Darkness Rising (Ancient Vestiges Book 1)

by Brenden Gardner

  “I do not remember such a thing, knight, please I—”

  “Do you not recall my face?”

  Johnathan stepped forward. He put his hands upon the desk and looked at Daskin. His cheek bones were smashed, his eyes were lifeless and dark, and the hair on his head was falling out. He seemed a husk of a man. “What did the lord commander do to you?”

  “He was… kind. The others, they were… they wanted to know what I sent north but I did not know it. Did not ask.”

  “What did you send north?” Lord Gareth asked.

  “It was pretty. Sparkling. Like a crystal. I only caught a glimpse of it. Sebastien Tiron wanted it.”

  “What was it?” Ser Elin asked. “What did you deliver?!”

  “A sacred relic of the Dalian Faith,” Lord Gareth put in. Ser Elin turned in an instant, and Johnathan saw a hint of knowing even in the darkness. “The Isilians refer to it as an Animus Stone. We call them Spherules of Divinity.”

  Lies woven into lies.

  “Why have I not heard of this before?” Ser Elin demanded.

  “You are not a man taken by faith, Knight-Commander.”

  “Do not proffer that,” Ser Elin exclaimed, rushing to Lord Gareth, and putting knife to the lord steward’s throat. “What secrets does Lutessa hoard?”

  Johnathan stood and watched, hands falling loosely to his sides. He would do Lord Gareth no favours.

  “She wants back what was taken,” the lord steward replied.

  “The lord commander speaks of the same!” Ser Elin shouted, pricking blood upon Lord Gareth’s throat. Still Johnathan did not stir. He saw all the arrogance fade form the lord steward’s face.

  You are not under the protection of the White Walls, nor does the High Servitor hold any power here. On the field, the knights deem life and death.

  “Did you not see the ruins of Serenity? Did you not see the dead? My sons and my love are dead! They were slaughtering the Northlands looking for these treasures. What is it Lord Gareth?”

  “Is it not enough to know that they seek it?”

  “Lord Gareth!”

  “Accounts have the stewards of old sealing them in treasuries. The Voice discovered the seals broken. How I do not know. I am here to reclaim—for the Faith!”

  A truth in lies, though not for the Voice. Nor will she get them if they are ever found.

  “She took everything from me!” Ser Elin wailed. “She will not take anything more. You will tell me what I want or your head will—”

  “Sr Elin,” Johnathan called out. “Let the Voice keep her secrets. The lord commander will not be far.”

  “No, he will not be,” Ser Elin replied, pushing away from the lord steward. His face seemed pale. “Is our path clear to Falen?”

  “We will know soon. I have already sent the outriders.”

  “Good,” Ser Elin clasped a hand on Johnathan’s shoulder. “See to Daskin. I need… time.”

  You will have it, boy. We need you.

  Johnathan stared at Lord Gareth until he could no longer hear the knight’s fleeting footsteps. The lord steward gathered himself before speaking. “We must convince him to head into the forests.”

  “See to Daskin, Lord Gareth.”

  “Did you not hear me?”

  “I heard you. Now, see to Daskin.”

  The lord steward scowled, disappearing into the darkness.

  I do not believe the words, nor would Ser Elin. Vengeance is all that remains to him, and to me. Prophecy, relics, they are meaningless.

  Whatsoever the sorcerers portend.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sacred Halls

  Rachel looked down from the Crystal Throne as the assembled left.

  The priests, stewards, and scholars left in groups or pairs, while the eldest of the orders lagged behind. First Scholar Anastasia looked often to the throne during the session, though the woman was unusually silent and left wordlessly. The Blessed Three were nowhere to be seen. It was a reprieve, but it left Rachel suspicious.

  Father Dominic often spoke for all three of them privily, either in the Voice’s presence, or within Rachel’s own solar. It was always the same argument framed in a new light: heretics should not lead from despair, the Voice betrays Mother God, and Sariel grips the realm anew. Persistent as the old men were, their time was brief, even less when the dark god’s name came to their lips too easily.

