Darknesses

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “See something, sir?”

  “I thought I did, but it’s gone now.” Alucius shifted his weight in the saddle, looking forward along the impossibly straight high road and the dry canyon leading eastward.

  The history book had made a passing reference to Deforya as an ancient land of great sorrow, and one which had been abandoned by all the inhabitants before the Duarchy. Did the mountains reflect that, or was there something about them that had created that sorrow? He looked to the north, over vingts and vingts of near-lifeless gray stone, then back at the road ahead. Did the emptiness of the mountains really matter?

  He didn’t know enough to answer his own question. Instead, he looked to Longyl. “How are the mounts doing on water?”

  “So far…we’re all right, and if we reach that stream tonight, they’ll be fine.”

  Alucius nodded. The sense of the blue-violet mountain creature had vanished, as if it had never been, even without the lingering sense that he felt with sanders on the stead.

  48

  By Duadi, the combined force was nearing the eastern edge of the Upper Spine Mountains. A glass before, Twenty-first Company had rotated forward to take its place as the first company in the main body, a half vingt behind the Lanachronan vanguard, where Majer Draspyr usually rode.

  Less than a vingt ahead of the vanguard, Alucius saw two vertical cliffs of gray stone, rising almost two hundred yards above the high road, each in a single unbroken line. As he rode closer, he could see that the cliffs were even more unnatural than the gun-barrel-straight gorge they had followed for days, for they had been sliced from the heart of a single mountain, creating an opening nearly a half vingt in width, more than enough for both the river to the left of the road and the high road itself to pass out into the high plains beyond.

  Alucius wondered why the ancient builders—for it had to have been an artifact of the Duarchy—had not left a much narrower gap that could have been more easily defended. Then…he laughed quietly to himself. The Duarchy had been built on unifying Corus, not on creating narrow passes that could have been reinforced to facilitate uprisings or revolts.

  “Sir?” inquired Zerdial.

  “Just thinking.” Alucius gestured at the artificial cliffs ahead. “About how times change.”

  Zerdial’s brow wrinkled, but the squad leader didn’t pursue the question.

  Once through the massive cut, Alucius found himself looking out at an endless plain, with only the slightest hint of rolling hills. The high road had not dropped more than two thousand yards, if that, from the heights it reached in the middle of the Upper Spine Mountains until it emerged onto the high mountain valley that held the land of Deforya.

  Alucius had studied the maps and histories of Corus, and he knew Deforya was bounded by mountains on three sides and by the rampart-like walls of the Aerlal Plateau on the north, and that Deforya was essentially one huge valley two hundred vingts from west to east, and three hundred from the Aerlal Plateau south to the Barrier Range that separated Deforya from Illegea. Knowing that and seeing the endless open valley were two different matters.

  As he continued to ride, passing through and then leaving behind the stone gate to the Upper Spine Mountains, another feeling swept over Alucius—one of immense sadness, an emotion that had not come from within him, but from the gray stone mountains he had just left…and even from the plains ahead. A feeling from those beings he had never seen, whose Talent-colors of maroon-violet had felt so similar to those of sanders, yet were not? And why would a sander—or whatever the mountain creatures were—be sad, or show sadness? Or were there other reasons for the sadness?

  He glanced to his left. The river that had flowed through the ancient stone channel beside the high road for the last fifty vingts was now carried completely by an eternastone aqueduct, an aqueduct more than twenty yards wide, whose graceful arches were already almost five yards higher than the high road it paralleled.

  “Never seen anything like that, even in Hieron,” said Zerdial quietly.

  “They didn’t need aqueducts in Hieron; but it took as much effort, if not more, to build the river levees and roads there,” Alucius pointed out.

  “Not as much as it did to cut the high road all the way through the mountains, did it?” Zerdial asked politely.

  “About the same, I’d guess. The levee roads are on both sides of the river, and they run for over a hundred and fifty vingts, and they probably had to dig fairly deep to put in foundations. Here, they just cut away stone.”

