Chapter 58
58
F ROM THE THRESHOLD of the copper door, Nyx gaped at the dark spectacle that spread across the breadth of Dalal?ea. They were all gathered under the tall set of crossed arches, even the Kethra’kai and Aamon.
Overhead, the skies raged against the trespass above. Lightning split the darkness in a continual storm. Bolts lanced from the crystal-tipped pillars and spattered across the underbelly of a huge ship that had breached the black clouds. The thick keel bore the brunt of the attack but appeared to resist the fire in those bolts.
From a multitude of holds in the ship, a flurry of small crafts jettisoned out, bursting forth with a billow of gasbags. Flashburn forges flamed the skies in all directions. The energetic verve in the air was laced with burning oil and smoke from all those ships, over a dozen. Hunterskiffs, sailrafts, and arrow-like ketches.
Several had already landed. The ships guarded the four gates out to the jungle, unloading legions in shining armor. Elsewhere, a few crafts burned in splintered ruins atop the stone plaza, struck by lightning during their descent.
“We’re too late,” Rhaif said. “There’s no way we can break through that blockade.”
Nyx glanced around. Their group, including the Kethra’kai and Xan, only numbered nine. Aamon brushed her flank, reminding her there was a tenth member. As she watched, more ships drew to hard stops atop the plaza, fluming fire and smoke under their small keels. One of the two-manned ketches shot low over the crossed arches, clearly scouting the ground below.
“We have to attempt it,” Frell warned. “We have no choice. If we can break through to the jungle, we might have a chance of escaping.”
Still, even he didn’t sound convinced of his own plan.
Another did. “I will forge us a path,” Shiya said.
She left the shelter of the doorway and stalked out across the plaza. She lifted an arm as if calling over to the enemy—but it wasn’t the king’s forces she was summoning. One of the crystal-tipped pillars blasted a bolt her way. She caught its fire in her hand and cast it at a sailraft sweeping nearby.
Its gasbag exploded with a whoosh of flame. The blast drove the raft into a steep dive and into a shattering crash, leaving a fiery trail across the rock.
The shock of her miraculous attack kept everyone frozen in place.
“Go!” Frell finally said. “Keep with her.”
They all rushed out.
As they fled, Xan started singing, drawing the voices of the other Kethra’kai. Amidst the roaring of countless forges, Nyx still heard them clearly. The strands of their song wound outward, like the tendrils of a sprouting seed. Those threads rose higher and higher into the sky.
Nyx drew herself into their melody—if only to hold back her terror.
She didn’t understand Xan’s intent, but she added her strength.
Ahead, Shiya captured another bolt and flung it toward a hunterskiff that had landed. She missed the craft, proving even a living sculpture could not entirely master wild lightning. Still, the strike hit the stone near the men and sent them scattering. Her bronze form blazed in the gloom like a torch.
But that was not all that glowed.
Overhead, the silver-gold strands of Xan’s chorus both rose higher and twined together, forming a shining trunk. Branches spread outward, bursting with clusters of finer filaments that wove into golden leaves.
Wonder nearly overwhelmed her terror as she gaped at the giant alder glowing and growing above them. It was as if the spirit of the Oldenmast had come to protect them under its bower.
But this shining tree offered more than shelter.
It was a flag, a rallying call.
Beyond the wall, the jungle awoke, stirred by this glorious symbol of bridle-song shining in the plaza. The forest screamed its savagery and howled at the trespass here. Through all the gates, the hostile heart of the dark jungle burst into the plaza. Poisoned fangs and ripping claws tore into the legions gathered at the thresholds. The air around them filled with painful stings and bullying bites.
Screams and cries echoed across the stone.
As the forces fled from the gates, Nyx began to hope. She should have known better.
A flurry of arrows, many flaming, streaked the skies, rising from a clutch of archers to the right. Shiya tried to sweep the threat away with a bolt of lightning, but the numbers were too many. Death rained toward them.
As Nyx stared, she was knocked down from behind. She hit the stone hard. Her skull rang with the impact, dazing her. A weight pinned her in place, a paw on her shoulder and leg.
Aamon…
Arrows struck all around. Steel points sparked off of the black rock. Shafts shattered into splinters. Others ricocheted away.
As the volley ended, Nyx was released. To her right, two of the Kethra’kai women rolled to their sides, both their backs feathered with bolts. Between them, Xan lay on her back. The two women had done their best to shield the elder with their bodies, but an arrow had made it through their sacrifice.
A bolt pierced Xan’s throat. Blood bubbled from her lips and throat, forever silencing her song. Still, she breathed. Rhaif rushed over to her side. Shiya’s bronze form had done a far superior job of sheltering Rhaif and Frell. Still, the alchymist’s face bled from a glancing strike.
Nyx turned to her own shield.
