“When you return,” Rusthammer said, “I will take you to where I keep these sacred writings hidden and teach you how to interpret them. I will show you wondrous things.”
With the conversation still echoing in his mind, Qhuin adjusted the covering over his mouth and looked back at the kingsrider to see if the man might have changed his mind as the dust thickened. It did not appear so.
Qhuin felt a surge of anticipation about his future. The feelings of freedom on the road had raised his expectations. Of what, he wasn’t certain, but even as the rush of optimism came, the weight of the iron collar around his neck mocked the hopeful feeling and pushed it from his mind.
Like the unfinished Iron Eagle, it was not yet his time to fly.
CHAPTER 42
Ashar watched in breathless fascination. He strained to hear the thoughts of the Oracle. He’d been taught the ways of mediation and speaking mind to mind, but the intensity of focus it demanded was elusive and difficult. He was distracted by the throbbing from the blow to his head.
Drakkor had been stripped of his armor and wore a simple loincloth. The last rays of sunlight reflected by the copper disc fell over him. He was thick in the chest and narrow at the waist, and his stomach was a rippling of muscles. His skin was stretched tight and looked pale against the dusky bronze of his face. The tail of the black dragon tattoo encircled his neck, then slithered over his shoulder and under his arm. The body of the fire-breathing beast curled from the deep scar of his navel to the hardened muscles of his chest.
Drakkor stood at the topmost point of a pentagram drawn on the floor of the chamber. A stone was placed at each of the other four tips of the five-pointed star: three white stones from the temple and the blackened stone of Drakkor.
Had he not been there in person, watching with his own wide, unblinking eyes, Ashar would not have believed such a ritual could take place in the temple. It was puzzling. He had never seen a pentagram among the symbols engraved on the walls and monuments on the Mountain of God. He remembered Master Doyan’s lesson on ancient symbols; he had said the pentagram was used by the cults of black magic.
There is so much I do not know, so very much.
Ashar’s eyes slipped past Drakkor to the sages held as hostages. From the bewildered expressions of the sages’s faces, Ashar wondered if this was the first time they had seen the “ritual of endless life.” The sages watched with hollow eyes, looking sick and old and more frail than Ashar remembered.
The Oracle has no choice. He is violating the sanctitude of this holy place for them. Ashar looked to Celestine. She was curled against the wall, her legs tucked under, the sacred silk wrapped tightly around her. He is doing this for her.
Ashar’s eyes continued to move around the room. Drakkor’s bandits stood on three sides, swords in hand. Drakkor had ordered his men to slay them all at the slightest provocation.
The ritual was short and mysterious. Drakkor drank an elixir that sent him into a haze of euphoric oblivion. The Oracle began the conjuration with an incantation chanted in a language Ashar had never heard. He finished in the common tongue. “And thus by the power of the ancient secret, it is done.”
Drakkor blinked his eyes and rubbed his temples as if trying to squeeze the fog of the elixir from his brain. He shook his head to chase the dizziness away. “It is done?” His tongue was thick, and his words slurred. “That is all?”
Ashar could see the bandit remembered little of what had taken place.
The Oracle sighed. “Yes, and may the God of gods forgive me for the desecration of the sacred stones.”
Drakkor straightened his back and pushed his fingers through his hair. He faced the Oracle.
Ashar tensed at the inevitable confrontation between the victor and the vanquished. Will Drakkor keep his word or kill us all?
Drakkor opened his mouth to speak, and the room plunged into gloom. The last ray of the sun was swallowed by the endless sea that flowed to the edge of the world. The reflection from the polished brass illuminating the chamber was gone.
Drakkor seemed suddenly seized by a sense of vulnerability. Little wonder, Ashar thought. The sudden gloom of darkness. Standing nearly naked. A brume of opiates still swirling in his head.
Ashar ignited an oil lamp that filled the room in a half-light and cast grotesque shadows onto the walls.
“Gather the stones,” the Oracle said.
Ashar knelt and reached for the black stone first.
