by Lakshman, V.
Duncan looked across the hills, his pale eyes searching for anything out of the ordinary, but only verdant knolls and grassy plains stretched out before him. Dirt paths cut lazy trails around various irregularities in the terrain, the only sign that anything lived here at all.
Then something impinged on his senses, a vibration just under his skin. A change in the air that he was instantly attuned to, like a chord being struck, but one that could not be heard. His skin began to bump, as if he were cold, and the world paused.
“You should not have come.”
He spun toward the voice, lightning already flashing at his fingertips. It sputtered and died when he saw who greeted him. Staggering back to fall to one knee, he held up a hand in disbelief and choked out, “H-how?”
The figure of a woman stood before him in simple white robes. She’d materialized from thin air, flowing toward him like a ripple that solidified with heart-rending detail. He looked at her, unable to comprehend the sight before is eyes, and felt his composure break. “She said you were captured…”
Sonya Illrys, wife to Duncan, looked down upon her husband and said, “There’s nothing but pain and grief for you here.”
“What?” he said, tears blinding his sight. “How are you here?”
The shade looked down at him. “Duncan, you must not follow this path.”
He turned to her then squeezed his eyes shut and opened them again, wiping away tears. The apparition had not disappeared, so he answered the last thing he’d heard. “What? It was only for you that I have dared—”
She held up a hand and he felt himself grow smaller, somehow weaker. “You cannot achieve your goal.” She looked at him with pity in her eyes. “I’m lost. What you see is nothing more than a shade.” Then she tilted her head and said, “I beg you, do not seek me out.”
Duncan looked her uncomprehendingly. This was too much, and he understood less and less of what was happening. She looked exactly as he’d remembered, exactly, yet this was not the reunion he’d envisioned. For what then, had he sacrificed everything?
Anger replaced loss and in a voice edged with obsession he looked up and said, “No! I did not come this far just to abandon you.”
Sonya looked around the small area Duncan had been sitting in, then knelt near him—but not close enough to touch—and said, “You’re not abandoning me. Leave this world and me to my fate.”
“No!” Duncan slammed his fist into the ground and lightning exploded across the landscape like a tidal force of energy, magnified by the very potency of the Way here. It blasted outward with a thunderclap’s crack, ripping through earth and trees, a detonation of grief echoing across the hills. Something about the act restored some of his mental balance, his anger and frustration finally having release. His shoulders sagged forward, but slowly he braced himself and rose to his feet.
Sonya still knelt in front of him, untouched by the devastation that spread out from him. Even her white robes remained unblemished from his violence. Duncan stood in the center of a shallow crater of ruin made by his own misery.
“There’s nothing for you here.”
“Nothing?” he asked incredulously. “What about you? What about our son? What has happened to you?”
The shade of Sonya did not react until Duncan mentioned their son. At that, her eyes met his own and she asked, “What do you mean, our son?”
Duncan was unprepared for the vehemence underneath her question and stood there, dumbfounded.
“What do you mean?” she repeated, insistent. “Our son is safe. I saw to that.”
The fact that he was talking to his wife called to question his grasp on reality. Her presence took him to the realm of the surreal. He could not parse her here with the contradiction of her having been lost for so long. Her questions, thrown at him, did not help. He shook his head slowly, backing up a step, one hand coming up to cover his eyes. This could not be real. This was not Sonya, was it?
“What do you mean?” she asked again and he knew from his own familiarity with her voice she’d reached her end. There was no compassion or sympathy, only dire undertones speaking of accusation and hate, as if she understood what he feared most. He’d come to believe he was to blame for abandoning her so long ago. Now judgment would fall again at his feet, but this time for losing their son.
“She has him…” he trailed off, feeling at fault. He had overlooked something, made a horrible mistake, of that he was now sure. There would be no reprieve, no reunion. Hope fell away, sifting out of him as if his soul were an hourglass about to run empty.
“She?” Sonya stood now, coming to within arm’s reach of Duncan. “Lilyth?”
When he nodded she exclaimed, “Curse your eyes, Duncan! I had him safely away from here!”
At first he accepted it. Guilt had thinned any shield he might have had used to block her denunciations. Her words stabbed into him like a blade through skin as thin as parchment. He knew the list of his failures intimately, starting with the sight of an arrow protruding from her chest. Duncan turned to her with sorrow, its marks chiseled into every feature on his face.
Then something in him changed. Whatever had bolstered him, had carried him through these centuries in search of his family, had also given him strength in the face of adversity. His mind, now clear and able, saw a glimpse of the truth. Her accusation hurt as only the words of a loved one could, by cutting to the bone. Yet the truth was, he had never given up. He had never released himself from the duty to save her, not for these two centuries, and that simple fact lent him strength.
In a voice rising in anger he exclaimed, “Safe? I did not know he survived until today… when Lilyth told me!”
It was Sonya’s turn to step back, her anger quickly turning into confusion. “I found a safe place. He was sent from here, through a rift, back to Edyn.”
Duncan’s anger bled out, his eyes downcast with misery. He could feel all of this as if he sat outside himself and watched his own actions like an actor in a play. His body walked slowly away from Sonya, out of the devastated area. He didn’t look back to see if she followed. He walked a few steps farther then said aloud, “I haven’t seen you for almost two hundred years and the first thing you do is tell me to leave.”
