Forged In Flame (In Her Name: The First Empress, Book 2)

by Hicks, Michael R.

  “A small group might escape, but even that is along a perilous route that only I myself have dared.”

  Keel-Tath’s eyes burned with defiance. “I will not leave them.” She looked upon the warriors who had declared their honor and their lives to her will. They were the dregs and scum of society, not even worth killing, for there was no honor in hunting honorless ones. They were killed when they attacked the “honorable” members of their society. Now she knew that they did not do so because they were simple barbarians or spiritual deviants, but because they were desperate and had nothing to lose in pursuit of their own survival.

  Dara-Kol reached out and touched her lightly on the shoulder. “You must, my mistress. Or all that we have done, the many warriors who sacrificed their lives so that you could escape from Shil-Wular, will have been in vain.”

  Keel-Tath turned to face a warrior who had come to kneel directly before her. She could tell from the length of his braids that he was old, possibly even as old as Ayan-Dar. His face had been terribly burned, and three fingers of his left hand were gone. He looked up at her with his disfigured face, and she felt from him…serenity.

  He reached out and took her hand, then said, “We would die, mistress, all of us, that you may live.” He smiled in a kindly way, and she gripped his hand harder. He reminded her so much of Ayan-Dar in the way he spoke, in the song of his blood. “Do not mourn or pity us, for you have given us a means to redeem ourselves, to return to the Way that I so long ago departed. I feel you in my blood, as do the others here. All of us are descended from the Desh-Ka, and all of us heard your cries when you emerged from your mother’s womb, and when your father and mother were killed.” He must have read the disbelief in her expression, and he smiled with worn-down, yellowed fangs. “The song of your blood is very different, mistress. All have felt it, but not all understood what it was, or what it meant. Dara-Kol told us your name as she spread the word of the prophecy among the honorless ones, but we knew of you long before then. Yes, we knew of you.”

  “Those of us here,” said another, a female warrior, “are only a few who have heard the word of your coming, mistress, who sensed you in our blood. Many more across this land and beyond the seas know of you, and will heed your call and command.” She drew her sword and held it up in both hands. “We will die this day with honor, in your name.”

  The other warriors, who had fallen silent as the words of the two warriors echoed through the chamber, drew their swords, as well, holding them up in their hands. “In your name!”

  “Go then,” Keel-Tath said, barely able to choke out the words. She was trembling with the power of their emotions surging through her. “Die this day with honor, warriors. And know that you will never be forgotten. Never.”

  As one, they saluted, and she returned it. Then, with a few shouted commands, they stood and began to quickly file down two of the tunnels. They held their heads high and their shoulders squared, for this last day the prideful warriors they had once been.

  Keel-Tath could feel the joy in their hearts. The fear had been driven out. They had not been afraid to die, for that was the way of a warrior. But they had been afraid to die without their honor. She had given them that much. Were there any gods to pray to, she would have, that their souls would rest in the light and not the darkness. But there were no gods any longer, and so she merely hoped.

  In her own heart was a pride so great that she felt she would burst, and sadness that she had not known them better, had never touched their souls save for the whispers of their songs in her blood.

  As the warriors cleared the chamber, she saw that seven had remained, including the two who escorted Han-Ukha’i, who also remained. The eight of them drew close to her and Dara-Kol.

  “I have suspected for years that certain honorless ones have been suborned in some fashion by Syr-Nagath,” Dara-Kol said as the warriors knelt in a semicircle before Keel-Tath and saluted. “I do not know how, but I have seen and heard tell of some of them being taken to her, and when they returned they were not quite themselves.”

  “Such also happened to Shil-Wular,” Han-Ukha’i said. “He mated with the Dark Queen at her bidding, and when he returned to us it was as if his soul had been torn out by the root.”

  Dara-Kol nodded. “Yes, I have seen others who have returned, their eyes opening not to their souls, but to darkness. There are not many, but some have come and gone from this place, so I did not know who I could trust, and who I could not.”

