Exiles & Empire

by Cheryl S Mackey

  “I need to know,” she murmured to herself.

  Without looking up, Emaranthe hooked a finger around the lip of the cover and pulled. The worn leather binding creaked at the firm tug, but opened to a page covered with tiny, precise words scrawled in black ink. The sudden urge to press her hand to the page spurred her arm into motion. Her small hand planted firmly on the paper.

  Heat boiled within her veins and radiated outward. The tiny script faded. The letters blurred into an illegible smear before being replaced by ghostly flames.

  Emaranthe stiffened when the flames licked and curled around her fingers, then hand, and her right arm. The script burned into her fair skin as they seethed and flickered.

  The crackle of flames and the slight stench of charred skin jerked Dehil’s attention to her.

  “Emaranthe, wait!” Dehil shouted.

  “Emaranthe!” Ivo bellowed.

  She stared at the now blank page, her mouth wide in a silent scream.

  “Don’t touch her,” Dehil barked. He shoved Ivo’s hand away before it could touch a tossing flame. Fully engulfed in the ghostly flames that charred words into her bared skin, Emaranthe was lost to the ancient tome’s sorcery. “Break her from the book before it releases her and it may kill her. Permanently. This is much like the same magic that created The Immortals, Ivo. It could unmake us in the blink of an eye, I’ve seen it.”

  Ivo sank to his knees beside her, his gaze hollow, wells of rage and fear.

  “What?” he croaked.

  “In the future, while protecting the children. Tanari wrote in a journal. I was able to sneak a look. It was the same language. I would recognize it anywhere. If she could write this language,” Dehil said, pointing at the book beneath Emaranthe’s damaged fingers. “Then it must be the language of the gods.”

  “We don’t know that for sure, Dehil,” Gabaran whispered. His fingers convulsed around the scrap of parchment tucked into the folds of his cloak. “We don’t know.”

  Sesti swallowed, her gaze still on Emaranthe’s unmoving body. “We just have to hope that the magic that made her won’t kill her.”

  “What do I do?” Ivo asked. His throat worked to swallow the lump stuck there. A fine sheen of sweat turned dirt into muddy streaks.

  Dehil dragged shaking fingers through his hair. “We wait.”

  Jadeth hissed beneath her breath and jabbed the end of the war hammer into the ice and snow with a crack. The solid rap of heavy metal on ice and stone echoed off the blue tinged walls. Everyone flinched, but no one dared look away from the silently screaming mage.

  Ribbons of green light erupted from the broad head of the hammer and wove into the air. They rippled and swirled around the faint fiery glow emanating from Emaranthe, but did not penetrate.

  “I can’t heal her while she’s trapped in the book’s sorcery,” Jadeth muttered. Fear etched lines at the corners of her eyes. The ribbons coiled away from her friend and instead wove a delicate path around each of Jadeth’s trouser legs. The green aura lingered for a moment before sinking into the ground beneath her feet and vanishing. Healing magic was cyclical and when called it must be used or be lost. A moment later a small patch of wild grass sprouted from a hill of snow beside her left foot.

  “We can’t touch her with anything until she is freed.” Dehil nodded at the bright green grass that stood out against the stark white snow and harsh light from the oculus.

  “By then it might be too late,” Sesti added. Her frown switched to the magic laced grass. “The book could mean her harm.” The dark haired elf looked troubled at the thought. It pulled her lips into a frown.

  “It won’t.” Ivo dragged his hands through his dark hair until it stuck up much like his brother’s. The lack of helm, of something to shield himself from the outside world and its pain, made such things as his hair even more troublesome. The lines on his forehead crinkled.

  “How can you be so sure?” Sesti asked. She turned to stare the immortal warrior down, but the dark pain in his gaze turned hers aside in guilt. She licked her cracked lips. It was her fault that the spelled book had been found. She shook her head until the long, straight strands of jet black hair hid her lowered face.

  “I would feel it if she were to be in danger. I would know. I can feel her heart beating in time with mine,” Ivo answered so quietly that everyone seemed to halt their breathing just to hear his brittle words. He pressed his fist to his chest, over his heart. “And I would scour this place apart to save her.”

