Twelve Ways to Die in Galadore, Volume I

by Coleman Alexander

  Laches just nodded.

  “Come on, friend. Let’s just sit down and have a drink.”

  Thonnos let him guide him back to the bar top. With a glance from Laches, the raider, whose name he’d already forgotten, got up and sulked away. The music had returned, and once again, voices rose in the deep.

  Thonnos sat back down, his hands trembling. Laches gave the swill-tender the same practiced gesture Thonnos used and soon placed a beer in Thonnos’s hand. The swill-tender set a second in front of Laches.

  “I heard you stopped drinking,” Thonnos said.

  “I did,” Laches said softly, then took a sip. His grip on the mug looked as comfortable as a sword might in his hand, but it wasn’t the same practiced chug that Thonnos used. Instead, it looked as though he might be sipping a pint full of poison.

  “Cheers,” he said after the fact.

  Thonnos drank and watched as his old friend put the beer down after that first touch.

  Thonnos wasn’t sure why Laches would come now, of all nights, to visit him. He didn’t ask. He didn’t want to know if his story had circled its way all the way up to the king’s summer eyries. If it had reached Valï, it might just have reached the upper halls as well. They sat in silence, the distance between them no smaller than the vast night sky between all the worlds.

  Thonnos was soon drinking his mug, thinking of Nouran and the raider, and most of all of Valï. He signaled for another. And then another, and then finally, Laches spoke.

  “Why do you come here?” he asked at last. He asked as if there was no gulf between them, as though it hadn’t been years since they’d last spoken.

  Thonnos looked about.

  The Grotto looked the same as it ever had. It was a swilling-hall of the lower half, which meant in general, it had all the charm of a mine. It was a large, undercut hall without arches or pillars or the faintest hint of architecture or structure. The mountain was the mountain here, and only the stone on the floor had been smoothed. It was an uncivilized placed for an uncivilized people. The tables were stone to keep them upright in a brawl. The beer was warm and the whiskey cheap. But it was the best swilling-hall of the lower half, and it had once been a gem of the city.

  To the side of the hall, where the tallest wall should have been, the space opened into an airy, circular void. That void had once been home to the Weeping Midnight Pool. A deep, clear pool within the heart of the mountain, ringed by precipices that rose out of sight. The walls of that pool had once been bathed in an ever-flowing seep that didn’t fall, but instead clung to the rocks and transformed the surface into a shimmering display of the underworld’s beauty. The rocks beneath had grown with luminescent moss, and when the torches were doused, they would shine in a dazzling display of blue and silver and green.

  But that had been a long time ago. Now, the seep had dried up, and the wall was just barren stone. The pool was half as deep as it had once been, and the walls were ringed in a reminder of its retreating water. Tappers and warrens had both sought to restore the flow, but none had ever succeeded, and so it was just an empty cavern in what had become an empty city. An empty city to Thonnos, at least.

  “It used to be a wonder of the underworld,” Thonnos said at last, not sure why he still came.

  “It’s a hollow shell of itself,” Laches said, leaning back with his mug sitting on his hip. “It’s depressing.”

  “Aren’t we all?” Thonnos replied, tipping his mug up to the ceiling of the cavern. When he finished, it was hard to tell what his friend was thinking. As usual, his sword hand played with the braids in his beard. The silence returned and Thonnos downed another beer. His buzz was returning. The throb in his fists wasn’t quite as heavy. He was just beginning to enjoy himself again when Laches opened his mouth and asked a question that Thonnos had feared was coming.

  “How’s Ghemnia?” he asked.

  Thonnos shrugged, a deep ache rising in his belly. He drank again, trying to drown out the feeling, but it wouldn’t go away.

  “I haven’t spoken to her in years. Not since . . .” He trailed off.

  “Since the night of the Taker’s Raid?”

  Thonnos nodded.

  Laches just stared into his cup. “She misses you,” he said.

  Thonnos stared at him. “So you’ve spoken to her?”

  His friend nodded.

  “Then why the fuck did you ask?”

  This time, it was Laches’s turn to shrug.

