Dh’arlo’mé oversaw the six hundred-odd elves who had chosen to stay, concentrating most on the twenty-eight his arguments had actually managed to convince. Within hours, their demeanors had gained the ponderous severity of men’s. Under ordinary circumstances, the change would have disheartened him; but desperation made the transformation a welcome relief. He kept them together, their seriousness enhancing one another’s concentration, and he let most of the others experiment at will. He had caught them doing everything from mutating their appearances to flying in star formations to making love in quads and triads. Elves had always been free with sexuality; the cycle of birth and reincarnation kept their number always at three thousand and pregnancies exactly as rare as deaths.
Suddenly, the eternally cloudless sky darkened to gray then black. The usual pleasant breeze became an unheard of wind that tossed the broad leaves of the kathkral trees into a clicking, rattling dance. Their trunks swayed, slightly at first. Then, as the wind rose to a gale, the kathkral bent as if to kiss the ground, first one way, then the other. The green-, orange-, and white-striped yarmshinyin trees stood firm, though their round, multicolored fruit rolled across the vast blue-green grassland. Soon, the air and land seemed thick with hollow balls, the swarm of colors random and patternless, their diversity a beauty unto itself. Many elves abandoned their work to play “tap,” “bounce,” or “fling around” with the floating yarmshinyin fruit, trading one for another on a whim.
Nameless terror enveloped Dh’arlo’mé. The Ragnarok has begun. He knew without comprehending how. The sky quaked and quivered, the movement lost behind the milling yarmshinyin fruit. Dh’arlo’mé saw, without normal vision, the world fragmenting around him and imagined seams in the expanse of horizon, in the continuity of ground, in all things once permanent. The boundaries between object and nothingness, between reality and fantasy blurred; and Dh’arlo’mé rushed to the side of those most believing. “Hurry,” he shouted, certain of the truth of his warning. “Our time is almost over.”
The youngest of the twenty-eight rose, a female of scarcely a century named Baheth’rin. Her hands shook as she traced a rectangle against a background changing by the moment. She stepped back, the outline white, the figure shimmering silver and aqua.
An explosion rocked Alfheim, deafening Dh’arlo’mé and sprawling Baheth’rin along with several of her peers. Distant screams shattered vast millennia of peace, their pain tearing through Dh’arlo’mé as if his own. Baheth’rin’s magic disappeared along with her concentration, and the farther horizon glowed red.
Surtr’s fires! Hopelessness froze Dh’arlo’mé in place momentarily. Elves scattered in panic, never before having faced a crisis. Others stood rooted, absolutely unable to move in any direction or fashion. A few remained, looking to Dh’arlo’mé for a guidance he felt too weak to give. Then, desperation lent him strength. He assisted Baheth’rin to her feet. “Do your spell!”
Tears dripped from her yellow-pink eyes, glazing them like marbles. Her white hair hung in limp tangles. “But that’s all I know. I can’t get it to open.”
“Try!” Dh’arlo’mé shouted. Already the roar of the fire touched his ears, its acrid stench stung his nose, and the agonized shrieks drew nearer. A small world, Alfheim would not take long to burn.
Baheth’rin started again, chanting and drawing. Her hands fluttered, leaving bumpy outlines in the air. The other seven pressed toward her, lending support, both physical and magical, where they could. They all kept their backs toward the approaching carnage, but Dh’arlo’mé dared a peek. Flames towered from ground to sky, as wide as the great wolf’s maw and redder than fresh blood. Colors danced through the conflagration, and Dh’arlo’mé felt a strangeness about the destruction, found himself thinking of it as an entity rather than a force. Living chaos of any kind, he knew, bore the name “demon.” He could see figures running ahead of the spreading flames, saw many collapse and disappear beneath the blaze. Surtr’s magic moved faster than any elf could fly or run.
Screams erupted amid Dh’arlo’mé’s crowd. More elves bolted, fleeing from the approaching mass of flames. Seized with an instinctive urge to join them, Dh’arlo’mé crushed need with understanding. Running would just delay the inevitable. Their only hope lay here.
