Breaking the Suun

by J. A. Culican

  She approached Eoghan and its captive then and gestured for the trehand to lower Arun to her level. It obeyed. Arun’s head lolled forward, lifeless. Ravyn peeled back one of his eyelids, then the other, and put her fingers to the amulet around his neck. A visible chill went through her body.

  “This looks like the work of Savarah,” Ravyn said.

  “No.” Estrid shook her head. “This was the ur’gels.”

  I elbowed her. “Who was with the ur’gels when the walking corpses were dropped on our heads?”

  She huffed a sigh. “Savarah.”

  “Exactly. It seems to make sense it was all her doing. The ur’gels may have some intelligence, but enough to pull this off?” I gestured at Arun.

  Ravyn walked away, slinging a cloak over her shoulders. “We must get to the Lake of Light before nightfall,” she said to no one in particular. “And before he is taken again.”

  Taken. That seemed to be a good description for what had happened to Arun. I hadn’t realized how close he’d been to the darkness, how tightly he’d been holding on for our sakes. For my sake? Anyone else might have given him up for lost, but he was the champion of lost causes, and now it was my turn to be his.

  “Let’s go,” I ordered my siblings, ushering them behind Ravyn and Eoghan.

  Instead of leaving the way we’d come in, we went out a back door beside the quiet kitchen in the depths of the temple. All of us, especially Eoghan, had to duck low to fit through the small door. We emerged beneath a midday sky, the sun directly overhead and shining brightly through the thin veil of a beautiful day. I thought, not for the first time, how strange it was that such horrors existed alongside such beauty in this world.

  I found myself beside Ravyn, who walked quickly behind Eoghan, her head down, her face determined. Taking advantage of her companionship, I asked, “So, can you tell me more about the Suun heir?”

  “The Suun heir,” Ravyn began, “the key to the prison. The savior of the world. I can see why you wouldn’t want it to be you.”

  “It isn’t me.”

  She made a noise low in her throat that was neither agreement nor dissent. “I cannot tell you much about the Suun heir. I can tell you as long as you are here, you are safe. Let us heal your elf, and then you and your friends can decide the next steps.”

  “He’s not my—”

  My objection died on my lips when we emerged from the thick forest onto the banks of a small lake. It wasn’t the lake that took my words, but the darkness. I’d thought at first that perhaps the veil had blocked out the sun, but when I looked up, I saw the truth. The trees that lined the banks had reached across toward each other, their branches intertwining and creating a dome of protection over the water. That alone made it clear this was no ordinary lake. It also explained why we hadn’t seen it from the air. I wondered if they were all tree monsters, or trehands.

  Ravyn knelt beside it and dipped her fingers into the water. A ring of light rippled away from her fingers, and soon, the entire lake was ablaze with it. It cast a strange reflection on the leaves above, giving us the illusion of being in an upside place.

  She gestured to Eoghan. “Go on, then.”

  The trehand proceeded to walk into the water, Arun still in his arms. He had begun to struggle, but Eoghan held tight, not seeming to even notice.

  “What will happen to him?” I asked.

  Ravyn watched them as she answered. “Nothing evil can exist in the Lake of Light. The waters will purge the darkness from him. If there is enough light left inside of him, he will survive.”

  I turned to her, startled. “And if there isn’t?”

  “Then he will perish.”

  “Wait a minute.” I started to walk forward after Eoghan, but Ravyn stopped me with an iron grip on my arm.

  “You enter those waters at your own peril. Do you believe you are pure enough of soul?”

  I noticed that Erik and Estrid hung far back, and even Ravyn had not touched the lake again. Only Eoghan entered without hesitation, and it made me wonder at my definition of monster.

  Eoghan carried Arun to the very middle of the lake, where the water came up past its legs, and began to lower Arun into the water. When the first drop touched Arun’s feet, his eyes opened, the black orbs blank. He growled and clawed at Eoghan, dragging his nails along the bark. When the trehand was unaffected, Arun then began to try to climb, his movements rigid and inhuman, as if he’d forgotten how to use his limbs. But Eoghan did not relent, finally freeing himself from Arun’s panic and plunging the elf into the water.

