by Matthew Ward
Erashel drew closer. “I can help you with that.”
“I don’t know that I can set aside the past as you do. I don’t know that I want to. That’s the difference between us. For you, the blood’s more important than the name. I’m the opposite.” He shrugged. “Years ago, my mother showed me our family tree. Twenty generations, stretching back through the Age of Kings. Twenty marriages, and who knows how much adoption and infidelity along the way? The Trelan name and Trelan blood likely parted long ago. But I can still honour that name.”
Josiri broke off. When he spoke again, his eyes shone.
“And I love Ana. I know that shouldn’t matter to a son of the first rank, but it does. For all that she can be infuriating – for all that she far eclipses me by any measure you can name – she has earned my fidelity a hundred times over. I won’t turn my back on her. I’m entitled to that much selfishness.”
The Ice Wind brought another burst of drums. Erashel folded her arms.
“I preferred the silence.” Even now, Calenne saw her mind turning. Erashel’s wasn’t the expression of a woman wrestling with rejection, but a soldier planning a new sortie even as the first failed. “But I understand. I even admire you for it, just a little. It doesn’t change our situation.”
“It changes everything,” Josiri replied. “Secrets are corrosive. I’d rather there weren’t any between us. Especially if you’re right about the coming hours.”
Erashel nodded stiffly. “Then you agree I should stay behind?”
He furrowed his brow, at last detecting subterfuge, and stared up at the sun. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours, or send word. If noon rolls around and you’ve heard nothing…”
“I’ll come creeping to your rescue. Let’s hope it’s not necessary.”
Josiri nodded, and set down his pack. “I’m a southwealder. Hope is my constant companion.”
He strode off along the cliffs, cloak streaming in the wind. Calenne watched him go, trapped by a fold of the land that would lay her bare if Josiri glanced behind. Better to wait until he was beyond sight.
Minutes slid by. Josiri vanished around the headland path.
Time to leave.
Keeping low, Calenne sidled along the crest, only to freeze at Erashel’s shout.
“I know you’re there! Show yourself!”
There was no wind in the blazing circle of the Cindercourt to offer relief from the stinging ash and dry, suffocating air – only the hot rush of convection, itching at sweat-slicked skin, making trial of the slightest breath. Too like Eskavord’s dying hours. Or at least, too like what little Viktor recalled.
The crash of drums heralded Thrakkian cheers. The steel stairway by which Viktor had descended rattled upward on its chains, vanishing into the swirling soot. Unless it returned, there was no exit from the ring of fire, save the gate by which the varloka had entered.
The grinding avalanche of the varloka’s roar rumbled away.
Smoke parted.
Cinders swirled about the giant’s axe. The air howled as Viktor hurled himself aside. Embers stung his face. He darted forward, lungs sputtering and claymore flashing at the varloka’s forearm.
Bright steel sparked against calcified skin. Bone jarred at wrist and elbow. Loose chains lashed and snapped as the varloka spun around. Viktor glimpsed a red, smouldering eye. Another crusted shut by injury. Then the flat of its empty hand bowled him away.
A many-voiced cheer rolled away above the smoke.
The world spun, arrested by the thump of soot-smeared dirt. Precious breath gasped free.
The varloka bellowed its triumph.
Viktor clambered to his knees, his shadow’s screams for release louder than the protests of bruised flesh. He held it tight. The rules of the Cindercourt were clear. For all that a thane’s honour seemingly allowed unequal contest, to win a contest of steel through witchery…?
Thrakkians.
The varloka closed. Larger. Stronger. Stone where he was flesh. Divine where he was ephemeral.
Regaining his feet, Viktor took measure of its weaknesses. The dragging leg. The crusted eye that rendered it blind on one side. Even the other eye, molten though it remained, flickered with madness born of agony. Whatever wit the giant had once possessed was stolen by the aeons, or by cruelties meted out at Ardothan’s hand. Slim advantages. Such was a soldier’s lot.
Another roar. The varloka’s axe crashed down. Viktor threw himself sideways, cinders from the ungainly blade spitting at his face. The ground shook with the axe’s strike. Scarcely had Viktor regained his balance when the varloka ripped the axe free and swung a blurring backhand blow.