  Rachel never tolerated heresy of words or deeds; but she was not lost to the concerns of the elderly priests. The Voice had chosen this course, and as counsel, Rachel vowed to see it through.

  She remained strong, spoke proudly for the Voice, and the holy will of Mother God.

  Young or old, audacious or timid, none had asked any questions of Rachel, and that unsettled her. Although the more she quietly thought about it, the more it fled from her mind. The orders were men and women of faith and divine law. They were not ignorant of the war’s existence, but unless it came to the White Walls, it was no more than a passing dream.

  Even when the news was good.

  The bird that came the previous morning bore tidings that the Northlands were near retaken, save for the port town of Falen; and Ser Elin insisted that it would fall shortly. It was some time since they last heard of exploits, and Rachel wanted to share it with the Faith; she told the Voice that in light of Zelen’s destruction and rumours of mass graves near the forest, that it would instill hope not only for the orders, but the pious who were cramped into the hidden passages underneath Dale. The Voice consented, reluctantly, before leaving to other affairs.

  The last of the faithful departed, and Rachel stood, gathering loose parchments and stuffed them into a worn leather tome. She looked down at an empty Chamber of Judgment and smiled, knowing that some semblance of hope would spread throughout the city, and beneath. It is what we need amid so much doubt.

  The afternoon sun still shone through the tall, narrow windows when she emerged into the Hall of Faith. A handful of scholars lingered, talking quietly to each other. She listened intently in passing. They spoke of the dead in the north falling unto the Mother’s embrace, and the treachery of the Mountain.

  They were details that she dared not share, even if some had rightly guessed it. Ser Johnathan Falenir sent messages in his grim, clumsy hand warning that no man, woman, or child had survived the imperium’s wrath. Some of the dead were buried, others left in mounds, while some still were left as they died, sprawled in terror. Serenity was one such village, and he warned that the Ser Elin’s wrath could not be tempered.

  She did not heed the veiled threat. Though she thought ill of the arrangement betwixt Dale and Lanan, Klara would ensure the fallen knight was no longer an obstacle. At wars end, Ser Johnathan would be a knight and lord protector no longer. The men and women would soon prove their loyalty to the Faith and not to their fallen commanders.

  The realm would return to righteousness.

  She reached the upper floors of the cathedral, and heard rummaging and grunts from across the hall. The door to Counsel El Lucourt’s chambers was half open. The elderly priest was away to the east, and was not expected to return for some time. The Faith Templar were absent, accompanying the Voice on some errand she dared not share.

  Who could it be?

  Rachel opened the door slowly, and the grunts were more audible.

  There was a hunched over white robed figure, and a weathered cane off to the side. There was another grunt, and the turned face of a familiar elderly priest.

  Counsel El was on his knees, shuffling through leather tomes at the bottom of his bookshelf. Rachel wanted to leave, knowing it was not some vagrant or misguided priest in a place they should not be. Yet her own conscience got the better of her. “Counsel El? One of the scholars can find whatever you are looking for. There is no cause for you to be on your knees.”

  The counsel simply grunted again, tossed a tome aside, and picked through another book, ignoring her.

  “Counsel?”

  “Yes,
yes, I heard you the first time, Counsel of State,” he declared haughtily. “I have not had words for you before I left, why would I have them now?”

  The elderly priest often insisted on formality, but Rachel thought the emphasis spiteful.

  The sour old man does not change. “I will leave you to your search.”

  “Ah but wait,” he called out and put the tome under his arm. He held onto the shelf, and pushed himself up. He leaned hard on his cane, and walked with his head down towards the desk; the tap tapping against the rock echoed louder than his laboured breathing. “Now that I have found it,” he slammed the tome now as if it was evidence. “There is a small matter that I would share with you. I would talk with you before the Voice returns. She will not leave us in peace much longer.”

  Rachel did not quite know how the counsel had learned of the Voice’s journey, but priests were talkative, and the most resolute had cracked under the old man’s furtive glance. Rachel took a wooden seat from the corner of the solar, pulled it to the desk, and looked at the elderly priest. He seemed worn and tired, and the few wisps of hair he called a beard was tangled and uncouth.

