by Matthew Ward
“He should have brought more!” Warden Tori Kastala shouted from beneath the banner. As mistress of Essamere’s vigil in Tarvallion, she’d demanded the honour of bearing the standard. There were no safer hands.
Agreement rumbled through the ranks.
Izack accepted a fresh lance from a squire and set the pole across his shoulder. “Reckon he should. But who better than Essamere to teach the bugger a—”
“’ware right!”
To the west, the banners of the 3rd vanished from the farm, replaced by the House of Saran’s spread-winged owl. The king’s blue uniforms remained, now joined by emerald silks. All along the riverbank, dark, filthy figures emerged from the reeds and shook themselves into a line of shields.
Kastala spat. “Queen’s Ashes!”
To the south, the line of cataphracts started forward.
The 3rd hadn’t held the farm at all. They’d been overrun, their tabards and banners claimed as deception. The Silsarians hadn’t erred. They’d been a lure, and now Essamere was to pay the price.
Drums shook the air. To the west, shields came forward. The first arrows flickered out from the farm. A squire screamed and toppled from her saddle. A horse reared. To the south, the cataphract line divided. The white flame of the Emperor’s sword veered northeast, towards waiting pavissionaires. A man swathed in a bear cloak’s thick furs led the remainder north to Essamere.
Zephan offered silent prayer to the Goddesses. For victory, and if not that then a death of which his twin families of blood and sword would be proud. To hold was to be caught between the anvil of muddy shields and the hammer of a cataphract charge. To retreat was to feel a spear in the spine. Head-on or nothing. Break the cataphract line before the shieldsmen closed.
“Canny bastard.” Disdaining the hissing arrows, Izack wheeled about and snapped his visor shut. “Until Death!”
He spurred away, Kastala on his heels. The green-and-gold banner snapped and streamed behind, the eagle swooping for the kill.
“Until Death!”
Zephan Tanor joined his voice to the cry and rowelled his destrier.
Battles turned on error more than valour, but valour had its place.
The cataphract charge met the Knights Essamere with a crash that shook the battlefield. Horsemen spurred into gaps emptied by the strike of lance and spear. The lines mingled in a blur of gold and green.
Muscles spasmed in Kai’s shield hand. Not now. One thing to display weakness in private. Another to do so as battle joined. Kai clenched his fist. Shaking fingers he could conceal. A seizure was another matter. Inch by tortuous inch, rebellious flesh subsided.
Elspeth’s shining eyes never left the battle. “It’s beautiful.”
“It’s necessary.”
Kai wondered why he bothered. Whatever her thawing of manner, Elspeth had shown no sign of sympathy for any other than him. Nor had she accepted offer of sword and armour, despite his pleading. She faced this battle as she had every skirmish since Ahrad: barefoot, with only her much-abused white dress and the slender surety of her silver dagger.
In the distance, the brawl quickened. Unhorsed Immortals dragged knights from their saddles. The Essamere banner dipped and rose tall. The last Silsarians scrambled away, redeemed for cruelties against the Tressian populace by their offering of blood upon the field. Better to offer knaves as sacrifice than real warriors.
Unable to shake discomfort, Kai urged his horse to the canter. To the northeast, the first Tressian line crumpled as King Sard’s column reached its shields. The leftmost end disintegrated, overrun by bellowing grunda and the lithe grace of the lunassera’s chandirin.
The Immortals cheered, Elspeth with them.
“Cowards!” she laughed. “Why do they not stand?”
“They expected a horde,” Kai replied. “When they didn’t find one, they took heart. But by now they’ve seen Sard’s rangers beneath the trees, and Corvanti shields by the river. They despair of there being any end to us. A man afraid counts every foe twice, and conjures more beyond his sight.”
On the rise, the Tressian commander strove to salvage survival from defeat. Crossbows abandoned, the lines shook into a wall of blades, shields locked and halberds bristling behind.
Kai raised his sword high. Time to make an end of things. For the Goddess. And for the daughter who would follow him.
“Ashanael Brigantim!”
Elspeth reached for him, eyes wide. “No! Wait!”
