“That’s fair, and accurate.”
“The people of Haeglin adored Oriana Gravendeer,” Jameson said, his hands parted and moving vaguely with each word. “If only because she wasn’t her sister. When Raegon died and Olyssi was named queen, I damn near had a revolt on my hands. Haeglin is not home to a daft people; they know the stench of rot when they smell it.
“It was by the gods’ graces that Oriana fled. She could have usurped Olyssi the next day if she’d wanted. Now, granted, she’s had foul rumors spread of her, and talk of misdeeds involving dragons and sorcery—gossip that she brought the wrath of the clutches to Avestas—has reached ears near and far. But there are also rumors she saved the world.”
Bastion slapped a hand atop Jameson’s desk. “And she’ll be dead within the day. That is, after all, why I invited her here.”
Intrigue wrinkled Jameson’s forehead. “You lop off her head and you’ll have a rebellion.”
“Not if we brand her a treasonous wench.” Bastion smiled.
He hadn’t expected Horace ever to return to Haeglin, and he certainly hadn’t expected Oriana to arrive with him. But he couldn’t have asked for a better time for the unexpected.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
“Ever feel cold when you’re supposed to feel warm?”
Paya gave Kaun her infamous are-you-an-idiot look. “Kaun, um—I don’t know if you’ve noticed, darling, but it’s snowing. You’re sitting on ice. You’re not supposed to feel warm. Maybe if someone”—she raised her voice and glanced in Adom’s direction—“could get a fire started, we’d have some warmth.”
“Hands are damned frozen,” Adom snapped, thwacking a dagger against flint. “You’re welcome to bloody try.”
“I killed the deer we’re going to eat,” Paya said. “If you ever get the fire going, that is.”
Kaun shivered. “You’re taking it too literally. I know I’m not supposed to feel warm, but… well, I’m fair certain I’m not supposed to feel this cold, either.”
“What the fook are you goin’ on about?” Tig asked, slamming his satchel down in the snow. He made a mound with his foot and sat on it.
“Just—” Kaun swallowed uneasily. “This isn’t a place—doesn’t feel like a place—to rest. I mean, look around.”
Wooden signs staked in the snow told them this was indeed not a place to rest. The skulls and corpses strung up on the signs reinforced that.
GODS DON’T LIVE HERE
I KILLED THE GODS
BREAK EM HANG EM KILL EM
CITY OF BLOOD
Elaya read them again and again. She couldn’t make sense of it all, because she had no knowledge of this place.
“Valterik,” she said, “what happened here?”
“He’s sleeping,” Adom said.
Elaya sighed. She looked to the plateau jutting from the mountain before them. So long as they could make it through another cold, brutal night, they’d reach the sprawling City of Ice on that plateau tomorrow.
She hoped Lavery was there waiting for them.
GYNOTH HAD HEARD the tales told about him. He was regarded as a man of ill-repute who cared not for love nor for hatred, but for chaos and evil.
Completely and entirely inaccurate, he thought as he brought plague into Avestas from the realm of death. He stood atop the parapet of Raeul City.
The bodies of a dozen guards lay scattered on the battlements, some the victims of a short sword, others the unlucky recipients of acidic rain.
The tales told of Gynoth asserted he was a man of thoughtless and senseless murder.
False, false and false, he thought as the sleepy city of Raeul awoke under a crescent moon. The people rose from their beds not with yawns and tired eyes, but with heinous screams and gut-curdling cries.
If torture had a sound, it would be those despondent laments that howled from the mountain Raeul was built into.
The stories said Gynoth did not simply wreak havoc, he bore it. He did not kill with the mercy of a sword, but with the unyielding pain of disease and rot.
Fiction, all of it, he thought as boiling puddles of green plague melted ice and snow, gobbled up the straw floors of cottages and swallowed whole cots and dressers and hearths. It shucked the flesh from the bones of every living soul in Raeul City. But it was hardly unyielding pain. It hurt and it burned, Gynoth knew, but it was the quickest and most humane way to cull the masses.