  “You always were a fucking bridge-builder, Laches. But that ship has sailed.”

  “She’s your daughter.”

  “She’s made it clear as the night sky I’m not her father.”

  “Have you considered why?”

  “Yeah. She thinks I’m to blame for it all. For her mother. For the raid. For. . .” He trailed off, unable to say the last.

  “For Gheldian’s death?”

  “Yes.” Thonnos finished his beer. “Another,” he said, slamming his hand down on the tabletop. He drank that fast as he could and then signaled for another even before he was finished. The buzz dropped like a hammer now. His head was spinning, and he was properly drunk. Laches just watched him. There was no disgust like Valï and no hatred like Nouran. But there was something else, some deep sadness that welled like the dark in the deepest caverns.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not here for fucking sympathy,” Thonnos said.

  Laches didn’t answer. He just pushed his beer towards Thonnos, who drank it greedily. After a time, Laches stood.

  “Come on, brother. I’ll walk you home.”

  “I’m not going home.”

  Laches gave him a knowing look.

  “Rhamnia’s not there. She’s come to our house, and she’ll be staying with us for a time.”

  Thonnos understood. He wanted to bash his head against the tabletop. Without a beer in front of him and hardly any dignity left, he stood up. He sorted through his pockets and paid, leaving a good deal more than was fair.

  Then he turned and walked with Laches, not saying a word. They came to the exit of the hall, and Laches stopped him with a hand.

  “Let’s go by way of the star fields. I have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of Nouran, and I don’t particularly want to fight.”

  “There used to be a day that you’d insist on it.”

  “I’ve changed,” Laches said.

  Thonnos just nodded. He didn’t argue. He just followed his friend along the quieter paths towards the star fields.

  They arrived and Thonnos looked up.

  Ten thousand glittering gems studded the underside of the mountain, glittering like the stars in the night sky. Laches continued, but Thonnos stopped, marveling at the view. The gems covered the underbelly of the mountain from above his head to below his feet. A void lay between their path and the field, a hollow that extended a thousand feet downwards, below even the deepest of the mines. He stared at it, having forgotten how beautiful it was. Laches stopped. For a long time, they just stood in silence.

  “I took Rhamnia here when we were first courting,” Thonnos said. “Seems like a thousand years ago.”

  He stared up at the star-like gems, remembering a time before all had turned to darkness. The ache from before was growing, a knotted pain that had been resting in his heart for years. He stood and stared and simply remembered. He had put his arm around her and drawn her in and kissed her. Then he remembered something else, and he nearly choked on the memory.

  “I took Gheldian here. He used to love it. He used to sit and try and count the gems, as though a day might come when he’d know them all.”

  Tears welled in Thonnos’s eyes, and his cheeks were suddenly wet.

  Laches was silent for a long time.

  “What’s done is done,” he said at last. “We cannot change the past.”

  Thonnos didn’t look at him. “You know, I spend every day thinking that. I spend every day wrestling with the pain in knowing that I cannot undo what I’ve done. That I can�
��t wrest him from the hands of time and fate. But what I would do to try. I would tear the mountains apart to see him even once more. To hear his voice. To hear his laughter.”

  Thonnos was staring at the stars, but he could see his son’s face, clear as day.

  “I tell myself it’s not my fault. But I know it is. For years, I blamed Rhamnia. She shouldn’t have left the door unlocked. She should have known they would come for him. I had too many enemies, just like you. When you go to war with kings, you have to rest knowing they’ll come for you with the whole weight of their crowns.

  “But alas, she left the door unlocked for me. Thinking I’d come home. Thinking with all her heart that that night might be different than all the others. And that is the reason he’s gone. Because of me. Because she was waiting for me with open arms, even though she knew what I was doing, even though she knew the monster I’d become. And I don’t even remember where I was. Some wench’s bed. Drunk. Blacked out. And she left the door open for me. What I would do to go back to that night. To every night before that. To the day I walked away from the path I should have walked.”

  There was silence, and for a moment, Thonnos forgot that Laches was with him.

