Ghosts of the Mighty Fallen
Two figures appeared on the sandy hill looking over an ancient city of pale red and orange stone. Neither man looked at the other, instead focusing on the waking city, glowing with inner fire, just one mile to the south. Eventually, the two men turned towards each other. Dalasin Mectar, grey-haired, frowning, and stoop-shouldered as he ever was in life, looked up into the sharply angled face of Atalin Danalath, with his pointed ears and fiery, emerald-green eyes, and then both men continued their silent vigil on the hill, looking ever towards the sleepy city. Just before the sun broke the horizon, Dalasin spoke.
“Were you sent with a message, or are you just here?”
Atalin took his time responding, as if trying to remember how to speak. “I only once saw An-Aniath with my waking eyes. I was summoned here to answer for crimes against Guinira. The real crime was bearing Taren’s endorsement for the throne. It did not matter to her that I lost, nor did it matter that Taren did not even cast his vote for me. It mattered only that I existed and could have been King. I was executed on this hill, at this exact spot, just as the sun breached the sky and the first bell rang.”
Dalasin accepted Atalin’s answer, but being a practical man, he was still looking for the other ghost’s reason. “So, there is no reason for you being here.”
“This day will be the seventh anniversary of my execution. That length of time may be nothing to any living Morschen, but much has happened in that time that I did not live to see. I want to know what was and what should have been.”
Dalasin turned to face the taller ghost. He had not known Atalin well in life, but he wondered what the other man could have done for Anaria had he been spared. “And what about what will be? Don’t you care about that? We may be dead, but these are still our people.”
“What will be is no great mystery. The future will bring it to us whether we are prepared for it or not. In death, I need not worry about the tomorrows that may never come. Seven years’ worth of them has passed without giving even a first thought to my continuing dis-existence. An eternity and more shall pass in the same way.”
Dalasin looked down at his feet, almost seeming ashamed that even in death he was so attached to the Morschen’s living world and their new struggle that, thanks to Guinira, he could have no part of. He wondered if he was not thankful that he had died before the Seven had truly returned.
“If Guinira had never been named, much of this would never have happened.”
“The Seven would still have come back.”
Dalasin shrugged, still looking at his feet. “But we would have been stronger. More ready to face them. United under one banner, the way Anaria was always meant to be.”
Atalin still wouldn’t look at Dalasin. He just kept staring at The Beacon, the Great Tower of Armanda, and the Golden Flame at its summit. “You speak as Taren once did, and it is not a speech that I ever enjoyed hearing; Anaria, under one banner.” He shook his head. “Would that truly have been better? I respected Taren, and truly did understand his desires for Anaria, but his methods left a great deal to be desired. He by himself could have left us more ready for the Seven’s return.” Atalin sighed. “Though such thoughts do occur, I try not to wonder what might have been, Dalasin. The gods of death chose us. It was our time. We still would have died. The Seven would still rule Anaria.”
“But not by the hands of one who should have brought us all closer together. I find it hard to forgive her, Atalin.”
“Guinira was once too great to escape the notice of the Seven. The Kindler would have gone to her anyway, knowing that sooner or later, she could be tricked into bowing. Her power did not help us, though.” Atalin now turned and fixed his emerald-green eyes on Dalasin. “I will never forgive Guinira, Dalasin. A quick death on the battlefield is more than she deserves, but it may be that her redemption is still before her.”
Dalasin couldn’t hold the disdain from his voice. “That choice will always be before her. I feel in my heart that she’ll never take it. She will continue to choose the path that is easy, not the path that’s right. She doesn’t have the strength of character to set herself against The Kindler now, not without some new force entering her mind.”
“Such questions are too heavy for me to consider right now.”
“And yet we have eternity to ponder these things, Atalin. We’re dead.”
Atalin’s pale face, thin and sharp as it was in life, lifted with the suggestion of a smile. “We are ghosts of another time, left here to haunt those who dishonour the fallen by standing with our enemy. As for all of eternity? New worlds and other dimensions are now open to us. Death does not only cast his net towards the Morschen of Anaria. I should like to wander among the stars, and see the circles of other worlds. Demosira would kill themselves if they knew what possibilities Death could grant them.”
