Arise

by Tanya Schofield

  Bethcelamin clasped her maid’s hands as they came to a stop before the door to their rooms. “That’s wonderful news,” she exclaimed. “Empty or not, this is a lovely city for such a celebration. These walls have survived countless winters, surely the hand-fasting can still proceed.”

  “I do hope so, Lady.” Bashara pushed open the heavy door. “Mercy, it’s cold. And there’s no wood. Let’s get you settled, and I’ll go fetch some.“

  “Go, Bashara, I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

  “Yes, my Lady.” The maid hesitated only a moment before dropping a quick curtsey and making her exit.

  Bethcelamin moved to the window, looking down at everyone still coming into the city. Melody’s song had reached more people than anyone expected, certainly more than could fit into the common rooms of the inns at which she sang. That she could awaken people who didn’t even hear her sing, Bethcelamin thought, was helpful, but rather unsettling.

  The girl was steeped in power, overflowing with it - protective circles and healing, and of course the rumors of Foley, which she did not deny. Solus had been the most powerful, multifaceted mage of his day, Bethcelamin remembered, but there seemed to be nothing his daughter could not do, or entice others to do.

  Thordike’s initial army had nearly doubled in size, Bethcelamin guessed, and that was with visits to just two towns. She couldn’t imagine their numbers if Porthold hadn’t been deserted, if Melody had been able to sing here. How many could she have awakened? Jayden dismissed the importance of the magic users, of course, though he was happy to take seconds at dinnertime after the vegetable girl joined them. Amarta, she remembered. That was her name.

  Bethcelamin’s own talents were aching to be used, so much that it was uncomfortable not to. She’d heard Melody sing twice now, and the power in her had responded with unexpected intensity. It was a shame she couldn’t ease her own hurts with the magic. She had tried, of course, cold on the floor while Jayden snored under the blankets. The most she had managed was to stop herself shivering, so she could sleep. There was a new sense of peace with her strengthening talents, though, unlike the wrenching fear she’d felt back when she healed Calder. Magic was not a curse, Healing was a gift, and she wanted nothing more than to use it— Jayden would never allow it, though.

  Jayden. Bethcelamin sighed, turning from the window and the sight of snowflakes beginning to swirl. The bed needed freshening, she was sure, and Jayden would want extra blankets - his headaches had returned in force, and he slept better when he was warm, with or without her at his side. She set her jaw against the soreness in her body and began to tend to the bed linens. However much she wished to use the healing power within her, Bethcelamin vowed that it would never again be on Jayden. Whatever the consequences.

  “I do hope you’ve come to apologize.” Thordike rubbed his cold hands together as Jovan and Melody approached. He adjusted his cloak against the wind that seemed determined to snatch it from his shoulders. “Four of my children, Melody. Four. I only have five. Would you have taken Elee as well if she’d gone to hear you, as she begged to do?”

  Melody’s hair whipped in the breeze. “I don’t control who awakens, Duke, or what gifts they manifest. I am sorry, though. I had no idea your children were even there.”

  “It seems they were invited to attend with their mother,” Thordike said, his eyes fixed on Jovan. “Encouraged, even.”

  You didn’t. Her voice in his head was stunned.

  “We don’t have nearly enough Healers.” Jovan kept his spine straight, his shoulders unapologetically squared. “Your wife is one, so it stood to reason her children might be as well.”

  “Well. My little Sophie, it would seem, has proven you correct. She told her mother last night. Congratulations, you’ve just ensured a ten year old girl will come face to face with the brutality of war, and be expected to heal it.”

  Both Jovan and Melody were silent as Duke Thordike continued. Snowflakes began to fill the air around them, whipped into swirls by the wind.

  “Arik has been setting things on fire,” he said, furious. “Last night it was while he slept! And the twins - I don’t even know how to describe what they’re doing, but the fact remains that they are my children, and you had no right to involve them in this.”