  “Honorless ones betraying their own kind?” Keel-Tath could not hide her sense of dismay and revulsion. In a way, it was even worse than straying from the Way, for the thought was simply…unthinkable.

  “Not in the way you might suspect, mistress. I do not believe those who serve her in such a fashion do so willingly, and perhaps they do not even know what they are doing.” She nodded at the kneeling warriors. “These seven have been with me for a long time, since before I came here. They are the only ones I completely trust, and to whom I would entrust your safety, mistress. The other warriors will hold the queen’s forces at bay to give us time.”

  “Rise, warriors,” Keel-Tath said after she had returned their sign of respect. She turned to Dara-Kol. “How, then, are we to make our own escape?”

  Dara-Kol pointed. “We shall take the third tunnel.” She flashed her fangs in a dark smile. “Through the caves.”

  As they quickly followed Dara-Kol into the mouth of the third tunnel, a hulking warrior, larger than any Keel-Tath had ever seen, said, “But Dara-Kol, there is no way out through the caves!”

  “Yes, old friend,” she replied, “there is. But none of you will like it.”

  “Why?” Keel-Tath trotted beside her. Like the others, she had taken a torch from the main chamber to help light their way.

  “We must cross the underground river.”

  Keel-Tath nearly stumbled, and she could sense in her blood that she was not the only one who felt a sudden stab of fear. “There is a river?”

  Dara-Kol nodded as she led them down the stairway to the door of the tunnel. Unlike the one she and Keel-Tath had passed when entering the great chamber, this door had long ago fallen from its great hinges. Having petrified over time before then, it broke into pieces when it hit the floor. “Yes. It is not terribly wide or fast, but a river it is. I think it must have been diverted from somewhere on the surface during one of the great wars in ages past, perhaps the same war that destroyed most of the other tunnels and doomed this place, whatever it was.”

  It seemed to take forever to reach the far end of the tunnel, which was much longer than the one through which Dara-Kol had brought Keel-Tath into the chamber. Many sections were choked with huge chunks of stone and debris that had fallen from the ceiling, and the closer they got to the end, the more water dripped from above. In some places they had to duck down or crawl on their knees to avoid the stalactites hanging from the ceiling and dodge around the often matching stalagmites that were growing from the floor. In one part of the tunnel, the stalactites and stalagmites had grown together and fused, creating a barrier eerily like a set of clenched teeth that they had to climb through.

  As they went farther into the tunnel, Keel-Tath was stricken with an eerie sensation, as if cold hands were caressing her soul. She shivered, but it was not from the musty dampness that permeated the air of the tunnel.

  Her attention was diverted by the growing sound that slowly filled the tunnel, a deep roar that she finally recognized. It was the sound of rushing water, and it seemed to be coming from directly above. Trying to restrain her fear, she looked up at the ceiling, which was coated in mineral deposits and dripped water onto their heads.

  “There is an underground waterfall in a cavern above us,” Dara-Kol explained as she led them through another stretch of stalagmites. One side of the tunnel here had collapsed outward, exposing the dark maw of a cave beyond. It was clearly a recent event, for the breaks in the stone were fresh, without any evidence of the mineral buildup tha
t characterized the rest of the tunnel. “It was…mistress? Keel-Tath?”

  Keel-Tath had come to a halt where the wall had collapsed, rooted to the floor as she stared out into the dark abyss that lay beyond the tunnel. “I feel them,” she whispered to herself. The strange sensation she had been feeling since entering the tunnel had only grown stronger. Here, where the wall was broken, it was strongest of all. Undeniable. Irresistable. “The dead. They are here.”

  Before the others could act, she had climbed through the wall into the yawning darkness.

  “Mistress, no!” Swords drawn, Dara-Kol and the other warriors clambered through the gap in the wall after her.