One of the twenty-eight turned, gasping at the sight, Baheth’rin stiffened, but Dh’arlo’mé grasped her shoulders, preventing her from turning, holding her concentration on the spell. “Don’t lose it, girl!”
Baheth’rin gasped, the magic obviously draining energy. “No more. Tried everything. Can’t finish.”
“Hold what you have.” Dh’arlo’mé commanded those who remained, whether by design or paralytic terror. “Help her, damn it! Add whatever you can. There’s no escape on Alfheim. This door must open!”
Now the elves rallied in support. Magic crisscrossed and flew, filling the air with a tangible chaos that sent the rectangle flipping through a billion colors. The air grew warm, then hot. Sweat beaded and ran from every brow, and others could no longer contain their fear. More bolted. The rest remained, savagely hurling every trick at their disposal to reinforce what Baheth’rin had started. An elf staggered into their midst from the direction of the fire. Dh’arlo’mé caught the runner before he had a chance to think. Only then, he realized he stared into eyeless sockets in a hairless head. Blisters covered the places that still held skin, most charred away leaving bone exposed. The legs and arms continued to move, though no life remained in the skeletal form.
Dh’arlo’mé recoiled, dropping the corpse, screaming despite every attempt to control the others with his calm. As if it was a signal, the savage heat slammed them. Agony encompassed Dh’arlo’mé, tearing at his insides as if to claim his soul as well as his body. His skin crawled and tingled. He screeched, hearing a chorus of pain resound around him.
A soft voice managed to penetrate his anguish where others had not. “It’s open.”
Dh’arlo’mé swept forward, shoving as many elves in front of him as he could. He kept his lids closed, certain that to open them meant blindness; his eyes could not survive the heat blistering his flesh. Then, suddenly, the burning disappeared, its absence more soothing than any herb or balm. Grass tickled his ankles. A damp sea breeze tugged at his flesh and the charred tatters of his clothing. He opened his eyes to a pewter sky, green grass, strange trees, and distant mountains. Beside him, Baheth’rin sobbed, eyes locked on the fading rectangle. Other elves stood, lay, or sat around them. He could hear pounding footsteps as some fled to various places on this new world they had discovered.
“Hold the gate!” Dh’arlo’mé shouted, uncertain which of his charges remained responsible for the magic. He shoved both arms through the archway, scrabbling wildly into a world he could no longer see. A heat far beyond mortal fire seared him, and the need to withdraw became overpowering. He managed to grab a wrist with one hand, hair with another, and tug two more coughing, sputtering elves to safety. Then the gate snapped shut, forever closing Alfheim from its creatures.
Dh’arlo’mé stared at his scorched, twisted hands for only a few seconds before unconsciousness claimed him.
* * *
On Midgard, Colbey fought the only way he knew. Raising Harval, he charged into the flames, hacking and slashing through a red conflagration that seemed at least as alive as the god at his side. The flames radiated a laughing, mocking sentience, and the land around held an emptiness beyond death. Where chaos touched, it destroyed utterly.
Frey swore, his emanating thoughts turbulent with choices. Though Colbey concentrated elsewhere, he could not miss the myriad thoughts the god unwittingly broadcast, decisions that ranged from allowing Colbey to die and rushing to rescue Alfheim to protecting them both and assisting where he could. All-pervading anger and grief blanketed his mind, making decision-making all the harder.
Colbey’s sword cleaved the flames, the hilt like ice in his grip. Above each cut, the crown of each saw-toothed flame dissipated, leaving a stump
whose heat withered the Renshai. Within a few seconds, his clothes ignited. Heat blistered his flesh, rising in increments to a crescendo of suffering that stole coordination and, gradually, thought. He staggered, his back striking something solid. Frey’s words were senseless over the roar of the blaze. Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the pain disappeared. Frey’s magic enfolded him like a sodden blanket, assuaging as well as blocking the intolerable heat.
Colbey did not waste a moment assessing Frey’s gift. He charged back into the fray, sword flying with a speed that rendered it all but invisible. The Gray Sword of balance ruptured chaos wherever it struck, slicing through fire as if through flesh. Flames surged, collapsed, and died before him. A swell engulfed him, battering with astounding strength, though its warmth no longer bothered him.