  The stunned silence was punctuated by a blast of frigid air. Visible only because of the frosty temperatures, it raced around the perimeter of the vast library. Moldy tomes and torn pages flipped and danced into the air. The wind settled into a steady, cold, breeze and the pages twisted on the draft before fluttering to the floor one by one.

  He turned his dark green gaze back to the unmoving woman held prisoner by the magicked book. He would wait for her. Forever.

  ***

  “How long has it been?” Ivo asked. He circled Emaranthe’s motionless form, unease turning his stomach. The silent scream was gone, her face now vacant. “What if she’s in trouble?”

  Gabaran shifted against the side of the statues, his right shoulder cold and nearly numb from the frosty stone. He had not moved from that position in nearly an hour, since Emaranthe had first touched the book. The magic was ancient and it made everyone more than a little nervous. What kind of people were the Windwalkers who could harness such powerful spells?

  “We have no choice but to wait for her to find what she seeks. Or not,” he muttered. “She may find nothing.”

  “There is something. Why else would Rodon taunt her? Or know so much about all of us?” Jadeth asked.

  “I just wish we knew of something that could help,” Ivo muttered. “I’m at a loss. What would Rodon do with the information about her past, or ours?”

  “I don’t know, brother, but I wonder,” Jaeger interrupted from the shadows darkening the gap between the book cases. “Jadeth, you said you remember your past lives, right?”

  Sapphire eyes hardened on the barely visible warrior in the shadows. The only part of him she could see was the slowly swirling shards of blue in his gaze.

  “Only flickers of moments. I don’t know which of my lives or when. All I see or feel is a chaotic jumble.”

  Jaeger frowned and sank deeper into the shadows. His mouth pressed into a thin line. He let it go, but could almost see the thoughts turning in her mind. Her gaze had gone vague, her lips pinched.

  Sesti, atop the platform high above, peered over the edge at the Eideili’s words. The long fall of glossy black hair half hid her face, but nothing could hide the burning interest in her dark blue eyes.

  “Jadeth, your past memories must also be important if Rodon made such remarks to you. All of your memories.” Sesti flicked a long finger at the upturned faces gawking at her.

  “I don’t see how,” Jaeger muttered. “Ivo and I drowned.”

  Sesti squinted at the bitter male. His pain was tangible even in the darkness. “This last life, yes. If you don’t remember prior ones, who knows what had happened to set you, all of you, squarely in his sights. Is he not a First Fallen?”

  “Yes, as far as we know, but we don’t even know if that is true now. We don’t know who or what he truly is,” Jadeth added. She wrapped lean, strong arms around herself. The chainmail tunic rippled and shimmered in the glare of the light.

  “I can guess,” Ivo said. “And for this answer I can see my own blindness.”

  All gazes swung to him, a myriad of puzzled colors in the light and shadows.

  Ivo exhaled. “Why do you suppose Rodon kept our ‘family’ together once we joined The Unknown Sun? We stayed away from the City for a long time. He should not have known us.”

  “He already knew or suspected who we were, didn’t he?” Jaeger shifted in the shadows. Uneasiness bled into the air in the form of rapid puffs of vapor. “Something must has happened long ago for
him to remain so dogged about it. Something our past selves did.”

  “Or what if he planned to keep us separate, the whole time, to spy on us?” Jadeth asked. Her arched brows nearly met in the middle and the tail of her left braid grew soggy and ragged. She spat it out and straightened so fast that her popping joints echoed in the silent room. “Oh, dear gods. He had us chasing everything from demons, to ghosts, to zombies on purpose. He was keeping us away from the other Immortals. Why?”

  Ivo dragged his fingers through his dark hair. In the cold air it stuck up in shaggy, frost edged spikes.

  He said, “Yes. We played into his plans for three hundred years.”

  “Why? Why would he keep us on a leash and mislead us for so long? What was he planning that took centuries of hidden agendas and pretense? The talismans have done nothing disturbing so far,” Jaeger said.

