Silent Requiem (Tales of Ashkar Book 3)

by Kayl Karadjian

  With that, the king lifted his cane and tapped its tip on the cold floor, signaling that his decree was over. There was no more discussion once the cane struck stone.

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” Kalic said as he kneeled once more. He felt Dalus’s hand touch his pauldron.

  “I will see thou again,” Dalus whispered in reassurance.

  “Thou can’t just send Kalic to die, Father!” Vanessa said.

  “I’m not just thy father, but thy king also,” he snapped back. “It would behoove thou to remember the role of a princess. It will suit thou well in the future.”

  Vanessa looked the other way, a vain attempt and stopping the tears from flowing down her cheeks. She wiped the tears, then looked Kalic’s way. “Thou can’t just leave me. Not after all that we’ve been together.”

  “P-Princess Vanessa,” stammered Kalic, though it didn’t make much sense in trying to hide the connection that the two had explored in months past, a revelation that only seemed new to Dalus, who let out a sound akin to ‘oh’ but it escaped his mouth too fast and he cleared his throat.

  “Kalic is a fine man,” spoke the king. “Once he returns, we will see about arranging a marriage. Think of Corsma as a wedding gift to Vanessa, a powerful display of authority to Lorine’s people.”

  “Don’t leave,” Vanessa whimpered. From her body language, Kalic knew that she longed to throw aside her tiara, jump off her seat, and run after Kalic.

  They both knew such a statement in front of the king was far from wise.

  “I will carry thy heart into the dragon’s lair,” Kalic said, his eyes fixed on the ground in front of him. With his helmet still on, it was easy to hide his watering eyes. “With thy blessing, my blade will end Corsma’s life once and for all.”

  “Don’t…” Vanessa pleaded between whimpering. “I would rather see that blasted dragon burn the world then to lose even a second with thou.”

  “I promise with my life that the next time we see each other, I will be kneeling in front of thou,” Kalic said.

  Without another word, he stood up and left, unable to lock eyes with anyone, not even Dalus, as he left to do the impossible.

  Chapter 25

  289th Dawn of the 5010th Age of Lion

  Kalic stared in disbelief at the ghost in front of him. There was no mistaking it. The figure that sat upon the king’s shattered, mossy throne was none other than Vanessa. Despite her paler than pale skin, her bonier features, and her unnatural appearance, he knew it to be her.

  There was no mistaking such beautiful blue eyes and blond hair.

  “H-how can this be?” Kalic asked, his body unable to move from his kneeling position. Upon listening to his own words, he realized a truth that he had kept hidden from himself.

  He never actually thought that he would find Vanessa. Or rather, he never thought that he would find her alive.

  “Tell me Kalic,” Vanessa said, her demeanor uncharacteristic of who he remembered her as, “or should I say, the man who wears the armor of my beloved, who art thou really?”

  “What?” he said.

  “Why doth thou not rise?” she asked with a smile of disbelief, her arms gesturing at their surroundings. “Lorine is no more. The king is no more. I am no more.”

  “Explain thyself!” Kalic said as he rose and stepped forward. “How doth thou still breathe?”

  Vanessa rose from her seat, taking steps toward Kalic. The two crept toward each other in inevitable collision, a fate intertwined that not even death could separate.

  “It matters not what happened a century ago,” she said as she pressed her hands against her chest. “What matters is one thing: would thou still love me if thou knew what I have become?”

  Kalic stopped and almost kneeled again, though this time it was because his knees sought to buckle under him. He looked away in shame, tears streaming down his face despite willing them not to. “It was me, Vanessa! This was all me! I am the monster. I am Corsma…”

  “No, you are my beloved,” said Vanessa, now only a few steps away from Kalic. “Would thou still love me, even if I am no longer human? What if I am a monster, too?”

  “Thou will always be my Vanessa,” Kalic said.

  “Art thou sure of thy words?” she asked.

  “As sure as the words I spoke that day,” He replied.

  “Then show me the monster inside,” Vanessa said as she pierced Kalic’s abdomen with her hand, pain coursing through him.

