by Dante King
She wasn’t one of them.
Movement caught my eye. Ganyir emerged from between the houses and walked slowly over to Targin’s body. He stopped a few feet away and stared down at the bloody, mud-covered corpse.
Ganyir’s face didn’t even twitch. Years of training to be a lord had their hold on him, suppressing any sight of his feelings. Still, the emotion of the moment was too much for him. His own blood lay dead before him, at the hands of his allies. Men who he had been born to lead lay scattered and broken, many of them killed by him. He sank to his knees and stared unmoving at the face of his brother, caught up in a hidden world of grief.
I closed my eyes, and sleep took me. I didn’t know if it lasted two seconds or two hours, but the next thing I was aware of was Vesma sitting down beside me. She laid a hand on my arm.
“You did good,” she said.
“I wish I could have done more. Chosi and Fig fell in the battle.”
“They did good too. It was other people’s evil that killed them.”
Chapter Fourteen
We dug the graves in a patch of ground behind the sand-sunken village. First, we cleared the heaped sand, using earth Augmenting as well as physical labor. Such sand was no good for a burial ground. It was shifting and fickle, too easily blown away by the winds and by time. A final resting place should be exactly that, and so it was only when we hit the rich, solid soil underneath that we started digging the graves.
Ganyir used his magic to clear spaces for the men and women we had killed, warriors who had once served under his command. He knelt at the place where each grave would be, planted his fist on the ground, and closed his eyes. The earth trembled and then parted, rising up to each side, creating a hole for a body to rest inside. The symmetry of the holes revealed this power as something familiar to Ganyir, an act he had carried out before. This was not his first war and certainly not his first losses.
The initiates insisted on digging Fig and Choshi’s graves themselves. They found shovels in the back of one of the houses, a little rusty but still serviceable, and set to work. Drek dug with the skill and certainty inherent to his dwarven people, Onvar with fastidious earnestness. Elorinelle, the one least acclimatized to this sort of labor, worked until the sweat poured from her brow. Only Zedal, one leg missing below the knee, sat off to one side and watched, her scaled face twitching in frustration. She wouldn’t let her changed body hold her back for long; I was sure of that. One way or another, impatience would soon drive her to find a way back onto her feet and into action, and I feared for anyone— friend or enemy—who stood in the way of that mission.
While they worked, I helped bring up the corpses of the enemy soldiers. These faces meant nothing to me, which made it easier to deal with than my own losses. But I couldn’t help remembering that some of them were dead at my hands. The path I had chosen had consequences, and for some people, they were terrible.
Still, I knew I’d done the right thing. Their deaths would serve as lessons to anyone who allied themselves with a cult.
One by one, we lowered the bodies into the graves and covered them over. Their armor and weapons went in with them.
“We don’t need those,” Talis explained. “But they might need them in the next life.”
Everyone gathered around to help with Choshi and Fig. We hadn’t been careless in burying our enemies, but with these two, there was an extra degree of care. Their friends laid them out in the dirt, arms folded across their chests, weapons by their sides. Elorinelle placed a pouch full of dates in Fig’s hands, “for the journey.” Onvar reached into Choshi’s pocket, pulled out a leather string carrying a simple amber bead wound around with blond hair, and placed it between her fingers.
“It was her brother’s,” he explained. “He died fighting the cult when they first came to Gonki.”
While the rest of us filled the graves, Zedal sat scratching symbols into round stones that Elorinelle had gathered. Each symbol was the same—a large ring with three smaller semicircles protruding around the circumference, and in the center, a pictogram for the name of the deceased. Ganyir knew the names of half the dead soldiers, and for the rest, Zedal left that central point blank.
I spotted an outer symbol on one of the stones. “What is that?” I asked.
“It’s the sign for the Earth Spirit,” Zedal explained. “When we are born, we come from her, and she takes us back into her arms when we die. Her sign marks the great changing points in our lives: birth, marriage, death.”
The stones were laid at the heads of the graves, then we gathered in front of them. Zedal used her staff as a crutch to stand alongside the rest of us, though the strain of staying upright was clearly taking its toll.
Ganyir faced us across the graves. “We come together in loss.” His voice boomed out like that of an old-time preacher. “To mourn the fallen and to remember what they meant to us. To recognize that, though they are passing from this cycle of their lives, they will go on. As we are lost into the embrace of the Earth Spirit, so we are reborn from her. Our lives are both a gift briefly shared and a burden briefly carried, but our spirits are eternal, just as the earth is.”
Everyone remained silent as Ganyir fixed his eyes on each of them. His spirit had definitely lifted since we’d last spoken, and there was something of a resoluteness in him, the vestiges of an immovable mountain showing through.
“We endure,” he continued. “The Spirit endures. Gonki endures. Though we face times of trial, we emerge stronger from them. And though we suffer losses, we find joy in remembering who our friends once were.”
Tahlis stepped forward and began to sing. To my surprise, his voice rang out pure and beautiful across that newly hallowed ground. Others joined in, their voices spiraling around each other in harmony. Only my fellow travelers and I, outsiders to this land and its customs, stood silent as we listened to the words of the Gonki.