  “He wants The Crown of Gods. He slowly enslaved an entire Immortal army over centuries. He kept us in the dark. He wanted us to trust him. It did not corrupt the four of us,” Ivo whispered in a stunned croak. “We must have known something he did not want known…or needs to know now.”

  “But, then why were we not affected by his evil spell like the other Immortals?” Jadeth asked.

  Jaeger answered, his voice thin and clipped. “He kept us apart from them. He needed us to remain intact, unaffected. Or he knew his spell wouldn’t work on us and needed us out of the way.”

  “What do we do? We don’t know what the Crown is, or why Rodon wants it. We don’t know who Rodon really is,” Gabaran spoke up for the first time. His eyes flared white in the frosty gloom, drawing everyone’s attention. “And what does it have to do with this future that Light,Tanari, is so keen on shaping?”

  The room fell into hollow silence and shoulders bowed beneath with unknown answers.

  ***

  The blast of a war horn shook the room. Jadeth, Ivo, Jaeger, and Dehil jumped, startled, and turned to Gabaran. All eyes were on him, even Sesti’s.

  Gabaran peered up at the tiny patch of gray sky visible through the oculus. A second blast from the unseen horn shook rock and ice from the shelves and statues.

  “Intruders,” he grunted. “We have company.”

  Ivo frowned. “Rodon?”

  “Doubtful even he could reach us so fast,” Sesti said. She appeared at her uncle’s elbow. “We need to see what’s going on out there.”

  “Hmm.” Gabaran spun on his heel. He aimed a broad finger at Ivo. “Protect my little sister, Ivo. Jaeger, Dehil, with me. Sesti, you and Jadeth find that location. We’re out of time. Go.”

  Dehil grimaced. His form shimmered into nothingness. He planted an invisible kiss on a startled Jadeth before following the old elf and the warrior.

  Ivo retreated to stand as close to Emaranthe as possible. The shimmer of ghostly fire coating her skin had faded, but he wasn’t about to guess what that meant. Jadeth and Sesti took the ice stairs at a dead run, the sounds of their boot heels stomping in a rhythmic beat not unlike his racing heart.

  He slid his sword free and widened his stance, determined to protect the one he loved. The wind obeyed his mute commands and encircled both him and the mage at a safe distance, forming a nearly invisible wall of air. Anything touched it and he would know.

  Above him the females muttered and the iron ball scraped as they shoved it round. It was enough to flay the last of his nerves.

  “Do you see anything, Jadeth, anything useful?” he called up to them after a long few minutes. He resisted the urge to pace and instead focused on the entrance to the Library. One way in, one way out.

  Jadeth grumbled, “The map doesn’t seem to match anything on Ein-Aral, Ivo. I don’t see anything that resembles these odd mountain shapes.”

  “Wait, what if it’s not on Ein-Aral?” Sesti gasped. “Our world is big, but this iron ball is so much bigger. Perhaps we are small.”

  “What?” he bellowed up at the she-elf. The word echoed off the frozen walls.

  “Turn it this way. More. More. Stop.”

  Jadeth gasped. “I see it. It’s another land…an island? I’ve never seen or heard of another land before! A large one, Ivo, nearly the same size as ours. It lies nearly opposite across the sea to the south east.”

  Sesti added, “It’s the only other thing that seems to match the map, but there are no words, only the double ring of mountains.”

  “Are you sure there is no writing?” Ivo asked. “We have to be sure. There will be no time for mistakes with Rodon hunting us.”

  “Yes, nothing. Not even in the strange language,” Jadeth replied. The globe screeched again.

  Emaranthe’s soft cry intruded out of the blue. “Ivo?”

  ***

  “It is nearly done, My Lord.” Garista gestured to the handful of masons that trailed after her into the throne room. Dismissed by her sharp glare, they backed away in stiff, disjointed motions, sledgehammers flung over shoulders as if they weighed nothing. Large and sturdy, these Guardians with useless powers were useful in other ways.

  “Good.” Rodon eyed the retreating masons in thinly veiled disgust. “Any problems?”

  “No, there is one more, but it lies much further west, on the very edge of the mountains. It will take some time to reach it. These Guardians are far more useless than normal.”