If the people who’d recounted the false tales of Gynoth had only known what he had, they would have gotten down on their knees and prayed to him. They would have looked to him as their savior, for he was the only one who could shield them from the reckoning that was coming.
That was a long time ago, though. A time when… well, time itself still existed. Had the Twins not killed him, he would have gathered an army that could easily crush Avestas’s intruders. Now he was outnumbered. Avestas was outnumbered.
Gynoth took the winding staircase down from the parapet, each step feeling like a knife being thrust into his shoulder; his battle wounds with the Twins had yet to heal.
Beautiful emerald flames rippled throughout the city, a stark contrast to the black sky above. The stench of charred hair and melted flesh wasn’t quite so charming.
Steam billowed from freshly melted snow, transforming Raeul from a thriving city to a cookpot of overdone and burnt food.
Gynoth had a long night ahead of him, and probably a long morning too. Raeul was home to over five thousand people. Chasing down that many souls, following them to their final resting place and ripping them back into the living world again—that takes time.
Time, Gynoth thought, frustrated. It always came down to that, didn’t it? He recalled when he’d first learned of the reckoning, centuries ago. It had seemed like he had all the time in the world then.
Seven hundred years ago, he had gone to Coraen, a dead kingdom full of secrets and myths and legends. He never had found the mutations he’d heard so much about, but he did find tomes detailing their uses… and their catastrophic effects.
He scoured the enormous library of Coraen, learned how sorcery was born. He discovered the consequences of sorcery and where those consequences took place: far away, in lands few knew existed.
A raven was reborn that day, at Gynoth’s hands. It flew across the sea in search of those uncharted lands, and when it returned, it told Gynoth all that it had learned.
He had learned that day of the existence of hoofed beings with dark red flesh and gnarled spines, and giants made of stone. Their lands had begun feeling the effects of sorcery that’d been used on Avestas and Baelous; eventually, Gynoth knew, they would be forced from their homes. They would be forced to migrate. And where would they go?
That answer was quite obvious. They would come to Avestas, and they would come with force.
Sometimes Gynoth regretted not sharing the secrets he’d uncovered in Coraen. But he saw himself as Avestas’s savior. As its god.
Perhaps he’d instead be its devil.
LAVERY FELT VERY WARM, so he knew he was still dreaming. A couple voices bled together as one, and through bleary eyes he saw a glistening wall of ice.
This doesn’t feel like a dream. He pinched himself.
“Self-harm is a symptom of madness,” said a woman. Her voice was lovely and smooth.
“I thought I was dreaming,” Lavery said, blinking away the blurriness from his eyes. “Where am I?” He tried sitting up, but several leather straps across his chest and belly tied him to the cot. His arms were bound as well.
“Relax,” the woman said. “You’re safe here.”
Lavery hated being confined. He jerked his arm, but the straps wouldn’t budge. He rolled his head over to his other shoulder and saw the woman standing beside him. She had fair skin and cherry cheeks. Her hair flowed in layers of blond and hazel, and her eyes were the bluest Lavery had ever seen.
“Where is here?” he asked.
“I think you know that answer,” she said, a kind smile on
her pink lips. “Few come to these walls without knowledge of its past, and even fewer trespass inside. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a young boy here.”
“I’m twelve,” Lavery said. “I’m not a boy.”
The woman clasped together her hands, interlocking her pale fingers. “Take no offense. Most everyone is young from my perspective. What is your name?”
“Tell me yours first,” Lavery said, guarded.
“Lusilia Con Vassaeus. Now it’s your turn.”
Lavery hadn’t expected her to actually reveal her name. “Lavery Opsillian.”
Lusilia tapped a sharp nail against her chin. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of the Opsillian lineage. Where are you from?”
“Not here,” Lavery said, hoping that would satisfy her curiosity.
“I assume not. Few settle these lands anymore. I also assume you are not from Baelous, as that would make your travels even more arduous. Hmm. You don’t trust me, do you?”