  _ _ _

  In the depths of darkness, Sora contemplated her due course of action knowing that Erendil was alive. Days had been spent alone inside the Skyward Hands’s lair with only Gorr at her side.

  She ran her fingers along the black bandana that she held in her hand, her mind racing. Ashkar was a large place, and Gorr’s powers only allowed him to track whether or not his target was living, not where they were.

  “Are you sure that it wasn’t a malfunction of the teamdisc?” Sora asked Gorr, who unlike her, seemed comfortable with remaining in the subterranean lair, perhaps forever.

  “I have yet to hear of any source of elementalism malfunctioning,” replied Gorr as he withdrew the teamdisc for the hundredth time. Red, green, and black all pulsed, indicating that Raxxil, Arwynn, and Erendil were all alive. With Serraemas’s weapon shattered, there was no way of knowing how he fared. She wondered just what Serraemas could be looking for now that he had lost his power.

  Sora sighed.

  “Erendil has a strong will,” Gorr assured. “To battle with one’s elemental is no small task. The Skyward Hands cannot risk their leader venturing out in her state.”

  “Then what use am I as its leader?” she replied.

  “Your power is great,” replied Gorr. “Greater than any other I’ve witnessed. You must be careful not to break your body. No one knows what battles may come in the future.”

  Sora clenched her fist, then released it. “I know, but I made a promise to Erendil. I could not do for Erendil what Brother did for me.”

  “You did what you could,” Gorr said.

  “It wasn’t enough,” she replied.

  “The dark element is dangerous,” Gorr said as he put away the teamdisc. “The Skyward Hands may not have room for such liabilities.”

  “The Skyward Hands isn’t just a machine,” Sora reminded Gorr. “It was… a family. My brother and I shared that dream. A family united against the injustices of the Asmani Empire and the other kingdoms of Ashkar. Even with all the orbs collected, the Asmani will fall but I will stand alone. Brother and I were supposed to see Ashkar bloom into what it’s supposed to be together. The same goes for every other member who is no longer with us.”

  “I didn’t mean to label Erendil as such,” Gorr said, and a long silence ensued between the two.

  Sora sighed. “I know. All I can hope is that he finds his way back to us.”

  _ _ _

  Erendil watched in horror at a love story gone wrong.

  Then again, he was not a connoisseur in human love, or any love, for that matter. The only love that he knew for certain was his for Sora’s, and her’s for him. Even then that wasn’t a love like the ones most people experienced romantically.

  By Sora’s definition it was of parent and child, and from Kalic’s descriptions, the one that he held for Vanessa was the other kind. But the last time Erendil checked, killing your lover wasn’t the best way to express it.

  Vanessa must have known Kalic’s secret because he shrugged off the wound. He grabbed her arm and ripped out her hand from his abdomen, then shoved her back. Despite being attacked, Kalic remained in his usual stance. Blood seeped from his wound, the ground beneath Kalic’s feet staining red.

  “I am not a mirage, if that is thy thought,” Kalic said.

  Vanessa frowned. “I want thou to show me who thou really is inside. Show me the monster responsible for the fall of Lorine.”

  “No,” Kalic barked back. “Tis the first time I’ve laid eyes on thee in almost a hundred a
ges, and thy first thought is not to embrace me but to see the monster that I’ve become?”

  “I need to know what thou hath become, so that I may reveal my true self to thee,” Vanessa said as she glided around Kalic like a specter, licking the blood off of her fingers.

  “Is this a game?” Kalic asked, his body language telling Erendil that he was tense. “Thy true self is already here for my eyes to see.”

  It was then that Vanessa’s demeanor shifted for the first time, her glossing eyes and pressed lips softening to the expression of someone vulnerable. She looked away, unable to meet Kalic’s hard stare. “I… I’m not the Vanessa of yore. I’m not the one thou knew back then. How can thou love me when this is what I’ve become?”

  To Kalic’s surprise, wings sprouted from Vanessa’s back where her vest was exposed, growing outward until they covered the length of half the throne room. They extended fully once, then collapsed inward like the wings of a bird.