Her cry came too late, his spurs already set. Churned ground rushed away beneath, shrouded by mist as sudden in onset as Elspeth’s alarm. A new sound vied with drums and buccinas. A trumpet call as deep and breathy as the rumble of a thousand wagons, and yet without note or substance. The music of the open grave.
The parry saved Zephan’s life at the cost of his balance. He sprawled as the cataphract hurtled past, left arm still numb from the spear-thrust that had ripped him from the saddle. He sank to his knees. The dead stared back. Cold eyes from open helms. Shadowthorn and sword-sibling, united in death.
The battle blurred away behind mist and the breathy, rumbling trumpet call. Lost were the cries of warriors beset; the clamour of steel. As Zephan staggered to his feet, screams and silhouettes grew distant where they’d crowded close before. He knew he was dying, senses fading as Otherworld claimed his soul. Only the pain in his shoulder burned bright.
He ripped off his helm and let it fall. The air stank of sorrow.
“Amhyrador Brigantim!”
The mists parted about the tatter-cloaked cataphract. The spear dipped. Zephan clambered to his feet, sword heavy and sluggish. One last effort.
The spear-point glinted, skeins of mist trailing. Too close. Too fast.
A shape hurtled out of the mists, hooves churning the bloody ground. A sword pierced scales at the cataphract’s spine. The shadowthorn toppled from the saddle, his spear falling free of a lifeless hand. His steed forged on. A glancing blow from its shoulder struck Zephan to his knees, then it was gone into the mist.
Izack sawed on his reins. “You alive, lad?”
The master of Essamere sat hunched in the saddle; helm and shield lost to the battle, armour bloodied and cloak torn. A man of stone, shoulders braced unyielding beneath the weight of the world. It demanded imitation.
Zephan stood, wincing as blessed numbness receded from his shoulder. “Yes, master.”
“Don’t look it.” He leaned down from the saddle, hand extended. “Climb up behind. Isildi’s a strong lass, she’ll carry us both clear.”
Zephan blinked. “Retreat?”
Izack snorted. “Retreat speaks of a battle barely lost. They’ve ground us to a bloody pulp. From what I saw before the mists came down, the rest of the army’ll be lucky not to follow.”
The world fell away as the full weight of the words sunk in. They spoke to Essamere scattered, perhaps annihilated. Unthinkable. Inevitable. The mists clung closer, tighter. Screams faded to whispering voices.
Zephan sheathed his sword and reached for Izack’s hand.
The mists parted before a line of filthy shields and spears flying ragged green pennants. Trophies stripped from the Essamere dead. Horsemen loomed behind. Outriders. Swift enough to overtake a burdened steed.
Zephan drew back his hand. “Go. Leave me.”
“Bugger that.” Izack wheeled about to face the shadowthorns and brandished his sword. “Until…”
The oath fell silent on lips unaccustomed to losing voice.
All around, mist darkened to shadow. Creeping, cadaverous forms pulled free of the drifting shroud. Skull masks gleamed silver. Swords blazed with black flame. And boiling above, squalling, screeching bird shapes whose wings bled into vapour.
A pale Izack fought for control of Isildi’s reins. Cold hands squeezed the warmth from Zephan’s heart. Until death? The dead had found them. He urged a nerveless hand to his sword. It remained unmoving, and he defenceless in the revenants’ path. His whispered prayer to the Goddesses stuttered and
died.
Spirits parted around him like a black tide. Gathering pace, they bore down on the shadowthorns.
The mists thickened with silvered skulls and drifting shadow. Kai’s horse reared and cast him to bone-crunching impact with the battlefield’s churned mud. Left and right, the cataphract line boiled away into black flame. Screams and trumpets rang out through the mists, then were drowned out by the clarion of the dead.
Terror swamped Kai’s soul, hastened by recollection. The brothers Andwar, and their tales of deathless spirits at Soraved. His father’s Last Ride beneath the gaping doors of Ravenscourt Temple. The ancient rites that opened Otherworld’s gates to the honoured dead. Only there, ghostfires held encroaching spirits at bay. Here there was nothing. Nothing save…
He stared into the alabaster flame of the Goddess’ sword. Fear abated, drowned in moonlight. Courage rekindled.
