Blood of the Emperor

by Tracy Hickman

  Dread suddenly overwhelmed him. Drakis quickly set Mala down, extending his hand toward Braun.

  “No!” Drakis called out. “Please!”

  Braun, with a look of infinite sadness on his face, reached up with his right hand toward the crystal of the Aether Well. He shook his head as he spoke. “I’m so sorry, Drakis.”

  Drakis tried to lunge toward the Proxi but Mala was still clinging to him.

  Braun’s hand touched the crystal of the Aether Well.

  A blinding flash of light filled Timuran’s garden, causing Drakis to slam his eyes closed. In that instant, a sudden blast of wind nearly pushed Drakis off his feet. A horrible chorus of screeching voices from every direction filled his ears with pain. He reached both hands up, trying to cover his ears from the sound but realized even as he managed to do so that the sound had already fled.

  He stood in an elven garden far different than the one he had stood in moments before. No avatria could be seen overhead—only the unobstructed sky filled with stars. The Aether Well remained, but its once blue glow now pierced the sky in a column of purple-tinged light.

  Braun, his dark face fallen into a thoughtful frown, stood next to the Aether Well, pulling his hand away.

  Braun, who had started all of this in the first place, Drakis thought. It had been this same Braun, mad as moonlight, who had abandoned Drakis and his brother warriors at the worst possible time. He had robbed Drakis of his victory and the greatest prize of the Battle of the Ninth Throne. It occurred to Drakis then that losing the crown as he had was what caused him to remain behind at the dwarven throne. If he had not lost the crown, he would never have met Jugar—and he might still be a slave.

  And she might still be alive today…

  Drakis had thought Braun dead in that battle for the dwarven crown deep beneath the mountains—had even thought that he had discovered his corpse among the dead. But it had been Braun who had been the first to welcome him when Drakis had slid down from the back of Marush on the shores of Willow Vale. Drakis had been too shocked to kill him outright at the time and had been conflicted about the man ever since.

  One thing remained at the center of Drakis’ thoughts regarding the human mage: more than anyone, Braun was responsible for what had happened to him.

  “You,” Drakis reached for the hilt of his sword, his hand shaking. “You did this to me!”

  Braun glanced at Drakis. “No, Drakis. This was your plan, remember?”

  “My plan!” Drakis yelled, drawing his sword. “I had everything—everything—and you robbed me of it. Worse, you showed it to me, let me taste it, and then tore it away from me!”

  “Everything you ever wanted,” Braun said, stepping back from the Aether Well.

  “Yes!”

  “And the sirens,” Braun continued, stepping to the side of Well. “What is their danger?”

  Drakis blinked, his mind trying to see past his pain.

  Braun raised his arms up, shifting them in the air as he murmured strange sounds. A circular fold tore open in the air, the light at its rim intensely brilliant.

  “Think! You know,” Braun said again to Drakis. “What is the siren’s danger?”

  “That…that they give you what you want,” Drakis said, his voice ragged with emotion.

  The edges of the fold grew slightly, its light brightening into an unbearable purple that was uncomfortable to observe. Ten of Braun’s mages moved through the fold as quickly as their weary legs could take them. As each stepped through, their faces brightened as though life and renewed strength were flowing into them.

  “Marun!” Braun called out. “Take four other mages with you toward the south. Klestan…take the other half with you to the north. Establish the fold link with your paired mages back at the encampment. There’s more than enough Aether now. Belag should have everyone arranged in their ten camps by now…one fold per camp.”

  “Are we waiting for a signal?” Marun, a voluptuous human female mage with wide green eyes asked.

  “No!” Braun answered. “Don’t wait for anything! Just start bringing them through!”

  The mages moved with lighter step, rushing toward the open gates in the subatria wall.

  Shaking, Drakis fell to his knees. He could see now that the subatria was much smaller than he had thought and that there was no garden here at all. The avatria never existed.