“Alfheim!” Frey screamed above the fire’s crackle and rumble, though Colbey could not guess how many times the god spoke before he heard. “Alfheim first, then here!”
“We’re here now!” Colbey returned, hating even the minuscule effort speaking claimed from him. “Alfheim next!”
“It’ll be too late!”
Colbey did not bother to return the obvious argument. If they did not have the time to destroy chaos in Midgard before Alfheim, how did Frey expect them to transport there, fight the same force, and come back for mankind? The logic self-evident, he gave no response, only continued to wade through the battering fire, slicing as fast as his tired limbs allowed. Exhaustion weighed on him like death, and he doubted he could take much more of chaos’ pounding before it crushed him.
“Come to me now!” Frey shouted. “Or I’ll leave you, and you’ll have no protection from the heat.”
Furious, Colbey found a second wind. His arm and sword never slowed. “I saved your worthless hide for this moment! I damned Odin and rescued you instead. Haven’t I earned any loyalty?”
“The elves are my people! My creation!”
“Mankind is my charge,” Colbey threw back the same point. “And we’re already here.”
“Come to me!” Frey’s voice became a frustrated screech that told Colbey the god wanted his presence not to protect Thor’s son but for more selfish reasons. The logical justification filled his thoughts: Frey needed him to battle Alfheim’s blaze every bit as much as Colbey relied on Frey’s magic. The difference was, they had come to Midgard, no matter the means or reason. Any delay might doom elves and men alike.
“Modi,” Colbey said, dredging the last whispers of stamina from his core. He lurched through the closing wall of redness. Fire enclosed him, the roar deafening him to Frey’s demands, and he wallowed through, cutting with every advance. It felt like an eternity before he waded to the outer edge of the conflagration, though logic told him he could not have traveled far. The fire encompassed an area no larger than two towns combined, though the number of casualties would depend upon their location. If it actually perched upon a single city, thousands might already have died.
At the boundary, Colbey renewed his battle, hacking and stabbing with rabid determination, yet paradoxically focused on strategy. Spiraling inward, he controlled the spread as well as fought the chaos-entity. He did not see Frey, but his continued imperviousness to the heat told him his companion had chosen the wiser course.
Onward Colbey fought, until his arms went numb and the battle became habit. His head buzzed, emptied of any thought but sleep, and darkness whittled at his consciousness. Frey, too, it seemed, was weakening. The air gradually changed from temperate, to warm, to uncomfortable, and sweat only enhanced the weariness, threatening to steal all reason. The flames continued to assail Colbey, a constant that no longer taunted him. His mind flickered through a series of exhaustion-inspired images: human weapons seemed to thrust at him from all directions, colors swirled into marching blurs, and a lullaby refused to leave his head to the point where he matched his strokes to its beat. Yet, still the fight went on. Whether instinctively or through some knowledge he read from Frey, he knew that to leave a single fire-demon meant losing the battle. He would die, all mankind charred to cinders with him.
Vision left Colbey first. His lids became too heavy to keep open, and he thrashed and stomped in darkness, guided only by the fire’s heat. Then, that clue disappeared as well, and he groped desperately, appealing to some higher force to steer his hand. As if in answer to the plea, a voice filled his ear. “Kyndig, stop. It’s over.” It took Colbey far too long to recognize Frey, and the name “Skilled One” that only gods called him. Then the Renshai dropped to the ground. He drew a rag from his pocket, his only thought to honor his dirty sword before oblivion claimed him.
But Frey would not allow the lapse. “Come on. There may still be time.” He sounded as tired as Colbey felt, and the god’s dedication spurred Colbey as much as anything could, which was little. Though he did not rise, he allowed Frey to transport him where he would. Spell words sounded thunderous in the hush that followed chaos’ destruction. Colbey suspected he had fallen asleep briefly because the gate-creation seemed to span less than a second. The dazzling flash stabbed even through his closed lids. The quality of the air changed, and his lungs sucked in a fragrant, delicate breath riddled with soot.
Frey howled, the sound rich with elemental grief. The inherent sorrow tore at Colbey’s soul, rousing an anguish so primal he could not help but cry without truly knowing the reason. Too late to rescue the elves. And, though he suffered Frey’s anguish as well as his own, he found relief in the void that swallowed him then. On a plain ravaged to nothing by chaos, Colbey mercifully fell asleep.
