5. Path Chosen
Path Chosen
“You don’t have to go, Eyros. But we do.” Wyvern–or Fiona–gestured between herself and Mirryr–or Charlie. “Hide here.”
“Hide? You make it sound like I’m being unreasonable in not wanting to be killed,” Eyros laughed.
“Killed?” Elgar’s voice was but a whisper, but they all heard him.
Three heads whipped towards him. Three sets of silver eyes glowing. Three sets of fangs exposed. Until they realized it was him and then there was no anger, only regret and great sadness.
“Elgar, how did you–why did you–what did you hear?” Eyros insisted.
“Too much and not enough,” Elgar said as he stepped up beside them.
The three of them were standing at the base of the gate to Nightvallen.
He hadn’t exactly announced himself. He had been going quietly as was his wont.
But he hadn’t announced himself either. The truth was that if all things had been equal, the three Immortals would have definitely known of his approach.
But all things had not been equal. All three of them were in the midst of a heated discussion.
Voices had been raised. Emotions were so heightened that they had almost solidified in the air.
So he’d been able to walk right up to them and hear many things that Eyros had certainly not wanted him to hear.
“You knew I didn’t want you out here!” Eyros shouted.
“Forgive me, Master, but I knew no such thing,” Elgar said quietly. “You wished me to assist Wyvern with the gate.”
Eyros let out a wild laugh. “Well, you could have announced yourself. Instead, you crept up and–”
“Are you going to die, Master?” Elgar cut him off because what was done was done.
“I… this is… you should not ask things like that of your Master!” Eyros sounded strangled.
Elgar turned to Wyvern and Mirryr. “Tell me.”
“Tell you what? There’s quite a bit we know that you don’t,” Mirryr chuckled uneasily.
“What he does not want me to know. About his Second Death. About what happens and why it happens,” Elgar said calmly even as his heart jolted in his chest.
Mirryr put his hands together and let out a breathy, uncomfortable laugh as he looked between Wyvern and Eyros as if he wasn’t going to be the one to let this particular cat out of the bag. Wyvern let out a long sigh. She turned towards Elgar.
“The future is good,” she said, “but how we get there is hard.”
Eyros let out an explosive breath. His back was to Elgar. His shoulders were hunched. He was shaking. Wyvern glanced at him with empathy, but she plowed forward.
“Clearly, some of us have already died, but we are reborn in the future and find our way back to Daemon.” Wyvern smiled as she put one hand to her chest. Then with a roll of her lips, she continued, “And some of us–like Eyros–will die in the future and then be reborn.”
“How does Master die?” Elgar was impressed how even his voice was even though he wanted to scream.
How could this happen? Was he not there? Did he fail Eyros? He must have. If his Master died…
“We don’t know the full details,” Wyvern said, but it sounded too noncommittal as if they were leaving out the parts that they most definitely did know. “But it happens in Solace.”
“That is where you wish to go? Not Nightvallen?” Elgar gestured to the gate.
“Seeyr is in Solace. A prisoner in the Spire,” Charlie said. “She’ll know how Fifi can use the gates to advance time.”
“The gate to Solace is glowing for me.” Wyvern was staring off into the distance where the gate to Solace was half-hidden in the trees.
“It’s a sign. An invitation. I have to go.
” Those words were not only said with such certainty but there was a thrum in the air to accompany them as if to give credence to that surety.
Wyvern then shivered and seemed to come back to herself.
“But as I was telling Eyros, he does not need to come with us. Just unlock the gate long enough for us to go through.”
“And I said no!” Eyros hissed.
He whirled around, his robes flying out behind him like a magnificent set of wings, as he glared at both Wyvern and Mirryr. But while he likely had intended this to come across as anger, it seemed to be filled more with fear.
“But if you don’t go with us, Eyros, then you can’t very well die on Solace’s plains,” Mirryr pointed out.
“And as I told you: something will happen to make me go!” Eyros’ fists were clenched. His jaw worked convulsively. “I won’t do it, Wyvern! Not even for you! Not even to make up for what I did!”
“You cannot outrun fate,” Wyvern said calmly. “I know. I tried often enough.”
“It’s not just me who is affected by this!” Eyros threw back at her. “And I can’t… I just can’t… I can’t.”
He turned and stalked off towards the sea.
“I’ll keep trying to work with this gate. If he doesn’t agree to open the Solace one…” Wyvern let out a soft sigh and shook her head. The beads in her hair click-clacked.
“How can you ask him to die?” Elgar clenched his fists.
