The newcomer nodded empathically. “Right in town, on the Great Road! I don’t know which one, but its all dead horses and a runaway carriage!”
The barkeep gave a weary sigh. “Well, that’s going to be the end of guests this summer. Jared’s going to be delighted with this one.”
The tensions of the Lords might be well known, but the locals seemed to think it wouldn’t touch them. It might not. War was a strange wild thing.
But then, by the same token, it might come to their very door. Maryx flexed her grip on her wine cup.
A troop of town guards brushed past the new man, storming unceremoniously into the inn. The barkeep looked very annoyed, giving a cross-eyed glare that no elf would be caught dead attempting.
“You have an elf staying here?” a short mustachioed man demanded. There was some bronze decoration on his helmet, marking him as the senior guardsman.
The barkeep eyed her warily. She looked back without expression, content to maintain the illusion of elven serenity. “Aye.”
The guard’s gaze locked onto her fiercely. She supposed this was the man who made sure the town stayed so delightfully sleepy. “Is this her?
“Aye.”
She offered no resistance or words as they took her long curving sword and her matching knife. Her bow was in her room, secure behind a locked door and beyond any but the strongest human’s ability to string or draw, anyway.
She’d known this was coming. At the first sign of a crises, humans found and detained all elves. Since every elf not secure within the borders of Aeldamarc was a scout, they either allowed themselves to be detained or vanished into the wild. It had been twenty years since Aeldamarc had ordered violence against humans.
As they dragged her along to the jail—it was always the jail— she sorted through how to word her next report to the Hierarchs.
To say they wouldn’t care about a human war wasn’t putting it quite right. Aeldamarc had grown more and more insular over time. Fewer elves were being born and the magics that blazed throughout the land were steadily going out. The long twilight that had begun with the murder of their gods was coming to a final end, though that wasn’t what anyone said, not in the borders, anyway.
So the Hierarchs would note the movements of human history, kill any who encroached upon their borders, and their people would continue to die. And the scouts would…scout, spy, wander, and report, too tainted to step foot within Aeldamarc again.
She shook her head to clear her thoughts as the guards tossed into a cell. A drunk in another cell grumbled and rolled to face a wall, whereupon he began snoring.
The senior guard looked grimly on her. “What’s your name, elf?”
“Maryx. Sellsword by trade.” She knew the routine. “Just passing through Lorcial on my way to look for work in the south.”
He huffed and marched away, no doubt to check her name and description against a list of bounties. Even small towns on the Great Road were orderly places. This holding- Lastinar- knew where the money came from. The Road was kept secure.
The assassination was most certainly theater as much as maneuver.
Maryx leaned against the back wall of her cell and waited, mentally running through all she knew the labyrinthine intrigue of the Lords’ Council.
2
Valen drew his horse up short at the sight of guards stationed on the Road. One of them held up a hand signaling for the halt he’d already come to, but he was too tired to be annoyed. The adrenaline of his victory had worn off hours ago.
The guards approached warily, spears raised discreetly, but then relaxed once they got a clear sight of the sunbeam sigil of Lyrica on his tabard.
“Sir Paladin!” one said, “Thank the gods! Finally a good omen.”
One of the others thumped the man’s lightly helmet with his spear. “If you keep on about omens, you’ll go mad.”
“Listen, when Jak stubbed his toe—“
Another thump, and then skeptical guard bowed slightly to Valen. “I apologize, Paladin, but there was an attack in town.”
Valen sat up in the saddle. “An attack?” Bandits on the Great Road itself, striking a well-defended settlement? Or worse things?
“Lord Beriskar’s heir was killed by assassins in broad daylight as his caravan came through town.”
“Broad daylight,” the superstitious guard muttered, “Another bad omen.”
That earned him a glare but the other man kept speaking. “It has been…difficult with the bad signs, there’s no denying that. I know Paladins of Lyrica deal with darker things, and you’re a traveling man, but seeing you in town for the evening would reassure everyone, if you don’t mind, Paladin.”