“The mysteries of this world may be enough for them. They don’t like to leave anything to the imagination. They need to understand everything.” But Dalasin nodded slowly at Atalin’s statement about what doors dying had opened for the two of them, then glanced over his shoulder, towards the north. “But Death’s is just another net that the Garrenins manage to avoid. Why do they stay attached to Morieden Castle? They can’t appear anywhere else, so why even stay in this world at all?”
“One hundred thousand Garrenins, and they all stand in the same doorway. They can manifest themselves more strongly than other Anarian shades, but only within the walls of Morieden. They feel the passing of time, they can recognize and speak to the living, and they can even see and speak to the ghosts of those who died after them. There are Demosira who devoted their lives to understanding the Garrenin Spirits. I cannot answer what they cannot answer.”
* * * * *
Slowly, the ghosts of Guinira’s rise to power began to fade in the increasing light, turning to a faint silver sheen. Nobody but they saw themselves. Nobody heard the otherworldly discourse as the sun’s leading edge poked over the distant rim of the world. And not one of the seven hundred Deshik warriors noticed the two faint blurs in the air as they thundered past, speeding towards the not so distant city at the summons of their queen.
Rivals
Makret Druoth rode at the head of the seven hundred Deshika who crossed the hill just as Dalasin and Atalin faded from sight. Though he saw the silver blurs that he knew belonged to ghosts of Morschen dead, he did not know who the two had been in life. He did not stop the Deshika to examine the ghosts. They faded just as he got close enough to know that he really did see them, and he doubted that any of his soldiers had seen the two spirits. Instead, he kept his eyes focused on the city ahead of him. The Golden Flame that burned constantly in the topmost room of The Beacon, the Great Tower of Armanda, was no less bright in the early morning than in the dead of night, but Makret’s eyes were not drawn to the eleven-hundred-foot tower or the symbol that it housed. Instead, he stared straight ahead at the newly finished palace that Guinira had ordered built for The Kindler and herself. Even from a mile away, the mammoth structure exuded power and evil. Though the city’s Ringlords were allowed to move throughout the city as they wished, unless otherwise ordered, every last one spent each night inside of its newly-built walls. Makret was lucky. He was The Kindler’s right hand. Most orders could not stop him. But it was dangerous, even for him, to be too obvious in flaunting them. The worst part of the whole ride back to An-Aniath would be the next half of a mile and inside of the city. There would be Deshika everywhere, and Ringlords who had either truly turned like Guinira had, or could not escape her rule, like himself. And, even more than that, the evil feeling that the palace gave off would only grow as he got closer to it. He briefly wondered if the Deshika could feel it, but he assumed that worshippin
g the Seven Devils as they did, they must be used to Black Power and its nauseating presence. With his soldiers behind him, Makret pushed the overbearing reminder of Anaria’s fall to the back of his mind and rode on through the city, going slower the closer he got to the giant palace.
It was a hideous structure in his mind. It was built entirely of red and black rock, but it was little more than a well-ordered pile of rubble. It was not elegant and graceful, like so many of the examples of Armandan architecture that surrounded the fortress. The stone was heavy, quarried flat and square, with neither carving nor statue nor any other embellishment, and did not radiate with the same light and inner fire that other buildings surrounding it did, especially the Morschcodal Palace, which now sat dwarfed in the new building’s shadow. Before the beginning of the New Deshik Wars, Makret had barely tolerated his beautiful homeland sharing its longest border with the deserts of Armanda. Now, all he wanted was for things to go back to the way they had been, though he knew that it was largely because of him that things had changed. He shrugged his shoulders and dismounted and, with a thought and a pat on the head, sent his Mordak to its paddock for food and rest. The soldiers he had with had remained outside of the city. Guinira had ordered him back to the capital, but he doubted that he would be there for long. He laughed to himself as he thought once again of his army. The seven hundred Deshik warriors who ridden with him to An-Aniath barely amounted to an Honour Guard for one of the Seven, but they had fought on more battlefields than any other Deshika. Though he hated all Deshika, the Veterans, as all those who fought at Agrista were called, were the ones he trusted most. There were not many of them left though.
