23. Cycles Ago.
Cycles Ago...
Q ueen Ead stood shoulder-to-shoulder with an army of demons. Once, they’d been farmers and raiders and beggars, spread out across her realm with no sense of purpose and no hope. Now they gathered on the edge of the River of Madness, armored and armed. They spat hatred at the invaders (Queen Ead still called them this, as did her army, even after one thousand cycles) from the sea of their red eyes.
Queen Ead had gathered them in the eleven cycles since she threw her dragon egg into the Mother's Womb. It was slow work, though the hardest of it had come first. After she convinced her father, the peasants who wandered the barren deserts were easy. Then came uniting them and training them, which she did by reminding them all of a simple truth: The world must be made ready for the return of the dragon-gods. The Realm of Los could not protect a fledgling dragon if there was no Realm of Los. And so Queen Ead had made one out of ashes and determination.
Queen Ead did not ride astride a mount, raising herself above her army. The only beast she’d ever ride would be her dragon. She’d vowed this over the protests of her bodyguard, Lyra.
Lyra stood beside her sovereign, close enough for their bare arms to touch. The red war paint they wore on their biceps smudged as they brushed, but the touch was comforting.
“Will we beat them?” Ead murmured, too quietly for anyone but Lyra to hear. She had not wanted it to come to this. Her army was best deployed in the dark. In surprise attacks, they fell upon the enemy and disappeared again like shadows. But cycles of such attacks had led the young, fresh emperor of the invaders to bring his army to their border, and now she could do nothing but meet his attack head-on before he swept through the glass plains and into the heart of her kingdom.
“We must,” Lyra said.
Yes, we must. This thought comforted Ead, for she’d always managed to do what must be done. She’d climbed down into the center of the world and climbed up to the very peak of it. She’d become fire itself. It was her child—she’d always thought of Asherah as her firstborn child, a girl more precious to her than the boy she’d made with a man in the cycles since—that would change the world. Her mission was righteous and fated.
“We must,” she affirmed. She raised her voice to call to her troops. “The invaders took our land and killed our dragons. Now they want to steal all we have left. They want to steal away our hope!”
A low hum started in the throats of her soldiers. It buzzed across the river and the enemy shifted on their feet. A swarm of wasps was coming for them.
“You all know what future awaits us in the Mother’s Womb.” She had made sure they did. Now she pointed across the river. She couldn't find the invader's emperor. He wasn't on the front line, as she was. “Do not let them take it!”
“HUH!” Ead’s army answered as one. They slammed their drawn swords against their bronze shields, and the army rang like a bell. Across the river, men jumped and almost pissed themselves.
Ead smiled. She charged.
The water of the river ran clear. Soon, it would froth with blood. Ead would dam it with the bodies of her enemies. So many would die that it would overflow the banks and infect the flow to their capital city, as had happened once in times past.
Ead met her first enemy in the river. Her bodyguards, led by Lyra, fought around her. The first bodies fell.
Blood sang in Ead’s ears. A grin split her face. A harsh laugh escaped her mouth as she cut down man after man. All the fighters the invaders put forward were men. Perhaps it’s why they were losing.
Ead’s scimitar swung in wild, unpredictable arcs. It was a biting snake, lashing out over and over. She did not seek to block blows, only to inflict them. She was high on dragonback, careening through her own bloodlust, lost to it. Unaware of everything but her own sword.
Until she felt Lyra’s absence. She looked on either side for her and then she looked down into the nearby water. That’s where she saw her. She rushed to Lyra’s side, pressing her palm against the woman’s chest. But the fire had already extinguished in Lyra’s eyes. They stared sightlessly, the color faded to pale grey. Two other bodyguards lay beside her. Above her, Ead’s remaining bodyguards blocked blow after blow. Ead stared around the battle. She was losing. Too many of the bodies piled in the River of Madness had horns. Too many bronze shields lay on the ground.
Then she saw the invader emperor. He was red-skinned from burns inflicted by the suns. He’d lost his helmet; red curls were plastered to his head with sweat. His lunges were brutish and basic, but bodyguards surrounded him, protecting him from the consequences of his overextensions.
Ead found herself moving towards him. She’d not made a conscious decision to engage him. It was simply her duty as sovereign. If she killed him, they took the day. She could turn the tide of this fight.