“Not at all.” He had a feeling it was not going to be a restful night. A holding heir’s life taken on the streets, by what these men at least called professional killers…he knew the Lords’ Council had grown tense, but he hadn’t expected this. Beriskar had been aggressive, western Shald still remembered its decades old failure at conquest, Mulvane had been spreading heresies, but that had all been true for years. This was far and away more public violence than you expected in Crownshold, the center of all politicking, where the scheming did sometimes turn deadly. There was little he could do about it, since he needed to secure the heartstone from the grove, but he could at least reassure the townsfolk that the world hadn’t come undone.
He extended a hand over the guards. They bowed their heads. The superstitious one attempted to remove his helmet until one of the others jammed it back on his head. Valen suppressed a smile. “May the light of Lyrica, guardian of mankind, shine down upon you. Call upon her in this dark time, and you will find your sword arm strengthened and your aim true.”
“Thank you, Paladin. Captain Smithson will be happy to see you. He’s at the guardhouse, keeping an eye on…well, there was an elf in town.”
Really? Spilling of a lordling’s blood and now an elf in Lorcial. “Thank you. Stay vigilant.” He nudged his mare into a walk.
Lamps burned more brightly and frequently tonight than they had the night he’d first ridden into town. Two abandoned but still burdened carts lay in the road. He noticed one chest was decorated had fine inlay work. This had been the site of the attack, then.
“Even the thieves are spooked, leaving treasure just lying out like this,” he told his horse, who couldn’t care less, and was no doubt wondering why there wasn’t fresh hay and water yet.
He found the guardhouse easily enough and tied the mare up outside by a water trough. She glared at him, probably resenting the lack of hay, and he resolved to buy instead of requisition from the Temple next time.
He knocked politely at the door, watching as a white-clad priest of Orishal hurried through the night across the street, saluting the Paladin with a touch in his heart as he passed.
The guardhouse door was yanked open violently, and a sturdy mustachioed man stuck his head out scowling. The priest, seeing this, hurried a touch faster. The man in the door looked rumpled and weary.
“I am Paladin Valen of the Lyrican Order,” Valen said, “I was stopped at a barricade on my way into town and told about what happened.”
“If you want to be useful, go do what the rest of the priests are doing and make housecalls,” the man grunted, “I have no use for you.”
Valen made a guess. “You’re Captain Smithson?”
That got him a grunt and a nod. “Captain Willard Smithson, at you service,” he said. He drew back from the doorway and gestured for Valen to enter. “You might as well come in. I guess I could use some comforting and you look like you’ve ridden halfway up the Great Road.”
Valen bowed his head in polite acknowledgment. “I was healing the corrupted grove to the east.”
“The Demon Garden?” Captain Smithson stared in shock at Valen for a minute. The old wives’ tale rearing its head. “Well, that’s a bit of good news.” He sat at a desk held up on one end by an old barrel and gestured for Valen to do the same. “Consider me comf
orted.” He stared blankly at a corked jar and the cup next to it. “It spares me the temptation of drinking with that demonspawn in the building. I’d rather not take the risk.”
Valen sat, shifting his sword and trying to stretch his back. “Your men mentioned an elf.”
“We dragged her in after it happened. I’m certain she has nothing to do with it, but I’d like to look thorough before Lord Beriskar shows up. Maybe there’s an off chance he won’t burn Lorcial to the ground.”
“Lord Beriskar is coming?”
“Messengers rode out from the caravan’s survivors as soon as the dust settled. At a hard pace, Beriskar’s, what, two days away?” Captain Smithson stared at his liquor bottle. “Beriskar’s set villages on fire for less than being the location of his heir’s assassination.”
“Beriskar won’t blame Lorcial,” Valen said, far too familiar with the workings of the Lords’ Council, “The lords kill off their rivals’ heirs on a regular basis.”