  Vanessa’s features also changed, her face and bone structure lengthening slightly while small horns protruded from her forehead. Her body, still lithe, also elongated and grew more muscular.

  She was now a fierce yet beautiful creature, just like the others that Erendil had encountered on the Isle of Undeath. The only reason that he did not reach for his bow was because she had helped him and the others.

  That and the fact that he didn’t think Kalic could be killed, so he wasn’t really worried.

  “This is what I am, my beloved,” Vanessa said. “Doth thou still love me?”

  Kalic’s initial surprise had already subsided, but he still had a somber look on his face. “What happened on that night? Why didn’t I see thou at the throne room on my return from the dragon’s lair?”

  “Father never wanted us together,” Vanessa answered, her eyes fluttering over the shattered seat where the king used to sit. “In the event of crisis, I was to be sent away from the kingdom. When thou returned, he got his wish one way or another, and I was taken to the east where my carriage was attacked by a creature like me. I was cursed and taken to the Isle of Undeath where I died and was born anew.”

  Kalic clenched his fists as he absorbed the news. In a fit of fury he roared, and to both Erendil’s and Vanessa’s shock, transformed from an ordinary man into a mythical creature.

  His armor appeared to fuse into his skin, the dragon-like design of the armor exaggerating into the form of a dragon. His skin became mottled, then scaly, like Erendil’s. Like Vanessa, wings sprouted from his back, only his were much larger. A tail grew out from the bottom of his backbone, lengthening until it was more than two dozen feet long.

  At the end of his transformation, Kalic’s serpentine head almost reached the ceiling, his black scales and red eyes a stark contrast to Vanessa’s pale skin and blue eyes.

  Kalic’s roar continued throughout his transformation, his human, guttural voice changing into a bestial one. He whirled around, whipping his tail against the three seats at the far side of the room. What was left of the three thrones from his first attack was now reduced to nothing now.

  Just as soon as he transformed, Kalic reduced in size until he was back into his human form. His breaths were ragged, sweat pouring down his face.

  “Doth thou love me still?” Kalic said with a stare Erendil had never seen him do.

  Vanessa’s wide eyes and open mouth relaxed. She let go of her monstrous state as well, shifting back to her more humanoid form. She stepped forward and jumped into Kalic’s arms, and he caught her without hesitation.

  Tears rolled down from both sets of eyes, and all the while Erendil stood awkwardly like the outsider he was. He thought that maybe he had just been forgotten entirely.

  The two exchanged some whispers in private, and in the absence of any sound, Erendil heard the frantic steps of something approaching. Whatever it was was bipedal, and from the rhythmic steps it felt more akin to a person.

  Who could possibly be here with us?

  From the hall behind the doors rang the steps until Erendil saw a man in strange, green armor appear from the other side of the door that was ajar.

  The man froze at the sight of Erendil, his hand gliding over the blade that was sheathed at his side.

  “Uhh…” Erendil muttered as he scratched the side of his face and looked over his shoulder at the other two, who were still entranced in their embrace. He then looked back at the man, who was still looking at him the kind of way that people did when they wanted to pick a fight with him in all the major kingdoms that he had traveled to.

  “I want to say that we’re not enemies, but I don’t really know who you are,” Erendil said before the man had the time to lunge at him.

  The man relaxed when Erendil spoke, though his hand remained close to the hilt of his weapon. “Who are you?”

  “Did you expect a towrth to speak the common tongue?” asked Erendil.

  “No,” the man said. “Should I have?”

  Erendil crossed his arms. “I suppose not. My name is Erendil. Who are you?”

  “My name is Jed,” replied the man as he stuck his neck through the door to take a look inside the room. “I am looking for—there you are!” He froze for a moment when he laid eyes on the other two.

  “First Dragoon Kalic!” he shouted as he barreled through the door, rushing past Erendil like the forgetful towrth he was. Jed stopped just a few steps from where Kalic and Vanessa stood, then bowed until his face almost touched the floor in an ‘L’ bent so far Erendil wondered how that was possible in such heavy armor.

  Both Kalic and Vanessa stepped away from each other and looked at Jed with curiosity.