It was clearly a song they all knew well, and judging by its archaic phrasing, an ancient one. It wasn’t a straightforward song of praise, though it was all about the Earth Spirit. Instead, it told a story of the Spirit’s past. In the story, the Spirit worked with others to forge the world and make it safe for the people they put into it. The spirits were kindred, brothers and sisters born of something ancient and powerful. Together, they shaped the world and made it good, driving out corrupting influences that threatened peace and tranquility.
But then came a change in the song, a shift from the high and trembling notes of that happy time to something deeper in which the singers’ voices played discordant parts. Some of the Earth Spirit’s kin betrayed her, jealous of her power and wisdom. They sealed her in a great weapon, a two-handed sword larger and mightier than all others, and named it Forgotten Memory before they sealed the sword away.
The song came back around again, gaining a new harmony and deep resonance, and I expected it to become the story of the Spirit’s escape, but instead, something else emerged, and I finally understood why this was a funeral song. The Spirit remained buried in the sword, just as the dead remained buried in the earth. But like them, her presence remained with the living, guiding and inspiring them. Though she was not among her people in body, the Spirit remained in their hearts. And so, too, the dead lived on.
I thought about the few days I had spent with Choshi and Fig. Though the time had been short, it had been memorable, and I would miss them. The memories of our time lived in me, just as the song said. I wiped a tear from my eye and saw that others were doing the same.
The song ended, and Tahlis took a step back.
“This isn’t over,” Ganyir said, his tone stern. “All these deaths stain the hands of the Cult of Unswerving Shadows, and none of us will forget that. For too long, we have let them dominate the province. I gave up the responsibility I was born to and let that rot fester in our midst. But we can do better. We should do better. We will do better.”
Everyone nodded before Ganyir continued.
“The Swordslinger has
provided the catalyst for a change we did not bring for ourselves. His example has moved us to action against the cult. Now, we must follow his lead.”
I shifted uncomfortably where I stood. It was true that I had helped inspire them to fight back, but I was also the one who had caused the Unswerving Shadows to go on the offensive. Without my arrival, they might never have sent out an army to hunt down me and any others who were planning to oppose them. Without me, the blood of the sand-sunken village might not be stained red.
But then, that wouldn’t have stopped blood being spilled in the streets of Hyng’ohr, would it? The brother whose token Choshi had carried had died long before I arrived. If it took bloodshed now to save innocent lives in the future and to set a people free from tyranny, then so be it.
Ganyir knelt at the head of the last grave he had filled in. Instead of a stone, it had a steel gauntlet to mark who lay there. Inscribed in the back of the gauntlet, surrounded by the Earth Spirit’s symbol, was the pictogram for Targin’s name.
“I failed you when I allowed this cult to poison our province,” Ganyir said to his lost brother. “To poison your mind and turn you against me. I cannot undo that failure, but I can mend what remains.”
“There is only one way forward,” Tahlis said. “We must destroy Saruqin and his Cult of Unswerving Shadows. We must retake the city from them, one piece at a time if we have to. Today, we mourn our fellows’ passing, but one day, we will celebrate the victory they helped win.”
With the funerals over, Ganyir and Tahlis headed back into the village to gather supplies left by the defeated army. Kegohr, Vesma, and Kumi went to help. But the initiates seemed unable to draw themselves away from the graveside.
I went to stand with them, and as I approached, they looked up with the same awe they had shown me during our time training together. Despite the hardship I had brought them into, that unsettling veneration remained. I might not be comfortable with it, but perhaps I could use it to help soothe them.
“You did well today. All of you. You fought with skill and courage, which isn’t easy the first time you’re in a battle. Hell, it isn’t easy any time. This must have been frightening, but you overcame your fears, and you went to work. You were ready to get behind more powerful Augmenters, to provide serious support against stronger and more dangerous opponents. You played an invaluable part in dealing a serious blow to the Cult and its corrupted followers. You should all be proud.”
They looked at each other and smiled, but one by one, their gazes fell sadly to the graves.
“Be proud of Choshi and Fig too,” I continued. “I saw them in action, and they showed that same courage, skill, and determination. It’s a tragedy that they died, but their deaths won’t be in vain. They died striking a blow for freedom, a blow against cruelty and tyranny. They died helping set others free. And by the time this is done, their deaths will be avenged.”
“Thank you,” Elorinelle said as tears ran down her cheeks. “I needed to hear that.”
“Aye.” Drek rubbed at his eye. “Me too.”
I headed into the village, leaving them to take a last few moments with their lost friends.
“That was beautifully done,” Yono said. “You have a gift for more than action.”
“You sell our master short,” Nydarth added.
I allowed their voices to fall to whispers.
In the village, the others had gathered together piles of supplies left behind by the scattered army. Some were obvious military materials, like arrows, swords, and spare links for fixing chainmail. There was also a lot of food, enough to have fed the army for a short campaign to drive us out of the Sunstone Temple.
“Looks like we’re set for a while.” Tahlis rummaged through sacks of fruit and vegetables. “Fresh apples! How do you like that? We’re going to eat like pigs tonight.”