Viktor ducked away. The wind of the axe-blade tugged at his hair. The flat struck his shoulder a bloody, glancing blow and cast him to his knees.
The varloka roared its triumph and hefted its axe high.
Viktor’s shadow screamed for release, straining at its bonds.
Attention divided, half-blinded by dust and his own shadow, Viktor barely crawled from beneath the killing blow. Wiping sweat-muddled dirt from his eyes, he staggered to his feet.
A sweep of the claymore sparked against the giant’s stony flesh with no sign of having done harm. Still, the varloka lurched back, surprised at the temerity of the flea come to bite at its hide, or perhaps wearied by the flurry of exertion. Fire oozed from the shifting platelets of its arm and spattered in the Cindercourt’s dirt.
Viktor sucked down a ragged breath, grateful for the reprieve.
He couldn’t let it strike him again. But nor could he dance about in hope of an opening. He had to end it soon, or not at all. The challenge lay in how.
Claymore threatening to slip from sweat-slicked fingers, Viktor backed towards the roaring flames of the Cindercourt wall.
The varloka quickened to an uneven run, the axe head dragging behind. Viktor held his ground. The world blurred behind sweat and the hot itch of skin apt to burn. Breaths foundered, unsatisfied by the choking air. Muscle ached and grew heavy. His shadow screamed.
He ignored them all.
The giant picked up speed. An avalanchine bellow revealed uneven teeth, chipped like flint. The axe came about. A wild chest-high arc, fit to scrape a shield wall into bloody oblivion.
Viktor ran. Feet stuttered on soot as he threw back his shoulders. Hip scraping against the ground, he skidded beneath the mangled axe, its passage a roar in his ears. A palm found purchase on ridged dirt. Then he was rising, the claymore in both hands and levelled like a spear.
Blind on that side, the varloka never saw its danger. The claymore’s point split the rusted chainmail about its monstrous leg. Slid between the shifting, ossified platelets of its skin.
Roaring in pain and molten blood oozing from its knee, the varloka staggered blindly on, dragging the claymore from Viktor’s grasp. He let it go, the giant’s chains thrashing about him.
Possibly the varloka never saw the looming wall of the Cindercourt. Possibly it no longer had the wit to care. It struck the blackstone and timber trellis like a stampeding grunda. Flaming debris spattered across the giant’s shoulders, the deluge quickening as the fire-weakened lattice gave way.
It fell face-first to the soot-choked floor, axe abandoned as it fought to scrabble free. Still the deluge continued, burying the giant to its shoulders. It gave a vast, booming roar and shuddered, one hand still scrabbling weakly for escape.
Viktor stumbled through the billowing soot of the wall’s collapse. For the first time, a flicker of awareness came into the varloka’s eyes, madness receding as the Raven reached to claim it. With it came a glimpse of the giants of Thrakkian myth, of Gormir’s Falsang. The cleverness that birthed great works upon old hills.
In that moment, Viktor wished he wielded Lumestra’s light in place of his shadow. To have the gift of healing, fit to raise the giant up. But it had never been his fortune to bring comfort. Mercy alone would have to serve.
As the crowd fell silent, he took up the varloka’s axe. On the first
strike, the giant’s struggles slackened. On the third, the Raven took his due.
Silence reigned, broken only by the crackle of the fires.
Letting the axe fall, Viktor stepped away, breath spent and muscles locked in a quivering scream.
“Astor has spoken!” Armund roared above. “Let down the ramp! Get him out of there.”
A murmur challenged the flames. Not yet a cheer, but its precursor.
“No!” Ardothan rose from his throne, quivering with fury. “The trial continues!”
The murmur rose to a growl of discontent. One thing to stack the odds. Another to defy judgement given.
“Seek your senses, brother!” said Armund. “This is ended. Astor has—”
“Throw him in!” bellowed Ardothan. “Send for my vanaguard. My brother will face the Judgement of Astor.”
“No!” Inkari’s voice cut clear across the flames. “This is not the law!”