* * * * *
Makret walked through the halls of red and black stone that made up even the interior of the palace of An-Aniath, now the capital of Guinira Estaleth’s holdings under The Kindler. The torches along the walls cast little light, and really only served to make the dark, overbearing feeling of the castle more intense. Though he only wanted to be out of the palace, back into the cleaner air far away from An-Aniath and the surrounding desert, he walked slowly. He had been ordered back to the capital from the Ashnora Desert’s western edge, had ridden through the night, and he had had no chance to refresh himself in the early morning. And, though he hated being back inside of the centre of his enemy’s power, he savoured the chance to be away from the endless battles that he had participated in since his debatable victory over the Morschcoda Council at Emin-Tal. Still, Guinira would have to have a reason for calling him back. She despised him even more than he hated the new palace. He knew that she had a reason for it, too. Though she hated him for all of the traditionally correct reasons, that she was Armandan and he was a Drog, she hated him more because she was afraid of what he could do in her place, and what he might do to take that place from her. But the Morschledu Remnant had made several daring strokes in recent months, and Makret would not have cared or shown interest, but several of the attacks had been severely damaging to Guinira’s slowly expanding power, so she needed to strike back. Makret sighed. The strokes that Xari, Daliana, Edya, and, most of all Erygan, had made were daring and inspiring to the Remnant and to those who hid their true loyalties, like he did, but it would not be enough. Nothing would be enough anymore. With the arrival of Nasheem, the second of the Seven Devils, known as ‘The Dread Commander’ to his Morschen enemies, there were more Deshik warriors in Anaria than there had ever been Morschen soldiers at one time.
After what felt like an eternity suffocating in clouds of Black Power, Makret finally walked up to the great doors of Her Majesty’s audience chamber and throne room. This room was lighter, but the heat was torturous to a non-Armandan. Three large fireplaces, and elegant, Caladean-carved lanterns hanging on every pillar, made the room less foreboding than the long walk to reach it, but the air was heavy and thick with heat, and painfully dry. Makret wished he could be anywhere else, but his face betrayed nothing, his mind remained armoured, and his walk was proud and arrogant as he pushed open the doors and strode up the long red carpet that stretched from the steps to the door.
“Reishtakeuna, Queen Guinira.” Makret bowed his head ever so slightly to Guinira Estaleth, who shifted uncomfortably on her new throne. Makret knew that the traditional greeting of the Morschcoda Council could severe his head far more easily than anything else, but he used it for several reasons. It was safe enough, as long as some of the older Ringlords did not hear him use it. Since it had become a greeting reserved for people one disliked but had no way to avoid, it had been unused by the Council for almost two millennia before Taren Garrenin’s ascent to the Flowing Throne of Drogoda, long before Guinira’s birth. But more importantly, he knew that he was irreplaceable. He was the commanding and victorious General of Emin-Tal, which had recently come to be known in Armanda as the Grave of Drogoda, and he had led other campaigns after that during Guinira’s rise to power.
Guinira sat upright, almost painfully straight, on the flat black throne that now symbolized her reign. “I will not have that word voiced in my hearing, General, nor any other word in the old tongue.” Guinira’s voice was as proud and commanding as ever, but it had an unused sound about it, as though she had not spoken for several weeks. Makret thought that she looked tired.
Makret pressed the small advantage he had. He rarely got the chance to speak his true mind with her, and she seemed slightly disoriented. He might not have another chance for some time. “I won’t speak to you as these other Rishtckal do.” He met her stare and poured his own will through his eyes to try to subdue her. He did not succeed.
“I will be obeyed, General Druoth.”
