The Return of the Sword

by Roger Taylor

  ‘What do you make of this?’ Hawklan asked the felci.

  ‘Nothing good. Sumeral’s taking shape again, somewhere, and He’s struggling to return.’

  Hawklan felt as though he had been suddenly plunged into icy water. For an instant he could hear nothing but his own heartbeat, and his vision was filled with Dar-volci’s triangular head. The felci’s mouth was moving. ‘Arash-Felloren stinks of His presence.’ A matter-of-fact tone helped draw Hawklan out of his shock and back from the memories of the war that were suddenly threatening to overwhelm him. ‘It must have been one of His citadels once – ancient, corrupted roots. And those damned Kyrosdyn nearly brought Him back, using Pinnatte.’ He chattered his teeth angrily, then scratched himself. He was silent for a moment. ‘You know, I’m not so sure that mightn’t have been a bad thing, now I look back on it.’ The expression in Hawklan’s eyes turned from shock to incredulity, but he said nothing. ‘Whatever the Kyrosdyn had turned Pinnatte into, it was unstable. Very unstable. It couldn’t have lasted. How it ever came to be defeats me.’ Dar-volci’s tone became briefly ironic. ‘Andawyr would probably be able to show you a calculation proving it these days, but all you needed to feel it was to be there. Ask Atelon. I think if He’d taken Pinnatte’s body it might have doomed Him utterly. Still, ever impetuous, we went and leapt to the rescue, didn’t we? And Pinnatte’s a nice enough lad in his way.’

  Hawklan was hoping he would be able to accuse the felci of playing some dark, mocking fantasy for him, but it was patently not so. Even Dar-volci’s sense of humour was not so dark. Hawklan dropped his head into his hands and shook it slowly. It was some time before he could speak.

  ‘You talk about it very casually. I can hardly bear even to think it.’ He looked up into the night sky, after the fleeing sparks. His face was pained. ‘It can’t be true, surely, Dar? You’ve made a mistake. How can He return?’ He knew the questions were futile. Dar-volci would not have spoken as he had without being certain. Nevertheless Hawklan had to ask them. They were part of his way towards acceptance. ‘At least, so soon after He was . . . destroyed. There were countless generations between the First and the Second Comings.’

  Dar-volci allowed no relief. ‘We don’t know how long He’d been in Narsindal before we learned about Him, do we? It was Oklar’s folly that exposed Him, not our vigilance. Nor do we know what brought Him back or in what form He came. But Derras Ustramel wasn’t built and the Uhriel weren’t resurrected and sent out to infest the world in any short span.’ The felci’s summary was coldly accurate. It was not new. The manner and moment of Sumeral’s return had been the subject of much debate amongst the Fyordyn and their allies after the war. It could not be otherwise for, however and whenever it had happened, it was a devastating measure of their failure to meet their ancient responsibilities.

  Hawklan stared silently into the fire.

  ‘It can’t be, it can’t be,’ he said, more a plea than a statement. ‘All those people killed. Every kind of suffering. Suffering that’s still with us – endless consequences. I doubt there’s anyone who was involved who doesn’t have some memory of the war return to them every day. We couldn’t fight Him again, not like that. It was supposed to be over. He was destroyed before He gained His full strength. He destroyed Himself. Scattered Himself who knows where?’

  ‘Precisely,’ Dar-volci said. ‘Who knows where? From the very beginning no one ever knew what He was, where He came from, or why He was the way He was. All that even Ethriss knew was that, like himself, He had come from the beginning – the Great Searing. That, and the fact that He would return, though he never said how he knew that. I suspect he just guessed. But return He did. And He’s coming yet again if we don’t find a way to stop Him.’

  Hawklan’s thoughts flailed. ‘Perhaps you and Atelon defeating Him in Arash-Felloren may have destroyed Him.’

  Dar-volci shook his head. ‘We thwarted Him, that’s all. I sensed no destruction. And the destruction of such a thing I’d have felt, I know. Now, in addition to what happened to us, we have Vredech’s experience. Dacu’s told you, I presume?’

  Hawklan nodded. ‘His friend – Cassraw, was it? – was possessed by something and tried to possess others through some kind of demented religion . . .’