Drakkor stooped, gripped his wrist, and plucked the stone from Ashar’s hand. “Put the rest into the box and bring them to me,” he said. “We shall know the truth of this masquerade soon enough.”
Ashar stared into the blackness of Drakkor’s eyes. His face was close, and his breath was sour. The odor of his sweat-soaked body was strong. “Yes, m’lord,” he said, regretting the slip of his tongue. He carefully gathered the other four stones.
Drakkor put on his linen shirt and trousers, then slipped the black stone beneath his padded doublet. “Other than a thousand needles stabbing the backs of my eyes,” he growled as he pulled on his boots, “I feel no different now than before.” He fitted the cuirass of boiled leather to his chest.
“You will sense the change soon enough,” the Oracle said, inhaling deeply and holding out his hand. “You took an oath to return the stone to the temple to be purified and cleansed.”
“Soon enough! Do you take me for a fool?” Drakkor scoffed and continued dressing. “How do I know this is more than a cheap magician’s trick to delay your death?”
Ashar took the stones to the box. As he turned his back, he felt the Oracle touch his leg. The movement was hidden from Drakkor’s view by the Oracle’s body. Ashar glanced down at the Oracle’s open hand. A shimmering of blue behind his eyes. A clarity of thought. He understood what he was to do and slipped the last of the stones into the Oracle’s hand.
“If some great change has taken place, why do I feel nothing?” Drakkor demanded.
“The life of the flesh is the blood, and blood sets the limit of life,” the Oracle said. “You will remain the same, only the essence coursing in your veins will be changed. By the power of the ancient secret and ritual of conjuration, the stones have the power to purify your blood and transform it to the finer substance of enduring life. It takes time. You must be patient. It may not be until morning. You must keep your word and leave.”
“Until morning! You expect me to leave the mountain on the pretense of such babbling? What proof do I have that I have not been deceived? How do I know your white stones are more than cobbles from the brook? Give me a sign.”
The Oracle smiled, and when he turned, the shadowed side of his face fused with the darkness. He appeared to be a mythical creature floating in the air. “Give me your hand,” he said.
The Oracle’s visage gave Drakkor pause, and he hesitated before extending his left hand. In a single, sudden movement, the Oracle slashed his dagger across Drakkor’s palm.
Drakkor whirled away and stumbled back. He seized his long sword from the mound of armor and laid the point of it against the Oracle’s throat. He gripped the hilt with both hands.
The Oracle touched the sword. A cold white light shimmered down the blade, enveloping the hilt and Drakkor’s hands. As the quivering glow radiated between Drakkor’s fingers, he lowered his sword and opened his wounded hand. The lacerated palm was oozing, but there was no blood. A translucent substance shimmering with a thousand tiny specks of light emanated from the wound. As Drakkor stared, the wound healed itself, and the light retreated back into his body.
A surge of wonder and terror passed across his face. He held up the healed hand and turned it slowly. His lips moved, but there were no words. He looked at his men, their faces pinched by superstition.
In the long silence that followed, Ashar studied the Oracle’s face, searching for answers to the questions pounding throug
h his head.
Drakkor fitted the final piece of his armor but could not fasten the buckles, and the straps hung loose. He wagged a commanding finger at Ashar. “Bring me the stones.”
Ashar’s eyes darted to the Oracle.
The Oracle shook his head. “The stones belong in the temple,” he said. “I have given you what you asked, and you have sworn your oath to leave.”
“The stones, boy!” Drakkor yelled.
“No!” the Oracle said, and moved to block the dais with his body.
Drakkor scoffed loudly and pushed the Oracle aside, but as the old man stumbled back, he seized the box and clutched it to his chest.
Drakkor grabbed it with both hands and jerked with such violence that the Oracle was thrown to the floor. The box crashed open, and three stones bounced out like living creatures escaping a cage. The Oracle reached for the stone he had hidden, but it wobbled from his fingers when he fell.
Drakkor stomped his boot on the Oracle’s wrist, crushing it.
Ashar hurled himself against Drakkor’s leg. “Stop!”