The guard captain gave up and popped the cork on the jar and poured a clear liquor into his cup. “No other cup,” he told Valen apologetically, “I found the young Beriskar’s carriage crashed outside of town with a complicated loop carved over the arms of Beriskar. Ended on one side in a little circle.” He took a long swig of the liquor and traced the symbol in the air. “That’s that damned Mulvane knotted serpent, you know, rough and simple so the common man can carve it on his door to let others know they’re in on that madman’s Dream. You Lyrican Paladins are based in Crownshold, so you know the ins and outs of all that.”
Valen found himself wishing the man did have another cup. There were many reasons he avoided Crownshold. “Lord Mulvane is not interested in starting a war by killing of an heir in broad daylight in a town along the Great Road. It doesn’t further his heresy.” He might kill off priests and priestesses, but the Temple wasn’t going to march on his lands.
“Well, it looks like he’s behind it.” Captain Smithson took another drink and refilled his cup. “The whole thing feels wrong, but it doesn’t matter what I think. The assassins were not locals and my men weren’t there too do anything about it.”
Valen crossed his arms. “I can’t council anything other than being honest—”
The other man grinned in clear spite of himself. “Paladins.”
Valen ignored him. “—and tell Lord Beriskar the truth.”
“This is a man who buried his mistress alive for flirting with another man. Do you really think honesty will…”
The rest of the sentence was lost in muffled noises as the world was washed out in bright white light.
Valen threw himself to his knees, ignoring the pain in his back.
A single beam of golden light shot through the blank whiteness before him, then shifted and transformed into a beautiful feminine form. Her face was still, her form and long robe all brilliant gold. She could have been a Temple icon.
A herald of Lyrica. Valen’s herald, his guide, his connection to his goddess, who had been with him since his days as an initiate. His great blessing.
“Valen,” a woman’s voice said, strong as iron but lovely anyway. The woman’s lips did not move. Only her warm golden eyes gave any sign of life. “You must leave this place. War is coming to Lorcial. Fire is coming to Lorcial.”
He stared at her wide eyed.
“War is coming to the world.” There seemed to be a hint of sorrow in the powerful voice. “Ride to the Temple. Leave before dawn. The men and women who serve the Tribunal must know before Crownshold burns.”
The herald and her strange domain faded, returning to the dim guard house. Captain Smithson was frowning at him where he knelt. “Are you alright, Paladin?”
His heart was thundering in his ears. “War is coming.”
“Yes.”
Valen quickly got to his feet. “Lyrica’s herald came to me with a warning. Lorcial will burn. Evacuate the town.”
Captain Smithson stood immediately. No sane man discounted the visions of anyone who served the Tribunal.
“A wise decision,” came a call from one of the cells in the back, “I would be much obliged if you would consent to free me, as the Tribunal has seen fit to clear me of any wrongdoing.”
The guard captain, tense and pale, cast a brief glare to where a woman now stood at the bars of the cell. “I’ll sound the alarm, though damned if the stubborn folks around here will listen. I leave the demonspawn to your judgement, Paladin, since that’s what you do.”
“I don’t know when it will happen, but the herald pressed me to leave for Crownshold tonight. I wish I could help more, but the herald is the voice of the goddess…”
“Then I best get going.” He was still for a moment anyway. “I like this town.” He rushed out the door.
Valen approached the woman in the cell. He wasn’t going to leave an innocent to burn with the town—maybe the herald was only speaking in metaphor? She never did, though, he’d learned that—but elves were rarely truly innocent.
Never, in fact, in his experience, but that was…unfair.
The elf was agelessly beautiful, as all elves were, but he had never seen an elven woman before. She was very...striking.
She was tall, though still shorter then Valen, and inhumanly fair-skinned. His first instinct was to assume she was his age, in the middle of her second decade, but elves could look young for seven hundred years. Her black hair was tied in a long braid and she stared at him with large violet eyes. Her pointed ears were very noticeable, though not to the mule-like extent bards and artists depicted.
He refused to think about it.