Screaming to drown his fear, Kai plunged into the mass of shadow. A skull helm split beneath his strike, the revenant unravelling beneath. Another rode at him, blazing sword levelled like a spear. White flame met black. The latter hissed away as the revenant’s sword shattered into glinting shards. A counterblow swept spirit from vaporous steed.
On Kai strode into the darkness. No fear. No hesitation. Only the white flame of the Goddess’ sword, and the black that sought in vain to quench it. Shadows gathered. A knot of grinning helms and darting swords bled from the alabaster flame, only to return when it passed.
“Ashanael Brigantim!” Another helm shattered beneath Kai’s strike. “I wield the Goddess’ light! I fear not your darkness!”
The alabaster flame dimmed, its flicker matched to a sudden pain. Seizure gripped his chest. His veins throbbed with the remorseless, stuttering thump of his pulse. The world spun. Vision muddied, splotched red.
Kai’s legs buckled. Hand clutched to his chest, he fell to one knee.
The sword’s fire sputtered out.
Hissing triumph, the revenants closed, their shadow no longer distinct from the stain behind Kai’s eyes. He felt himself slipping, body and spirit. A part of him bleeding into the mists. The Goddess’ sword fell from numbed fingers. The sounds of battle grew more distant than ever.
“What has my sister done, that you burn so bright and brief?” A domino-masked man strode out of the mists. A hat hung loosely from his hand. A disdainful smile glimmered beneath the goatee. He squatted, dark eyes gleaming. “No greeting? I’m disappointed.”
The turgid thump of Kai’s pulse all but drowned the words. Pained wheeze swallowed defiant reply.
The man snapped his fingers. “What am I thinking?”
The Tressian suit rippled away into the black garb of a traditional mourning gown and its woven shawl. The man of prime years became an old woman, white of hair and lined of feature. Only the mask remained, though now its feathers shimmered behind a silken veil. An echo of the statues that guarded the Ravenscourt gate.
“I confess, I prefer the other.” The Raven reached out her wizened hand. “It’s time for you to come with me, Kai, son of Ceredic, son of Edric. You’ll make a fine wedding gift.”
Kai doubled over as the pressure about his chest tightened. Blood welled up from his eyes. It spattered across the mud, and hissed away silver. He stared, revulsed. Thoughts mired, spared from horror by weariness of sinew and bone. His last strength faded as his fingers reached the sword’s grips, and he pitched forward onto an elbow.
“Yes,” said the Raven. “You’re ready now.”
Pale, white light edged Kai’s failing senses. The musky scent of spring blossoms and burning fleenroot – the cleansing fragrance of the pyre. Revenants recoiled, swallowed into mist.
The Raven rose, a scowl on her lips. “You’ve no business here.”
Elspeth strode into sight. She bore a cataphract’s upturned helm in her hands, a smoky white flame crackling and spitting within. “I swore to serve him.”
“With your death?” The Raven shrank away. “You’re nothing but a splinter of moonlight.”
Mockery glinted. “I’m not the one recoiling from a handful of burning blossoms. You’re not all here, are you, uncle? The mists came at your call, but they’re already fading. A shadow of a shadow. How poetic. Or do I mean ‘pathetic’?”
“I won’t forget this.”
“I don’t care.”
The Raven vanished.
Mist scattered from the battlefield. The revenants and shrieking birds went with it, leaving no trace but horrific memories, and the bodies of the slain. The shadowthorn army was gone, the dead thick upon the ground and the living set to flight. A tide of horses, men and wagons, thousands strong, streamed towards tents upon the southern hills. The Tressian lines – bowed in some places and gaping wide in others – stood silent, lost in the terrible splendour. Zephan couldn’t stop shaking.
Izack dropped from Isildi’s saddle and stared across the corpse-choked plain. The crop of shadowthorn dead couldn’t conceal the bitter swathe of king’s blue. “I don’t bloody believe it.”
Knots of green revealed survivors of the Essamere charge. Two-score paces to the east, the eagle-banner yet flew, Kastala’s slumped corpse holding aloft in death the colours she’d borne in life. Out of every ten who had mustered to the field, perhaps two or three remained fit to fight. A dark day for Essamere.