Aamon panted behind her. Arrows impaled his chest, shoulders, and flank. Darkness soaked through his fur and slowly dripped under him. She despaired for him, but he stood firm and kept watch all around.
Across the plaza, a deafening series of booms drew her attention outward. She turned in a stunned circle. Bombs rained from ships overhead, blasting at each gate. The forest hordes screamed and bellowed within the firestorm below.
Nyx covered her ears, wanting to close her eyes.
She sank to her knees next to Aamon, into a pool of his blood.
Everywhere she looked was only death.
R HAIF KNELT ON the cold stone and held Xan in his arms. The last two Kethra’kai guarded over them.
“Just hold on,” he whispered to Xan.
She stared up at him with eyes of emerald and azure, all of Cloudreach in her gaze. Blood seeped from her lips, which impossibly smiled at him. He saw no pain as the arrow throbbed in rhythm with her heart.
She reached a trembling arm and palmed his cheek. His mother’s lullaby again rose inside him, but he knew this song was not his alone, not just a mother to a child. It was a grandmother consoling a granddaughter, a father teaching a son. It was a thousand generations of one comforting another. Even now, Xan sought to do the same for him, to offer him solace, to let him know that one end was not the end of all.
He remembered his horror at Shiya’s plan. She wanted to destroy the Crown and kill untold millions, all so this spark might survive and carry on, from one generation to the next.
In this moment, he almost understood it.
Rhaif leaned down and pressed his forehead to her cheek. “Xan… you will never be forgotten.”
She managed a whisper that reached him. “My granddaughter… lives in you… through you. As do I… as do all the Kethra’kai. Do not forget that.”
He managed a small smile.
Even now, she still sought to teach him.
The lullaby inside him rose louder, ringing with notes both happy and sad—then it slowly faded. Her palm slipped from his cheek. He straightened to see Xan’s body slump into peace.
Hands drew him away. Another shifted the body.
The last two Kethra’kai had their own good-byes to make. Rhaif let them, standing back. They took his place, kneeling, singing over her body, keeping vigil.
Rhaif stared at the legions closing upon them from all directions. Knights and Mongers, archers and pikemen. The rain of fire continued to flow down from the ships. Smoke rolled everywhere. The jungle cried out in agony.
Ahead of him, Shiya blazed before all of it, a fiery bronze torch against the darkness.
He headed toward her beacon.
Frell stood a short distance away, balanced between Shiya and a small girl on her knees next to a blood-soaked champion. The alchymist seemed lost, his face smeared with crimson.
Shiya lifted her arm, ready to summon fire to her.
Then a small arrow-shaped ship—a scout-ketch—sped past overhead. Something tumbled from its underside. Then another and another. All falling toward Shiya.
No…
He ran for her, a shout of warning on his lips.
Then the small casks of alchymical fire burst around Shiya, blasting her forward. Frell caught an edge of it, too, and was thrown to the side. A hot wall struck Rhaif and tossed him backward, lifting him off his feet. He hit and rolled, tumbling through smoke and air too fiery to breathe.
Finally, he stopped and stared toward where Shiya had been standing.
Only flames remained.
S PRAWLED ACROSS STONE, Nyx fought to an elbow, then a knee. She rolled around and stared all about her. The world was smoke, lit by pools of flames. Still, the fires weren’t enough to pierce the thick pall. Her lungs burned. Her eyes watered. Fiery embers spun in whirls and gusts.
She searched around, partly deafened by the blasts.
Then something nudged her from behind. She startled away, only to have a cold nose touch her palm. She turned as Aamon sidled next to her, panting, nearly gasping now. He came next to her, offering his shoulder. She leaned on him. He swung his head and bumped her thighs, then faced forward, as if to say: This way…
He guided her through the smoke, skirting the fires, sticking to the thicker pall to keep them hidden for as long as possible. But it could not shelter them forever.
As they continued, the smoke cleared around them. The air felt frigid after so much heat. She shivered, so did Aamon, but not from the chill. He clearly weakened with each step, but kept on, obeying his grizzled brother’s last command.
Protect.
With this thought, she sensed something sweeping through the air, coming closer, as if drawn to her. It felt like a storm building over the horizon. She hoped it was the Sparrowhawk —but she sensed a danger in that storm, one of grim power, trained on her.
She stared up.
What is coming?
W RYTH CIRCLED IN a sailraft above the fiery carnage across the black plaza of Dalal?ea. He still clutched Skerren’s orb, but he no longer needed its guidance.
He had watched a scout-ketch unload a fiery storm atop the bronze figure. She had been blasted far, torn from her allies. Smoke now covered the view. He waited for it to dissipate. Despite his desire for the artifact, he didn’t fault that barrage upon her. He had watched her commanding this henge, drawing lightning to her like an iron rod, and tossing it back upon her enemies.
He had never imagined such a fearsome weapon.