“I… would spare you the pain of finding me.” Her voice floated up, still some distance away.
When he turned to look at her, she was looking down at the earth, her form echoing grief and shame. At least, he imagined it was, and knew it could be wishful thinking on his part. Some part of him, small and perverse, wanted her to miss him as much as he’d missed her. Instead he asked, “What are you talking about?”
Sonya looked up at him, and for a moment he saw love in her eyes. It sent his heart fluttering, but quickly her face crumpled into sadness and she held a hand up to her mouth, stifling a sob.
Then she asked, “What does Lilyth want?”
Duncan looked away. “Kill Valarius and we get back our son.” He said this dejectedly, sitting down with the burden of the years weighing on him like never before. He crossed his arms over his knees and rested his forehead, wishing to be somehow awakened from this bad dream.
It was Sonya’s turn to be silent, her expression one of shock. Clearly she’d not expected that Lilyth would move with such alacrity. After a few moments, she turned to Duncan and asked, “Why does she think you can succeed?”
He laughed, a short bark that echoed out into the still air., “It’s good to know you still worry about me failing.”
Sonya didn’t reply right away. She was still, then asked quietly, “You would have to enter Avalyon… how?”
“There’s a dwarven prisoner I’m to rescue. Lilyth felt Valarius would be interested and allow me entry.” He fell onto his back, crossing his arms over his eyes. He could feel Sonya move up next to him.
“Do you know Lilyth has Aten?”
“Aten?” he asked, moving an arm out of the way to look at her with one eye. “That’s our son’s name?”
Sonya tilted her head at him in assent, the gesture so familiar it drove him to move his arm back in place, a futile attempt to blot out the sight of her. His mind could finish every feature on her face even if he were blind. The only thought that intruded now was it wasn’t fair.
“It was what I named him when he was born. After he went through the rift to Edyn, it was impossible to see him directly, yet I followed his life. It was not much, bits and pieces of moments with those I thought could protect him best.”
“And who was that? Clearly not his own father,” Duncan said, unable to hide his frustration and disappointment.
With a sigh she explained, “The Galadines were thorough, but some managed to escape. When Alion Deft was killed, rumors said Captain Dreys survived. Much was put in place so that our son could find a way to him.”
“Then you must have known I survived the king’s hunt too,” he said, acid still in his voice. “But you didn’t trust me.”
The shade of Sonya did not respond to his condemnation. Instead, she took a breath and said, “You were consumed with revenge, Duncan. Captain Dreys tried to find a place safe from the Galadine law.” She waited, then added, “You always trusted him.”
He propped himself up and met Sonya’s eyes, confused for a moment at the mention of Deft. He’d killed the magehunter who had brought such misery and ruin to the land. Did all the dead come to life here? If so, his seeming victory over her was being fed to him now a bitter mouthful at a time. “You’re telling me Alion Deft still lives?”
Sonya slowly nodded but explained, “For the most part anyone who dies is gone. However, there are a few who have, through deed and action, become legend. And legends find life here. The more people who believe in you, the more likely it is that you will appear here.”
She was quiet, then said, “It is why I’m still here… your belief in me.” Sonya dropped her gaze, unable, it seemed, to look at him anymore. Then she changed the subject and said, “Dreys’s sons lived. They found an isle far from the king’s lands, one protected by the Conclave of Dragons. I could think of no better place.”
Duncan felt a sudden fear form in the pit of his stomach, a hollow feeling he knew had a reason to be there, though it was still nameless. Trepidation replaced bitterness, and he asked, “Do you know our son’s name?”
Sonya looked down. “I… they named him Arek. I sent him to—”
Duncan bolted up, staring at his wife with wide eyes. For the second time in their conversation he felt his mind go numb, racing through his conversation and mindread of Silbane. He’d been so close! The boy had been within his grasp if not for that idiot Kisan. Her interference stopped him from taking Bara’cor and reuniting with his son!
An unspoken part of him recognized that he was being unfair. He would not have known Arek was his son, but anger flared nonetheless, so much so that he could feel the world respond with a tremor. More anger and demons would appear, though he understood from Valarius’s teachings that his Ascension with Scythe was proof against possession. Though death was still on the table.
Too much, he told himself. He breathed in, calming himself, finding balance in the Way. Finally, he uttered, “I know a boy named Arek. As common as that name is, this particular boy was trained by monks in an isle secluded in the Meridian Sea, under the leadership of Themun Dreys. The boy is apprenticed to a man called—”
“Silbane,” Sonya finished for him.
“By the gods,” he said to himself. “You’re telling me Arek is my son?”
Sonya did not respond at first. Then, in a voice edged with anger, she responded, “Yes, and you do not understand the danger.”
“Then explain it!” he exclaimed, frustrated and confused. What was going on here?
“Our son may mean the end for all of us.”
Duncan let out a heavy sigh and said, “You’ll have to explain—” he paused and his eyes narrowed—“about Arek and you.”
