World of Darkness - [Time of Judgment 02] - The Last Battle

by Bill Bridges (epub)

  Standing over a battlefield of fallen Wyrm creatures was his image, marked by a glowing Silver Crown and his well-known eye patch. They even got the details of his grand klaive right.

  Beneath his image, something had been carved over, scratched with multiple claw marks. He peered at it, but couldn’t clearly make it out. It looked like a Garou warrior of some sort, his image stricken from the surface.

  “Lord Arkady, ” Broken Talon said. “His honor has been abolished. ”

  Albrecht frowned. “Look, I hated that guy. I wouldn’t mind seeing him get some comeuppance, but he did sacrifice himself against the Wyrm. It doesn’t seem fair to completely wipe him from the record. ”

  “His feats still stand, my lord, ” Broken Talon said, pointing out another image of Arkady, this one to his left, farther back in time. In this picture, he led a pack of Garou against a horde of undead soldiers, his aura glowing like that of the Firebird, his sept’s patron totem.

  “Well, I guess he deserves that at least. Who did this picture of me, anyway? It’s pretty accurate. ”

  “We have shamans and skalds who sculpt the shapes, but the spirits inform them, sending them dreams of what to depict. They dare not impose their own wills onto these images, lest they mar the record. If you stare intently at these scenes, they will awaken and engulf you, displaying their events as if you were a witness. Do you wish to see any of them now? ”

  Albrecht scanned the wall, but also looked up at the sky. It was completely dark now and the moon was rising. “Damn it, I do. But not yet. I came all this way to see Tvarivich. I’m damn well going to do that. Let’s move on and get this over with. ”

  Broken Talon nodded but seemed disappointed. He led them into the nearby woods, skirting the far side of the enclosed valley, and down a series of descending paths. After passing what sounded like another waterfall invisible through the thick tree cover, they came out into a field.

  Standing before them was the largest tree Albrecht had ever seen. It made the giant oak that served as his own throne back home look small. The fir tree stretched so far into the sky that Albrecht had no way of estimating its height.

  “It is even bigger in the Umbra, ” Broken Talon said, noting Albrecht’s obvious awe.

  They moved past the fir tree to a small lake created by the waterfall they could now see. From the lake, the river continued on, now to their left. Across the banks, standing stones encircled a clearing. Some people gathered there, watching Albrecht with curiosity. He scanned their ranks but saw no one that resembled Tvarivich.

  Instead of taking them across the nearby ford in the river, Broken Talon led them back along the lake toward the cliff face. There, a slender path hugged the cliff, leading under and through the raging torrent of the waterfall.

  “My lord, ” Broken Talon said, halting before the path. “My Queen awaits you in the crystal grotto. She asks that you come with only two warriors, for the grotto is small. ”

  Normally, Albrecht would have been suspicious of such a request, but he didn’t think Tvarivich would try anything here. He looked to his group and waved over a single warrior, Erik Honnunger, a Silver Fang from his own sept. He patted Byeli on the shoulder. “You’ve got me this far, I figure I can trust you further. ”

  Byeli nodded, smiling at the compliment and gesture of respect. Broken Talon stepped back. "I cannot accompany you. Be careful as you pass the water; the spirits must first judge you. If they do not like you, they will not let you pass and the torrent will take you. This is, of course, unlikely. ” He bowed as he said this.

  Albrecht snorted and shook his head. “It takes all kinds. Let’s go. ” He started down the path, Erik behind him and Byeli following last. When he reached the falling water, he slowed and peered into it, trying to see signs of the spirits. He couldn't see anything but water. He walked through it, figuring if the spirits wanted to try something, let them; he’d rip their ephemeral guts out if they judged him wrong. He had no doubts that a bunch of water spirits couldn’t begin to match him.

  He emerged into a small cave and followed a dim light coming from within, some sort of phosphorescence. As soon as Erik and Byeli were through, he moved onward, noticing the crystals that studded the walls of the place. The light, from a source he still couldn’t pinpoint, made them sparkle, giving off a rainbow of colors. He couldn’t help but stare at one of them as it sent off a shimmer of multi-faceted light. He blinked, somewhat dazed, and opened his eyes in another world.