  “How did thou find us?” Kalic asked.

  “We looked everywhere,” Jed said as he returned to an upright position. “When we could not locate you, we sought the birthplace of the Dragoons.”

  “We?” asked Vanessa, her eyes moving from Jed to Kalic. “Who doth this man refer to?”

  Kalic narrowed his glowing, red eyes. “I have already told thine order of my wishes.”

  “But you are the first,” Jed replied. “You are only below the Great Dragons, and amongst the Dragoons, you are like a king to us.”

  “I’m not a king,” Kalic blasted, his hand swiping the air in frustration. “Not to thou or anyone. I’ll have no part in thine abominable order.”

  Jed sighed. “Be that as it may, I have come to ask your aid not on behalf of the Dragoons, but of Ashkar.”

  The three of them perked up.

  Didn’t Jorne say something like that?

  “What are you talking about?” asked Erendil, garnering the attention of Jed for the first time since he began speaking to Kalic.

  The green-armored dragoon looked over his shoulder at Erendil. “The Orb of Knowledge has been stolen from us.”

  “Orb of Knowledge?” repeated Erendil as though he was clueless, but his thoughts were assaulted by everything he knew about the orbs. It wasn’t actually much, but he didn’t want anyone to know anything about him or the Skyward Hands.

  Vanessa must have thought the same, for she too feigned ignorance. She must have been curious about what the dragoon had to say.

  “A legend speaks of nine connected orbs that hold the fate of Ashkar,” Jed explained.

  “And thou hath come to me, why?” Kalic asked.

  “Most of the Great Dragons still sleep in the deep places of Ashkar,” Jed said. “Their original purpose was to safeguard Ashkar, but millennia have passed since their power was needed, and many fear that they will never wake from their slumber. The Dragoons will do all that they can in their stead, but Ashkar is threatened.”

  “By what?” Vanessa asked.

  “Hell,” replied Jed gravely, his face darkening.

  “Are you saying that the orbs and Hell are connected?” Erendil asked.

  Jed nodded. “The legend isn’t clear, but we are certain that Hell will invade Ashkar soon. Our only chance for survival falls into the power held inside the orbs. Only with
all of them together could Ashkar stand a chance against the infinite armies of Hell.”

  “Thou art asking us to help the Dragoons to find the orbs?” Kalic asked.

  “What say you?” replied Jed.

  Kalic and Vanessa looked at each other, speaking to each other with just their gazes. A few moments later, they both looked back at Jed at the same time.

  “Shall we begin with the stolen orb?” Vanessa said. “Doth thou know who stole it?”

  Jed shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. Whoever they are, they are powerful. Not only did they manage to tear down the wards hiding the orb, they also managed to defeat a dragon and two dragoons.”

  It was at this moment that Erendil crept toward the door in the hopes that no one would notice. There was no way he would divulge the information of the Skyward Hands and betray Sora.

  He had to escape.

  “Erendil?” Vanessa called out to him before he could get to the other side of the open door.

  Erendil stopped and laughed awkwardly. “Yes?”

  “Did thou think me to be forgetful?” she said, baring her fangs in a smile that could either be construed as murderous intent or warm friendliness.

  “The truth is, I haven’t a clue where the orb that you gave me went,” Erendil lied.

  “But didn’t thou align with those other elementalists?” Vanessa ask.

  Erendil sighed. “I did… once. But I almost met death, and I am no longer with them. Kalic will tell you.”

  Vanessa looked over at Kalic, who nodded.

  “I haven’t known thou to speak lies,” Kalic said. “If thou finds it in thine heart, thou can journey with us.”

  Erendil thought about it for a while, his fingers running along the length of the sash that was wrapped around his head.

  “I don’t know what Jorne or Ashkar seeks of me,” Erendil started, “but I’m not ready. There is one other journey I must go on. I hope that you understand.”

  “As a man who journeyed for nearly a century,” Kalic said as he smiled at Vanessa, the edges of his eyes wrinkling and the melancholy of his eyes dissipating, “I fully understand. May I ask, what doth thou seek?”