  I stepped as close as I dared to the water’s edge, but everyone else stood perfectly still, even Eoghan. I imaged even the trees around us were watching, waiting to see if he would reemerge. The thought he wouldn’t made me feel physically sick and I pressed a hand to my heart to try to slow its beating. Estrid must have seen it, because she came up behind me then and wrapped her arms around my shoulders.

  “He’ll be fine,” she whispered.

  But would he? What did I really know about him? I knew that when he loved someone, he loved them fiercely and with his entire heart. He was loyal, and trusting, and loved the wind on his face and the freedom of flying. He was terrible at mazes and looked good with his shirt off. I also knew if we were to discover I was truly the Suun heir, he would never, ever make me feel unworthy of the title. But did any of that make him stronger than the darkness Savarah had planted inside of him?

  I made a quick, silent appeal to Zoe, the goddess of life. Let him live. Let him live and I would admit that he was my elf after all.

  Arun burst through the surface, gasping for breath. Eoghan scooped him out of the water. Too stunned to fight it, Arun collapsed against the trehand. I felt the same, tipping back against my sister who kept me upright with a hand to my back.

  “I told you,” she said.

  We moved to the side to let Eoghan pass, carrying a dripping Arun in his long-limbed arms. He looked dead. If I hadn’t seen him open his eyes and take a breath just moments before, I would have assumed he’d drowned. There was a lock of dark hair across his face leaving a trail of water across his lips.

  Erik appeared beside us. “Incredible.”

  The three of us walked together behind Eoghan and Ravyn on the way back to the temple. It felt strangely like the old times, traipsing through the woods with them, yet still very different. We weren’t hunting monsters, not anymore. Now we were hunting for something else. Something much more dangerous.

  “I feel I must apologize,” Erik said eventually, stepping aside to hold back a branch for us.

  Estrid and I passed, shooting confused glances at each other as we paused and waited for him.

  “Especially to you, Frida.” He nodded at me.

  “For what?” I asked.

  We were walking again, but he slowed to put more distance between us and the priest. “For not listening to you when you tried to tell me about Savarah. For insisting on taking her with us. For fighting you every step of the way.”

  I never in a million years thought I would hear Erik apologize to me for not listening to me. It was just something I was used to. But he was obviously upset about this. That, for once, he’d been made the fool.

  “You were pretty bad.” Estrid sounded way too cheerful.

  “It wasn’t your fault.” I waved a hand at Estrid as if shooing her. “You heard Ravyn. Savarah is an empath. She had influence over us.”

  Erik furrowed his brow at me. “You’re forgetting something.”

  “What?”

  “We’re D’ahvol,” Estrid chimed in.

  “Magic does not affect us. Anything I did was, sadly, of my own volition.” Erik’s cheeks were red, and I didn’t think it was from the fresh air.

  “I don’t know,” I said slowly, eyes on the ground as I thought about it. Every time Savarah was around, I felt different. Agitated. “Maybe it’s different with her. We’re immune to magic, not to charm.”

  We’d reentered the part o
f the forest with the massive trees. The temple tree loomed in front of us, and now that I knew what I was looking for, was impossible to miss. Larger and more elegant than its neighbors, the bark was scrawled with runes and unfamiliar designs. Ravyn pushed open the backdoor and disappeared inside with Eoghan and Arun.

  “Either way,” I continued, “I forgive you. If you forgive me.”

  It was Erik’s turn to ask, “For what?”

  “For everything. For the life-debt. For taking the job from Tsarra Trisfina. For presuming to free you from your debt by dueling with Luthair.”

  Erik pressed his lips together and huffed through his nose. “Oh, Frida.”

  But I didn’t get to find out what he was going to say, because the ground trembled. The force of the quake shook the temple tree and knocked the three of us off our feet. I went sprawling over a root. Pain shot through my already injured shoulder and I grimaced.

  As I was pushing myself back up, Ravyn emerged from the door, her eyes wild with fear.

