Breaking the Gloaming

by J. B. Simmons

  Now that man reigned over this city. The tiny piece of Icaria left deep within the Icarian would not allow that. He was going to kill Tryst and avenge whatever the man had done to his people. It gave the Icarian a final purpose.

  He swallowed his last bite and stood. He took one last sip of the water that dripped from the hole in the wall. He said goodbye to the hole and this home.

  Through the hidden door, out the building, and into the streets, the Icarian made his way to Tryst. The false god lived at the top of the tallest building in the city, overlooking the central square. The Icarian knew better than to try the front entrance. Tryst’s men were growing devout in their service. They would stop the Icarian. He felt sure he was one of the last holdouts of men who would not swear obedience to Tryst.

  Instead of the entrance, the Icarian approached the towering structure from behind. He glided along the wall of a low warehouse like he was hiding beneath a ridge in the mountains. The gray rags he wore blended into the shadows.

  From the corner of that building, he peered out and saw no motion. In two quick steps he crossed the shadowless gap between the warehouse and the tower. Then he began to climb.

  No one could climb like an Icarian ranger. His bare fingers and toes found holds where other men would see only cracks. His body straddled the corner of the building, gaining more stability and traction. He pulled up, stepped up, reached up, held fast, and kept climbing without a look down.

  His arms were shaking from fatigue and he was sweating when he made it to Tryst’s floor. One side of the room had no wall. He swung his body in and the floor made no sound of protest.

  The room was silent, darker than most places in the city. The floor was made of wide, almost black wooden planks. The ceiling beams looked like the same wood. Iron chandeliers without candles hung down. Otherwise the room was completely empty, except for the body lying in the middle.

  The Icarian thanked the floor for its quiet as he glided toward the body. He pulled out his knife and kneeled over him.

  Tryst was on his back, breathing deeply. He looked peaceful and spectacular. The Icarian marveled how the man could be so unaffected by this place. His porcelain face was shaved smooth. His black hair almost shined against the dark wooden floor. His hands were on his chest, gripped around the ruby hilt of his sword. The blade was spotless. Its metal was like a source of light, rising and falling with each breath.

  The Icarian would dispel every notion that this being was a god. He held his knife to Tryst’s perfect, bare throat.

  Tryst’s eyes snapped opened. They were a brilliant blue.

  “You win,” Tryst said, as if he had been awake the whole time. “Go ahead, finish me. It would be a good death.” After a moment’s pause, with their gazes locked, the prince spoke again. “You’re an Icarian?”

  The Icarian nodded, too surprised to say anything or to move his knife. The metal quivered at Tryst’s neck.

  “Do it, stab it into me. It would be a fitting end, given the destruction I brought to your people. You have also earned it.” The prince still had not moved. “Many men have challenged me directly and died by my hand. A few such as you have tried sneaking in and assassinating me. Only you have evaded my detection long enough. You might as well finish what you came here to do.”

  The Icarian heard honor and defeat mixed in Tryst’s words. He sounded like a leader, like the Summit. “You are not like the rest of us,” the Icarian said, slowly pulling his knife away.

  “Am I so different?” The prince stood and stared into the Icarian. His eyes were cold, like a frozen lake in the mountains. The Icarian would never see a lake or his mountains again.

  “You do not care if I kill you?” the Icarian asked.

  “I remember you,” Tryst said. “You’re the one Sebastian brought back. The ranger who told him about the powder.”

  Tryst stepped forward and the Icarian stepped back. Instinct made him raise his dagger between them.

  “I was that man, the Icarian,” he answered.

  “Then finish what you came here to do,” Tryst said.

  “I was wrong,” he paused. “I cannot recover my honor, not even by killing you.”

  The Icarian’s final purpose blew away like misty breath on a cold morning. He turned the blade toward himself, the metal shaking like a bird’s hurt wing, and he plunged it into his chest.

  Tryst’s eyes bore pain and sadness. They were the last thing the Icarian saw.

