The king charged. More heavenly hammers struck the land, and the stone man stomped and stomped, causing the spine of the world itself to shake. Gloriatrix was thrown down—losing her gun—and caught by Eod’s spymaster. She shook off his assistance, using him primarily as a climbing post on which to stand and look out upon the vibrating land.
What could even be seen through the foggy storm descending from the heavens? There was dust—a coughing, eye-watering quantity of it. There were flashes of green and gold light going off that would have tempted her toward delirium had it not been for the mesmerizing dance of two jewels in the chaos. One was black, the other emerald. They reminded her of the shooting stars she and Thackery had once seen on the clearest night she’d known in Menos. But these were men, or powers that wore man-like forms. She heard their weapons of obsidian and ice smashing against each other. The calamity unleashed torrents of snow and pelted her with a rain of scorched soil. In specks, she was filthy and covered, and yet she could not look away. For it was too exhilarating, being in the presence of real divinity. As hard as Rasputhane—shocked and concerned for her safety—and her Ironguards tried, they couldn’t convince her to sit down.
Lightning thrashed in a web from above, and it became impossible to determine which storm was where. Then, in a moment that would be remembered forevermore, a black meteor launched itself on an angle from the billows like an arrow flying in reverse. It hung—glinting, growing a golden flame around itself, and growling, she thought—and then retraced its arc to the earth, landing with an impact as heavy, fiery, and great as expected. The shockwave vaporized the cloud below, blasted apart the storm above, and forced Gloriatrix to the ground with a slap of heat.
Her head rang; her eyes watered. She had the taste of blood in her mouth. Still indomitable, she stood with the rest of her groaning company and looked past the crumpled and scattered wreckage across a sparking, flame-twisted, and pockmarked square. Even in the midst of so much devastation, the warrior maidens sang; she could hear them now that the thunder had stopped. Indeed, they sang on because the battle was not yet over: through the ash and fires, the king and his son still danced. Gloriatrix wondered if the Immortals had stopped their dance for even a moment as the world skipped a beat. She assumed they hadn’t, for they parried and spun with a speed so great their movements were difficult to distinguish.
To her, they were garlands of black, gold, and green—incredible spirals. They threw each about like glowing rag dolls; their aerial acrobatics defied the laws of physics. Into the sky they leaped, hovering like a star of two colors. Gloriatrix feared the consequences of another fall, and this time braced herself, but when the star split, one half—the green one—was cast into the wall above Lila’s army. There, it bounced back from a dusty impact and tackled the black bolt already hurtling in its direction. The streaks twisted, rolled across the sky like ribbons in love, then veered downward and carved a smoldering rut in the flagstones before breaking apart. On sky, on land, it didn’t matter: the Immortals were stuck to each another, bound by their anger, apart only for instants. The dance, the renewed and booming thunder, and the lights were a divine pageantry. Certainly all the people of Eod had climbed out onto their roofs and turned their eyes toward the spectacle.
The fury of the conflict seemed to be waning, the blows the two exchanged less apocalyptic. Perhaps they had become aware of the damage they were doing: the Faire of Fates was now a wasteland, and no doubt there were many lying injured, if not dead, among the tarred heaps. Magnus’s rage had overpowered his compassion.
Occasionally, the Immortals froze in a wavering tangle, and she could see that they now looked much as they had at the start of the battle. In those moments, she heard them barking at one another, though their voices were rumbles and blaring crackles, and she could make no sense of them. Soon, she realized that the battle was indeed slowing, that most of the fight was taking place on land rather than in the sky, and that she could finally see the shapes hidden in the blurs. She didn’t dare approach the coruscating pit in which they still battled. Nor would she test her feet on a split land still trembling with tiny earthquakes from their blows. Sadly for her, she wasn’t privy to their confessions.