  Everything I ever wanted…

  Braun continued to hold open the fold gate. As the mages dispersed, Ethis stepped through the fold, followed by an Octian of manticorian warriors rushing to follow the mages to their assigned positions beyond the subatria wall. A second Octian followed, moving to the edge of the subatria and climbing the stairs to the top of the wall surrounding the Aether Well.

  “The camps are ready,” Ethis said to Braun, then spotted Drakis pale with shock, still shaking where he crouched on the ground. “What happened?”

  “Corruption, that’s what happened,” Braun answered. “It seems that the Rhonas Imperium has been doling out their magic to your southern cousins just as you believed. Your youth—your sirens as you call them—have been using it to enhance their powers of persuasion. They appear to have become illusionists of more skill than we thought.”

  Ethis moved quickly to Drakis, dropping to one knee and examining him closely. “What happened to the sirens?”

  “They fled when I inverted the Well,” Braun said, watching another Octian of warriors—these almost exclusively human—emerge from the fold he continued to hold open. They ran with their blades drawn toward the western exit from the subatria. “It seems that they have an aversion to the Aether of an inverted Well. Now, with an inverted Well of our own, we have the Aether we need to secure the encampment and to send the army west just as you promised your Queen Chythal…and the world will never be the same.”

  “I take it the plan worked, then?” Ethis said.

  Drakis bowed his head to his chest.

  “Too well,” Braun grimaced. “The sirens concentrated almost exclusively on Drakis. They were so intent on satisfying his desires that they paid little attention to me. It was the diversion that we hoped for—it certainly allowed me to reach the Aether Well and invert it—but it was worse for Drakis than he expected.”

  “Why?” Ethis asked.

  “Because they gave him the one thing he can never have,” Braun sighed. “They gave him back his home.”

  CHAPTER 23

  In His Name

  SHE CAME IN THE NAME OF DRAKIS…and they followed.

  She came on the back of a great dragon, whose markings were gray and white. Manticores, chimerians, humans, goblins, gnomes of every station, both free and under elven Devotions—all trembled before the power of the enormous drake and the lithe woman who rode it. Elven Governors and their Legions of the Occupation abandoned their posts at her approach. The liberated towns gathered at her call. She told them that Drakis, the Man of Prophecy, had sent her for them so that she might lead them back to join with him and his army to forge for each of them a better life free from the cruelty of the elven administrators and their Legions. She told them to shake from their shoulders the burdens that had been imposed upon them and follow her to a better life in the name of Drakis.

  She sat astride a monstrous creature of power and majesty that had been nothing more than a legend before her arrival. The elven oppressors fled from her and her creature. How could they not believe her? Word of her and her call spread eastward with every merchant ship.

  So in the cities, ports, and townships from Tempest Bay to Cape Tjakar and up the Shadow Coast, those who could packed up what little they had to call their own, filled their carriages, carts, wagons, and wheelbarrows, harnessed whatever beasts of burden they could acquire and set off to answer the call of Drakis and the promise of his return in power to lead them to a better land.

  They formed a stream of refugees making its way up the Shadow Coast and toward the wilderness. As they traveled, the refugees gravitated into sm
all groups for their mutual protection. Each of these small collections of refugees followed in the footsteps of the refugee group that had gone before them. None of them suspected that two full Legions of the Rhonas Imperium were ahead of all the refugee caravans.

  All, that is, except one.

  “Excuse me?” A human by the name of Gyorg raised his hand from where he stood at the forward edge of the gathering. Nearly all of the fifteen hundred persons who made up the caravan had gathered together at a cautious distance from Ephranos, the white-and-gray-marked dragon sitting regally upright on the north side of their camp. The remains of the original pilgrim encampment stretched for several leagues in every direction.

  The Lyric, now arrayed not only in her padded leather flying coat but in assorted pieces of mismatched armor as well, stood before the dragon facing the caravan with her arms folded across her chest. “Yes, friend, what is your question?”

  “Where are they?”

  “They who?”

  “Your army, miss,” Gyorg answered at once. “You said they would be coming toward us.”