  “Do it. Inform me when it is done.”

  Garista bowed, but hesitated.

  “My Lord.” She waited. When Rodon remained silent, but turned his oily black gaze on her, she hurried to continue. “What about this one?” She gestured to the throne room portal.

  Rodon laughed. Not a chuckle, nor a snort, but a wild, full throated, belly laugh that echoed in the vaulted chamber. The harsh sound, tinged with madness and arrogance, turned Garista’s lips into a frown.

  “No, this one will be preserved. Now go.” He smirked when the amusement dissolved from his face and returned it to its sour, aged grimace. “Destroy the one other portal. Fail and you will not return.”

  Garista bowed out of the throne room, her multitude of snake-like braids snapping against her armor with each step.

  Rodon made his way to his quarters. Remnants of the shattered thrones still crunched beneath his feet, a sound he very much relished. Soon he would be fully in control of The Unknown City and able to finish the war he began long before the Immortals rose.

  He grinned and oily black spittle edged the corner of his mouth. He smeared it away with the back of his hand before climbing the wide, curved stairs to the quarters above the throne room. Three rooms the hallway held, the first two he stalked past with a sideways sneer.

  The third was his, or at least had been for almost a thousand years since he began to inhabit the pathetic Earthlander’s body. The Four had made a crucial mistake that day and he wanted to thank them the only way he knew how.

  With death.

  He slammed through the double doors hard enough to crack the hinges. They bounced off the walls and swung shut behind him. His tread, heavy despite the muffling rugs, echoed with each step across the large room. He halted on the balcony overlooking the bailey below the main keep of The Unknown City, his attention caught by the gleaming rays of light bouncing off every surface. The light might have burned anyone other than Immortals, but to them the beams of heated sunlight were a source of energy and power and the city built of the gold colored metal all but glowed like the suns it reflected. Even on nights that should have been cold, the gold metal radiated the heat it soaked up during the daylight hours. Endless power, endless energy. The perfect combination Rodon needed to put his slow-moving plan into motion.

  He leaned over the balcony railing. The marching soldiers spread out to form ranks and move to their duties. His plan had taken a thousand years but now he was ready. Ready to do the thing he vowed to do upon his imprisonment.

  He would kill the others. All of them, his sister included…for their final betrayal. The Crown of Gods would do it for him. All he had to do was set the trap he had
been baiting for nearly three hundred years.

  Rodon gripped the iron railing tight enough to bend the metal, his mind roiling. “I have them in my sights. Tanari walks the world in and out of time. I wonder then, who and where are the others?”

  His sneer widened. Black spittle dribbled from one corner of his cracked lips.

  The Four had done him a favor when they created the Immortals in a desperate attempt to stop his assault on the Windwalkers. They had given him a body to borrow, time, powers, and virtually erased all knowledge of his true self and theirs.

  All knowledge, memories, gone. Temporarily. The spell that created the Immortals hadn’t quite worked as intended on his people as it had on the natives of this miserable planet, so he had retained some memories and gained powers. Others of his kind had regained more, some less, he presumed.

  He chuckled and turned away from the scene below. The mangled railing gleamed in the beams of light radiating from the golden towers.

  Chapter Eight

  Stunned, Ivo twisted to face her. Her hand fell away from the book and the cover flipped shut.

  “Emaranthe, are you all right?” he asked. He reached for her, but hesitated before gripping her arms. She swayed and blinked up at him in a daze. “Did it hurt you? Did you see anything?”

  Sesti jumped the last dozen ice steps and joined them. Jadeth followed, the fragile map clutched in her hands. Her ears flicked with excitement at the sight of Emaranthe unharmed.

  “What happened?” Jadeth asked.

  Emaranthe rubbed absently at her chest, her thin fingers clutching her tunic as if to be sure it was in one piece. Ivo frowned, puzzled, but said nothing. Pushing her to explain would get him nowhere fast. Instead he gathered her to him, his touch gentle. She buried her face against his chest with a shudder. Broad, calloused, fingers traced along her jaw to her ear in soft, repetitive caresses. She leaned into his embrace with a soft sigh.