  The road was not kind.

  Yet that is El, as no one else can be. Frail to the eyes, but fierce when moved, as I do not doubt he will be soon. All these months, I thought to learn more than I did before, but he is unreadable. Lutessa will not move against him either, and I must endure him. He has wells of knowledge from long years, and when news from Zelen reaches the ears of the faithful, his words may move more than the Blessed Three to action. If he could be turned…

  The priest did not say a word; he gazed at her listlessly, eyes fluttering.

  “Was your trip fruitful?” Rachel asked kindly.

  Counsel El’s eyes shot open, fierce and glaring. “I do not take back the words I spoke to the Voice in her chamber before I left. The people of Zelen will return to a lifeless husk. I dare say others will look north and despair. That worm of a man—I will not name the heretic—is a lecherous disease that must be culled. The Voice never understood that, and still does not.”

  Though sudden and jarring, the counsel’s words were a truth that Rachel could not flatly deny. There was much that she begged, urged the Voice and Lutessa to do different, but Rachel’s words made no difference. To speak openly would seem like a betrayal, but the elderly priest was still a problem, even when the fallen knights were dead and gone; if the counsel could be an ally instead, Rachel believed that Voice could be moved.

  “You are not far wrong,” Rachel replied, slowly considering every word. “We would have all been better off three years past if execution—not excommunication—was the will of Mother God. Yet that did not befall us. The Voice had many reasons for her decision—the faithful not least of all. A heretic he is, but useful in his own way. As we have learned.”

  “Are those your thoughts—or hers?”

  It felt like the counsel’s eyes pierced her soul, and he would know a lie from truth before the words were uttered. “You heard my proclamation three years past. I would have left it to the lord protector.”

  “The same fallen knight who brought the unwanted heretic unto the gaze of the faithful?”

  “Yes,” Rachel replied, disgusted. “That man should have been stripped of knighthood. He is fiercely loyal, and his service we will honour. But should we remain loyal to the dog that ravages children against the cries of their master? Ser Johnathan knew what I wanted—we had a like mind, Counsel—and I believed he would put down his mad dog before the faithful.” She sighed. “It was not so. He instead clamoured for forgiveness and mercy. I lost much in that trust. I have long regretted my faith in that man.

  “There is much that we do not agree on, Counsel, but I do not think we should be enemies, not when heretics ply for the Voice’s favour. The differences can be bridged; for we agree on what matters most: the soul of our country and what Ser Elin is doing to it. Zelen was unforgiveable: three years past, and now. I am not a woman of war, but I cannot countenance any justification for burning it to the ground. He must be stopped, but how, when the Voice is so intractable?”

  Counsel El slouched back and fingered his cane. Rachel felt his gaze waver, and wondered if she said too much.

  “Hmm,” the priest grunted. “Faith and state have drifted much apart, though there may be common ground that we can reach, if you are but honest with me; and of course, I shall be honest with you. Is that not agreeable?”

  Rachel hesitated. She thought it was more than the old man’s senility; and she burned with a desire to right the Voice’s poor judgment. “It is agreeable. Ask what you will.”

  “I have not been idle,” the counsel tapped the leather tome with his index finger. “I spent long in our cathedral’s great libraries, then journeyed east and north. There was a young priest who spent long in the fallen knight’s company, taken by sickness not half a year after the war—yet his words were preserved. The words were enlightening; his thoughts contradicting known accounts.”

  “There are always inconsistencies,” Rachel replied, though taking the time to read the text on the tome ‘Tribunal of Sin: An Account of Zelen.’ “Ser Elin stood before all of us, and confessed to his sin.”

  “He was not the only one who sinned that day.”

  Rachel met the old man’s glare: judgmental and sere. What he guessed she did not know. “Do you accuse me of aught?”

  “I simply desire the truth.”

  “You have an account of it.”