  “Look around you,” said the Lyric as she gestured toward the horizon in every direction. “Do you see the remains of our encampment? Not just a city but a free nation made its home here not days before us. You have seen their tracks in the dust heading to the place of the magic road. Have I not opened up that same road to you again and again, crossing great distances to bring you to the very spot where they lived?”

  “Yes…but they are not here!”

  “I have moved them,” the Lyric said with a wave of her hand. “They are now in a place of greater abundance and safety from which we may strike against our oppressors. That is where we will join them in only a day or two more. Our return will be one of triumph and celebration at your coming.”

  “Yes, as you’ve told us before but, begging your pardon, miss…I thought Drakis was a man’s name?”

  “So it is, friend,” the Lyric said, pitching her voice unusually low and husky.

  “Well, then,” Gyorg went on hesitantly as his glance shifted between the young woman and the dragon towering behind her, “no disrespect but…how is it that you are Drakis?”

  “I am glad you asked that question,” the Lyric said, pacing back and forth before Ephranos as she spoke. “I am, indeed, Drakis…the Drakis of the prophecy that was long ago foretold. That is because Drakis is not a man or a woman for that matter; Drakis is a calling and an ideal to which we all aspire. I am the embodiment of that idea and it is in that name to which I dedicate my life that I am Drakis. To the extent to which you dedicate yourself to that ideal, then Drakis is a part of you, too. We are all, therefore, each in our own part and our own way, Drakis. Does that make sense?”

  Gyorg smiled wanly, nodded his head a couple of times, and then said, “Uh…no.”

  “Drakis is before you,” the Lyric continued, her wispy hair blowing about her narrow, delicate face, now red from the sun and sky. She pointed behind her toward the north. “Out there is where my army awaits us! My thousands of the encampment long to accept you as their family in the fulfillment of your greatest destiny! Here stands with me a dragon of the north—the very symbol of Drakis and the future that he holds for you. For tonight, rest and be at peace. We shall soon be with our companions in this great cause—though the road is long and difficult. I shall open the fold in the morning and we shall continue toward the north.”

  Gyorg and the rest of the company looked up at the dragon towering above them.

  “Yes, Drakis,” Gyorg said. “So we shall do in your name.”

  “Legate Xhu’chan!” shouted the elven Centurai captain as he banged the hilt of his sword against his armored chest in salute. He had been given barely sufficient warning of the approach of the Legion’s commander to don his ceremonial armor. The fringe of hair around his excessively pointed head would not stay in place. “By the Emperor’s Will!”

  The canvas of the captain’s tent flapped and snapped in the strong wind blowing across the plain. At least here inside the tent, Xhu’chan thought, they would find some respite from the blowing sand and howling noise. The nosy War-mage Kleidon had followed him into the tent as well as his aide…a young elf by the name of Tsaj. He was Xhu’chan’s sister’s son who had pretentions of making the military his career since his father had believed him unsuited to any other work. Xhu’chan knew better. He doubted his nephew would last more than a week in the field.

  “By the Emperor’s Will,” Xhu’chan returned halfheartedly. Unlike the captain, who had had warning of the approaching commander, the Legate was dressed casually in a simple tunic, a cloak, and breeches tucked into his knee-high boots. “What is this place called, Captain…”

  Xhu’chan let the sentence hang in the air like a question.

  “Captain Zhan’sei Sha-Jadi, Lord Legate,” the captain prompted with his name. “To be accurate, Legate, this specific place has no name. We are currently encamped on a plain known locally as the Craedecian Fields. We are seven leagues north of an abandoned village once called Gobton.”

  “And the pilgrim caravan?” Xhu’chan asked at once. “Where are they currently?”

  “The pilgrim caravan is spread along a trail stretching from the eastern edge of Cape Tjakar up the coastal road through Shellsea and Blackbay Township then up toward Gorganta Bay, and then there is a large gap between…”

  “I’m not interested in the stragglers, Captain,” Xhu-chan huffed. “Where is the most forward element of the caravan?”

