Chapter Irian
Irian
Irian was late.
He had lost himself to the violence, to stave off the sorrow.
Lost himself to the steady, singing sweep of his blade, its hilt so familiar in his palm that he might as well have been born holding it.
Lost himself to the easy slide of muscle over bone, the crouching sway of boots on dirt, the rhythmic dance of death.
Still they came—revenants pouring through the Gate like honey through a sieve, slow but inexorable. How many had he slaughtered? Hundreds? Thousands? Their congealed blood slicked his hands and armor; their rotting flesh ribboned his sword.
At last he felt it—a tug beneath his heart. A downdraft before a storm, carrying unfamiliar sensations: the prickle of withering thorns. The drag of an ebb tide. The vanishing flicker of a dying fire.
He cursed, kicking out at the armless revenant trying to gnaw upon his greaves. He turned, flew.
The void between spaces swallowed him. Spat him out.
He stumbled, nearly careening into Laoise. Both she and Wayland bowed in silent vigil beneath the dark, towering shape of the Heartwood, the sleeping giant of the forest. How he hated the sight of it.
Had this place not taken enough from him? First his future. Then his bride. What more could it demand that he had not already given?
He cursed again as he knelt beside the other two heirs.
In this moment it was easier to feel anger than it was to feel the anguish lurking like a specter in his veins.
He jammed the tip of the Sky-Sword into the dirt, leaned his forehead on its hilt.
Listened as it sang to him the last notes of a valediction.
“By fire and by sky.” He sang the words he had always known like a lullaby for all he had wished for. A dirge for all he had gained. A lamentation for all he had lost. “By fast water and by ancient tree. By the power of my willing heart, I tithe my Treasure to thee… O Eala.”
He closed his eyes. They were waiting for him—Geth, the cosmic, tempestuous source of his Treasure’s power. The breath of the world; its first inhale and final exhale. As angry as they were essential—cyclone and breeze and everything in between.
The cost will be high.
“I know.” His voice was a storm; his tears, cold as cirrus clouds upon the sky’s blue face. “I know.”
They reached for him as if they would comfort him, as if they would tear him apart.
The love we give is equal to the love we live. The storm descended on Irian like a tornado, ripping his hair and clothing. Lightning crackled along his bones, a pain he could not stand. His head cracked open and his thoughts and memories poured out, strewn like leaves before a hurricane.
For a moment, he was a dark-haired, gray-eyed boy once more, standing upon the iron cliff as the tide ebbed toward the horizon.
Only this time, the waves carried away something precious to him.
More precious than clams or pebbles or stories.
He reached for it, crying out as it was ripped from his arms.
Fia!