“I was not involved in the assassination,” she said, utterly serene.
“You’re a spy. Every elf is.”
She gave a small smile, showing of the pointed eleven eyeteeth. “Scout. I’m not looking forward to traveling in a land torn by war. Even if the Hierarchs wanted it, I don’t.”
Valen frowned. War was coming, the herald said. The fact churned his stomach. He reached for the key ring that hung on the wall. “Get out of here,” he told her, searching for the key to the cell door, “I’m not stupid enough to believe you aren’t scheming, but I know…I know what goes on in Crownshold.” He did, this had been coming, but he had thought that perhaps, maybe, it wouldn’t come.
The Lords’ Council, the image of the Tribunal that governed the world. Arguing and plotting and now coming apart in power plays. It was a kind of sacrilege. He threw open the cell for the elf. “Go back to Aeldamarc.”
She laughed, the fifth shock of this very long day. Elves were lovely and crystalline, emotionless. They did not laugh. “Yes, back to Aeldamarc, for an arrow to the throat there. I have options.”
She brushed past him, just a brief moment of contact.
Valen fell into darkness as the elf screamed.
“Immor,” an inhuman voice said, “Immor!”
✽✽✽
Maryx woke groggily, her throat raw.
She turned to look at the tall Paladin who lay with his knee sticking into her stomach. He was blinking awake to, staring at her dazedly.
She half wanted to laugh. She’d seen him sink without warning into some Tribunal vision, the same as she had seen hundreds of time before among human holy men and women. Compared to interventions from the other gods, the Tribunal offered gentle loving caresses of divinity.
She wondered if he’d seen the same scene she had, many wings and many eyes all wreathed in fire, ever dancing.
“What?” he asked, sounding raw himself.
There had been only one word in the vision, a fell one, and she supposed it was at once prophecy and warning and mandate and now, undeniably, she was stuck. She was an exile, but she was still an elf, and she was going to have to head for Crownshold next anyway.
Here she’d been thinking maybe she lacked purpose.
She licked her lips and found she’d bitten the bottom one hard enough to bleed. “The powers outside the Tribunal give their own visions.”
“Just a word,” he said, “Immor. Second time today.” What? “What does it mean?” There was something hard in his dark eyes.
She levered herself up, sighed, and then reached a hand down. He stared at it like it was a snake. That was fair.
“I’m going with you to Crownshold. I was going there anyway.”
He took her hand and she helped him up. He was briefly shaky. “What does it mean, elf?” His grip tightened and he glared down at her. The first time he heard that title must have been unpleasant, which was fitting.
She twisted out of his grip. “Something neither of us wanted to hear.” She noticed the small candle that had lit the guardhouse had gone out and she looked out a nearby window. The position of the stars showed that an hour had passed. “If you need to be gone tonight, according to your goddess, then we had best get going, Paladin.” She had to get her bow. She was going to need it.
She snatched her sword and dagger from the captain’s desk and rushed out into the night, leaving the Paladin bewildered, no doubt. He’d leave, between his goddess’ mandate and his destiny. She’d find him on the road. It wouldn’t be hard. Paladins were not the hiding kind.
How much she wished she had not stopped at the bar in the inn.
3
Valen was several miles north along the Great Road, along its uphill climb, when he saw the flames of Lorcial raging behind him. He stopped his horse to watch it, despite his need to get to Crownshold.
“They should not have gotten there that fast,” he heard the elf say, causing him to jump. He glanced over to see her steer her horse onto the road from the forest. “They did not come along the Great Road. It is not faster to come here from Crownshold by any other way I know.” She stared at him grimly as she finished.
So she was traveling with him after all. He looked back to the rising flames. “It’s Beriskar?”
“Yes. I saw them riding in as I left.”
“Did the townsfolk leave?”
“Some did, some did not.”
“War has come to Lorcial, then.”
She turned north and began following the road. “It was only a matter of time. Every lord wants to be king.”
Doomwalker Page 2
