The Sanctuary Series: Volume 03 - Champion

by Robert J. Crane

  Cyrus felt the smooth woodwork of the bench behind his neck as he leaned back and looked up. Over the pedestal, hanging above the statue of Vidara, was another, this one a grotesque figure, with eight arms and the beak like that of a bird but filled with terrible teeth. It was built to hang from the rafters, and looked like an overlarge spider ready to descend on the nursing likeness of Vidara. As Cyrus watched, it began to lower and lanterns projected light directed by mirrors onto the figure, illuminating it.

  “While I welcome you in her name, I caution you as ever,” the High Priestess said, “to be wary of He that stalks all of the Life-Giver’s children. His threat looms large over all we build in our lives, ready to take us at any time should we be careless or grow ill.” The High Priestess looked over the crowd and locked onto him. “I speak, of course, of the God of Death—Mortus. He reigns from inside the Eusian Tower in his realm,” she continued, “a fearsome place of infinite horror—”

  “It’s not so bad,” Isabelle muttered under her breath as the Priestess continued to sermonize, her eyes off Cyrus now. “Not homey, but I’ve been worse places.”

  “Last time I was there,” Cyrus said, “one of our less thoughtful wizards set the boiling oil on fire with an explosion.”

  Isabelle snickered, drawing a reproachful look from her mother. “I bet that made fighting the hydra a challenge.”

  “Yes, we capped off that expedition with a battle where we fought against the undead skeleton of a dragon I’d killed the day before,” Cyrus said. “It was...interesting. I’d rather not go back.”

  “Agreed,” Isabelle said, sotto voce. “I’ve spent more time in Death’s Realm than anyone living has a right to.”

  “Ever see Mortus himself?” Cyrus nodded toward the hanging statue.

  “No,” Isabelle said with an emphatic shake of the head. “No mortal has, at least not in living memory. I heard tell about a guild a couple centuries ago that disappeared into Death’s Realm; speculation was that he had caught them in the act of pilfering from his treasure room.”

  “I’ve only run that expedition with our old alliance,” Cyrus said. “How does one know if a god is going to be absent from his realm?”

  “Or hers?” Isabelle said, teasing. “There are information brokers that deal in such things.”

  “I don’t know any of them,” Cyrus said. “We’ve been hitting the Trials of Purgatory for the last few months, and of course the Gatekeeper’s grown very sick of granting our requests for treasures at the end of the battle; we’ve flooded the market with the formerly rare pieces of the beasts that live there. We need to look elsewhere for targets to keep our army busy.”

  “You should join Endeavor in the higher realms,” she said with a whisper.

  The High Priestess continued to deliver a soliloquy in the background, but he was not catching much of what she said. His mind raced at the thought of taking Sanctuary into the Realms that were being explored by the most elite guilds in Arkaria. “You think we can handle it?” He regretted it the moment after he said it, cursing himself as weak for even asking, fearing he sounded like he was begging for her approval.

  “Tearing through the Trials of Purgatory at the rate you are, you won’t have much trouble with the upper realms.”

  Chirenya leaned across Vara, who still sat back, her hands folded in her lap. “This is a time for reflection and holy worship, and the two of you are chattering so loud they can hear you in the backmost rows. Shut up!”

  Isabelle made a playful eye roll and obeyed her mother, leaving Cyrus to listen to the words the High Priestess spoke. He felt uncomfortable throughout the service, as if he were there under false pretenses—that they would turn upon him if it were discovered that he was a follower of the God of War. Other than death, there cannot be any god more opposed to Vidara’s principles, Cyrus thought with a well-honed sense of irony. I haven’t been this uncomfortable since Imina dragged me to a worship for Virixia, Goddess of Wind.

  The Priestess spoke in parables, telling a story about a miraculous blessing that was visited upon the people of Elvendom, and Cyrus tuned her out, thinking once more of the Hand of Fear and the threat they posed. If I could find a way to track them down...they must have a headquarters somewhere...or a base in the city...how do you find a secret organization?