Something in his stance must have gotten through. Sonya seemed to agree, her hands coming together in a white-knuckled clasp. Duncan knew this was a sign she was uncomfortable, and waited patiently. Saying anything now would only make her defensive and cut their conversation short.
So he waited, drinking in every detail of her as a way to distract himself from the implausibility of this moment. No matter the fixation of his centuries’ long quest, nothing had prepared him for this outcome. He wondered again at her anger toward him, and her seeming disinterest at being rescued. Clearly she had found a way to live here, perhaps she’d come to even enjoy this world, perhaps enjoy Valarius’s company. The gods knew how much time had passed for her.
“Our son is special,” she started slowly, her voice almost a whisper. Her eyes darted up to see if Duncan was listening, then she continued, “He was born here, and because of that something of this place infused him, like a changeling.”
“How did you survive the birth, or for that matter, the arrow from our king?”
Sonya looked away, her hands unconsciously covering the site of the wound. “You know I fell through the rift. Valarius’s elves found me. They delivered our son, and nurtured us back to health.”
“So Lilyth wasn’t lying when she said Val lives?”
“He’s powerful and has dedicated himself to destroying the Aeris.”
“What else is new? He’s a Galadine, and they seek war. Calling him arrogant is being—”
Sonya held up a hand, interrupting, and said, “You do not understand. He has dedicated himself… It is all he thinks of, the eradication of the Aeris. His obsession has become his faith, and faith here has power. Our son was born here, a place powerful in the Way. As a changeling, he has more power than you would believe. Valarius did something, something that changed Arek, made him even more powerful.” Sonya stopped, then added carefully, “Belief here begets reality. Val believed our son to be his weapon against the Aeris, and the boy was shaped by that faith. Something of the Galadines, their power, their hunger, is within our son.”
Duncan breathed out through his nose and closed his eyes. Rai’stahn had said as much, but his own consuming obsession had made it hard for him to focus on the dragon’s words at that time. Now they came back to him with a vengeance. Still, he could not give up his quest for her and asked, “Why don’t you want to be rescued?”
She did not answer his question, but instead insisted, “If Arek is killed here in Arcadia, it will not mean just his death.”
“What are you talking about?” he replied, now confused.
“Duncan, our son is a weapon. If he dies here, both our worlds will perish.”
Nephilim
Pride is the blood of the fallen ones,
Dark wings spread from shoulders that in life were smooth and unburdened.
- Duncan Illrys, Remembrances
Arek and Niall had been following the escort for what felt like the better part of the day, the sun’s slow crawl across the sky somehow out of step with how long it actually felt they had been walking, but still their only measure of time’s passage. They stood at the center of a double column, with wingblades serving as outriders ahead, behind, and to the flanks. These streaked by quickly, darts of blue-green color flashing in the bright sunshine with trails of dirt kicking up into lines of dust behind them. To Arek, they and their riders seemed like one object, swooping across the land like low flying birds of prey.
This world was different, so much so that Arek had a difficult time cataloguing it all. He knew his eidetic memory was fine, but that was more for anything written down. Scenery, especially new areas and places, were harder to remember. Most incredible were the islands floating in the sky. He’d seen the specks earlier, but it wasn’t until one loomed up over their horizon and then sailed overhead that the vast difference between here and Edyn hit him. Seeing it somehow made him feel small and insignificant.
“What are you thinking?” Niall said, looking at him with worried eyes.
Arek gestured with his chin to a
copse of trees in the distance. “We’ve been making our way in this direction for some time now. Do the riders seem more anxious?”
Niall shook his head. “I’ve noticed more of them, though. What do you think it means?”
“Their patrols are switching from scouting to setting up a perimeter.” Arek said, pointing. He showed Niall where some of the scouts had stopped to hold a loose circle around the copse he’d indicated earlier. Then he said, “The henge Gabreyl mentioned.” To Niall’s inquisitive look, he shrugged and asked, “What else?”
“What’s a henge?” Niall asked quietly, his question directed discreetly to Arek alone.
“A circle of stone or wood set inside a depression,” Arek explained. He recited this by rote, his memory delivering the fact with reliable certainty. His training had prepared him for much outside the Isle, and now it showed.
Was royal training within the various combat schools as comprehensive? Somehow Arek doubted it, yet he said, “It’s good to ask. Some people don’t have the courage to say when they don’t know.”
“Father said I’d probably lose my kingdom over a math problem.”
Arek laughed at that, knowing his friend didn’t mean it as a joke, but it was funny nonetheless. Then he noticed that as he’d predicted, the riders had created a cordon around what could now be discerned as a circle of trees around what looked to be a basin in the ground.
“Yeah, but I know what they’re doing now,” Niall said, sounding as though he was trying to redeem himself.
Before Arek could respond, Gabreyl swooped in and landed lightly, his face set in a smile that seemed to want to convey that all was well. He fell in pace beside them and said, “We near our destination. The riders act as sentinels while we travel to Avalyon. The highlord will be most pleased to see you both.”
Arek looked around, then back at Gabreyl and asked, “Where is Sparrow?” He had not seen the rider since they had started their journey and though the sun indicated only a half day had passed he felt as if they had been walking for far longer.