“Are they ready to go?” Ganyir nodded toward the initiates.
“Almost,” I said. “Just give them a few more minutes.”
Sure enough, the initiates embraced each other, then walked slowly over to join us.
“What can we carry?” Zedal asked.
“You?” Tahlis asked. “Nothing. You need to concentrate on getting about with half a leg.”
“I am getting about. I don’t need you telling me what I can’t do.”
“Yes, you do. Because you’re the sort of pig-headed warrior who will try to push yourself hard at every opportunity, and that can be great for completing chores or training or studying, but when it comes to recovering from injury, it’s completely backward. Your body needs as little strain as it can stand.” Tahlis chuckled to himself at the barely veiled meaning of his words.
“And how would you know that? I don’t see you using a crutch.”
Tahlis pulled his robes open all the way down to his waist, revealing his scaled chest and stomach. A scar ran from his collarbone down to his navel, a dark and puckered stretch of skin where no scales grew.
“That’s how I know,” he said. “Because if I’d had the sense to listen to a physician, I might have got back the strength I lost there, and I’d look a lot better naked. That might not matter to virginal initiates like yourselves, but past a certain age, these things matter.”
Zedal looked at her guildmaster’s chest, then down at the stump of her leg. “Fine. But I’ll be carrying things soon.”
“Oh, yes, you will. There’s no shirking chores in my guild, not even for crippled heroes of the liberated province. So, focus on getting better so that you can get on with doing my will.”
“Yes, Master,” she said with a laugh.
The rest of us picked up sacks and satchels of goods, then headed across the dunes into the foothills and up the stairs to the temple. Ganyir led the way, the day’s exertions taking nothing out of his purposeful stride. I walked with him, eager not just to set an example to the initiates but to talk with the Lord of the Gonki about things I had seen and heard.
“That song about the Earth Spirit,” I said. “Is the story literally true, or is it a fable, something to help understand what the spirit represents?”
“I’m no priest,” Ganyir said. “If you want something other than simple acceptance of simple facts, find someone more complicated.”
“Then I’ll ask a simpler question. Is the Forgotten Memory sword still around?”
Ganyir shook his head. “It’s been lost for a long time. Longer than any reliable records go back. In my youth, I had high hopes of finding it one day. So did Targin. It was one of those childhood dreams, how we’d find it and be like heroes out of legend. Like Swordslingers.”
“Did you find any clues to where it might be?”
“There are no clues. If that sword did exist, it’s long gone to the ages.”
We walked on in silence while I contemplated this. The song had me wondering about what other spirit weapons were out there in the world, waiting to be found. But of course, if they were out there, then other people would have been looking for them. There couldn’t be many that remained hidden, and those that did would be incredibly hard to find.
“Why are you so interested in the legend?” Ganyir asked.
“Because I already have two weapons with spirits trapped inside them,” I said. “Those Immense Blades have been incredibly helpful to me in mastering the different elements. I was hoping I might find something like that for earth.”
“Careful what you wish for, Swordslinger. Spirits can be as much trouble as help, no matter what the legends say.”
We soon arrived at the top of the stairs. We carried the supplies into the temple and up to the kitchens above the main chapel. Tahlis took charge of where things were put away, while Kumi starting making plans for a meal, then setting members of our band to work carrying those plans out.
The grim reality of the day faded as we settled into the comforting routines of cooking. Washing and chopping vegetables, preparing meat, mixing marinades; it was all simple yet distracting, a focus for body and for mind. I
sliced carrots and peppers alongside Zedal to the sound of oil hissing as Kumi fried bean curd behind us.
Zedal pushed away a bowl of shredded greens.“What next?”
“Crush the garlic, please,” Kumi said.
“Okay, but that’s not what I meant.” Zedal started peeling garlic cloves, but her attention was on me. “I meant what now in our struggle against the cult?”
Around the room, eyes turned to me. For my part, I looked over at Ganyir, who stood to one side, looking lost amid the domestic activity. As the son and heir of a great lord, he probably hadn’t needed to cook for himself growing up, or ever been part of making a meal that wasn’t roasting meat over a fire in the camp of a campaigning army. All the bustle of preparation, into which the rest of us fell with ease and varying levels of skill, was alien to him.
That was fine. I didn’t need him to be a chef right now, I needed him to be a general.
“The army we defeated today,” I said. “Was that a large part of what they have?”
“Large enough,” Ganyir said. “It will be a significant setback, enough to throw them into retreat, for a while at least.”
“They’ll be vulnerable?”
“Potentially, yes. But they have the fortress on their side.”
“Tahlis mentioned the fortress, and I think we saw it when we first arrived. Is that where the army is based, or the guild, or both?”
“The fortress is the safest place in Gonki, our last bastion in times of trouble. When our lands have been invaded or overrun by monsters, we could always retreat there for safety. It was how the clan survived many of its darkest hours.”
“And when it’s not providing a refuge?”
“Sometimes a barracks, sometimes a prison, often both. There are cells in the darkness below, and rooms where an army can rest for a while in the fortress itself.”