  “For those who fear, who doubt, who wonder if she exists and if they should tread her path...I say to you that there are miracles that she has performed and blessings placed around us...you need look no farther than this very Chancel to find her works.” The High Priestess clapped her hands together once more. “I’d like to call forth the children.”

  A few of them came forward, down the aisles as the Priestess descended from the pedestal to sit with them at its base. Cyrus surveyed the room again. It was large enough for at least twenty thousand, if not double that. Children gathered around the Priestess, and she launched into another parable. He watched her gentle, matronly manner with the little ones and then looked back to Vara. Her head was bowed, deep in thought. The clean, angular lines of her face gave him pause. At the moment, dark circles hung underneath her eyes, her hair was tangled and she looked tired and careworn.

  He resisted the urge to put a hand on her shoulder, to pull her close to him. It was not only inappropriate given the setting, but the fastest way to get slapped on the side of the head regardless of when he did it. He remembered the time a year ago when she had kissed him on the cheek, soft and gentle, a quick peck, and he felt the memory of it bring a tingle to where her lips had brushed him.

  My life is tangled beyond belief, he thought. I’m in a Chancel for a goddess I don’t worship, sitting next to the woman who is the biggest enigma I’ve ever encountered. He frowned. Sometimes she seems like she wants me, sometimes I think she’d like to kill me; maybe it’s both. I wish I knew how she felt. He reached up, kneading the bridge of his nose between his fingers. Hell, I wish I knew how I felt.

  He watched the children returning to their parents at the conclusion of the High Priestess’s parable and saw a half dozen walk down the aisle nearest him. Their ears were pointed, but only slightly. Hybrids, he thought. Half human, half elf. His mind drifted to another thought, of he and Vara...and of children...children just like the ones that were passing him now.

  He looked to his right to find her staring back at him, her eyes vacant and with a touch of sadness. “What?” he mouthed, careful to keep from speaking aloud. Chirenya cast him an evil look nonetheless.

  Vara shook her head, expression changing not a whit, and returned to staring straight ahead. He sighed, as close to under his breath as he could, drawing another scathing glare from Chirenya, and settled in to listen to the rest of the High Priestess’s message.

  The worship lasted for a further two hours, during which time Cyrus became more restless. When the High Priestess signaled that the service was at an end, it finished with another procession of dancers leaving the way they came. When the rest of the congregation stood, Cyrus did as well.

  The guards that had been seated around them kept them in place while the Chancel cleared; once it was almost deserted, they were escorted to the entrance. Odellan fell into line behind Cyrus just before the door. “I’ve had some of my people asking questions about the other victims of the Hand of Fear; who their business associates were, what they had in common, that sort of thing. They’ve discovered a link that I’d like to show you—why don’t you stop by my office this afternoon? You know where the government center is?”

  Cyrus nodded. “I’ll do it as soon as I make sure that...” He looked and found Isabelle talking with her mother in a hushed whisper and Vara, still dazed, following behind them. “...everyone is safe and under guard.”

  “Very well.” Odellan fired off a crisp salute and exited the Chancel, descending the steps while Cyrus stopped with his party in front of the pedestal now occupied once more by the High Priestess.

  “Honored guest,” she said after nodding in acknowledgment to
Chirenya, “have you learned more about the light of the All-Mother after today’s worship?”

  “Ah, yes,” Cyrus stuttered. “I’ve learned...much more.”

  The High Priestess smiled, a knowing smirk that gave the first hint of her age. “And remain unconvinced, it would seem.” He started to protest, but she raised a hand to stay him. “Worry not, friend of Chirenya—” Cyrus caught a sour expression on the face of Vara’s mother—“we do not badger the unconverted to believe as we do. Your spirit is your own, and those who seek the Life-Giver must do so of their own free will.” She bowed to Cyrus. “If you come to us a thousand times more as an unbeliever, you will be as welcome as you are this day.”

  “I...uh...” He sputtered, looking for something smooth and articulate to say, something which would encapsulate his feelings about long worship services for gods he didn’t believe in, spearheaded by millenia-old elven women who looked young enough that they stirred the deepest fires of desire in him. He settled on, “Thank you,” and bowed to the High Priestess.