  “What was it?” Estrid was already running toward her. “A quake?”

  But Ravyn was waving her arms, motioning for us to go back. “We’re under attack!” she finally managed to say.

  I collapsed back down to the ground and groaned. There was no doubt in my mind that the ur’gels had found us. They’d likely seen the ship in the treetops, visible to anything flying overhead. And they were hunting me because Savarah knew about the mark and what Beru believed. Another battle, more death, and it was all my fault.

  But I didn’t get a chance to wallow in my pity. Erik stepped up beside me and lifted me to my feet by the back of my vest.

  “Come on,” he said. “We have another fight to win.”

  Chapter 17

  Ravyn had horses and trees fighting on her side, but the ur’gels had—

  “What is that?” I asked aghast from my spot on the ground beside Ravyn.

  The priest rubbed a hand down her face and sank back into the undergrowth. “That is an armored tusker.”

  We’d crawled around the side of the tree to get a look at our attackers. The ur’gels were familiar—deformed, humanoid creatures, some of them uglier than others. But this time, several of them were on the back of an enormous, four-legged animal. Its skin was wrinkled and leathery except for its head and long trunk-like nose, which were covered in armored plates. Two giant tusks angled downward, out of its mouth, perfect for spearing us.

  “How dangerous is it?” Erik asked.

  Ravyn considered. “Alone, it’s only dangerous if you get in its way. I’d say that right now, the greatest danger lies in the fact that it is under the control of what I assume are ur’gels, who will use that size against us.”

  I immediately saw the reason in her logic. The ur’gels had brought the armored tusker for a reason, and it wouldn’t be to kill us. There were easier ways to do that. “They’re going to destroy the temple.”

  No sooner had the words left my mouth than the ur’gels began to drive the tusker forward. The closer it got, the larger I realized it was. Instead of crashing into the tree that contained the temple, it just pushed its armored head against the trunk. Its gigantic, round feet dug grooves through the undergrowth, ripping bushes and smaller trees right out of the ground. Behind it, dozens of ur’gels held onto ropes attached to the beast’s neck and whipped its back legs.

  The three of us scrambled back, away from the monster and the tree that was cracking and groaning beneath the assault. Estrid was inside, evacuating the other residents of the temple. Eoghan had taken Arun and fled back into the forest, where Ravyn promised me the trees would keep him safe. So it was just the three of us against a dozen ur’gels and a giant armored tusker.

  “Who has a plan?” I asked, glad we were small enough to go unnoticed.

  Erik wasn’t paying attention, though. His head was tilted back, and he was staring at the ur’gels on the tusker’s back.

  “What is it?”

  “Is that—” he started, but was cut off by a shout from the tusker’s back.

  “Harder, you stupid beast!” It was a familiar female voice, and the sound of it raised the hairs on the back of my neck.

  I stumbled back a few steps and shielded my eyes with my hand to get a better view.

  Sure enough, there she was, Dag’draath’s most loyal subject and the bane of my existence these last few days. Savarah rode astride the tusker, right behind its shoulder blades. In her hands were leather reins. The other end of the reins wrapped around the base of the animal’s pointed tusks. There was an exceptionally large ur’gel with her, too, one of the winged ones. He sat beside her, one meaty hand on her shoulder. They looked like old friends. It was obvious they were the ones in charge here.

  Any thought I’d had of careful strategizing disappeared. I ran forward, slipping on leaves and debris, until I reached the tusker’s foot. I launched myself forward, grabbing the tough, wrinkled skin and climbing.

  “Frida!” Erik was not far behind me, but I couldn’t let him talk me out of this.

  When I was several meters off the ground, the tusker slipped and went down to one knee, very nearly knocking me off. But I held on, my feet scrambling for purchase against the slick skin. I wished for Stiarna, who always had a way of appearing when I needed her the most. But we’d left her back at the ship recovering from her fight with the horses. She had no way of knowing where we even were.