“Do you want to join him, Inkari af Üld?” Ardothan either didn’t notice the growing malcontent of the crowd, or else was past caring. He swept up an axe from beside his throne and pointed to each of the smeltpriests in turn. “Do any of you?”
Armund made no effort to resist as the smeltpriests ushered him to the platform edge. A crack of breaking bone and a howl of pain accompanied his landing, his left ankle buckled at a horrific angle.
Viktor helped him stand as the opposite stairway ratchetted into position, offering kinder descent to drakon-helmed vanaguard in sea green and yellow… and to Ardothan himself. Twenty axes, fresh to the fight. Against a one-legged blind man, and another weary enough to drop.
Above, the crowd grew ugly, a fit match for Inkari’s expression.
Viktor swallowed to ease a parched throat. “This is going well.”
“Let me stand, lad.” Armund pushed away. His ankle gave at once, and he sank back against Viktor. “Family, eh? Who’d have ’em?”
Calenne stood stock still behind the crest.
Had she been seen? Had she given herself away? Memory said no. Erashel and Josiri had seldom glanced behind during the morning’s travel. When they had she’d taken care to hide. But was there any other possibility? Suspicion, perhaps? A refusal to accept Josiri’s explanation for an attack more felt than seen? Even now, the memory of the hurled stone sparked dark satisfaction.
“He’s gone,” called Erashel. “We should talk. I won’t hurt you.”
Satisfaction soured to annoyance. How dare she? Calenne stood tall above the hummock, teeth grinding defiance. “As you wish.”
To her delight, the other woman took a half-step back, hand on her sword. “So I didn’t imagine you?”
“Apparently not.”
“What are you?”
Calenne stared down at her hands. Grass and stone showed through flesh and sleeve, her colour washed out and hazy. A spirit caught between Otherworld and the Living Realm, fickle in sunlight. Humiliation ran sour. Maddening to have her own perception quashed by another’s truth. As if she were no longer fit to judge even her own existence.
“I don’t know.”
Erashel’s sibilant oath was lost beneath the crash of waves. She stepped closer, fingers tight about her sword. Her eyes widened. “Your face… You’re Calenne Trelan.”
Calenne flexed her fingers and let them fall to her sides. “I was.”
“Blessed Lunastra.”
Calenne snorted. Lunastra. Not Lumestra. The faithless moon worshipped above the radiant sun. So Erashel Beral was a heretic? The woman was riddled with deceit.
“What happened to you?”
“As if you care.” Anger gorged on sorrow.
At last, Erashel let go of her sword. Her throat bobbed. “We met once, years ago. Before Zanya. I wouldn’t expect you to remember. You were only a child.”
Calenne’s search for the memory ended like so many others, in the cloying pit that had stolen everything. People and places, yes. But events? She remembered nothing before the night Viktor had saved her life. Just snatches. Whispers. But even as she railed against the void, light gleamed elsewhere. Between bright banners contesting Davenwood and the fires of Eskavord. Her foster mother’s house. A glint of steel. And a deep voice, the words indistinct. She wanted to scream.
“I won’t let you use my brother.”
Erashel blinked. “How long have you been following us?”
“Since you came to my home at Tarona. Since you drove Viktor away.”
“Josiri wanted Viktor’s help. Just as I’m trying to help him see a way forward.”
“Liar!” Black clouds gathered. “You’ll destroy him, and you don’t even care!”
Calenne bore down, fists bunched and innards knotted. Erashel stumbled away. A stone skittered away, bounced once at the cliff edge, and vanished from sight. A puddle rippled beneath Calenne’s boot. Just corporeal enough to count. The cliff edge beckoned. So easy. A shove, and it would be done. Lost to the waves.
Calenne blinked. No! That wasn’t what she wanted. She wasn’t a killer.
But she had killed. At Davenwood. To protect those she loved. How was this different?
It wasn’t. It was necessary. Viktor would have done it.
Would he? The answer, so clear a heartbeat before, drowned in the wrathful void of missing memory. The storm in her mind gathered pace, drowning out grey daylight until all she saw was the sneer beneath Erashel’s concern.
Josiri was too soft. Too trusting. He always had been.