  Jovan lowered his head in acknowledgement, then met Thordike’s eyes. “I mean no disrespect, Duke, but they were involved the moment they left Estfall with you.”

  “They are my children,” the Duke insisted. Flakes of snow were beginning to collect in his graying dark hair, and a gust of icy air blew all of their cloaks behind them.

  Jovan stepped to one side and pointed at Melody’s pregnant belly. “And that is my son,” he said, his jaw clenched. “His mother risks everything for this, for all of you. What future will your children have if she doesn’t?”

  Thordike stood silent for a long moment.

  “Rhodoban will help Arik,” Melody said softly, pulling her cloak tight around herself again. “Fire is his specialty. I’m happy to talk to the twins, learn their gifts, and Sophie…”

  “My little girl will not set foot on a battlefield,” Thordike said.

  “She can help Melody when the moon goes full, stay with her when we face Semaj,” Jovan suggested. “There will be no safer place, I guarantee it.”

  “Speaking of safety,” Melody began.

  Duke Thordike held up a hand to stop her. “The scouts have been all over this city, and we can talk about why it’s empty later,” he told Melody, “but I have to get the rest of these people inside and those gates closed before the storm gets any worse. That includes you - we’ll get you set up in the Keep.”

  Jovan opened his mouth to speak, but Thordike barely paused for breath.

  “Yes, there is a Darkmouth here, and yes, I’ve got three layers of soldiers - each with two mages - guarding it, and no, Jovan, there has been no word on the man who attacked Melody. He’s in the wind. Korith insists it could not have been his Captain. I believe that covers everything.”

  Calder approached, bent slightly against the worsening wind. “The soldiers are in place,” he told Duke Thordike. “The scouts have cleared the rest of the buildings. The city was completely empty. Not so much as a body.”

  Duke Thordike nodded. “Excellent, Calder. And the mages?”

  “Two with each unit,” Calder confirmed. He kept his gaze straight. He had been withdrawn since Tregon, barely speaking to Melody - or anyone else - after Attilus’ death. Working for Thordike had given him the distraction he needed. “I checked the library myself, as you asked. It’s clear.”

  “Crestus will be so pleased. If you’ve nothing else pressing, Calder, would you escort him? Someone needs to see that he eats, and doesn’t burn the place down.”

  “I will.” An evening away from the weather, minding the fire while Crestus pored over scrolls - there was no denying the appeal of it, and Calder was grateful. The old scholar preferred the quiet, expected little, and the ranger had found some peace riding by his side this past week.

  He nodded to Melody and Jovan and took his leave.

  “If you will excuse me, friends, I have much to attend to.” Thordike dismissed himself as well. “Oh.” He paused, looking back over his shoulder. “You’ll be at the hand-fasting ceremony this evening?”

  Melody nodded. “We will. They’ve asked me to sing. Nothing magical,” she quickly reassured him. “Just to celebrate.”

  Thordike nodded, and followed the messenger back into the city. Melody and Jovan were not far behind.

  “Don’t I remember Orrin specifically asking for magical singing?” Jovan took Melody’s arm, lending her some of his warmth. He’d spoken with the young soldier himself, the poor man was too nervous to approach Melody directly.

  “He asked for a blessing song,” she corrected him. “That’s different.”

  “Sure it is.”

  22

  Crestus chewed at the side of his thumb, the skin there already ra
gged from previous such attentions. Porthold’s library had been abandoned long before the city itself had been. Duke Derbin had built everything around trade and commerce, he never intended his city to be a center for study and learning. That meant, however, that the knowledge contained within these scrolls had been ignored and overlooked, perhaps for centuries.

  They were also not as secure as they appeared. When he bent to remove one of the larger books from a low shelf, an avalanche of parchment and scrolls had come from above, cascading to the table. Crestus had rescued one scroll from the oil lamp it landed on, then looked at the parchment he’d stopped from falling on the floor, his eyes seeing the words on each … There. There was the answer he had been looking for.