“I loathe you.” Erik grunted. In one hand, he clutched the sizzling blade of his father, dark blood pouring over his obsidian-gold knuckles. Sloppily he swung at his father with his free fist. Erik’s armor was chipped and much of its shale plating had been cleaved away: what remained gleamed with a polish of blood. Magnus’s icy mail had been shattered. Half a helm, a vambrace, and the whole abdomen of the king’s breastplate had been carved away. Blood concealed his paleness, but not the glittering fragments of shattered emerald buried in his flesh. Neither warrior could continue this for much longer. The king’s blade had been whittled down to a thick wick of light. Erik’s hands were numb, and he was sure he was missing a finger. He hoped it would grow back. The pain didn’t bother him. Rage pushed his extreme tolerance even further; he’d fight for Lila forever if he must. “You never deserved her,” he spat.
“You speak the truth,” huffed Magnus.
With a groan, Erik pushed them apart. Spent and shocked, he fell to a hand and a knee. Erik’s rocky plating crumbled away from his muscles, leaving him nude and defenceless. Magnus, at last released from Erik’s astonishingly strong and determined grip, staggered and also slumped to the ground. Only the flickering brand of the king’s weapon prevented him from collapsing: he rested both hands on its hilt. He Willed away his armor, and it faded from him in a shimmering wind. He knelt before his son—a real and true heir to his strength and power—in bloody rags and spoke his heart’s greatest secrets. There was no longer thunder in his voice.
“You feel that I have wronged you, by dishonoring Lila,” he whispered, “and I have. I defiled her. I allowed my love for my brother to blind me. I took her; I did not earn her. I see that now, although that wisdom will help neither of us heal our wounds. I do not believe we can ever be healed. Know that I have always acted with virtue as my goal, Erik. In my quest to be a man, I built many houses of sand that are now being swept away by the black tide that comes for us. I thought we were stronger. As a nation. As a family. I lived in a prison of my own illusions. I do not blame you for what you have done. In fact—” Magnus coughed and gave his son a bloody smile. “I am proud of you.”
Erik’s anger rose at this kindness. “You ordered us hunted. You turned the whole of Geadhain against us.”
Magnus nodded. “You stole off with my wife and destroyed a nation. Are you upset that I judged you before you could speak? Guilt has too many shoulders to fall upon here, Erik, and I had nothing but vagaries to offer the ruler of the Iron City, who had shown up on Eod’s doorstep—after being foiled in her destruction of it. Another ambiguous crime, though not as damning or clear-set as the lives you and Lila claimed in Menos. At least Gloriatrix never had her chance to reap our people. Thus, what was I to tell the Iron Queen of this tragedy when I knew so little of its details myself? I had, at most, two people with faltering phantasms impersonating my missing wife and possibly treasonous aide who themselves couldn’t vie for your or Lila’s innocence. Do you think Gloriatrix is a reasonable woman? That she would patiently wait for a logical explanation for Menos’s holocaust and the menagerie of deceptions left in Lila’s wake? Not until recently did we learn that Lila was not entirely, perhaps not at all, responsible for the atrocity. Nonetheless, blame must be placed upon a head lest all heads be removed. I had no choice.”
“Wait.” Erik shook his head and managed to look at Magnus without hate. “You know of the spirits that tortured Lila?”
“I know something of your tale, yes. This morning, the Iron Queen and I heard a ghastly account of survival from four unbreakable souls. They validate and vouch for your innocence to a degree. I expect there is more for you to confess and to share with the allies of Geadhain—the ones who seek to preserve Her, for reasons either wicked or good. I have buried a thousan
d-year grudge against the Iron Queen’s nation for the sake of a future. If you have the strength, Erik, my child, my son, I must ask that you wait before testing your impressive power against me once more. I know you must hate me, and yet this is what we need: unity. Hate will not win this war. That is the Black Queen’s weapon.”