  ***

  Keel-Tath climbed and stumbled through a forest of mineral deposits and rock, following the call in her blood. She did not know how she knew they were dead, but there was no doubt in her heart or her mind. Who they were — had been — and how she could possibly hear them, she could not fathom. Ayan-Dar had said that some of those in the priesthood could sense the spirits of the dead, but it seemed to be a vague sense of their existence beyond the barrier that stood between life and what lay on the other side, not a palpable presence in her blood, a song that here was more powerful than the living who followed behind her, shouting their warnings.

  A stream blocked her path, but she ignored the potential danger of creatures lurking in the water and waded in without a thought. She heard the shouts of the others behind her, but paid them no heed. If there were deadly creatures in the water, they let her pass.

  Beyond the stream was a natural stairway of slick stone, narrow and steep. She tossed her torch to the top, then followed after it, digging her talons into the soft stone for purchase as she pulled herself upward.

  At the top was a narrow hole that was just wide enough for her to squeeze through, lying on her belly and wriggling like a fish. Her father’s sword, still strapped to her back, caught on the roof of the tunnel twice, but she managed to free herself and continue on.

  She emerged into a vast natural cavern, whose far side was lost to her vision in the light of the guttering torch. Sliding down a long cascade of mineral formations, she stood at the edge of what must have been the tributary of the river that Dara-Kol said they must cross, and that fed the waterfall.

  Walking quickly beside the water, she came upon enormous blocks of stone, most of which had been fused over long ages to the softer rock of the cavern. It was part of one of the seven tunnels that had collapsed. She climbed over the stones, her heart beating rapidly. She was close now, very close, to whatever called to her.

  “Mistress!” Dara-Kol’s shout was barely audible over the sound of the rushing water. Keel-Tath paid her no heed.

  She vaulted to the top of another huge block of stone, expecting it to be level at the top, as had been the others. Instead, it was shorn off at an angle, like a badly worn tooth. With a shout of surprise, she lost her grip on the torch and fell into the darkness.

  ***

  The fall was terrifying, but brief. She slammed into a large chunk of stone, probably the piece that had broken from the block she had climbed, then slid off to fall onto the rubble-strewn floor of the cavern. She felt something warm trickling from her cheek where her face had banged against the stone, but otherwise was no worse for wear, having been saved from more serious injury by her ill-fitting armor.

  The torch had fallen into a pool of water and gone out. Now there was nothing but an all-consuming darkness, so black that she may as well have been in deep space, with not a single star lighting the entire universe.

  Except that there was light, and not the glow of the torches from her companions who were not far behind her.

  A soft blue glow, barely visible, came from the floor just a few strides ahead of her. Had it not been so dark, had her torch not gone out, she never would have seen it. Whatever it was, she knew with the power of some deeply rooted instinct that this was what had called to her, what was even now drawing her closer. It was so powerful that she could not just sense the song in her blood, but could hear voices, whispers upon the wind, but in a tongue she could not understand.

  Stepping forward with great care, probing the darkness with her hands and toes for any obstacles or drop-offs, she moved to the edge of the glow. Kneeling down, she could see that the glow was not a single thing, but many, tiny fragments spread across the floor of the cavern. Reaching out, she touched the nearest of the things, and gasped. The whispers became a voice accompanied by a full-throated song in her blood. She saw a vision of one of her kind, robed in white, surrounded by warriors. She was not a healer, for she commanded them. Her hair, as was Keel-Tath’s own, was white, and her talons crimson.

  I am a descendant of Anuir-Ruhal’te, Keel-Tath realized, shocked. For all these long ages, the Books of Time had held that Anuir-Ruhal’te was an oracle. Perhaps she had been, but she had also been so much more.

  Keel-Tath recognized the setting of the vision: it was the huge central chamber where the honorless ones had gathered. But the chamber was not the dilapidated structure that served as a sanctuary for the forsaken. It was beautiful, even more so than the great hall of Ku’ar-Amir.

  The image shifted. It was again set in the main chamber, but the warriors were gone, dead, their bones turned to dust. Where the white robed one had stood in the center was a graceful swirling spire of crystal, upon which sat a shape that Keel-Tath could not immediately credit. After a moment, she saw that it was in the shape of a heart, also fashioned from crystal, she thought. At its center was the same glow that she saw now, although much stronger.