  “They were last spotted here, my Legate,” the captain replied, pointing down at the map unrolled on the table before him. “It’s called Minum Wells. The locals say it is a good place to replenish water and has been a trade crossroads as long as any of them can remember.”

  “I did not ask where they were, Captain. I asked where they are,” Xhu’chan said.

  “We have not had any further reports from our scouts, my Legate, and therefore I regret that I cannot tell you with any precision where the caravan is located,” the captain managed to get to the end of the sentence although the last words had nearly exhausted his breath.

  Xhu’chan grimaced. He was striving to keep his temper in check. He knew that this pompous captain was just trying to be accurate not only in his report but in the words by which he chose to make his report. Still, he felt that getting information from this posturing commander would take more effort than was necessary. “Captain, do you have a guess as to where the caravan might now be?”

  “I would hesitate to offer an opinion, Lord Legate…”

  “Then offer a guess.”

  “A guess?”

  “Yes, a guess,” Xhu’chan said, his voice rising slightly as though the captain were hard of hearing. “As in, where would you guess the caravan is now?”

  The captain frowned. “We have a scout Octian detached to follow the caravan. They sent word back to me this morning that the caravan has moved away from Minum Wells in a north-by-northeast direction. I have ordered the scout Octian to continue to follow the caravan and to report back daily or as often as the situation demands. As soon as word returns from them, I can give you a more accurate report.”

  “Just GUESS!” Xhu’chan yelled.

  The captain swallowed hard. “I believe they are headed toward what is called Lakes Basin. It is a natural gathering spot about forty leagues north of the Wells.”

  “They should have made contact with the Drakis main force by now,” War-mage Kleidon observed.

  “Unless their army is moving southward slower than we expected,” Xhu’chan said, considering the map. “This human is not just moving his army but all of his support and supplies. That would be nothing compared to moving the entire rabble of families that are following them as well.”

  “It would appear that the fears of the Emperor were exaggerated,” responded Kleidon.

  “Or perhaps misinformed,” Xhu’chan said, straightening up. “It is certain, however, that he will be caug
ht between the waters of Thetis and the Mournful Mountains. If they retreat into Nordesia with the aid of the goblins then we chase them all the way to the Westwall Cliffs. If they retreat into the Mistral Peninsula then we’ll chase them back to Port Glorious.”

  “Then we have them,” Kleidon hissed with satisfaction.

  “Yes, all we have to do is find them,” Xhu’chan nodded.

  “And perhaps not even that,” said an irritatingly familiar voice behind him.

  “Just when I thought you had left me, K’yeran,” Xhu’chan said as he turned.

  The Inquisitor smiled as she entered the tent. Captain Zhan’sei straightened a bit more. Xhu’chan noted beads of sweat forming near the point of his elongated skull as the Iblisi operative came closer.

  “I’m only pleased that I found you at all,” K’yeran said in a dangerous purr. “But I’ll spare you the requisite pleasantries. I am only here in transit to the south and will be continuing my journey within the hour. I am leaving these military matters in your capable hands as I have other duties to attend. That said, however, I thought you should know that I and my Quorum have visited the remains of the main encampment of this phantom army that you have yet to see.”

  “Where is it, K’yeran?” It was formed as a question but Xhu’chan spoke it as a command.

  “As you were so disposed as to ask then I shall gladly be disposed to answer,” K’yeran said, stepping toward the map on the table. “I passed the caravan you have been tracking and it led us, as you suggested into an area known to the goblins as Flat’s Gap. It is a wide plain of flatlands that sit between the Goblin Peaks on the west and the Mournful Mountains to the east. We’ve rune marked it for you in several places. March northeast from this Lakes Basin and, if you can manage to get within fifty leagues or so of our marks, you should be able to find it. That caravan you’ve been tracking certainly did. They should be there by now.”

  “They’re that far north so soon?” Captain Zhan’sei blurted out. “That’s not possible!”

  “Possible or not, they were approaching that place when I passed them,” K’yeran said.