“Calenne?” Erashel’s feet found a warrior’s footing on the cliff edge. Her hand closed again around her sword. “Move away. Now.”
Calenne stared down at the rippling puddle. At an afterimage of herself more dream than woman. An echo of what was.
“I won’t let you hurt him.”
She lunged.
The vanaguard formed up across the Cindercourt in a ragged line, Ardothan behind. Twenty axes. One treacherous thane, flouting age-old convention. Viktor shook his head. Was it so hard to be a tyrant of conviction?
“A thousand marks for my brother’s head,” shouted Ardothan. “Another thousand for Akadra’s. Deliver the Judgement of Astor!”
The crowd fell silent. The line came forward. Viktor set his shadow loose.
It slithered free from the smoke, hissing and howling with the heat of the fires, but also with joy at a freedom of a scope not tasted since Eskavord’s final days. It snatched a vanaguard howling from his feet. Forced another to her knees. A third wailed as it coiled tight about his throat. Hands clawed madly at the Dark seething behind their eyes. Others shattered, frozen solid in his shadow’s embrace.
Flagging spirit ebbed with each triumph. The weariness of day’s travails, the shadow’s fear of the fire – the burden of atrophied gifts long denied. They clawed at Viktor’s reserves. But beneath it all, he felt the drowning sea of the Dark. The joy of it. Even as he reached out, abused flesh betrayed him. Shadow streaming from his eyes and ice crackling across his skin, he cried out and collapsed.
Teeth gritted, he held his shadow about those it had taken. Through slitted eyes, he saw Ardothan and two of his vanaguard tear free and hurtle to the charge.
“You’ve done your best, lad. Couldn’t have asked for better.” Armund stood, his axe braced as support. “My turn.”
He hobbled away, sister’s spirit coalescing to bright fire about him.
The first vanaguard came hasty to the fight and died the same way, cut off at the knees by the sweep of Armund’s axe.
The other closed as Armund hobbled upright. Clutching tight about his last scrap of being, Viktor hurled the shadow forth. The woman spasmed, ice rushing across skin as her axe fell wide. But he could do nothing about Ardothan, who came running to the fight with eyes wilder than the varloka’s.
Warned by his brother’s cry, Armund twisted about, Anliss’ fiery spirit moving in echo. Ardothan’s axe clove his brother’s charred haft in twain and hurled Armund to the ground. The ruined axe glinted and fell dark. Anliss’ spir
it guttered, a candleflame in a gale, and was gone.
Armund reached for the broken haft.
Ardothan kicked it away. “Astor chooses me, brother.”
Armund spat. “You’ve betrayed Astor as you betrayed our father. As you betray our traditions. I weep for what you’ll do to our people.”
“Then consider it kindness that I speed you to Skanandra.”
His axe came up. Viktor gritted his teeth. His shadow sputtered with his failing strength, the vanaguard pulling free.
The axe froze. Ardothan threw back his head. “Where is your praise? Your adulation? I am your thane, chosen by blood and proven in battle! You will cheer for me!”
Not one voice sounded.
“Cheer for me!” screamed Ardothan.
A harsh wind sprang up within the circle of the Cindercourt. It gathered ash and ember, streams of black soot orbiting a figure of flame at its heart. A woman’s form that Viktor beheld for the first time not through his shadow, but with ephemeral sight. A likeness stuttering with the waft of flame. Anliss af Garna, freed from Skanandra’s hall just long enough to right an old wrong, and deliver the judgement of a god.
The crowd’s silence adopted new aspect, no longer resentment, but fear twin to that etched on Ardothan’s haggard face. The surviving vanaguards fell to bended knees, eyes averted.
((Brenæ af Brenæ!)) cried the apparition. ((Væga af Væga!))
Cinders trailed behind an axe of flame.
Ardothan’s head struck the ground a heartbeat before his body, the wound seared shut.
((This is the Judgement of Astor.))
The wind howled. The apparition dissipated. Smoke and flame leapt skyward in a great, coruscating spiral that touched the clouds. When it passed, the Cindercourt was naught but blackened timber and smouldering stone.
Calenne’s palms found brief resistance, then passed clean through Erashel’s shoulders.