  The great chamber, then, had been a crypt.

  She cried out as the vision exploded. But no, it was the crypt, shaken by titanic forces that Keel-Tath could not imagine. Debris rained down from the ceiling, and plumes of dust erupted from several of the tunnels. A great torrent of water gushed in, sweeping away the crystal heart into one of the other tunnels…

  These glowing shards were all that was left of the crystal heart after it had been swept from the main chamber. It must have wound up here, then been crushed or shattered by the stone of the nearby tunnel, perhaps in some subsequent cataclysm.

  She also knew something else. While she could not understand the words the thing had spoken to her, she had recognized a name: Anuir-Ruhal’te. These glowing fragments had somehow preserved the ancient oracle’s spirit.

  With shaking hands, she gathered up as many of the fragments as she could, but the glow was fading, and with it, the song of the ancient spirit in her blood.

  “No,” Keel-Tath whispered as she frantically grabbed up more of the shards, raking them with her hands to gather them more quickly. “Do not leave me!”

  Just before the glow died out, she pried back some the edge of the leatherite armor at her wrist. Hoping against hope, she took one of the larger shards and ran the razor sharp edge along her skin. As her blood flowed over the crystal, the glow grew brighter. In the blink of an eye it was so bright that she was blinded, and she heard cries of fright and disbelief from her companions as the vast darkness of the cavern was filled with a light as bright as day.

  Keel-Tath felt as if she was flash-burned, her mind incinerated. She slumped back against a rock as the glow faded, then at last went out.

  Dara-Kol and the others found her there a few moments later. While Keel-Tath was conscious and could hear them, her body was paralyzed.

  “Come, we must get her back to Han-Ukha’i.” Dara-Kol gathered Keel-Tath in her arms and carried her.

  Getting her back to the tunnel where Han-Ukha’i and the huge warrior waited took a long time and a great deal of effort on the part of her companions, and Keel-Tath felt guilty for being such a burden. But try as she might, with rising anger, she could not move a single muscle.

  At last, they heaved her through the break in the tunnel wall from which they had come, and the hulking warrior gently set her down on the floor. Surrounded by the others who held their torches aloft, Han-Ukha’i checke
d Keel-Tath’s wounds.

  “She is not badly injured,” the healer said softly. Then, placing both hands upon Keel-Tath’s temples, the healer closed her eyes. Keel-Tath felt a warm glow fill her body, then a sharp, stabbing chill.

  With a gasp, she sat up. Beside her, Han-Ukha’i fell into a swoon. Keel-Tath took hold of her, pulling her close. “Han-Ukha’i!”

  “Can you move, mistress?”

  Keel-Tath looked up to see Dara-Kol’s face, the marks of mourning under her eyes quickly receding. “Yes. Yes, I can move. But Han-Ukha’i…”

  “I will carry her.” The huge warrior reached down and gently picked up the unconscious healer, who to him seemed no more burden than a strand of hair.

  “I am sorry, Dara-Kol,” Keel-Tath said as the older warrior pulled her to her feet. “I did not mean to leave you, but something called to me, and I found—”

  Dara-Kol gently put a hand to Keel-Tath’s lips. “We would hear your tale, mistress, but not now. Time is short, and we must move quickly if we are to get you to safety.”

  Keel-Tath was about to ask why when she heard shouts and cries echoing down the tunnel, loud enough to be clearly heard above the sound of the waterfall.

  The queen’s warriors had broken through.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  To The West

  “We are not going to make it, are we?” Just behind Dara-Kol, Keel-Tath could hear the rhythmic footsteps of hundreds of warriors somewhere down the tunnel. It was impossible to judge the distance with the strange echoes in this place, but one thing was clear: they were gaining.

  Dara-Kol turned to regard her mistress. Her eyes were determined, but Keel-Tath could sense the fear rising in her blood. “I will not give up hope.” She held out a hand, holding back Keel-Tath. “Stop!”