  “Just?” asked Longyl, easing his mount up beside Alucius on the left.

  “Just,” Alucius affirmed with a laugh. “It’s always easier to build by removing. It’s like carving. You cut what doesn’t belong away. When you build anything, first you have to dig deep enough…” He stopped and shook his head. “You may be right. We don’t know how they did it. If we were doing it today, this”—he gestured back toward the artificial gorge and then to the aqueduct “—would be easier.”

  “How far is Dereka, sir?” asked Zerdial, clearly wanting to change the subject.

  “About thirty vingts. We won’t make it today. Besides, we’re supposed to stop at a border post another few vingts or so to the east. We might have to wait there, until the Landarch sends for us. The majer wasn’t sure.”

  “Didn’t tell him enough, did they?” asked Longyl.

  “That doesn’t change from land to land,” Alucius suggested. “They never tell those doing the fighting enough.” As he finished speaking, Alucius concealed a frown. Even away from the mountains, his Talent registered the continuing sense of sadness.

  49

  On Tridi, the combined force left the outpost early, escorted by a half squad of Deforyan troopers in crimson uniforms, strikingly similar to those worn by the second raider company that Twenty-first Company had destroyed in late winter. The sky was clear, the white sun bright, the silver-green sky clear, and the day was pleasant, perhaps because of the higher elevation of Deforya, with a light breeze out of the north.

  The high road and the aqueduct continued due east. Every so often Alucius looked to the north, but the aqueduct remained solidly there, having risen only a few yards over the vingts since the outpost. At intervals of roughly two vingts, circular eternastone pipes ran down from the aqueduct and into the ground, the water they carried reappearing in functional square stone fountains on the north side of the aqueduct and on the south side of the road. From the fountains, open stone channels ran parallel to the orchards. Rather, Alucius thought, the orchards had been planted paralleling the watercourses.

  At times, there were hamlets around the fountains, and each dwelling looked exactly like every other dwelling—oblong, with brownish red shutters, walls of plaster over stone, and old slate roofs. While the houses were well kept, Alucius saw none that looked new. At other times, there were not even dwellings, only the orchards.

  By midafternoon, what had first appeared as a golden haze where the road met the horizon had resolved itself into the first view of Dereka. Rising out of the green golden grasses and above the neat rows of the apple and plumapple trees that filled the orchards lining both sides of the high road and aqueduct were golden stone buildings, as well as three glistening green towers that reminded Alucius of the tower in Iron Stem. Even from a good five vingts to the west, the sharp and clean edges of the buildings were clear, as was their size. Many had to have been a hundred yards or so on a side.

  As Alucius and the column of troopers rode closer, smaller structures—dwellings, shops, stables—became visible, and while they were also of stone, the stone was of a yellow shade, and the lines were not as sharp and clean.

  The aqueduct and high road continued straight, effectively splitting the city into two sections, northern and southern, with half the ancient structures to the north, half to the south. The dwellings on the fringe of the city were of the yellow stone as well, but far more crudely cut, and the roofs were of split slate, much like those of the Iron Valleys.
Some of the side streets were of stone, but most were packed dirt and dusty, and more crowded than in any city where Alucius had been—but none of the people thronging the side streets ventured onto the high road. Some of their comments did, although Alucius had trouble at first with the dialect, an oddly accented form of Lanachronan.

  “…black…the northerners…”

  “…Landarch…bought them…”

  “…don’t need outsiders…just take up water…”

  “No…sent by the young Lord-Protector…rather fight here…”

  “…no fight at all…rock spirits will finish the grass-eaters…”

  Close to the middle of the city, the Deforyan escorts turned south onto a paved yellow stone road, into which years of wagon wheels had carved grooves almost a handspan deep. The vanguard and then the rest of the column followed.