  Before I could reach the creature’s back, there came an inhuman shout of alarm from the ground. I looked down and saw I’d been spotted. Several ur’gels were sounding the alarm, pointing at me with their long-handled whips, abandoning their posts and beginning to climb. When the ur’gel with Savarah peered over the edge, I pressed myself flat against the tusker. He shouted something incoherent at the ur’gels and turned away, drawing shouts of protest from below.

  Erik and Ravyn wasted no time silencing them. Ravyn’s blade flashed with light as she cut down the dark creatures with cool, calm precision. Erik, on the other hand, seemed to be unleashing his anger and frustration on the ur’gels. Even as I kept climbing, I could hear his grunts and growls as he brutally destroyed the monsters with his Ahvoli blade.

  I had nearly reached the top when someone grabbed the back of my shirt and hauled me up, dangling me precariously over the edge of the monster. My eyes met two dark orbs set in a twisted, leathery face. Two fang-like incisors protruded over the ur’gel’s bottom lip and he made a horrible sucking sound between them before he spoke in a gravelly voice.

  “Look what we have here. The prize came to us instead.” Then, twisting around to Savarah, “I thought you said she would be difficult to catch.”

  Savarah passed the animal’s reins off to another ur’gel and stepped toward me. She was sure-footed, even as the tusker’s back swayed beneath us. “Don't let your guard down too easily, my dear.” One of her smooth, pale hands caressed my cheek. If I hadn't been holding onto the ur’gel’s wrist to keep from falling, I would have swatted her away. “She's tricky. After all, she is descended from Onen Suun.”

  “No,” I grunted out through gritted teeth, tightening my grip on the ur’gel’s arm. “I'm. Not.”

  I swung my legs up and connected solidly with the ur’gel’s chest. He fell back and took me with him so I landed on top of him. His hand was still wrapped in my collar and he pulled me close. His breath was hot and smelled like a stable that desperately needed mucking. I gagged and dug my fingers into his eyes, not letting go even as black blood seeped out and pooled around my thumbs.

  Finally, he released my shirt and threw me off him. I skidded to a stop at the very rear of the tusker’s back, grabbing the base of the tail to stop my slide.

  The ur’gel was back on his feet, wiping his eyes and snarling at me. Savarah was hiding behind him and had even put a few other ur’gels between us. She obviously preferred sparring with words to fighting with fists.

  I drew my sword and ax and did my best to assume a fighting stance, though i
t was difficult when the surface below me was rocking and swaying. The ur’gel laughed, his smile revealing rotten, black teeth, and pulled his own weapon. It was a heavy spiked ball at the end of a thick chain. It had to weigh a ton, but he held it as easily as I did my ax.

  Beyond him, Savarah cracked the reins. The temple tree groaned and cracked but held as the tusker continued to drive forward. I didn't know why she didn't stop if I was who they'd come for. Maybe I wasn't enough. Maybe it would never be enough for them until they'd destroyed everything good in this world. That meant we were on the cusp of another Dark War, and we had to find the one who could put an end to it, because it definitely wasn't me.

  The ur’gel took a step forward, swinging the ball and chain lazily overhead. I took a step back, my foot nearly slipping off the tusker. But I caught myself, shuffled forward, and swung the sword. The ur’gel brought his weapon around and they crashed together. The chain wrapped around the blade and jerked it out of my hand, sending the sword tumbling to the ground.

  I watched it fall. “Well, that doesn't seem fair.”

  The ur’gel didn't laugh this time. He swung the chain again and I danced to the side. When the spiked ball hit the tusker’s back, I thought I heard the beast cry in protest, but it was hard to tell over the other sounds from the fight below.

  I spun away from the ur’gel and brought my ax around with me. Using my momentum, I buried the ax in the ur’gel’s blue-skinned chest.

  He looked down at it, then back up at me, his mouth cracked open in shock. Then, he wrapped his clawed fingers around the handle just above where my hands still gripped it and jerked it out with a growl. Blood streamed from the wound, leaving black streaks down his stomach.

  “Stupid human,” he grumbled, looking up at me.

  “I’m not—”

  But I didn’t get a chance to finish. His big, meaty hand came across my face and sent me spinning sideways and off the back of the tusker.