Makret seethed, but forced himself to remain calm. His was a peculiar position. He could make threats. “And I, unlike you Your Majesty, can’t be replaced by any who serve you, Deshik or Morschen.” They both knew that it was both entirely true and an empty threat. Makret would never be able to convince The Kindler to remove Guinira, and Guinira knew that to attack Makret without evidence that he posed a real threat to The Kindler’s war would destroy her own position. “So, my lady, I suggest you grow accustomed to whatever tendencies I have that displease you.”
“Is it treason, then, Makret?” That she said ‘Makret’ was enough for him to know that she was in a dangerous and unpredictable mood. She never used his first name. But it was how she said it that bothered Makret. As hot as the room was, it sent a cold shiver down his spine. Even though he had the greater power, she had somehow become The Kindler’s favourite. ‘It must be because the demon-spawn doesn’t have to fight her the same way that he fights me.’ Makret hated both The Kindler and the Deshika, but he also could not help but be annoyed that The Kindler had chosen Guinira. She could be a formidable woman, deadly and powerful, and capable of a viciousness towards her own people that The Kindler needed, but he was Makret Druoth. He was one of the most dangerous and powerful Ringlords to walk the Ten Nations. He knew almost everything there was to know about Anaria and its rulers. ‘By the gods, I killed Taren Garrenin! I deserve that throne.’ But whatever The Kindler’s reason was for choosing Guinira, he had had one, so Makret knew that he had to be careful.
“No, this isn’t treason. But I did much for this cause before you were even an afterthought. I just think that I should be permitted to do and say what I wish.”
Guinira, her mind finally fully awake, looked at him intently. ‘This is a tricky one. He’s as skilled with his tongue as he is with his sword. And he’s not wrong, either.’ She knew that Makret’s prowess as a sword master and a battlefield commander was something from beyond legend. She had seen him turn ordinary maps into works of art, masterpieces of death. He truly was irreplaceable. He had led the assault that had liberated An-Aniath from the rebel Morschledu when she had proclaimed herself Queen of Anaria. Guinira’s own mother, Xari Gundara, Armanda’s former Morschcoda, had instigated the rebellion, but she had also escaped after its ultimate defeat. The last stroke of that long, bloody battle had been dealt on the ste
ps of the castle dwarfed in the shadow of the one that Guinira now called her home. Now, finding Xari was one of Guinira’s highest priorities.
“Very well General Druoth. You may speak as you wish here, when we talk privately. But in formal audience is another matter. When occasion calls, I demand that you conduct yourself as someone of your rank and station should.”
Slowly and carefully, Makret nodded his agreement. “Now, if we may talk of why I am here?” Though she had summoned him, he had other reasons for returning to the capital. If he had not, he would have remained with his army.
“The Kindler wants the rest of Anaria conquered, but he also wants any symbols of the old order that are in our lands to be swept away.”
“Does he state specific targets, or do I just burn everything?” As a Drog, it was expected that he and the Armandan Guinira would not get along, but Makret was playing the game more dangerously than he needed to, protected by his rank and reputation.
“No, you will not burn everything. You are to target specific landmarks; the Great Library in Dorok-Baan, the city of Dishmo Kornara, Castle Morieden, and others like them. And—”
“I will not, as I have repeated many times, march in open war to Dishmo Kornara. It would be suicidal, especially with the Eschcotan army holding it. Nor is it within the lands we hold. Erygan has his armies, the Morieden Tribes are not yet subdued, and the Remnant is still widely dispersed. Many forces could converge to destroy us if we marched there. As for Castle Morieden, it would be a waste of my time. It’s a derelict old hump of rubble twenty leagues south of Drogoda’s northern border, surrounded by a city that members of the Morieden Tribes go to maybe once in their lifetime. Since the Garrenin line is broken, there is no Prince of Morieden to rule the city, so nothing lives there now except rats and the ghosts of long dead members of House Garrenin. And, as I said, the Tribes are still untamed. They would slaughter the Deshika if an army tried to march in force.”
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