  He started, reaching for his klaive, but then calmed. The place was larger, the walls wider and taller. He had somehow been shifted over the Gauntlet and into the Umbra. Erik and Byeli were with him, both also blinking their eyes.

  “Welcome, King Albrecht, ” Queen Tamara Tvarivich said in her Russian-accented English. Her midnight black mane seemed even darker against her silver rune-embroidered white robes. She had a sly, playful smile on her face. "I wondered if you’d ever get here. ”

  Queen Tvarivich spread her arms, gesturing toward the brilliant, crystal-laden grotto around her. It was larger in the spirit world than it had been in the physical world, but it was still only about thirty yards across and wide, with an uneven floor. Shimmering light reflected from a pool somewhere behind her, throwing wavering shadows and light across the walls and ceiling. Sitting by the pool, two wolves watched Albrecht with curiosity, their pure white fur practically glowing in the light.

  Albrecht bowed his head and shoulders, but didn’t take his eyes from the queen. “Tamara, ” he said, addressing her by her first name. If she couldn’t be bothered to bow, or even to bid her fellows incline their heads, then he could bloody well call her whatever he wanted to. “It’s good to see you again. This time, in better circumstances. ” They had last met amid war at the caern of the Margrave Konietzko.

  Tvarivich’s nose wrinkled, a wolfish gesture that looked somewhat odd in her human form, but her smile never wavered. “It is also good to see you healthy and whole. Spasibo, chto priekhala v takuiu dal. Word of your march against the Dragon of the Tisza speaks well of you. Congratulations on your victory. ” She bowed her head, finally.

  “Thanks. It was a tough one. Some of my crew didn’t make it out alive, but their names are hallowed and will always be sung. Interestingly, we couldn’t have done it without Lord Arkady’s help. He softened the thing up for us. I owe him for that. I hope your people remember that. ” Tvarivich’s smile softened and seemed more genuine. “Yes, so I had heard. He walked the Silver Spiral, the legendary path through the Weaver’s web to the heart of the Wyrm. Many of us had believed it to be a myth, and yet it led him to secret powers. He shall be remembered for his glorious deeds. But we shall also not forget his errors; they will instruct cubs on the dangers of arrogance. Nonetheless, I am glad that you asked. Come. " She gestured to the pool and walked to its edge, the silver runes on her robe shimmering in the light. "I wish to show you something. ”

  Albrecht joined her by the edge of the water. The two wolves stood and backed away, making room for them. As they did so, they lowered their heads to him. That’s more like it, Albrecht thought.

  “This is the Pool of Sorrows, ” Tvarivich said, dipping her hand into the water. The source of the light came from deep within the pool, unseen somewhere far down in its milky waters. “It holds the memories of our losses, our tears for our fallen comrades and our crushed hopes for our native land. But it also holds our triumphs, our victories, gained at great cost. To swim in it is to commune with our past. To drink from it is to shed tears with us, and so join in our grief. Would you drink with me, Albrecht? ”

  Albrecht stared into the water. It looked more like honeydew than water, nothing like salty, sorrowful tears.

  This was surely some sort of Ivory Priesthood thing, and Tvarivich, bom under the crescent moon, was the high pooh-bah of that secretive order. They were obsessed with the mysteries of death and the Underworld, places not natural to most Garou, who knew that their ancestor spirits lived not in th
e Abodes of Death—places reserved for humans, mainly—but in the Summerlands of the spirit world. He didn’t know what game Tvarivich played here, but he knew that to deny her request would be a serious insult. “Sure, ” he said. “I want to know what you guys go through here. ”

  Tvarivich dipped her hand in the water and brought it to her mouth, drinking with closed eyes. She shuddered and her mouth trembled. When she opened her eyes, they glistened with wetness and she no longer smiled.