Drakkor swept down and lifted the boy to his feet with an iron fist around his throat. “Gather them!” he growled in a voice as feral as his animal eyes. He threw Ashar to the floor, but in doing so lifted his boot from the Oracle’s arm.
Sage Laehus rushed to the fallen Oracle and helped him to his feet. He kept him from falling with an arm around his waist.
Ashar gathered the stones and returned them to the coffer.
“Give it to me,” Drakkor said.
“You swore by your gods!” the Oracle said, stepping forward with the help of Sage Laehus.
“I am my own god,” Drakkor said and took the coffer from Ashar. He spoke to the Oracle in a way that included all present. “You and any one willing to join us are welcome to stay. Otherwise you must leave the mountain before the sun reaches midday on the morrow.” He looked at his hand healed by magic. “Unless, of course, I awaken with no sure sign of the endless life you claim to have given. Then . . .” He shrugged an apology for his murderous threat.
Drakkor put the box beneath his arm and turned toward the door. With a sudden and violent movement, the Oracle lunged forward and grabbed the box, then whirled away.
The room erupted in chaos.
From where Ashar stood, it looked more like a dance than a fight, a graceful ballet that could only end in death.
The momentum of seizing the coffer spun the Oracle in a sweeping arc. Drakkor’s arms followed like ribbons blown by the wind, but his grasp fell short. The Oracle circled the plinth and ran for a portal arch. Drakkor’s reaching hands circled around and returned with the sword in their grip.
Celestine seized the moment of confusion. She sprang to her feet and bounded from the room like a gazelle escaping a lion.
Ashar saw her from the corner of his eye and felt a surge of hope.
Sage Kurgaan struggled up and tried to block Drakkor from chasing after the Oracle, but the warrior knocked him down with single blow.
The old sage cried out, and the Oracle turned back. Empathy was his undoing. It gave Drakkor the one blink of an eye he needed to slash the Oracle across his back and shoulder. The blow would have been fatal had Drakkor not tripped over the toppled dais and stumbled as his blade came down.
The Oracle sprawled forward and landed on the box, his blood running out. He clutched the precious relics to his chest and dragged himself forward.
With the warrior’s attention turned, Sages Armu-Tukic and Laehus grappled to escape the chamber with the wounded Kurgaan. Drakkor’s men chased after them.
With a growling curse, Drakkor scrambled to recover his feet and lifted his blade to end the Oracle’s life and might have but—
Smash!
Ashar pounded a wedge of marble into the side of Drakkor’s head. He had snatched up the broken corner of the dais without the slightest forethought.
Drakkor went to his knees, and the would-be fatal blow of his blade clanked harmlessly on the edge of the archway.
Now I am going to die, Ashar thought. He backed away with the ragged chunk of marble still clutched in his hand. He expected an explosion of anger and slashing sword, but Drakkor remained on his knees, stunned.
Drakkor looked over at the Oracle crumpled in the portal behind him. No longer moving. He raised his fingers slowly and touched the ridge of bone above his temple. There was no translucent flicker of light. No mystical substance of immortality. Only a ribbon of blood.
Drakkor touched a bloody finger to his tongue. His face darkened with the realization. In the same moment, Ashar also understood. The elaborate ritual had been a charade. An elaborate deception by the Oracle to trick the bandit into leaving the mountain. Give them time. Allow them a chance to escape. Get help. Survive. It had failed.
Ashar gulped air to catch his breath and glanced behind him. The Oracle lay as if he were dead, the box of stones clutched to his chest.
Drakkor rose slowly to his feet and twisted his neck with an audible crack. The flickering glow of the oil lamp deepened the hole in his face. “Who are you?” he asked Ashar. His voice was level, soft and deadly.
A conversation with the monster was the last thing Ashar expected. Fear and faith cannot abide. Ashar tried to visualize fear as a creature fleeing from a warrior that embodied faith. He felt a curious sense of courage, but it did not come from the imagined warrior of faith in his head. It came from the broken chunk of marble in his hand.