Lavery lunged upward, against the straps. They slammed him right back down. He spat out an angry breath. “I was attacked, and now I’m being held against my will. So, no. I don’t trust you. Or anyone else that might be here, for that matter.”
Lusilia tilted her head inquisitively. “You trespassed into my city. Is it not my right to protect myself?”
“Well, I suppose. But—”
“You yourself said you are no boy, so I ought to take caution against a man arriving uninvited, yes?”
“Well, I—”
“You could be here to kill me.”
“Why would I—”
“Or steal from me.” Lusilia stood back, chin high and eyes cast suspiciously downward at Lavery. Then her rigid, upright posture softened, and she smiled. “But I don’t think you would do those things. Prove me right, and tell me why you’re here, Lavery Opsillian.”
Lavery didn’t know much about negotiations. Maren O’Keefe had tried to teach him, but like most things Maren O’Keefe went on about, Lavery had ignored him. He wished he’d paid more attention. Although it didn’t seem like he had much room to negotiate, being bound to a bed and all.
“I met someone who told me to come here. If you’d like to know, his name was Haren.”
“Is this Haren a friend of yours?”
“No,” Lavery admitted.
“Do you often travel great distances on the whims of a stranger’s request?”
Lavery frowned. “It wasn’t just—well, I mean… there’s more to it than that. But I don’t think it’s fair that I have to answer all these questions. I have my own questions.”
Lusilia touched Lavery’s arm. With her free hand, she reached under the cot. Something clicked, and a strap spun across Lavery’s chest, unraveling. “I’m sure you do. How about I ask a question, and then you ask a question? Does that sound fair?”
Lavery thought about it. He wondered what the catch was; he knew prisoners often didn’t get treated this well unless there was something in it for their captors. “All right,” he said, hopeful Lusilia was truly a kind woman with a good heart, “that sounds fair. It’s my turn to ask, though.”
Another click and a second strap unraveled. “Go ahead.”
Lavery considered his choices of questions carefully. “Why is this city so empty?”
“No one lives here any longer,” Lusilia said.
“But you do.”
She shook her head, her soft hair bounding against her blushed cheeks. “I do not, Lavery Opsillian. Not for a very long time have I called this place home. It’s now my turn to ask a question.”
Lavery nodded.
“Do you know your mother?”
That’s a strange question. “Yes. She’s very sick. Her mind is diseased, so I don’t truly know her, but my father told me she was a wonderful woman. My turn. You said you don’t live here. Then where do you live, and why were you here when I arrived?”
Two more clicks, and a third. The straps around Lavery’s chest and belly had all been undone. Now only his arms remained bound.
“That’s two questions,” Lusilia said. “I’ll answer them both, if you’ll allow me two.”
“All right.”
“I live in all the places of the world. I prefer a nomadic life. I was here before you arrived. I had my fingers in the past, searching for something… you were quite loud and I heard your approach, and I returned to this time.
“Your eyes danced like the night stars in response to my second answer. That tells me something. It makes me wish to ask you something. Are you a Wraith Walker, Lavery Opsillian?”
Lavery opened his mouth, but he didn’t know what to say.
“You must tell the truth,” she told him. “I’ll know if you are lying.” She said this not as a threat, nor as an intimidation tactic, simply as a factual statement—much like someone who declares the weather outside is hot and dry.
Click. Click. Lavery’s left arm was now free. Lusilia walked around to the other side of his cot and released his right arm. He was no longer a prisoner, or at least not a bound one.
“I am a Wraith Walker,” Lavery said. “So was Haren. Or is… I’m not really sure the proper tense. He’s not from this time.”
“Haren Sisclin. He is your uncle.”
Lavery sat up, rubbing his wrists. “What? No, you’re mistaken. He is from an ancient civilization. I can’t remember the name, but it’s very old.”
Lusilia shook her head, smiling at the wall wistfully. “I never did think your mother could leave you.”
“What are you talking about? My mother is—”
“The Mother, Lavery.” Lusilia placed her palm on Lavery’s cheek. She had pity in her eyes. “She is Matriarch of the Children, though you are her only true child. She undoubtedly sent your uncle to ensure you were doing well. My question is why he sent you here; he would not have done so without your mother’s approval.”