“What happens now?” said Zephan.
Izack gave a slow shake of his head. Then he pulled himself to some semblance of the man who’d taken the field. “Now? We retreat. No one won today. Saving the Raven, of course. He must be glutted.”
The Raven. It was one thing to offer prayer to the Goddesses, and another to witness Otherworld emptied to war – no matter to whose banner it marshalled. The stuff of myth and nightmare.
“I don’t know that I recognise this world any longer,” Zephan replied.
“Nor me, lad.” Izack reached for Isildi’s reins. “Nor me.”
“Wake, my Emperor.”
Kai lurched upright. Darkness yielded to the greys of his tent. The battlefield’s embrace to that of his bed. Armour creaked alongside weary bones. Pain cobwebbed every breath, every motion. But at least he could breathe. Trembling fingertips traced his cheek, recalling black tears and the emptiness of unmoored spirit. The helplessness. The Raven. He bit down on his knuckles to stifle a cry.
“Hush.” Elspeth stood at the tent’s flaps, her back to him and arms wrapped about herself. “Devren surrendered you to my care most unwillingly. If he suspects that I mean you harm—”
“Was it real?”
“Every moment.”
“And the battle?” There was no victory in the subdued camp beyond the tent’s thin walls. Only despair, and snatches of mourning song.
“The Andwars spoke true. My uncle has sided with the Tressians. I drove him off, but he’ll return.”
Kai touched his eyes closed. “Uncle? I saw a woman.” Only… that wasn’t true, was it? Not at first.
“The Raven is whatever he wishes,” she replied. “Whatever amuses. When you are different things to different people no one has power over you, because no one truly knows you. But to me, the Raven will always be my uncle, because that is how my mother thought of him.”
“And you?”
“I am what I have always been. What my sisters have always been. Our mother’s dream of what her daughters might be. What she might have been, had fate taken another course.” She paused. “She always claimed she and I were the most alike. Take from that what you will.”
The spark of self-loathing sat ill alongside recent, selfless, deeds. “Her sword…”
Elspeth cast a hand towards the table. Steel sat cold and dark in the gloom. “Is here.”
“It failed me.”
“You failed it. In divine hands, that blade might part the heavens. But it is only as strong as the life of he who wields it. And you…” She hung her head. “You are no longer among the living.”
The words should have hurt. And yet Kai could barely
stir himself to surprise. What has my sister done, that you blaze so bright and brief? The tremors he’d felt ever since Ahrad. He’d thought them a sign of age, but they were more than that. He’d been a fool to ignore them. “At my coronation. You told me you saved me!”
She turned, eyes blazing. “I strove to hold you in the balance. To make you eternal. But your soul had already splintered between ephemeral and divine. Not even the deepest obsession could hold you among the living. Only my mother’s light would serve.”
Kai rose from the filthy bedsheets. Knees shuddered but held. How much of the sensation was even real? “You should have told me.”
“Mother commanded otherwise.”
“And now?”
“Now she is in no position to forbid anything. With her light gone, I spend mine in its place.”
“Why?”
“Because I promised my mother, and then I promised you. The Dark must be driven out of Tressia at your hand.”
The Dark. The conceit by which he’d unified a fractured Empire. He’d used Ashana’s ambitions to feed his own, never knowing the extent to which she’d used him in return. Perhaps Elspeth was right, and she the truest reflection of her mother. “What if there is no Dark to be found in Tressia?”
Elspeth turned away.
“I see,” said Kai. “I am to provide Melanna with an Empire, and then fall into the mists.”
“That was my mother’s intent. It is not mine. However long I can sustain you, I will. But it will not last for ever.”
“Nothing ever does.” Anger came no more easily than surprise. Weariness, or the recognition that Ashana had not conspired to his death, only postponed it? “Why has the Raven sided with the Tressians?”
“Did you miss when I said he does little save out of amusement? His motives are mystery. And his power…” She shuddered. “I am the breeze that shakes the boughs. He is a hurricane. Though diminished, he should have torn me apart.”