  Dar-volci interrupted him, his manner emphatic. ‘Always His favourite way, religion, you know that. The easy way. Ignorance masquerading as certainty. Endless opportunities for all manner of horrors when that kind of claptrap’s poured into the minds of the weak and the gullible.’ He uttered a low whistle. ‘You’re easily led, you creatures. Then there’s what happened to Thyrn. These things aren’t coincidences.’

  ‘You think Thyrn has been touched by Him also?’ Hawklan said warily. ‘That it was Sumeral who took possession of this man who employed him?’ He searched for the name.

  Dar-volci found it for him. ‘Vashnar. Some kind of high-ranking government official.’ He stretched, then curled up again. The tension in his voice was replaced by thoughtfulness. ‘I don’t know about Thyrn. What happened to him feels similar but very different at the same time. Whatever it was that possessed this Vashnar character used the Power, if Thyrn’s description is to be trusted – and it is, as you’ll learn when you get to know him. But there’s something in the way he talks about it. It’s because he’s a Caddoran, I suppose. He reproduces what he’s heard with great subtlety. It’s remarkable. You must have him tell his own tale to you personally, you’ll understand what I mean then. When I listen to him talk about Vashnar and the power . . . the entity . . . whatever it was that was driving him, I get the feeling of something . . . truly ancient . . . something that perhaps comes from a time before the Great Searing. It’s very odd. Very disturbing. I can’t put my claw on what it is but I can’t shake it off.’

  Dar-volci was not normally given to uncertainty and his hesitation added to Hawklan’s unease. He risked an element of levity in his reply. ‘You can attend to that, then. You felcis are supposed to come from a time before the Great Searing, aren’t you?’ he said, unclear himself whether he was being serious or not.

  ‘We do,’ Dar-volci replied flatly. ‘Or our line does, to be more accurate.’ His half-closed eyes opened suddenly, bright, wide and challenging. ‘How do we know such a thing, you ask? It’s buried deep in the spiralling knowledge that lies at the heart of every least part of us.’ Then he responded to Hawklan’s need, becoming ironic again. ‘But I’m afraid we don’t have it written on a piece of paper somewhere to show everyone,’ he said, his manner heavily confidential.

  Hawklan laughed, grateful for the humour, though it served only to dispel briefly the darkness into which Dar-volci’s original analysis has plunged him. As he pondered it now he saw that, in many ways, it was a darkness that had perhaps been growing since the war itself. It was quite separate from the pain and the suffering he had seen and tended. That was something he had been able both to accept and yet detach himself from. That was a necessary part of his lot as a healer. This was different. It was unclear, ill-formed. It came from another place within him and it hung around the words that Sumeral had spoken to him as, Ethriss’s Black Sword in his hand, he had run along the causeway across Lake Kedrieth and towards the mist-shrouded fortress of Derras Ustramel to destroy this returned abomination.

  ‘Greatest of my Uhriel,’ He had called him.

  Whenever this memory returned to him, he was running again on that dank and empty causeway with no sounds about him other than his own soft footfalls and the icy lapping of the lake. A coldness had possessed him as Sumeral’s voice had rung through him, as beautiful as it was fearful.

  ‘Greatest of my Uhriel.’

  Every part of him had screamed out in denial. This could not be so! Had not Ethriss’s own hand snatched him from the point of death on an ancient battlefield of the First Coming to bring him to face Sumeral in this time?

  ‘That hand was mine, Hawklan. Ethriss spared none of his creations. I saw your true worth and took you to be mi
ne when I should rise again.’

  Soul-shaking words.

  ‘See your inheritance and deny it if you can.’

  Then had come His vision of Ethriss’s world and those beyond, and how they were to be remade in His image. Flawless, perfect, without the least impairment. Even now, it lingered hauntingly in Hawklan’s thoughts, though he rarely spoke of it. He seemed to have no ability to go beyond it, to question it. It was there. Finished. A totality.

  And with the memory came another. One that racked him. Numbed by Sumeral’s revelation, and tempted by His words, he had let slip the Black Sword. ‘Ethriss’s cruel goad.’ That had been a deed of the profoundest folly, he had come to believe, though any reason for this certainty was denied him. He needed no sword in this now-peaceful world, and even if he should there were countless in the Armoury at Anderras Darion that would serve him perfectly well. Yet something that was a part of him had been lost.