  Chapter 16

  UNDERWORLD DREAMS

  “Those with the greatest awareness

  have the greatest nightmares.”

  The leader of the mountain people, the Icarian Summit, stood in the central square of the Gloaming. He held his sword high overhead. His face was blank. His long gray hair fell over his shoulders. Blood dripped down his bare chest.

  He swung hard at me. I jumped back, but too late. He slashed into my shoulder, and I dropped something from my hand. The pain blazed.

  I fell onto my back. The black box was hanging above me, taunting me as ever. It was a path out of this place, but I could not reach it.

  The Icarian Summit stomped his bare foot on the fresh wound in my shoulder. He pointed his long sword at my neck. It was Zarathus. It was supposed to be my sword.

  You grow soft, Andor. I heard his words in my mind, but his mouth did not move.

  “Stop!” I shouted at him. “Enough killing. Make it stop.”

  Only you can make it stop. His expression was the same, as steady and solid as a mountain.

  “I can’t. Look what’s become of me.”

  Who are you?

  Suddenly I was not myself. I was the king of Sunan. I could not see my face, but I remembered the throne. It was made of gold, as bright as the sun.

  “A Sunan,” I said, “but I don’t know who.”

  “You know and you run from it.” This time the Summit’s mouth spoke the words. He moved his sword away from my neck. He stepped back. “Stand and fight me.”

  “No, I will not fight.” I rose to a crouch.

  “You will fight or you will die.”

  “Then I will die.”

  “You will fight,” he commanded.

  I stood and a spear was in my hand. I hurled it at him.

  He ducked it easily.

  “You fight.” He smiled. “But he will die.”

  Before I could ask who he was, the Summit stabbed Zarathus at me. The blade pierced into my gut. I drowned in the pain like a man sinking in an ocean.

  “If you will fight,” the Summit said, “you will bring peace.” He twisted the blade inside me. I collapsed, my hands clutching at the wound in my gut. “If you will not fight, you will find a death worse than the Gloaming.” His words rang in my ears.

  I was writhing on the ground. Blood and mud and pain washed over me.

  “Wake up.”

  Someone was shaking me.

  “Wake up.”

  I opened my eyes. I was in my bed.

  “You were having another dream,” Lorien said. She had lit a candle by the bed. Her face showed concern and something more. Fear. Her face showed fear of me.

  “What did I say?” I asked.

  “You said you would die.” She paused. “And you said you’d rather we all die than fight. What did you see?”

  “I was in the Gloaming. I was not myself. I was fighting the Summit.”

  “The Summit?”

  “The leader of the Icarian people. He wanted me to fight.”

  “He was right,” Lorien said. “We have to fight.” She had been saying that for days.

  “I think maybe I will have to fight, but it is more complicated.” I began to say more, but she stopped me with a finger on my lips.

  “The Sunans bring war, and we will defeat them.” The fear was gone from her face. She looked pure and resolute, like a leader. “War may bring complexities, but what we must do is simple. We prepare our men to fight, and when the Sunans come, we throw them off our walls and our
shores.”

  I shook my head. “I am still hoping for another way.”

  “You can keep your hope.” Her voice blended sympathy and frustration. “You have to overcome what happened to you in the Gloaming. Stop pretending it did not happen. Face it and overcome it. Hope can help. But you cannot avoid this war. We have to prepare for it.”

  “You are doing a fine job of that,” I said. Lorien had been taking on more and more of my responsibilities.

  “I am, but the men need you. They need their prince to lead.”

  “I will lead them, but I want to find another way. I want to find some unseen path that avoids destruction. Thousands and thousands will die if we fight. Our city might burn. I will not lead us into that.”

  “You are denying reality.” She peered into my eyes as if looking for some clue of what I was thinking. I hardly knew what I was thinking. “You are still denying the scars you bear from the Gloaming.”