“I don’t hate you…” mumbled the knight. He was fighting back tears. All the trapped frustration of his exile, of his feelings toward Magnus, toward Lila, and now of this catastrophic release nearly broke him. He was obsidian, and he was the rock for his queen, and yet…she was happy. From within, he felt her spirit: that lightness and peace that had first touched him in a stable in Eod. They were free, their blood-debt paid and extracted, and she wanted him now to surrender to peace. But he wasn’t sure he knew how to surrender. Everything in life had been a battle: his survival, his honor, earning his place with the woman he loved. How could he simply stop fighting? Then Magnus rose, and his blade vanished into starry crumbs. The king dragged himself forward a few steps and offered his son a hand. Erik gazed at the pale offering—still unclear as to what he should do.
“We can never be the same,” the knight declared.
A melancholy smile afflicted the king. “Although I have lived forever, I am only now realizing one of life’s most painful secrets. The decay of life, Erik, is what makes it precious. I would not ask you to change. I would not reverse my damning decisions. Not one. For in that fault, and the damage that you and I have caused, there lies truth and beauty. The leaves must turn; the fruit must rot. What we have been must die. Perhaps one day, something green will grow from what we have left behind.” The king paused, and seemed twice as somber. “Though I shall not pray for it.”
It was a soldier’s promise, to endure and suffer, rather than to ignore the pain, and Erik respected it. He took Magnus’s hand and stood. Those watching from afar, who saw the naked man and nearly-naked king rise and walk back toward the now silenced army of the queen, felt no shortage of astonishment.
“I don’t understand,” exclaimed Rasputhane as he clung to the arm of the Iron Queen. “What of Lila’s crimes? What of the murder pool?”
Gloriatrix quickly shook him off like a pest. “You are sniveling. It is disgusting. Speak to your king if you want to be kept abreast of the changing winds of war. The true enemy of Menos was revealed early this morning by survivors of the calamity. If you were a spymaster worth his salt, you would know that by now. Furthermore, I hereby declare the murder pool officially null and void. I shall have to make other plans for the restructuring of the Menosian diplomatic circle. Those plans certainly do not include our most recent enemy’s spymaster. If you’ll excuse me.”
The Iron Queen spotted some of her aimless Ironguards, including the one whose gun she had stolen, and commanded them to escort her to sanctuary.
Displaying a greater sense of authority than people presumed him to have, the spymaster issued sharp commands to the lads and ladies of the Silver Watch. They had been loitering around in the destruction, dumbfounded, but at the sound of his commands, these consummate warriors stiffened, focused, felt new determination. Once his contingent had been assembled and rallied with some of Gorijen’s late-arriving legion, he’d issued orders for groups to scour the marketplace for those injured or worse. Then he went to meet the king.
By then, Magnus had covered much ground and was somewhere amid a ring of warrior women and men. As he drew closer, the queen’s army appeared even grander and more intimidating, and Rasputhane’s force seemed tinier. Before the wall of glaring Arhadians, they tread like worried mice. It was rather eerie, how little conversation he heard among the ranks of the queen’s army. Their discipline was impressive, as strong as that of the silver folk at his side, and he could not fathom where, or even how, Lila had assembled such a force.
The spymaster found the red-and-white spot that was his king. Magnus stood near the gate, whistling out into the desert. The former Hammer, nude but for a cloak wrapped around his waist, was at his side. Magnus, too, had been clothed in a ratty crimson cloak. Behind them, assessing, calculating, was a sultry enchantress who Rasputhane knew quite well: Lila. Past the queen leered the stone-faced female horde. Their stoniness deeply unsettled the spymaster. At least there was a more pleasant smell here, which he found strangely soothing, like a room of incense. However odd it sounded, he felt as if the smell came from Lila. She studied him, a snake watching a rat, as he left his contingent and approached the softly talking dignitaries.
“My king. M-my queen?” he said uncertainly, and bowed.
Magnus and the queen traded glances that spoke of agreements already made, then the king turned to his aide. “Your queen, yes—although a redistribution of rights, titles, and responsibilities will be written into a charter when peace provides us an opportunity. For the moment, Lila remains our queen, and I remain your king.”
