve allowed yourself to grow bitter because things haven’t worked out the way you wanted.” Kieran sighed and wandered over to the window to stare out.

  Talsy glared at him with a mixture of anger and misery, knowing that he was right, but unwilling to admit it, even to herself.

  Kieran went on, “You’ve got to let Chanter go. You’ve got to accept that he’s Mujar, and let him be what he is. Your ploy to burden him with the responsibility of a child has failed, and that’s made you bitterer. You mustn’t allow your bitterness to colour your fe
elings for Chanter. If you do, you’ll grow to hate him, and neither of you want that. Love him for what he is, and who he is. Love him like a brother, a friend, but don’t be bitter because he can never be the lover or husband you want.

  “I made that mistake with Dancer, and I’ve never truly been able to get over it. I wanted him to be my protector and guide, a second father who would look after me in the woods, because he had all that power. But he didn’t, or couldn’t, and I resented him for that. That’s what makes Truemen hate Mujar. You’re falling into the same trap, the Mujar trap. Don’t you see it? The gods sent Mujar amongst us to bring out the bad in us, and there was plenty to be brought out. Jealousy, envy and resentment, which turned into hate.”

  The Prince turned to her, and Talsy’s acrimony drained away at his soft words, leaving behind immense sadness and self-loathing. She bowed her head over Travain’s downy hair. “What have I done?”

  “Well, you’ve proven one thing that no one knew before,” he said cheerfully, making her look up in confusion.

  “What?”

  “Mujar do get angry.” Kieran smiled. “I’ve never seen Chanter cross before. It was quite an eye opener.”

  His words brought a reluctant smile from her. “He got cross with you when you hurt the sea monster.”

  “True, but it was all over so fast, I barely had time to register it. This time he really read you the riot act.”

  She wiped her eyes. “It’s not really funny. Do you think he’ll ever forgive me?”

  “He already has. He wouldn’t stay mad at his First Chosen, his little clan, would he?”

  Chanter’s pet name for her brought a surge of memories and the special love she held so dear. Smiling, she shook her head. “I suppose not.” Travain grizzled, and she sighed, glancing down at him. “Travain’s hungry, I’d better find a wet nurse.”