  He felt his hand opening and the Sword tumbling from it. It could only have fallen into that grey, cold lake, surely? But he remembered it falling for ever, through the darkness, falling, falling, until a ringing chime had signalled . . . what? He tried to rationalize what he had heard. There had been so many other sounds dinning through that dank Narsindal greyness as Sumeral and his great fortress had been destroyed. It could not have been as he remembered it. Yet . . .

  ‘At the lakeside again?’ Dar-volci’s voice shattered his reverie.

  ‘Despite your denials, I still think you read minds,’ Hawklan replied, looking up.

  Dar-volci shook his head. ‘I prefer both depth and quality in my reading.’

  He spat into the fire.

  ‘Bad taste in your mouth?’

  ‘At the lakeside again,’ Dar-volci said sourly.

  ‘Do you think we’ll ever leave it?’

  Dar-volci’s firelit eyes glinted at him. ‘I left it that same day,’ he said. ‘I only go back because you’re still there.’ He shook his head with an irritated growl and spat into the fire again.

  Hawklan bowed apologetically. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘But I value your company.’ Then he heard himself saying, ‘I shouldn’t have dropped the Sword.’

  For a timeless moment, there was nothing anywhere save the man and the felci by the fire, hovering in a universe of absolute silence. Dar-volci slowly inclined his head.

  ‘Well, well, well. It’s taken you some time to say that, hasn’t it?’

  Hawklan let out a long breath. There was a feeling inside him such as a vast and still ocean might know as the unseen forces holding it imperceptibly eased past a point of balance and turned its smooth rippled equilibrium from ebb to flow.

  ‘I think you may be right,’ he said.

  ‘You’re not contemplating sending another batch of poor volunteers out to plumb that foul lake, are you?’

  Hawklan hurriedly disclaimed that notorious enterprise. ‘Fortunately that was never my idea. Besides, wherever it is, it’s not there, I’m sure of that now. It’s gone as mysteriously as it came.’

  Dar-volci turned towards the tent where Vredech and Pinnatte were lying. ‘Somewhere else, eh? Like our two friends, perhaps? Maybe they’ll come across it for you.’

  A companionable silence settled between the two. Dar-volci eventually broke it. ‘Do you ever have the feeling that at some deep level everything is coming apart, unravelling?’

  Hawklan gave him a perplexed look.

  Dar-volci stood up and shook himself. ‘It doesn’t matter. Just a fancy. I’m sure if anything’s amiss it’ll show itself soon enough.’

  ‘Andawyr says he feels things are not so much coming apart as coming together,’ Hawklan said. ‘You, Atelon, Thyrn, all the others, suddenly appearing with your frightening stories, is going to give him even more to think about.’

  ‘Andawyr’s at Anderras Darion?’

  Hawklan catalogued. ‘And Yatsu and Jaldaric. And Yengar, Olvric, Jenna, Yrain. All of them, like you, with unusual guests. And Gulda!’

  Dar-volci was sitting on his haunches. He emitted a series of excited whistles. ‘Do tell, dear boy,’ he said, imitating Gavor. Then he cocked his head sharply on one side and muttered something under his breath.

  ‘Don’t bother, they’re here.’

  * * * *

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ Vredech said.

  ‘Hush!’ came the urgent reply.

  No sun was to be seen and the sky rang with a dark and peculiar blue. Beneath it was a harsh and rugged landscape.

  Blue-in-black shadows shaped out a curving line of jagged peaks and crags that lowered over a wide plain. Stretching to a blue-echoing horizon, it was cracked and split by deep ravines, which gave it the look of something dead and long decayed.

  Vredech did not know why he had said, ‘Don’t be afraid,’ because he was very afraid himself. A habit brought with him from his pastoral duties, doubtless, he decided. Trying to bring comfort even though he saw cause for none.

  He and Pinnatte were standing near the top of a broad col which rose up on either side of them to buttress sharp and cruel peaks. Where they were, how they had come there, how long they had been there were mysteries to him. He had gone to bed quite normally, then, abruptly, without any sense of change that he could recall, he had been here, Pinnatte crouching by him.

  Pinnatte’s instincts, as a street thief, had been to remain still and silent in the face of an unexpected development until he could properly assess it. For danger there was here, he was sure. He too had found himself in this place without any recollection of how he came there.