  “I am,” I admitted. “And Tryst and other men are still down there. The minister of prisons keeps saying the time is close for bringing them back. Maybe I should follow Tryst’s example and run this city like a tyrant. At least things would get done then.”

  “I agree you must speed up this rescue, but you also must remember who you were before the Gloaming.” She ran a finger along the scar on my cheek. “Do you remember when we last saw each other before Tryst betrayed you?”

  I nodded. I did remember. I had seen her in the back of the throne room toward the end of that day. I had excused the nobles, and she and I had gone for a walk along the bluff between the palace and the sea.

  “The wind was calm that day.” I closed my eyes to see the memory more clearly. “You were wearing a yellow dress. You were beautiful. We talked of the future.”

  “You were wearing your crown, and your hair was darker then.” She ran her hand through my pale hair. “When we talked of the future, we talked about our children.”

  “You called me bold for assuming I’d be the father of your children.” A smile came to my lips.

  “You were bold,” she said. “You were bold and strong. I played at resisting you, but you knew you had me.”

  “I hoped I had you.”

  “And now you do, but your boldness has faded. I can be bold for us, but I want the man from that day to return.”

  “I’m trying.” I sighed, and then I felt the tug. It was the pull of the Gloaming, common lately and made stronger by my dream, as if the Summit’s blade was still in my gut, calling me.

  I slid out of bed. “I’m going down to the dungeons. I want to stand over the pit. Maybe it will help clear my head.”

  Lorien did not look surprised. “I’ll come with you,” she said.

  I shook my head as I began to dress. “I will go alone tonight. It will be safe, and I will not be gone long. Only I can fight these demons inside me.”

  She stood and took my hands. “Very well, but promise you will not even think of going down into the Gloaming.”

  “I promise.” I bent down and kissed her lightly. “I will be back before dawn.”

  “Come back safe.” She held my face and smiled. “I will keep our bed warm. It will be ready for a bold man’s return.”

  As I walked out of my chambers, her smile left a warm shell around the cold terror of my nightmare.

  I declined when my guards offered to go with me. The halls were empty and quiet and cool. I went down the grand central staircase and through a plain door that led to the dungeons.

  As I descended through the torch-lit dungeon halls, I thought back on my two prior trips along this path. On the first, I had worn a bag over my head, with my hands tied behind my back. On the second, I had been just as blind, hoping to rescue Tryst like a hero. How wrong, how full of pride, I had been. And now he was down there. Was he still alive? How many men had he killed? How had he changed? I had no answers.

  After many more stairways and halls, I entered the vast, round cave with the entrance to the Gloaming. The cave was lit by a hundred torches ringing the smooth walls. Slits carved into the outer edge of the floor let the light of those torches glow into the city below. In the center of the huge expanse, there was a hole in the floor, twenty paces across. Empty cages hung motionless over the hole. Four guards stood around it. They faced the outer wall, as if no threat could come from the pit.

  I approached the nearest guard.

  “Halt,” he commanded, drawing his sword. “Name yourself.”

  “I am the prince, Andor Vale.”

  “I doubt that,” the guard grunted. “Drop your sword.”

  I held my empty palms out to him as I stepped closer.

  He peered at me. His eyes suddenly opened wide. He sheathed his sword and bowed.

  “Stand,” I said. “I trust all goes well this night?”

  “Yes, my prince.” He pulled off his helm. He had a solid face and clear eyes. He was maybe twenty years my senior. Like most guards this deep in the dungeons, he would have once been a prisoner who was assigned this secret penance of service.

  “How long have you been a guard here?” I asked.

  “Almost fifteen years, my prince, and I’ve been in the dungeons ten years longer than that.” He paused. “I have never seen a prince visit this place.”

  “You know I was down there for a season?” I gestured to the pit behind him.

  He nodded. “You’re the only one who’s ever gotten out.” He had awe in his voice.

  “I want to change that,” I said. “What do you know about the city below?”