Chapter 1
King Kohleran’s Heirs
The choice between life and honor falls into the hands of the one whose life or honor is at stake.
—Colbey Calistinsson
The sun hovered over the Bellenet Fields in Erythane, glazing the enclosing wooden and wire fence and glittering off its metal hardware. Knight-in-training Ra-khir Kedrin’s son continued to review combat tactics on the packed earth of the practice grounds long after his three colleagues had left for the midday meal. Unlike them, Ra-khir had no reason to go home, no one with whom to dine. His knight-captain father had led a troop of Erythane’s finest on maneuvers in the high kingdom of Béarn, and his mother had made matters clear on his seventeenth birthday two weeks earlier: Ra-khir could choose to associate with Kedrin or her, not both. His father’s unconditional love had made the decision easy, but the consequences still ached within him.
Ra-khir repeated a drill Armsman Edwin had taught, a tricky block/riposte/parry/shield bash combination, working to memorize the maneuver to the point of instinct. His fine red hair swirled around handsome features, and he had finally developed the musculature and power he needed to complete his knight’s training, hopefully by his eighteenth birthday.
As the sequence became rote, requiring less of Ra-khir’s concentration, his gaze wandered to his dapple-gray steed tethered outside the fence. Its color identified him as an apprentice knight. His imagination transformed the beast into one of the snowy white knight’s chargers, its mane braided with ribbons in Béarn’s blue and tan, its broad chest and powerful hindquarters giving it a conformation none but another Knight of Erythane’s horse could match. In his vision, Ra-khir rode to war at his father’s command, his allegiance first to Béarn, then Erythane, and always to his honor.
Ra-khir finished the sequence for the twenty-third time and lowered sword and shield, panting and satisfyingly tired. Sweat plastered errant red strands to his forehead and cheeks. A spring breeze wove through the V-neck of his tunic, refreshingly cool. He flicked back his hair into a tangle, only then noticing a small figure perched on the fence, watching him.
Ra-khir smiled, no stranger to spectators. In the last year, he had gained strength as well as height. The knight’s training honed him to a build adolescent girls seemed to find irresistible; and he had always sported his mother’s striking green eyes and his father’s stately features. At the age of hero worship, about eight
to fourteen, most Erythanian boys emulated the knights, often dogging their steps or incorporating their chivalry and style of warfare into their play. The stranger on the fence appeared to be one of the latter, a boy of about twelve years in Ra-khir’s estimation.
Ra-khir sheathed his sword and trotted toward the other. Pleased with his self-imposed extra practice, he felt generous. As the gap between them closed, he became more certain of his first impression. The youngster wore a linen tunic and breeks cut in combat style but child-sized. A short sword, obviously borrowed from a father, was thrust through the belt. Soft, white-blond locks dangled to skinny shoulders, and the largeness of the blue eyes made them seem wide with wonder.
“Hello,” Ra-khir said.
The stranger nodded a greeting, remarkably calm for a youngster meeting an idol. “Hello.”
Ra-khir bowed, hoping formality would make the child feel important. “Ra-khir of Erythane, son of Knight-Captain Kedrin and apprentice knight to the Erythanian and Béarnian kings: His Grace, King Humfreet, and His Majesty, King Kohleran.”
More patient than any youngster Ra-khir had ever met, the stranger allowed him to complete his full title before speaking. “Kevral.”
“Kevral,” Ra-khir repeated. He had never heard such a name before, but he liked it. He might consider it if he ever had a son of his own. That thought raised a wave of bitterness. His parents’ marriage had failed when he was three; and his mother swore his early, happy memories of Kedrin were actually of the man she married later, the one she had insisted was his father. Only later did Ra-khir discover the truth and a brave, gallant father whose love and presence had been banned from his childhood by a domineering mother and a jealous stepfather. If and when I do have a child, no man or woman will take him from me. He pushed the thought aside, along with the grief that followed naturally from a decision just beginning to lose its raw edge. “Kevral. A strong name.”
Beyond Ragnarok Page 3