  He peered through the heavy blue twilight, seeking some clue in the mysterious and unpleasant terrain. But there was nothing. Yet, he realized, he was more himself here, more the Pinnatte who had flitted through the crowded streets and byways of Arash-Felloren, confident, sure-footed, ever watchful for both opportunity and danger. Gone was the haziness that seemed to have come between his mind and his speech since the Kyrosdyn had started their damned experiments with him. It was good.

  ‘If I didn’t dream, I’d say this was one,’ he said softly.

  ‘I don’t dream either,’ Vredech said. ‘And wherever this place is, it’s real. This kind of thing has happened to me before.’

  ‘What has?’

  ‘This moving to . . . other places . . . without warning. I don’t understand it. One of the reasons I was going to Anderras Darion was to find out about it. At one stage I thought I was going mad.’

  ‘Perhaps we’ve both gone mad,’ Pinnatte said.

  Vredech shook his head and laid a reassuring hand on Pinnatte’s arm. ‘There’s no madness here. Not in us, anyway.’

  Releasing Pinnatte, he put his hand to his face. Although no wind was blowing, there was a sensation on his face as though one were.

  ‘Your hands are shaking,’ Pinnatte said. ‘I thought you said this had happened to you before.’

  ‘I didn’t say I enjoyed it or that I wasn’t afraid,’ Vredech replied. He looked around. ‘And I was never anywhere like this. No clouds, no sun, no stars; this place is like nothing I could have even imagined.’

  ‘And the air smells funny.’

  ‘Acrid,’ Vredech agreed. ‘Like a smithy, burning metal, but cold instead of hot.’

  ‘How do we get back?’ Pinnatte asked hesitantly.

  ‘When it’s happened before I’ve found myself back where I was, just as unexpectedly as I . . . left,’ Vredech said, though he knew there was no comfort in the words. He closed his eyes. Faintly he could feel another part of him, lying in the tent. Nertha was watching over him. But how indeed to get back there? Pinnatte’s question started a panic mounting that took him some effort to control. There was nothing he could do. Nothing except wait. He passed his conclusion on to his companion.

  Pinnatte was rubbing his hand. ‘Do you think it’s something to do with what the Kyrosdyn did to me?’

  ‘I’ve no idea, I . . .’

  ‘Look.’ Pinnatte was pointing.

&
nbsp; Vredech followed his hand, reaching out over the fractured plain.

  ‘I can’t see anything.’

  ‘There, look.’ Pinnatte jabbed the air in emphasis.

  Vredech blinked, then narrowed his eyes in an attempt to penetrate the all-pervading blue light.

  As he saw the figures, so the sound of them reached him.

  Chapter 21

  It was no welcoming hail. High-pitched, tearing and cruel, it cut through Vredech and Pinnatte as it cut through the acrid blue air. Both men brought their hands to their ears to keep out the awful sound, but to no avail. It seemed to Vredech that the mountains themselves quivered and rang at its touch. Pinnatte dropped low. Feeling doubly exposed, Vredech followed him. Crouching side by side, they watched the approaching figures.

  Apart from the difficulties posed by the light, they were too far away for any detail to be seen, save that they were riding and that there were three of them with one leading and two following on either side. They maintained their stations so meticulously and kept to so straight a line that they had the appearance of an arrowhead as they moved across the plain. Both Vredech and Pinnatte gasped as the three riders jumped over a wide ravine without changing either speed or formation.

  ‘Who are they?’ Pinnatte whispered.

  Alarm made Vredech’s reply irritable. ‘I told you, I’ve never been here. I’ve no idea who they are – or what.’

  Pinnatte ignored his tone. His instincts spoke. ‘I think we should keep away from them.’

  Another cry reached them. It was joined by others, screeching and frightening. Though he could detect nothing intelligible in the sound, the hairs on Vredech’s arms rose in response. A ghastly conversation was being held. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s probably a good idea. They don’t sound particularly hospitable.’

  ‘They sound terrifying,’ Pinnatte corrected him, his eyes wide. ‘I’m glad we’re halfway up a mountain.’ He pointed to some rocks nearby and, following his unspoken command, he and Vredech slipped silently into their lee. ‘This feels a bit better,’ Pinnatte whispered as Vredech joined him. ‘We can watch them from here.’