Suspicious wording, thought Rasputhane, that signaled tumultuous changes in the royal cabinet; hopefully, there would still be need for a spymaster. “As you say. I shall inform our criers and presses.” He imagined that tomorrow would be their busiest day yet. “I’ve sent legions to assess the damage to the Faire of Fates and to our citizens.” Magnus’s shoulders slumped. “I’ve seen no bodies as of yet—a miracle. If I may, I have a few further questions, mostly about how to communicate our message about the great return of Her Highness…You see, Gloriatrix has dismissed the charges against the queen—”
“Has she?” Erik laughed.
“Yes,” continued Rasputhane. “She speaks of another enemy, a greater one. I’m beginning to lose count of how many of those we now have.”
“Every ancient force in creation,” said the king, cast in gloom.
“All right—we shall need to devise a plan for battling everything. However, for the moment, let’s address the giant spinrex in the room: the queen has returned, is no longer an enemy of Geadhain, and has brought with her…an army? To aid in the defense of our nation? Is that a credible enough explanation?”
“It should suffice,” replied the king, and turned to Erik and the queen. Through this brief discussion, the new bloodmates had drifted slowly and steadily together, drawn by currents of attraction. They now stood as a pair of obsidian and tawny statues, perfect in their complementary beauty. (Rasputhane noticed this, too, and knew then that all of the rumors of their affair were certainly true.) Magnus continued, sounding pained. “I would ask that you and Erik stay to defend what we have built.”
“What we have built…” muttered Lila, and she surveyed the city, studied its silver highlights and valleys of towers and perfect houses. Was that happiness on her face? Rage? Rasputhane couldn’t read her inscrutable stare or emotions, though they were intense.
Erik studied the city as well.
“Yes,” said Lila and Erik in unison.
“Good,” said Magnus. “You will understand if we have no immediate room for your army within Eod. I believe that setting up an encampment beyond the Great Wall would be best. Possibly—”
Lila interrupted him with a sting of venom. “My people will not be told where in the desert we may rule. We shall make our camp in the West, close to the Salt Forests, so neither our ways nor yours will be infringed upon.”
Unperturbed, Magnus continued. “Well said. Distance will give our citizens time to adapt to yet another great power becoming entrenched outside Eod.”
“What of the movements within?” asked the spymaster. “We have a city full of murderers and thieves who will be extremely annoyed that their bounty has been called off. I don’t believe the Iron Queen will move to control any chaos caused by her capriciousness, which means that the responsibility for maintaining order will fall upon us.”
“As it always has,” said the king, and held his chin in thought. “The mercenaries will need to be routed, peacefully. Although…” As the sentence dangled, Rasputhane intuited that he would not like what Magnus said next. “They are men and women made for murder. I
am sure that a few of them have honor buried under their callousness. We have all stepped onto the side of darkness before, and the bravest of us have returned from that journey.”
“You’re not suggesting…” Rasputhane didn’t complete his thought; the notion was madness.
“The gears of war are oiled by choices,” said Magnus. “We shall offer these mercenaries a choice. Either they leave our city in fair standing, or they stay and are conscripted into the service of Eod, the service of Geadhain. For we are the final bastion against my brother.”
“You cannot turn hired murderers into valiant men,” warned Rasputhane.
“We can all become valiant, or ignoble, when faced with our ends,” countered the king. “Give them the choice. We need all the able and sword-wielding hands we can find. You do not know my brother. None of you understand him as I do. He is the ultimate hunter. Even his failures are merely steps toward his future triumph. He will have learned from each loss he has suffered, first in Zioch and then in Gorgonath. When Brutus comes for Eod—now all that remains to bind our continent together—he will bring a force he believes to be invincible. Look out into the desert, and picture every wave of sand bearing a crest of hideous soldiers, men twisted by his Will, and forged in metal and fire. Look up to the sky, and imagine a moon of blood.”
Feast of Chaos (Four Feasts Till Darkness Book 3) Page 77