  “I have to wonder exactly what it can accomplish,” Crestus murmured to himself sometime later, tapping a finger on the table as he puzzled it out. The ranger that Duke Thordike had sent to keep him company had slipped away a few moments ago, so there was no risk the preoccupied man might assume the scholar expected a response. “None of the passages make reference to … well of course they couldn’t, could they … not and survive, anyway. Semaj would have destroyed them.”

  The flickering light from the lanterns danced with an unseen breeze, but Crestus barely noticed. He mumbled some more, working out the intricacies of the pronunciation as he looked from scroll to scroll. He scratched on a fresh sheet of parchment what he hoped was a complete, ordered copy of a chant he hadn’t known he was searching for.

  “Crestus?” The scholar did not look up at the ranger’s return, not wanting to lose his place. He ignored the interruption as best he could, hearing only the long-dead language in his mind.

  “I’ve brought you some food,” Calder said. “You need to eat something. It’s close to moonrise.” Still Crestus showed no sign of acknowledging him.

  Calder sighed and put the tray down on the table beside the old man.

  “Scrolls!” Crestus exclaimed, finally looking up. “Watch the scrolls! You must be careful, please!” He glared at the ranger.

  Calder took a deep, patient breath, and lifted the tray clear of the table until Crestus had moved the papers aside. “You must eat.”

  Crestus sniffed once at the stew they’d been eating for days – lean on the venison, heavy on the vegetables – and turned back to his studies.

  “There is no time for eating, young man, there is work to be done.”

  Calder removed the quill feather from Crestus’ hand and replaced it with a spoon in one smooth motion, his expression never changing.

  “Scholars who lose consciousness because they haven’t eaten or slept do not accomplish much.”

  Crestus glared at him once more, but the ranger would not be intimidated.

  “Those scrolls aren’t going anywhere in the next ten minutes, I promise. In fact, I will stand right here and watch them while you eat, just to make sure.”

  Calder crossed his arms, pointedly staring at the papers on the table until the frustrated scholar huffed loudly and dipped the spoon into the stew. The lanterns flickered in another unseen breeze, making the shadows appear to laugh.

  Logannus watched the exchange with amusement. Semaj would be greatly displeased to know that copies of the Breaking and Bonding had survived, if the First Fallen held any intention whatsoever of telling him. Logannus, however, did not.

  He gave humanity full marks for cleverly disguising the chants from Semaj’s eyes, but as valuable as those two were, it would not be enough. Not even with the girl’s power could they hope to defeat Semaj … no, the only hope they had lay with him, the First of the Five. He alone knew that when Semaj had fallen a thousand years ago, the crucial third chant had not been spoken - which had allowed the Lich King to return.

  The Breaking was important, yes, for it broke the connection between Semaj and the enchantments protecting the body. Without The Breaking, the body Semaj inhabited could not be further enchanted, or killed. But killing the body was only the first step.

  Once the body was killed, Semaj could - with effort - possess a new host … unless The Bonding was chanted the moment his body fell. The Bonding would freeze Semaj’s spirit, forcing it to remain with the dead body of his host, trapping it within the remains.

  Semaj would not be able to re-awaken the enchantments that had given the body long life and protection from all harm. He would be locked inside the shell of his host without voice or motion until no part of the body remained to house him. To be sure, The Bonding was a powerful spell, one that caused significant, lasting damage – but even it would not kill what Semaj had created himself to be.

  Logannus alone knew the means to end his Master, the forgotten third chant that was the key. No one knew of The Banishing, not even the elves who had lent their voices and their power to the Bonding so long ago. Only the Five had possessed knowledge of it at all – and none of them had survived to speak it over the remains of the body.

  That was why Semaj had been able to return … time erases all things, and a body in the elements is no exception. A time came when not even his bones remained, and Phelwen Semaj was free once more. Weak, yes, barely even a shadow of his former self, but he was free, and he was patient – and more of a threat than ever before.