It was not her, but Mirryr who answered, “Death is not the end. Not even an end. Elgar, if you knew that Eyros would be happier than he could ever be if he went through this thing, what would you give?”
“Happier–”
“The person he becomes is not only a better man, a better Immortal, but a far more joyous one,” Mirryr said.
“But he would have to die and be reborn and go through many trials–”
“Yes,” Wyvern sighed. “And he’s right. It’s not just him. Others pay a price too.”
“But others have already paid that price, Fifi. You did. Grayson did. Ryder did. Caemorn did. So many more,” Mirryr pointed out.
“You did, too, Charlie, even though you didn’t die,” she said softly.
“In a way I did die,” Mirryr said with a sad laugh. “And maybe it was a little hard living without all of you. So death is not the worst thing that can happen. It really isn’t.”
They both looked at him. Elgar blinked then frowned. He could look into their minds–whatever they were thinking was literally at the forefront–and know what it was that was worse than death. It evidently involved him.
But he didn’t look into their minds. He went after Eyros instead.
Because he needed his Master to be the one to tell him what was going on.
He just wasn’t sure he would accept it if Eyros told him nothing.
Or nothing that he needed to concern himself about.
Because he knew that wasn’t true. Eyros not wanting to die was understandable, but there was something more here. Something he needed to understand.
He found Eyros standing on a cliff overlooking the ocean.
The wind whipped back Eyros’ dark hair and robes.
He was staring out at the inky black waves with their silver-foam tops with a look that could only be described as one of suffering.
His Master’s mind though wrapped around him in a warm embrace and Elgar felt all the love Eyros had for him.
He sent back his own love. A torrent of it.
Love, devotion, loyalty and more. Eyros’ shoulders curled forward and he covered his face with his hands.
“I’m not worth all that, Elgar,” he said.
“Master, you are. You are to me.”
Elgar put a hand on Eyros’ nearest shaking shoulder.
He couldn’t remember the last time he had seen Eyros cry.
There had been terrible moments in the War when Eyros had looked blasted as if everything was a wasteland before him and nothing good would ever be there again.
In truth, Eyros looked like that most of the time now.
“Elgar, I can’t… I can’t… can’t tell you, but I should. You need to know. It’s only fair. I looked. I know the future. You should too,” Eyros whispered into his palms.
“Do I fail you, Master? Is that why you die?” Elgar asked.
“What?” Eyros’ hands fell from his face and his head snapped around so that he was facing Elgar. “Good gods, no! The opposite! The opposite, Elgar! You don’t… you won’t… won’t leave me. Not even in death. You don’t leave me.”
Elgar stared at him. The knowledge was right there at the cusp of Eyros’ mind. “Master, may I?”
“Yes, because I cannot say it. I cannot describe it. I cannot… this is not fair!” Eyros raged at the stormy sea.
The waves crashed below them against the rocks with a thunderous roar as if they were screaming back.
Eyros then let out a yell, a shout, a wail.
The sky split asunder with lightning as if he were Horys.
But it was just a coming storm. Lightning rippled all over the ocean.
Thunder rumbled like a displeased spirit.
Elgar looked into Eyros’ mind.
And he knew.
Everything.
Elgar staggered away from Eyros. One hand lifted to his face as if to cover his eyes and block out the flow of knowledge. For it was not just what Eyros knew, but it was beyond that. More than that. There was…
“Caemorn, I tell you something terrible has happened to them!” A man cried as he paced inside of the Eyros Palace in Nightvallen.
Elgar recognized it though it had been changed. Updated, he supposed to represent the era from when this was.
A platinum-haired man with sharp, yet handsome features looked up from where he was sitting in an armchair by the fire. His black coat had silver Kaly death heads sewn into the collar and cuffs.
“I feel that it is all right,” this man said. He must be Caemorn.
“You feel? Oh, by the gods! Will wonders never cease? You’re talking about feelings?! NOW?!” The first man, whose mind he was evidently somehow in, let out a squawk of strangled laughter.
Caemorn stood. His expression was gentle. It was not an usual look on his face, Elgar thought. It was a face that was more used to showing scorn and disdain or diffidence. But the emotion shown through like a flame in the darkness. Caemorn took the speaker’s hands in his.
“My memories are not all certain, Balthazar,” Caemorn said.
“Memories? What would your memories have to do with where Grayson, Ryder, Fiona and Charlie are? Oh, gods, Arcius is going to kill me if something has happened to Fiona! He will become his old berserker self and grab his ax–”