  Albrecht reached his own hand into the water. It felt warm. He cupped it in his palm and brought it to his mouth. It tasted odd, like nothing he’d drunk before. If anything, it was an absence of taste, a brief numbing of the tongue. As soon as it passed his throat he was wracked by a deep, terrible loneliness, a feeling of abandonment. He barely kept a sob from escaping his lips and shut his one good eye to hold back the tears. As he opened it again, the light in the grotto seemed brighter, and he knew with a strange surety that he was not alone, that he was never alone, no matter the odds assembled against him. His ancestors waited, along with those who had fallen fighting beside him, in the spirit world, in their tribe’s true home. But more than this, he felt the bond between his packmates, the powerful ties between himself and Mari and Evan. Distance did not matter; only loyalty, which spanned all spaces and times.

  “Do you understand? ” Tvarivich said, her voice soft and cracking.

  Albrecht looked at her and saw not a political rival who had to be won over through games of diplomacy, but a fellow Garou, one of Gaia’s own, trapped like him in a dying world that no longer wanted them. He knew his perception was some sort of trick caused by the water, but he also knew it was true. Tvarivich, by sharing this water with him, showed that she disliked politics also, and wanted to meet him as an equal, to let them communicate without pretense or ploys, one Garou leader to another.

  “Yeah, I get it, ” he said, nodding.

  She moved away from the pool, toward the passage through which Albrecht had entered. She stopped and placed a hand on Lord Byeli’s shoulder, and he lowered his head in deference. She then looked back at Albrecht and gestured toward the exit with a tilt of her head, and left the grotto.

  Albrecht followed, Lord Byeli and Erik falling in behind him. The two wolves remained, sitting beside the wall and watching without comment.

  Leaving the grotto, but still in the spirit world, Albrecht could now see the water spirits sliding up and down the waterfall, slim, tenuous snakes with odd smiles and sparkling eyes. They slithered down his fur as he went through the water, tumbling down into die widening lake.

  Tvarivich stepped from the thin path onto the grass, waiting for Albrecht to join her. He could now see that what Broken Talon had said about the giant fir tree was true: it towered past the bowl of the sky and into the realm of the stars.

  “How old is that thing? ” Albrecht said as he reached Tvarivich’s side.

  She shrugged. “Older than our most ancient grandmothers, I suppose. It has always been here. ” She wrapped her arm in his and began walking, following the edge of the lake as it bent around toward the river. Her gesture was purely friendly and royal, an act of communal, not personal, intimacy.

  “So, ” she said, “the world turns and here we are, two leaders of the Silver Fangs, long sundered by time and distance, now reunited. House Crescent Moon and House Wyrmfoe, allies again. ”

  “Yeah, all together now, to quote the Beatles, ” Albrecht said. “Thanks for having me over. You know, you’re welcome in the North Country Protectorate any time you'd like. ”

  “It would be interesting to see America. I understand that your packmate, Evan Heals-the-Past, is a Wendigo? I have met so few of that tribe. They fascinate me. As do their cousins, the Uktena. ”

  “Well, most of them are probably more fascinating from a distance than up close. They don’t like us ‘Wyrmcomers’ much. But they’re damn good warriors. Evan’s not typical for most of the tribe, although he’s not exactly alone among them either. He’s trying to get us all to work together, despite what’s happened in the past. ”

  “Much like you and 1. We, too, need to put aside any problems from the past and seek our future together. Our tribe will be stronger united under two powerful rulers, rather than a hundred petty kings. ”

  “Ooh, I sense revolution in the air. It’s one thing to dream it, Tamara, another to achieve it. We’re a tribe of alphas, each trying to stay on top. It’s never been easy to get Silver Fang kings to pal up with one another. It usually requires pretty bad times to cement alliances under a few of us. It’s one thing for you to gather the Silver Fangs—hell, the other tribes for that matter—under one banner here in Russia. It’s not going to be easy spreading that banner over Europe or the States. Hell, I barely have contact with the Midwestern Silver Fangs, let along the West Coast ones. It’s just too much territory to cover. "

  “Freeing Russia from the Hag was not easy. But it had to be done. The same here. If we do not forge a global alliance of Silver Fangs, we can never unite all the tribes together. What if the final times come upon us now? We are weak and scattered. We would fall like leaves defeated by the coming of winter. ”

  “Don’t get me wrong; you’re right that we need to get everybody’s act together. But I have a hard enough time winning the hearts and minds of the tribes in the New York area, let alone worldwide. It’s going to take more than you and me, Tamara. ”