His lust for her grew—along with his caution. Upon Wryth’s order, the sailraft’s drover kept his boat high and away. They were all fearful of one of those bolts striking the craft.
Through the raft’s tiny windows, he searched the fire and smoke below.
Movement drew his eye, to a path stirring through the pall, like a finger across black water. The smoke parted enough to reveal a blazing bronze figure, looking no worse, at least from this height. From the darkness at her feet, she pulled forth two dazed figures, two men. They all looked around, lost and wrecked in those smoky seas. But they searched for something—or someone.
Bony fingers clasped Wryth’s arm. A hand pointed in the opposite direction. He turned and squinted. He saw two figures stumbling together, looking nearly like one. It was a large wolf or dog, accompanied by a small girl.
Vythaas drew closer, whispering in Wryth’s ear, raising gooseflesh. “Vyk dyre Rha…”
Wryth stared harder. He could not imagine how that frail, staggering form could be the future vessel for the dark majesty of the Klashean god, the infamous Shadow Queen.
Still, Vythaas knew far more about this prophecy than anyone, so Wryth had to trust the withered Shrive in this matter. Moreover, despite appearances, the girl had fought her way all the way here to Dalal?ea’s dark henge, while somehow also collecting the ancient weapon along the way. If Vythaas was correct about her, she had to be stopped now, before she came into her full power.
Wryth glanced again to the blazing bronze torch. The shining woman remained dangerous and formidable. He still feared approaching too closely. For now, he would leave it to Brask’s forces to grind her down, to drain and deplete her, to hopefully bring her low.
Then I’ll collect her.
In the meantime…
Wryth touched the drover’s shoulder and pointed to the two figures stumbling across the stone. “Drop us hard in front of them.”
N YX AGAIN FELT the pressure in her ears as something came for her, that dark storm driving at her. She trembled in fear, sensing the menace and fury. She gave up searching the skies for it and glanced around.
Behind her, she spotted a fire far more golden shining in the smoke.
Shiya…
Nyx wobbled as she tried to turn. “Aamon, we’re going the wrong way.”
The vargr continued his path forward. Maybe it was the only way he could go. His legs quaked under him. Her palm on his shoulder lay soaked in his hot blood. He fought onward, nearly dragging himself. She didn’t understand his goal, if he had one. Maybe just to draw her farther and farther from the smoke and flame.
Still, with each pained step, he seemed to be drawing her closer to that dark storm in the air. It no longer felt beyond the horizon, but sweeping toward her, coming straight at her.
Suddenly, the world roared in front of her. She ducked and gasped. Flashburn flames raged ahead of her, slowing a sailraft that dropped out of the skies like a falling boulder.
She stumbled back, tripped over her tired legs, and fell to her knees.
The sailraft blasted to the plaza, wreathed in smoke and smolder.
Aamon rounded in front of her, still ready to protect her. But he could not hold himself up anymore. His legs gave a final shake, and he dropped heavily before her, creating a wall of bloody fur between her and the fiery craft.
Ahead, the stern door of the raft crashed open. Two Mongers stalked out of the hold, unfolding their giant frames to exit. They carried hammers, but rather than approaching, the pair moved to either side.
Between them, two Shriven climbed out. One she did not recognize, but she suspected was the Iflelen Wryth. The other—all bone and sagging flesh—had to be the one Kanthe had described, the Shrive who had come to the Cloistery with the king’s legion. Kanthe had said his name was Vythaas.
The pair did not approach farther than the end of the ramp. Maybe they were leery of the growling vargr. Even wounded, Aamon was dangerous.
Her hands reached to his fur, feeling the tremble of his threat.
The Shriven then parted, allowing two more figures to leadenly stalk forward. They moved stiffly, as if risen from the dead. They dragged iron pikes behind them. Each wore skullcaps of steel, like those worn by the scythers.
As they neared the Shriven, a smaller copper box—held in Vythaas’s hand—glowed brighter, humming with a noise that ate at her ears, trying to worm into her skull.
She ignored it, too shocked by who had arrived.
Their features were slack and dull; ropes of drool hung from their lips. Still she knew them. They were part of a life that seemed lived by another.
She whispered their names from that other life. “Ablen… Bastan…”
Vythaas lifted his copper box. He spoke a command to it, glowing it brighter with his breath. She could nearly see his words carried through the air on threads so corrupt and inimical that she shuddered.
She also heard that command.
“Kill them… kill them both.”
Ablen and Bastan swung their pikes up and marched forward.
R HAIF DUCKED AS Shiya cast out another bolt of lightning, scattering knights away from them. She also watched the skies, ready in case another scout-ketch should draw too near. Two ships lay in smoldering ruins, adding to the thick smoke that both choked the air and kept them hidden.