  “Can it be undone?” his friend asked.

  Thonnos dropped his eyes, cheeks cramping as he tried to gain hold of the quiver that had taken them.

  “No. I’m too bitter. I’d rather die than look her in the eye.”

  Laches nodded. For a time, Thonnos didn’t dare look at his old friend. But when he did, he found Laches had a far-away look in his eyes, and his face was set in stone, unreadable.

  “It has to stop, Thonnos.”

  “I know. But I have no control over it.”

  “I know.”

  Thonnos didn’t answer. He took a moment, surprised by his own admission, and even more surprised by Laches’s answer. It was the kind of quiet condemnation he’d long known he deserved, but to hear it was too much. He lowered his head and wept. He felt it coming from his body, and for a moment didn’t think he could stand. His whole body shook, and the pain and agony of what he’d done, what he’d become, and the life he’d ruined welled up inside of him. He didn’t know himself. He didn’t know anything. And then he was simply crying. Crying like he never had, a great release as though all the horrible things he’d done and said were going up in smoke, like a mara releasing from a corpse. Laches drew him into an embrace and he wept.

  When at last he stopped, his eyes burned and his beard was streaked in tears. When he looked at Laches, his friend too had tears in his eyes, and his lips were quivering.

  “You know I loved you, brother. I still do. When we were on the up high of things. . .” He fell silent and grimaced. “ You were the shield to my sword. The anvil to my hammer. I would have died for you.”

  “I know.” Thonnos wiped his tears away with the coarse sleeve of his jerkin. He patted Laches on the shoulder and stood there for a long moment.

  Then he turned, but when he did, he found a figure standing just behind him, listening to them.

  For a moment, he froze, surprised and thinking it was Nouran, returned.

  But it wasn’t. It was her. His nose twitched and he could smell her. In the dark of the starfields, he couldn’t see the bruises beneath her eyes, but he remembered a time long ago when he’d brought her here, and there had been no bruises, and no beating, and no bitterness between them.

  “Rhamnia . . .” he said. It came out as a whisper. A name that meant so much it hurt to say.

  “I loved you too,” she said. “I still do.”

  For one glorious moment, Thonnos thought she might have come to reconcile with him. He felt tears welling again and lifted his hand to greet her.

  She flinched, and he stopped.

  He glanced to Laches, but his friend’s face was set and the tears were still in his eyes, and then Thonnos understood.

  Rhamnia didn’t hesitate, and Thonnos made no effort to stop her. He could have grabbed her wrist, but the way she had flinched had been too much. She stepped forward and with hardly any effort, pushed him. He came off balance and stepped back, but there was nothing to step back on, only empty air. For a moment, his body tried to regain its balance, but he knew. That chance was gone.

  And then he was falling, face up to the stars. To his friend and brother. To his wife and lover.

  The last thing he saw was her face. She was beautiful. Beautiful as the first day he’d ever laid eyes on her. He felt his heart burst with sorrow and pain, and then he was falling, free. In that moment, he knew she was free, too, and he was glad for it. And then the darkness swallowed him, and he knew nothing more.

  Part III

  The Serpent of Ennor

  “What I don’t understand is how you’re so damned calm?” Markus asked.

  Adrika just stared back, teeth clenched to keep her voice from betraying herself.

  Markus was sitting across from her in the large skiff, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. Their feet entwined where the stray water sloshed along the planks of the bottom. He’d left his crown somewhere in the palace, and his summer cloak had been replaced with an embroidered shirt and a snug leather vest. He carried no sword and no knife. He didn’t seem to care that his own magistrate had found Adrika guilty of malfeasance and murder by use of magic, or that they were setting out on the Serpent’s Lake with Maelichthion lurking somewhere beneath.

  Instead, he looked irritable, sullen—as though he was the one being put to death.

  “I’d keep your distance, sire. You never know what lows she’s capable of,” Gabe Menton, the new head of Markus’s guard, said from the rear of the boat.

  Markus ignored him and gave a signal to the oarsmen to get going. Adrika eyed the sash across Gabe’s chest, frowning. It had been her only request to wear it one last time, but Markus had declined her.