  “Probably nothing you don’t know,” he shrugged, “but there’s some legends passed down to us guards.”

  “Do they speak of how this started?”

  “You see these walls?” He pointed past me and raised his arm in an arch as if tracing the dome above. “I’ve never seen stone this smooth, except maybe where thousands of feet or an ocean has worn it down. One legend says, when Prince Jonas was digging this out, he had a team of men who cast spells on the rock. Nice to have wizards on your side, eh?”

  “That depends. Tell me more,” I urged him.

  “Another legend says these wizards linked the city down there to the throne, as if draining life from these lost men to give power to the prince. You know the last head of the dungeons, the man named Ramzi?” He whispered the question.

  “Yes?” I said.

  “One time I was on guard and Ramzi came in here. He kneeled right there.” The guard pointed to a spot near us, by the rim of the pit. “He lit some candles and stayed on his knees for a long while. He said strange words I could not understand, but he said them like he meant them, like it was a prayer. I think Ramzi believed all these legends. You know he threw hundreds into this hole. Maybe thousands. I think he thought those men gave him power, and gave Tryst power.”

  “Do you think Ramzi was right?”

  “Oh there’s usually some truth in a legend, but I have my doubts.” He held up a clenched fist. “I’ve never seen a man who could move rock without muscle and a tool.”

  “What about the link between the Gloaming and the prince?” I asked.

  “I don’t believe in magic, my prince. This cave is as real as dirt, no matter how smooth the stone is. But I do believe this place is cursed. We hear the screams from down in the pit.” His voice grew quiet. “They’re faint, coming from so deep, but they echo in here something mighty.”

  “Why would it be cursed?” This guard sounded like he knew more than the archivists. He’d breathed this air a long time.

  “I think it’s been cursed from the beginning. We all learned about Prince Jonas as boys. The man was like a machine. He chewed up his servants, swallowed everything good, and then spit the rest out like husks. I bet he worked his men to the death down here. He probably made them chip away this stone with shovels until their bodies gave out. I’ve looked close at these walls. I’ve seen thin lines, as if a man dug his fingernails into the stone and dragged them down as he collapsed and fell
into the long sleep.”

  The guard shuddered and closed his eyes. It was silent as I waited for him to continue. “That’s dark work,” he said, his eyes still closed. “Darkness was poured into this dark pit. Then men are thrown into these cages and into this hole. They writhe and scream and die down here, without anyone knowing but us guards.” His eyes blinked open and fixed on mine. “But, like I said, you probably know all that. Are you going to do something about it? Stop the curse?”

  “We are going to get all of them out,” I answered, “and then I’ll bury all this. It is taking a long time, too long, to figure out the details of what to do with these men once they’re back. But I’ve ordered no more men be sent, and better food be dropped. Have those orders been followed?”

  “Yes, my prince,” the guard replied. “We have not heard the screams lately. I do not know how to explain it, but it has felt a little different down here.”

  I nodded, imagining the effect of more food in the Gloaming. Ramzi sprang into my mind. I wondered what he had done by the pit. “Where did you say Ramzi kneeled to pray?”

  “Right there, my prince.” The man pointed to the spot again.

  “Thank you for talking with me.” I clasped the man’s shoulder. “We’ll end this work, and I’ll make sure men like you get to see the light of day.”

  His face brightened. “Something like that would go a long way to lifting a curse.”

  “We can hope,” I said. “Goodnight.”

  “Farewell, my prince.” He bowed and moved back to his post.

  I went to where Ramzi had knelt, and I dropped to my knees. A curse. That sounded right. A curse was an expression of evil, just as light was an expression of a divine good. This curse was bigger than Ramzi. It was bigger than me. The Gloaming had to break, or the nightmares and the curse would go on. It would hang around my neck and the neck of every prince to come. I rose to my feet and began my climb out of the dungeons. I needed more help.

  Chapter 17

  STRAINED PRAYERS

  “The strength of the people