A deluge of emotions crashed down upon Lavery. He felt confused and elated, sad and betrayed, angry and hopeful. Had he been lied to his entire life? Was his mother actually a—
“Lavery,” Lusilia said, taking his hand in hers. “Why did you come here?”
Lavery looked at her with watery eyes. “The Order. Haren said I could rebuild the Order of Wraith Walkers.”
Lusilia’s shoulders fell, and her head listed. “Oh, Lavery. I’m so sorry.”
“I can do it. I’m not sure how, but… you’ll help, won’t you?”
Lusilia sighed. “Lavery…” He raised his brows. “I truly am sorry.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Craw smoothed out the strip of silver hairs along his temple. Catali noted that he seemed to have a severe distaste for out-of-place hairs. Catali was also bored out of her mind.
She’d decided the quickest and safest route back to Avestas was by retracing her steps. She and Craw would take the long road back to the Free City, and from there she’d pass several villages en route to the western shore of the Glass Sea. They’d catch a boat there and sail to Avestas.
The first few days were filled with a sense of risk and excitement, never knowing if they’d be chased down or surrounded by demons. But as mornings came and went and the afternoon suns baked them to the color of beets and made them yearn for water, excitement had turned to drudgery and boredom.
Catali hauled six saddlebags’ worth of mutations on her shoulders, while thin-as-bones Craw carried two. And he complained the whole time.
“Swear there’s somethin’ pinchin’ me in there,” he said, rolling his shoulder. “Hurts like you wouldn’t believe.”
“I’d believe it,” Catali said flatly.
“How much longer you reckon we have? Can’t say I was countin’ down the days from when the Conclave disembarked from the Free City and arrived in that mountain pass. Seemed a good while, though.”
They’d passed into the Lonely Lands a few days ago. The pancake-shaped terrain made her eyes cross when they were tired and sucked any and all motivation from her.
“I don’t feel up to the task of runnin’ the opposite way.”
“You will if those demons chase us.”
Catali and Craw made fires and foraged for berries and nuts as they journeyed onward. Sometimes they tried to catch squirrels and chipmunks and field mice. Never were they successful.
When her belly was full and her throat wet, a concurrence which was rare indeed, Catali happily chatted with Craw about mutations, asking him what this one and that one did. She never could remember come morning, though that was Craw’s fault. The old man segued into unrelated stories, then circled back around to the topic at hand before disembarking on another wild anecdote.
The weather held up for the most part, besides some heavy rains that made travel slick and muddy. The Free City’s walls of sun-bleached mudbrick greeted them two and a half weeks later. The sight drew a “Thank the gods” from Catali.
The longest leg of their journey was over. Better yet, they’d have actual beds to sleep in and real food to eat. Feirdeen’s meats and fruits would have likely long ago spoiled, but the larders and root cellars would have kept veggies fresh and crisp. Or at least fresh. And if they could srounge up enough ingredients from the shops, they could fire up a hearth and bake some bread.
The possibilities were endless! Catali was giddy with excitement. Or maybe it’s madness, she thought. Either way, she was happy and thankful. Of course, then her stupid mind just had to remind her of the fiends and the terror they were spreading.
And what if they’re already on Avestas? her mind said.
Shut up, she told it.
The world could already be lost.
I said shut up. Leave me alone.
You must hurry to Oriana. She has to know.
“Shut up!” Catali screamed.
Craw stopped and slowly turned. “Er.”
“I need to rest,” Catali said. “Badly.”
Craw wiped a bead of sweat off his caterpillar brow. “Lookie there, in the sky.”
Above the Free City of Emyrth, against a backdrop of pure blue sky, circled an illusion. A mirage. A clearly obvious hallucination that affected not only Catali, but also Craw. She wondered if they were dangerously dehydrated. Or maybe a diet of fruits and berries had run them dry, and their bodies were shutting down.
Reign of Gods (Sorcery and Sin Book 2) Page 24