  “I know. That’s why we need to ally with the Margrave. ”

  “Konietzko? He’s good, I’ll grant him that. But I don’t like his vision; too bleak. ” Albrecht held up his palms when he saw the frown on Tvarivich’s brow. “I know, I know: if I went through half of what he’s had to, or even a quarter of what you’ve had to, I'd be thinking differently. But I do think differently, and that’s the problem. Yeah, we do need to have better ties with Konietzko, but we gotta be careful here. He’s the kind of guy who’s all too ready to steal the show. We can’t have a Shadow Lord dictating to a Silver Fang. "

  “Dictating, no. Consulting and making decisions on a council, yes. With you and I united, we could easily keep Konietzko’s own ambitions in check and ensure that our own are forwarded... with his aid. ”

  “I wasn’t expecting this. I figured you and I’d be parleying on how to trade moon bridge privileges, loans of pack assistance and spirit pacts. Here you are talking about some sort of global—what exactly? A council? ” “No, a triumvirate of true rulers, who would lead the other tribes against the Wyrm all over the world. It wins now because we are scattered, because we have no central rulers to bring tactics against it. We won here in Russia because we had such a rule. I took over and demanded complete loyalty. Once it was achieved, all the tribes followed my rule, and we moved against the Wyrm as one hand, not five disconnected fingers. It proved our victory. ” “Look, I admit that what you did was remarkable, but you lived in remarkable times. Each tribe saw that it had more to lose on its own than by following you. How do you aim to get Garou the world over to believe in the Silver Fangs again? They think we’re nuts and past our prime. ”

  “So I hear. They speak disrespectfully of us in other lands. You and I will have to teach them otherwise. ” “By what, threatening them? That only goes so far. Believe me, I know the value of a well-timed challenge, but it doesn’t always work. Especially against the Wendigo and Uktena, those tribes you’re so fascinated with. They don’t show throat for anyone but their own. ” They reached a ford in the river, where a line of stones had been piled, allowing an agile Garou to step across in a few bounds. Tvarivich went first, and Albrecht followed. On the other side, a large ring of standing stones formed a ritual area. Albrecht could see spirits— bird, hares and some other small animals—watching him from the nearby woods. He turned to watch as Byeli and Erik followed him across.

  “Here, ” Tvarivich said, standing in the center of the circle, her arms spread wide, “is where I accepted the allegiance of the Russian tribes in our war against the
Hag. Here is where our tribe’s power was made whole again. " She looked at Albrecht with utter seriousness. “The Margrave is doing the same, Albrecht. He consolidates rule among the European tribes. Already, many of the tribes involved in the Jo’cllath’mattric war are behind him, including the Jarlsdottir and the Fenrir. If we do not become a counterforce, his will be the ruling voice in the coming years. His howl alone will command the legions of the Apocalypse, to our ancestors’ eternal shame. ” Albrecht walked into the circle, his head down, hands behind his back. He paced around it, walking clockwise. “I hear you. I understand the threat, if you can call it that. If he can unite the tribes at all, that’s a good thing, regardless of what it means for our tribe. However, I know the American Garou won’t follow him, at least not all of them. He’s too old school. ”

  “Which is why I need you, Albrecht. You can appeal to them; they will follow you. When faced with the choice of Konietzko and I, they will prefer you. If you were to join us.... ”

  Albrecht stopped and looked her in the eye. “Us? Is it ‘us’ already? You’ve already teamed up with him, haven’t you? He knows he can’t win over Russia’s tribes; only you hold their loyalties. He didn’t kill the Zmei— you did. His best bet is to share power with you. That gives him old-style Silver Fang cred, but at his beck and call. ”

  “Not his call—mine. I chose to ally with Konietzko. We shall lead together, deciding the course of the Garou Nation jointly. ”

  “I get it. It’s already been decided. You two are gathering the world’s forces, tying them into a nice ribbon and bow, and delivering them as a present to yourselves. ”

  “You speak of this as if it’s a bad thing, " Tvarivich said, her voice cold now and tinged with anger.