  Alucius studied the ancient buildings, whose lines were straight and clean. The windows were oblong, without shutters. The slanted roofs, some of them fifty yards high, were of the same polished golden stone, without any chinks between the roof or building blocks. The one structure directly to the east of the main street on which they rode was vacant, and Alucius wondered why. Was it gutted on the inside, the way the green tower in Iron Stem had been? Or were there other reasons?

  They continued to ride south, nearing a second ancient and massive building, at least three hundred yards in length. There, from a staff before a wide circular drive and entrance, in the light afternoon breeze, flew a red banner, rimmed in gold, and featuring a golden half-moon and a full and smaller green moon under an arc of four eight-pointed stars. From the northern end of the structure rose a tower with the shimmering green stone finish that made it a duplicate of the one Alucius had passed so often on his way to Iron Stem growing up.

  “Must be the Landarch’s palace,” Longyl suggested. “Looks like it’s been there a long time.”

  “Gold eternastone,” Alucius said. “It’s mentioned in the histories, but they don’t say anything about Dereka being built of it. There wasn’t any that I saw in Madrien.”

  “Ah…” Longyl offered apologetically.

  “You saw it?”

  “Yes, sir. There were some buildings made of it on the outskirts of Faitel. Center of the place was a big circular lake, black water. They say it was created in the Cataclysm, but they didn’t tell us how. Maybe two vingts back from the black lake, there were buildings, sort of like that one.”

  “That’s interesting.” It was more than interesting, and it fit, but Alucius couldn’t say why, just as he hadn’t been able to figure out the meaning of Hieron’s construction in the beginning.

  The iron gates to the palace were open, but guarded by a half squad of mounted troopers, who did not move as the column rode past and toward another ancient structure, far lower, if as long, that was farther south on the western side of the main street and surrounded by a stone wall two yards high. The gates to the city fort were guarded by two sentries, in open wooden posts.

  Directly inside the gates was a large paved courtyard, but the stones were old and cracked, although the cracks had been filled with mortar and the joins between stones had been repointed, if not recently. At the western end of the courtyard was the long ancient structure, and in the center on the lower level, a stone platform with a balustrade extended some ten yards into the courtyard.

  “Form up by company, left to right, centered on the platform!” Draspyr’s orders bellowed across the courtyard.

  Twenty-first Company, in the middle of the order of march, ended up directly in front of the stone platform. Then all waited as the ten wagons creaked into the courtyard and came to a halt. Alucius glanced back over his shoulder. The five companies—more than five hundred troopers and officers—and the wagons covered only half the courtyard.

  A tall man, dark-haired, with a square-cut beard and wearing a crimson uniform with silver epaulets and silver collar insignia of crossed sabres over an eight-pointed star, stood at the front of the platform, behind the stone balustrade. The platform was tall enough that his head was a yard and a half higher than those of the mounted troopers and their officers. “Welcome to Dereka and Lancer Prime Post, and greetings on behalf of the Landarch.” He looked to Majer Draspyr. “Your presence, and the friendship which it betokens, are most appreciated. You have had a long journey, and I would not wish to prolong it unduly. There is a welcoming feast for you in several glasses. Your troopers will be feted in the troopers’ hall, and you, Majer, and your officers will dine with the Landarch in the Great Banquet Hall…”

  It took a moment for Alucius to adjust to the accent, but the words were familiar enough.

  “…the stables are ready, and so are your quarters, so that you may care for your mounts and refresh yourselves.” He gestured, and from the building behind him appeared ten men in crimson uniforms, the equivalent of squad leaders, Alucius judged, walking out into the courtyard, two toward each company.

  “…and now…a word with you and your officers, before you begin your preparations.”

  “Officers forward!” Draspyr ordered.

  Alucius eased Wildebeast toward the platform, reining up beside Feran. Heald slipped his mount next to Alucius, while Koryt reined up alongside Feran. Clifyr took the end.