  The High Priestess smiled and turned to Vara. “Vidara’s grace be with you, shelas’akur.”

  Vara’s head snapped up at the blessing. “It has been, since the beginning.” Her voice was dull, dead, but her words courteous enough that they drew a half smile of acknowledgment from the Priestess.

  Cyrus followed Isabelle and Vara back to the waiting carriage as Chirenya lingered to speak with the Priestess. The air was cold now, a brisk winter wind whipping through, with the sun shining but bringing little warmth. As Cyrus shivered, he realized he’d become accustomed to the mild winters of the Plains of Perdamun and forgotten how brutal the cold got as one went farther north. He shuddered to think of how bitter Reikonos would be at this time of year.

  Once Chirenya joined them, the carriage got underway, and they lapsed into another silence, broken only for a moment when Chirenya looked daggers at Cyrus and Isabelle, saying, “You two couldn’t shut up during worship and now you’re dead silent?”

  Vara continued to stare out the window in a placid calm as they wheeled through the streets. Once more, Cyrus looked out his window, trying to keep from mashing Isabelle under his armor while watching the elves in the streets pass by. The squares and avenues were crowded with people, filled to brimming, all of them clad in cloaks and winter garb. No snow was on the ground nor a cloud visible in the sky; Cyrus wondered if it snowed in Termina like it did in Reikonos.

  The clattering of the wooden wheels ground to a stop as they reached the residence. Cyrus once again offered assistance, which was taken by all three women this time; Isabelle with quiet thanks and a smile, Chirenya with scorn and a sudden move to ignore Cyrus, and Vara without comment or emotion.

  Something about the street bothered Cyrus. The houses still showed signs of damage from the night before, with windows broken and facades cracked from the combat that took place inside the house, but something was off. There was an eerie quiet on the avenue, with no sound of pedestrians and only the snorts of a dozen horses to break the silence.

  He watched Chirenya lead the way up the steps, saw Isabelle follow with reserved silence. From the street he could see the living room through the broken glass, and he stared. A ripple of movement passed before the window as Chirenya opened the door, almost as if the window were the surface of a pond, disturbed by motion within.

  He quickened his pace as he followed the women up the steps, and halted as Vara stopped in the doorway, but a moment too late. He ran into her as she stiffened, and he looked around the entryway and realized—the house they were in was not hers.

  Chapter 20

  “What deception is this?” Chirenya’s eyes were aflame, looking around the foyer of the home they had stepped into. “This is nothing like my house!”

  “Sorry,” came an apologetic voice. Vaste stepped from the corner, where he sat at a table playing a card game with two members of Endeavor that Cyrus had seen but did not know by name. He took a step outside and looked through the window. Although the card game was going on right in front of it, none of the players nor the table was visible from the front step. “J’anda came up with a clever idea—use an illusion spell to switch the facade of your house with this one. Anyone who’s passing by won’t notice, and assassins might be fooled into attacking the wrong house.”

  “That’d be a brilliant stratagem, you bloody green idiot,” Chirenya said, grinding her teeth, “but for the fact that I’d like to return to my actual house now, and continue to live in it.”

  “Fortunately, ma’am,” Vaste continued, “I have a plan. And it’s one in which I will be able to accommodate your request, rather than one that would end with your crabby ass being dumped into the river Perda in a sack at midnight.” He smiled so sweetly that it was hard to tell he’d just threatened her. “Follow me,” he said, beckoning them toward the stairs.

  As they descended into the cellar, Chirenya sniffed her nose. “Are you quite sure that this troll is trustworthy?” she asked Vara. “He’s not planning on murdering us in the cellar, is he?”

  “I told you that wasn’t the plan,” Vaste said. “But it is a pleasant thought, isn’t it?” He stopped at the base of the stairs and extended his hand, pointing toward the hole in the wall that the Hand of Fear had created the night before. “Your humble abode, madam. And by humble, I mean I’ve seen mud huts in the troll homeland possessed of more warmth and charm.” He smiled again, pointed teeth displayed in a grin of pure antagonism.