  “Ser Elin is an intriguing figure,” Counsel El began, leaning back, propping his cane against the desk. “Sinful and base, ambivalent to works of Mother God. He could not recall what he did to those children. Ser Johnathan accounted for much. Yet the sinner could not. I recall looking into his eyes then, and saw shame and guilt. I thought it was unspeakable to him. He was a man so lost in his guilt, that he could not utter a word concerning it. I let it be for some years

  “Those children, Counsel Rachel, they cried out, screamed; Ser Elin took pleasure in their agony and suffering—or so Ser Johnathan told us. Our Voice was an orphan, you know that. It seemed strange to me that she would not demand death of a man who tormented innocent children, and who very well could do so again.

  “I looked and looked, and I came upon the writings of Father Staven. He casts a very stark depiction of the knight. I will not regale you with the praise he heaped on the man, but of a single passage I will illuminate.”

  The priest reached into his robes, pulled out a palm sized booklet, placed his forefinger on an open page and began to read. “‘Though we are pushed back to Zelen, I have not lost my faith. Ser Elin came to me tonight, to offer prayer. I could not help but see him so downcast, so I asked him what was the matter. ‘I am aggrieved for what I must do, yet I see no other choice. Brave men and women will die tomorrow.’ Yet there is hope, I implored. To which he said, ‘Hope is fleeting if but Mother God does not shield us.’ You are Her warrior, I said, you go with Her blessings. ‘If I am,’ he said, ‘I will die in Her defense long from Her walls, in the heart of the forest, where the fighting will be fiercest.’

  “There is more from the day that he sinned. ‘The city is in ruins, though the Trechtians have been pushed back. I asked Ser Johnathan if I could but go to the cathedral, he said no, but would say no more. I needed to be in the halls of Mother God, though I would not gainsay the lord protector. I waited, and asked near every hour, and the answer was always no—until the hour of dusk. Ser Elin returned to the city. I saw him shoulder past the knights who barred the cathedral. We all chased after him, and looked in horror. It looked like bundles burnt to a crisp, small, with hands and feet. Of men there were, piled throughout, like a great mound of the dead. Before the alter to Mother God stood Lord Commander Rafael Azail. He let his helm drop to the ground, turned, and I had never seen such a pained face in my life. He said but a few words: ‘The deed is done. I could not; it was too much.’

  “‘I saw Ser Elin storm acro
ss the room, throw his sword aside, and he struck the lord commander across the face and he crumpled to the ground, screaming out in despair and terror. I turned to Ser Johnathan in hopes to find some absolution. His eyes were down and I heard him mutter a few words, ‘May Mother God forgive us all.’

  “Father Staven was the only man of the four to face the grave,” Counsel El tossed the journal on her lap. “There was a pact between the three men, and I would know what it is.”

  “I do not know,” Rachel replied, swallowing a lump in her throat. “I was not there.”

  “If you will not be honest with me, I will tell you my thoughts,” Counsel El declared, leaning forward. “The war had turned south, and a final gambit had to be made. Rafael did what we could not, and Ser Elin took the fall, for he had final word on all matters. You and Lutessa saw the need in your perversion of faith, but could not execute the man, so you left him alive, excommunicating him. You two are heretics before Mother God.”

  “How dare you!” Rachel declared, standing up. “How dare you accuse me of such an act! I love this city, this country, and the Faith more than I could ever put to words. I spent long, long years in the stone walls of a monastery, more in the libraries, and then leading this country alongside Lutessa. Every waking moment of my life is to Mother God and Her servants. What madness possesses you, Counsel? You would cast death upon the Ser Elin in one breath, then accuse me of plotting his downfall? Speak!”

  “Ser Elin had command, and deserved death for his role, but so do you. They are dead. The children who did naught. There is more at stake than victory, but the soul of a country. The soulless shall not reign o’er Mother God’s flock.”

  Rachel was speechless. The counsel did not understand what was at stake, the choice they had to make, and the sentence he cast upon himself. Rachel would just have to wait for Lutessa to return. Then the counsel would die. Ser Elin Durand and Lord Commander Rafael Azail would perish in the war, and Ser Johnathan Falenir would not speak of it, however distant he became.