  “I am Submarshal Ahorak, the Assistant Arms-Commander of Dereka, and I am pleased to see you. You will all be quartered in the visiting barracks. There are officers’ quarters at the north end, more than enough for you all. There is an officers’ café in the headquarters building here, on the lower level, and it is open from one glass before dawn until midnight every day…Tomorrow morning…we will have a briefing on what we know of the nomads’ movements, and on Quinti you will be on your way south to join our border guards…”

  Alucius listened to the brief explanation, keeping a pleasant smile on his face, but studying the submarshal all the time. Ahorak had no traces of Talent, and behind his pleasant façade were condescension and arrogance, probably because he had to welcome a mere majer, Alucius judged, realizing that, by sending only a majer the Lord-Protector had delivered yet another message.

  “…You, Majer, as the commander of this force, will sit at the high table with the Landarch, and, if you will supply the names and ranks of your officers, they will be seated at the long table of the Deforyan Lancers, with its officers…no weapons at table…not even sabres…”

  After another set of instructions, Alucius followed a Deforyan squad leader to the officers’ section of the stables, where he saw to Wildebeast before walking back to the building that held the visiting officers’ quarters. The quarters were on the upper level of the barracks, and close to luxurious. Each chamber was walled in marble, with inside shutters on the windows, and had a wide bed with a thick mattress, as well as a writing desk and a large armoire, and plenty of wall pegs for gear, even a rack for rifles. The floors were polished granite, but with a large woven cloth rug beside the bed.

  In addition, rather than having a common wash chamber, each officer’s room shared a large washroom, containing a tub, with one other chamber. There were even two spigots to the tub, one admitting warm—not hot—but warm water. After talking matters over with Heald, quietly, Alucius and the other overcaptain had agreed it was best that each take a chamber shared with their captain counterpart.

  Alucius enjoyed getting thoroughly clean, and, after Feran bathed, and before Alucius fully dressed, washing out his other undergarments and riding uniforms.

  In time, two open carriages took the six officers from Lancer Prime Post to the Landarch’s palace. There they were escorted down a long great hall, thirty yards in height, and fifty wide, supported by golden eternastone pillars that exuded antiquity, for all that the hall was spotless, the polished stone floor bright enough to catch the reflections of the officers. They then made their way into the even larger Great Banquet Hall, with similar pillars and ceiling, and with crimson hangings draped between the pillars on each side of the hall. />
  The high table was on a dais a yard above the floor of the rest of the hall. The tables set up below the dais covered but the front third of the banquet hall. While Majer Draspyr was escorted away, Alucius found himself seated between two Deforyan officers in crimson dress uniforms with the silver epaulets. Heald was seated across from him, and two places more toward the head of the table.

  They had barely reached their places when a functionary in gold stepped forward and rapped a heavy staff on the stone of the dais. Then the Landarch appeared, wearing not crimson, but a dark green trimmed in gold. He was not a large man, and his face was thin, but even from twenty yards away Alucius could sense the presence he projected, but without Talent.

  “To the time eternal, to the One Who Is, and to the Unknown, as all three are and have been forever!” The Landarch inclined his head in the silence, then added, “And to our friends from the north and west who have most generously offered their services against the scourge of the south. There are no speeches tonight, and no toasts! Just wine and good food and friendship!” With that, he turned and walked to his place at the middle of the high table, seating himself.

  Immediately servers appeared, all young men.

  Alucius glanced around, realizing that he had not seen a single woman since he had entered the Landarch’s palace. He focused on using his Talent, knowing he might feel overwhelmed, but he had to know more than his eyes were telling him. He took in the lifethreads of all the men in the banquet hall, and almost all were of a rust red, a shade that conveyed an ancient sadness or sorrow, or something close to it. Did the lands hold those feelings and pass them on? How?

  “How did you become an officer in the…Lanachronan forces?” asked the overcaptain across the table from Alucius, a man who looked even younger than Alucius was.