  “We’ve increased security in case the Hand of Fear decides to attack again tonight.” Vaste patted the banister with one massive green hand as he began to climb the stairs again.

  “I want to discuss the security precautions,” Cyrus said, nodding at Vaste. “Meet across the street in a half hour?”

  The troll nodded and continued his climb. Once he was out of earshot, Chirenya frowned. “I thought his people learned to respect their betters after the last war.”

  Cyrus bristled, but it was Isabelle who answered first. “I daresay he does, Mother, which is why he doesn’t respect you.” The healer turned and followed Vaste back up the stairs.

  “Well, I never.” Chirenya walked through the hole in the wall in a huff, and Cyrus heard her feet echo on the stairs in the next room, on her way up, leaving him alone with Vara, who was still inanimate.

  She stood quiet in the dark of the cellar, with only a single lamp to light the room. Her back was to him and she turned, walked through the wall, and made her way to the stairs. Cyrus followed wordlessly.

  They passed the first floor and reached the sitting room. Cyrus followed her to the door of her bedroom, which she entered. She made no move to shut it behind her, so he stopped in the frame as she looked out the window, her arms wrapped around her midsection. Her hair lay around her shoulders, still loose, framing her pale face with a golden outline.

  After a moment of staring out the window, she turned to him. “Shut the door, please.”

  He froze, heart thudding in his chest. “Do you want me in the room or outside the door?”

  She did not turn back to him. “Either is fine.”

  He stepped inside, taking care to shut the door behind him as gently as possible. He turned back to find her throwing her pauldrons on the ground as she unstrapped her breast and backplate. He watched as she slid off her plate metal boots, followed by her greaves and vambraces. Next she shed her chainmail, until all that was left was a suit of clothing she wore underneath it all, a white cloth shirt that was stained with years of the sweat and blood of battle, dark pants and worn leather footcovers that she wore inside her metal boots to protect her feet from wear and callousing.

  She walked from the missing window to the armoire on the opposite wall before Cyrus’s shocked eyes, and opened it after pulling her arms out of her shirt, followed by her head. The worn piece of cloth fell to the floor behind her, leaving her naked to the waist, her back to him. She was careful not to turn lest she expose herself. To the right of
her spine, a scar the length of his hand ran up from the small of her back.

  He stood in muted shock, unable to think of anything clever to say, nor bring himself to any sort of action. He recalled two years earlier, when Nyad had showed a similar lack of modesty, and after coupling it with what he had seen in the Chancel of Life, he realized for the dozenth time since arriving in Termina that he was, again, no longer in Reikonos. Far from it.

  He blinked his eyes in rough disbelief. Years, he thought, since I’ve seen...and now twice in one day...and Vara, of all people...

  “The polite thing to do,” she said in, what was for her, almost a normal tone of voice, “would be to turn around while I change my clothing.” She chose a dress from the armoire, her back still to him, and slipped it over her head, pulling it down until it covered her to mid-calf. “Failing that, you could at least act as though you’ve seen those parts of a woman before.” She reached down, sliding off her leather footcovers and then shimmied off her pants, using the dress to keep her covered.

  “Uhhh...all I saw was your back,” Cyrus said, still struck dumb.

  Vara paused, cocking her head at him. “I was also referring to your unbridled display of lust at the Chancel.”

  He shrugged as a flush crept up his cheeks. “It’s been...a while.” He cleared his throat before speaking again. “I cannot recall ever seeing you in a dress in the years I’ve known you.”

  She looked down as if she were seeing herself in it for the first time. “I haven’t worn one since the day I left to join the Holy Brethren. I can’t recall ever wearing this when I was younger, and it fits marvelously, so I can only assume that either I haven’t grown since I was fourteen, or Mother has been stocking dresses in my size in the closet, hoping someday I would come back to the idea of wearing them.” She frowned. “It’s probably the latter.”

  Cyrus crossed the floor to where her armor lay and picked up the breastplate. It shone, showing none of the wear and beating that Cyrus’s black armor did, even though he knew she had been wearing it for years and through countless battles. He picked up the pieces one at a time from the floor, gathering them together and setting them on the chest at the end of her bed.