She must.
“To me!” Ead shouted. Her people swarmed the Vaharilaran army, screaming cries of war, lost to the intoxicating scent of battle and blood. Ead had done what she said—the river ran with blood. She just hadn’t meant for so much of it to be demon blood.
The emperor saw her coming. Queen Ead did not wear impractical, garish gold armor like he did, but the symbol of a dragon was painted onto her forehead with war paint and stamped into the leather across her chest. It was enough. The invader called his men to clear the field and welcome her into the reach of their swords.
Ead’s soldiers engaged his bodyguards. Bronze and iron flashed. A droplet of sweat trickled down Ead’s forehead, smudging her paint. She shook her head to flick it away.
The emperor lunged. They crossed swords and Ead toyed with him, knowing she should finish it. She’d caught him off-guard; he hadn’t expected much of a woman, but he would soon learn. A laugh bubbled up and out of her again, the vengeance of a dragon burning in her veins.
Until a new man dispatched two of her guards and joined his sovereign. They stood back to back. The new man was taller than his king. He carried a straight sword. His black-blue hair was swept back off his face and his eyes frightened Ead. They held power absent in the weak ruler. They held determination.
Ead engaged him. Her focus zeroed in on his body, his eyes, his sword. They spun about each other, her lunges wild and chaotic, reckless, his precise and deliberate. Ead blocked over and over. She was not laughing now. She felt afraid. Still, she was a skilled swordsman, and the man could not overcome her. Not yet.
But his emperor stood with him shoulder-to-shoulder, like brothers. Their swords lashed out and Ead rushed to block them both. Her bodyguards had fallen around her. Their blood could not leach into the glass earth. It sat in puddles on the surface. The emperor slipped on one and Ead saw her chance.
She swung a killing blow, but the taller man blocked her and threw her back.
The emperor jumped up, laughing. Blood from the puddle he’d fallen in rolled down his golden armor and dripped off. “Yes, Marcus! Get the bitch!”
Marcus kept coming. Ead fell back and back, heading for the river. The day was lost. “Retreat!” she called, despising the smirk on the emperor’s face when he heard her words. She would peel his skin off his face for that smile, but she could not do it today. “Retreat!”
What was left of her army disengaged. Some of them waded away across the river. Some of them saw her and headed her way. She wondered how many she’d already lost to desertion. She would hunt them down and they would pay. But not today.
Marcus’ sword bit shallowly into Ead’s arm. She stumbled, and her scimitar was wrenched from her hand.
The River of Madness was only a few steps away. It would mean nothing to reach it—not really—but Ead latched onto the goal as if its waters would save her. Behind Marcus, the emperor screamed orders. His men ran for her, swords outstretched. They cut down her soldiers as they retreated.
Ead splashed into the river. But a hand closed around her arm and tugged her back towards Vaharilar.
“Don’t kill her! I want the bitch alive!” the emperor screamed. Blades were exchanged for hands. There seemed to be a dozen of them, wrestling her back to land.
Ead screamed her rage, the sound like the keen of a dragon. She kicked at her captors and butted them with her scarlet and black horns. The soldiers that tried to help her were cut down. She was captured.
Suddenly, her mind was inside the Mother’s Womb. She could see her egg. It glowed red-hot, an ember promising to awaken and bring fire and death to the world. Even if Ead wasn’t here to see it, it would happen all the same.
Ead felt hot. Men swore and the hands disappeared from her skin. Ead looked at herself and saw she glowed red, as she had that day in the mountains. Even so far from her god, she was not abandoned. She, Queen Ead of Los, descendant of the ancient Riders, could burn with their fire even in this lost, dead place.
The soldier Marcus had backed away. He wore a look on his face that he hadn’t had before. Ead thought it was fear. Another soldier rushed forward to grab her. He screamed when his palms touched her. He stumbled back, holding his hands high, fingers splayed. His skin was raw and crimson. Boils rose across his palms where the skin had not already sloughed off. The scent of burnt flesh filled the air.
Ead began to laugh. The invaders circled her as if to recapture her, but none came close. She backed into the river, her eyes locked on the grim face of the weakling emperor. The water boiled around her as she navigated the dam of bodies. Where she touched them, their dead flesh sizzled and cooked.
Next time, she thought to herself.