“I am Ashar, son of Shalatar, postulant to the Holy Order of Oum’ilah, God of gods and Creator of All Things.”
Drakkor laughed. It was chilling and disdainful. “That may be who you think you are, Ashar, son of Shalatar, but you are mistaken.”
Ashar tensed.
“Since I gained the summit of this mountain, you are the only one with the courage to challenge me.” He laughed again, scoffing. No longer chilling. “A boy in a woolen robe with a rock in his hand and the courage to stand against a warrior clad in armor with a sword. You are not who you think yourself to be.”
“You promised to leave.”
Drakkor looked at the blood on his fingers, then turned his hand toward Ashar and raised his eyebrows. “Where is the essence of endless life your holy man promised me?” His words were cold. “There will be more blood spilled before the night is over. Only those who bow will be allowed to live. And what of you, son of Shalatar? Will you stay alive and follow me? You do not belong in the crumbling temple of a mythical god.” He looked to where the Oracle lay atop the box of stones. “With these stones, I will have the power to be King, and as King, I will gather the rest of the stones, and when I am immortal, I will reign as a god on earth. Join me, Ashar, son of Shalatar, and stand beside me in my glory.”
Ashar stood unblinking. Then he set his jaw and shook his head.
Drakkor swept his blade forward and pushed the point of it against Ashar’s throat. “Put the rock down.”
Ashar felt the pinprick of pressure at his throat. The chunk of marble thudded to the floor. Fear splintered through his head like breaking glass. The pressing point of the steel blade made it hard to breathe.
“Where are the rest of the holy stones?”
“I don’t know.” Ashar tried to swallow but his mouth was too dry.
The point of the blade went deeper, and he could feel warm blood trickling down his neck. Tiny sparkles of light fluttered at the edge of blackness as consciousness slipped away.
He was ripped from the edge of darkness by the rattling clank of metal crashing over stone.
A warrior clad in armor smashed into the wall and landed in a broken heap on the pentagram. A second man flew in from overhead as if thrown by a catapult. He landed headfirst on the stone floor. Dead.
The point of the sword against Ashar’s throat vanished, and he dropped to his knees, gasping for
breath.
Drakkor whirled with his sword in both hands. Too late.
Rorekk, the giant, stepped over Ashar in a single stride and grabbed Drakkor by his breastplate. At close range, the sword was useless. Rorekk lifted the bandit off his feet, whirled him in a half circle, and slammed him against the wall. Rorekk was a forearm and a half taller than Drakkor and thicker by twelve stones. Drakkor fumbled for the dagger in his belt, but Rorekk crushed him against the wall a second time.
Three of Drakkor’s warriors stormed into the room. The first of them plunged a short sword into the giant’s side. Rorekk flinched and lost his grip on Drakkor, who tumbled to the floor in a semiconscious stupor.
Rorekk pulled the blade from his side in a rush of blood. He seized his assailant by the wrist and flung him in a circle, like a battle flail of flesh, bones, brass, and leather. The bandit’s airborne body struck the next attacker in a violent collision that drove him face-first into the wall.
The third bandit leaned back to evade the whirling death, then lunged at the giant with his ax. The iron spurs on the boots of the man Rorekk swung like a human flail caught him in the neck and slashed his throat.
Drakkor struggled to his feet with fleeting glances at the giant’s rain of death. He scurried for the door with his back against the wall. The giant whirled the hapless bandit in a third arc of destruction. His iron spurs hit Drakkor in the chest, tearing across the leather breastplate, but not deep enough to wound. He was thrown backward into the passage. As he struggled to regain his feet, he kept one hand over the blackened stone of fire.
Several brigands rushed into the hallway of the sanctuary. One threw an arm around Drakkor and helped him toward the entrance.
Rorekk lifted his human bludgeon over his head and hurled him into the confusion of men who charged toward the doorway with weapons drawn. He didn’t wait to watch the calamity of bodies crashing into bodies but seized the ornate iron door and dragged it shut. The rusty iron hinges shrieked a wailing cry. He dropped the heavy crossbar as the door slammed into place.
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