While Shiya did most of the protecting, Rhaif and Frell added to the defense. If they spotted any archers in the distance or the streak of flaming arrows in the sky, they would shout out. With such warnings, the group would hopefully have time to cloak themselves in smoke to make harder targets or shelter under Shiya’s bronze form.
Still, a question remained.
Frell asked it again. “Where’s Nyx?”
Their group held off making a strike for one of the gates until they found her—not that such an escape would be likely either way. As proof, Rhaif watched one of the purple-faced mandrayks go bounding by through the smoke. It raced wildly, its tail on fire. It scribed a glowing path through the pall.
On all sides, the gates burned.
As Rhaif followed the mandrayk’s trail, his eye was drawn to a sailraft in the distance. It smoldered under hot forges. He nearly looked away, thinking it was yet another shipment of the legion’s forces. Then he spotted a furry mound nearby—and a small girl sheltering behind it.
Nyx…
“Frell!” Rhaif shouted.
The alchymist ducked and winced, believing Rhaif was warning about another attack.
Rhaif drew abreast of the man and pointed. “That’s Nyx over there.”
Frell squinted and stiffened with recognition. He stepped forward. “We must get to her…”
Before the alchymist could move farther, a bronze hand grabbed his arm. “No,” Shiya warned. Her lightning-hot grip smoldered on his sleeve. “I hear what is being sung over there. It is… wrong. No one must go there.”
“But Nyx…” Frell stressed.
Shiya did not let him go. “No. She is lost to us.”
N YX HID BEHIND Aamon as her two brothers stalked slowly forward with raised pikes. Though this pair looked like Ablen and Bastan, whatever approached now was not them. They might wear their faces and bodies, but those were not the brothers who had teased her mercilessly and who had loved her just as fervently.
She stared at the lengths of hard steel raised at her. Over her lifetime, she had watched them spear fish with similar weapons, able to strike at the merest flicker of silver in black water and draw out a flopping karp or a squirming eel. With stouter spears, they had hunted great armored krocs and had driven off grimwolves who harried their bullocks.
While what approached might look dull and dead-eyed, she suspected those lethal reflexes remained, all controlled by whatever sang to them from that copper box in Vythaas’s hand.
The two Iflelen studied her brothers, staring with cold curiosity, as if testing what they had wrought. The pair could have sent the Gyn after Nyx and Aamon, but maybe they believed this death would pain her more. Maybe even get her to stay her hand.
She knew both to be true.
Even if I could, I have no heart left in me to kill my brothers. If they would die for me, can I do any less?
Still, she refused to simply bare her throat to the knife.
Her hands were still atop Aamon, who growled his challenge even as his life ebbed. She had tied herself to him, to his brother. She drew upon that bond.
I will be vargr.
She fought the only way she knew how. She drew a deep breath and sang to her brothers. She drew on their love, their friendship, trying to remind them who they were. Her eyelids drifted closed. She remembered them laughing, cajoling, taunting, snoring. She put all that into her lilt and rhythm.
Remember who you are.
She cast out tangles of song and reminiscences, brightening those strands with voice and heart. She tried to send them toward her brothers. But there was something foul in the air, frizzing any approach, a wind blowing against her. She shuddered from its corruption. It was a fever’s heat, the stench of vomit, the boil of pus and rot. It fought the strands she cast.
Still, she did not give up. Her fingers clenched in Aamon’s fur.
I am vargr.
She sang louder, pulled harder, straining all she could. Slowly her strands teased through the pestilent air until they could brush the steel. With a touch, she knew she was blocked. Still, for a breath, she caught a flash of agony, of drilling through bone, of fiery poison flowing into skulls.
She flinched from it but held strong to her song.
She tightened her throat and drew upon the strength of another brother. Though her fingers still felt the texture of Aamon’s fur, she also remembered a curl of bark, the scent of tea.
A keening flowed into her song, drifting her eyes further closed. She sent those waves out with each note, testing the steel, searching for its lock. But again the corruption fought her. It wasn’t only in the air, but also in the steel. She sensed there was no key she could use. It was too corrupt, too poisoned. She would never find a path through that fouled metal.
Worse, as she struggled, she caught the briefest glimpse past the steel. It was all shadows and poison. There was truly little left of her brothers in there. But for a fraction of a heartbeat, she saw the tiniest flame of them, drowned deep in the darkness.
Not all had been snuffed away.
This agonized her more than anything, knowing they were trapped.
Despairing, she let her song die, recognizing its uselessness against such vileness.
She opened her eyes.
Her two brothers reached her.
Aamon growled, struggling to stand.
She again felt that storm in the air, dark energies building in the skies. Something was nearly upon her, far more dangerous than anything here. She prayed it was just the Sparrowhawk, burning all its forges to reach here.
Still, she knew she was wrong.
Both her brothers stabbed their pikes at Aamon.
Nyx covered her face, knowing all was lost.