  “Happy now?” Logannus watched as Crestus dropped the spoon in the empty bowl, and washed down the final piece of bread with the last of his goblet of water.

  Calder handed over the confiscated quill feather and picked up the tray. “I am delighted. Thank you. Have you any messages for Duke Thordike?”

  Crestus ignored the man’s question, finding that the food had actually improved his thinking – he was seeing the old texts in a whole new light. That passage there, that had to be part of the first chant, you could tell by the use of the evocative tense …

  Calder cleared his throat, and Crestus waved him away.

  “Tell him I am close, tell him I have the answer, tell him whatever you like but please, just leave me to my work.”

  Logannus leaned over Crestus’ shoulder when the other man had gone, watching the quill as it crossed out one passage and began its shaking script anew – this time in the correct order. He nodded to himself, and subtly shifted the scrolls so the pieces of the second chant were close at hand. Crestus never noticed the motion, lost in his translation.

  Whispering soundlessly into the old man’s ear, Logannus repeated the Breaking, then the Bonding, as they had been spoken so very long ago. He whispered the chants over and over, knowing that the scholar’s memory would return the correct pronunciation when the time came.

  Only when he was certain that Crestus would remember did Logannus slip under the crack in the door and move out into the keep. He had business with the girl, but first he needed the true measure of her abilities. The celebration being arranged upstairs would serve as a testing ground.

  “Calder tells me you have answers?” Duke Thordike adjusted his tunic as he entered the library, only slightly out of breath from the stairs. Who put a library in a sub-basement, he wondered. At least it was warmer down here. The blizzard’s raging winds found no cracks to blow through. “Tell me, old friend. What have you discovered?”

  “I’ve cross referenced and double checked, my Lord. Of course, without access to the original I can only make an educated guess, but to the best of my knowledge, I have found the chants used by the Five.”

  Thordike brought his gaze to the endless cramped lines of endless tiny letters on the thick, yellowed paper Crestus was showing him.

  “Chants? You mean magic spells?”

  Crestus sighed, and pointed to a spot on the scroll in front of him. “Here,” he said, impatient. “The reference is obscure, certainly, and the chants are in code – I almost missed it myself. They’re spread out over several different accounts of the Fall, never reproduced in their entirety in one place. It’s all rather clever, really,” he mused, almost forgetting the Duke was there. “The accounts are so woefully inaccurate that Semaj must not have v
iewed them as a threat, and did not destroy them … when you think about it, it was truly a brilliant tactic …”

  Thordike interrupted him. “I’m sure it was. Now tell me, this chant. It will defeat Semaj?”

  Crestus laughed, a thin, wheezing sound. “I said I had answers, my Lord, not miracles. We have no real idea in which order the passages are to be spoken - I think I’ve worked it out but there is no way to tell, and as for where one chant ends and the other begins? I have no idea. No one alive speaks this language, and if pronunciation is a factor – as it has been in the past - translating the text enough to determine speech clues could take the rest of the lives of several scholars. We will have no certainty until the chants are spoken in the presence of the Lich King himself.”

  Thordike sighed heavily, but Crestus continued on.

  “Remember also, it took the combined power of the Five as well as the Elves to use these chants – and at least two of the Five had the power of vocal magic, which is rarer now than it was then. We have neither the Five nor the Elves.”

  Thordike rubbed his temples, pressing hard. “We don’t have the luxury of lifetimes of scholars, Crestus. We are on our way to battle right now, as we speak. I don’t have the time for translations and speech clues … what we have is the girl. There’s your vocal magic.”

  Crestus looked down at the stack of scrolls and parchments spread across the table before him, and then back up to Thordike. He frowned, the wrinkled skin of his forehead furrowing even more deeply. “My Lord …”

  “This chant worked before? It put Semaj in the ground?”

  “Chants,” Crestus corrected him. “There were two, and yes, it worked, but the magic users required—”

  “She’ll get you the mages you need. Put it together, Crestus. Figure this thing out and assemble it, as soon as you can. This is the only hope we have.”