  Wood ground against the iron oarlocks, the blades dipped into the water, and the four oarsmen, whom Adrika knew well and had once commanded, strained in practiced unison. Their backs straightened against the weight of the water, then their oars came up dripping, and they swung forward once again. The boat shifted away from the dock and out from the shadow of the city wall.

  The tide was in, and the city’s promenade circling the Serpent’s Cove rested only a dozen feet above the wind broken surface. The Seaway, the tunnel through which the Serpent’s Cove joined the sea beyond and the passage by which Meolichthion came and went, was entirely underwater. Being hidden, it made it seem the cove was nothing more than a landlocked lake in the center of Ennor, surrounded by gleaming walls, stone-white buildings, parapets, and towers. But Adrika knew the truth. This was but a small extension of the sea, and though the city surrounded it, the waters were no less dangerous. In fact, they were likely more so. These waters were home to Meolichthion—the Serpent of Accurus.

  Just thinking of her made Adrika shiver despite the heat, which lay upon the city with the full weight of summer. It seemed to wring the salt from the sea, the air rife with the smell of the port and the harbor to the north. She squinted in the direction they were heading.

  The Serpent’s Tower was almost entirely submerged by the water, with only a few feet of the topmost pedestal rising above the surface, creating what looked like a small island at the center of the bay. The statue of Accurus atop the isle was clearly visible from the boat, though only a few of the details were discernible. He was sitting on his throne, with bronze birds bursting into flight from his feet. His hand was raised, and between his fingers, he was holding something up to the sky. Was it in triumph, an offering, or merely a gesture of his power? It was hard to say, and though Adrika couldn’t see it yet, she knew Accurus held the realmstone of Ennor—the stone that made life in the realm possible. At least on most days.

  Markus was watching Adrika’s eyes, seeming to guess her mind.

  “Do you think he will abdicate you?”

  Adrika didn’t answer.

  “If you’re w
orthy, perhaps Meolichthion will release you. Perhaps she will remember all the offerings we’ve made together. They say she does not forget.”

  “Nor does she forgive,” Adrika said, knowing her fate.

  True, the stone was said to have the power to release any from their crimes, but she didn’t hold much hope. The legend said Accurus would release the stone to the righteous, but in all her time overseeing the trials of this manner, she’d never seen a soul freed. And she was sure that they had put innocent men and women to death. The last month had taught her that, if nothing more. She turned away from the isle.

  Upon the palace walls toward their stern, she could see most of the court gathered. The Queen stood at the edge of the grand balcony with her and Markus’s children about her. Aya and Arabella barely peeked over the railing, while Danique watched stone-faced next to his mother. Pallov and Tabitha were likely with their own families, but Willa, the third oldest, was crying. She was almost to womanhood, but she made no effort to hide her tears. Markus would no doubt think it inappropriate for one her age. But Adrika understood. Willa’s heart weighed heavier than the others with her death. In Willa’s mind, it was her fault. Adrika put her shackled hands over her heart as she looked towards Willa, hoping the young princess understood it was a gesture meant for her.

  Markus looked over his shoulder and then back at Adrika.

  “You know the trouble you’ve caused her? She can’t sleep at night. No doubt thinking an attack will come at any moment.”

  Adrika pursed her lips, knowing it was nothing of the sort. But it would do her no good to say as much.

  “She should know it won’t come to that, my lord,” Gabe said.

  Adrika rolled her eyes, and for a moment, she almost thought Markus did too.

  The oarsmen steered the boat towards the island, setting a course that didn’t waiver by an inch. This was their job, and though the city lay about them on all sides, they still looked nervous. Water lapped at the boat. They glanced this way and that, eyeing the depths below. And rightly so, knowing what lurked beneath. Markus, however, gave no such appearance of concern. He sat before Adrika, hands crossed over his chest, feet resting almost upon Adrika’s manacles. His leather jerkin was untied at the top in the hot summer sun. He could have been lounging on the veranda in his gardens, drinking wine and eating cheese.