by S L Farrell
“The door is unlocked, and I will sit over here away from it,” he told the young woman. Grunting, he slid on the seat to the side opposite the door. “You can reach it long before I could stop you. There-now you can escape into this horrible weather whenever you like. But if you’re staying, I would like to hear your story. The true one.”
She stared at him, and he held her gaze placidly. He saw her relax slowly, though the hand never left her hidden weapon. “I could kill you, Sergei,” she told him. “Easily.”
“I’ve no doubt of that. And if it happens, well, I’ve lived a long life and I’ll trust you are skilled enough to make my end fast and easy.”
“I’m not joking.”
“Neither am I,” he answered. “So, is your name even Rhianna?”
The silence stretched long enough that he thought she wasn’t going to answer. There was only the creaking of the carriage and the rocking motion of the ruts of the Avi. She slid closer to the door, and he thought she would bolt out into the rain again to be gone forever. Then she let all the air out of her body in one great sigh. She looked away from him, lifting the flap of the door to stare at the rain.
“Rochelle is what my matarh named me,” she said.
Nico Morel
Fire slithered up the walls, licking at the faces of painted Moitidi and long-dead Archigi. Smoke hid the summit of the dome from view, coiling toward the openings of the great lantern at its very top. The chanting of the war-teni and the shrieking of their spells was a backdrop to the screaming of the injured and the calls of the Morellis as Nico half-ran, half-stumbled toward the main gates with Liana struggling behind him. “Absolute!” Ancel shouted, and he saw the man’s gaunt figure through the haze. “The gardai are charging toward the temple!”
“Tell the war-teni to respond,” Nico called. “They’ll break. They’ll run.” He said it with a confidence that he no longer felt, and he apologized to Cenzi for his doubt. I’m sorry, Cenzi. I believe. I do…
The ferocity of the initial attack had surprised him. Nothing he’d seen in the dreams that Cenzi had given him had prepared him for the reality of this battle. The war-teni had been unable to turn that initial attack-it had happened too quickly, and they had mistakenly thought that the fireballs were created from the Ilmodo when they were purely physical: black sand projectiles that exploded on contact. The blasts tore open the doors they’d so carefully barricaded: broken timbers and stone shot backward like terrible missiles into the main temple, hurling pews and raining dust and debris. At least two hands of his people had died in that first, horrible moment, and many more had been injured. The screams of the wounded still echoed in his head. He’d gone to them, comforting them as best he could, praying to Cenzi that He move through Nico’s hands and heal them-and for some, He had responded, though it left Nico as tired as if he’d used the Ilmodo himself against the tenets of the Divolonte, which forbade the use of Cenzi’s Gift for healing.
It had been Ancel who had taken command of the defense of the Old Temple as Nico and Liana tended to the wounded and prayed for the dead. The war-teni who had responded to Nico’s call now retaliated, sending out their war-spells toward the onrushing gardai. Their low chants filled the nave, and they gestured angrily as they sent volley after volley out into the storm. Nico could hear the screams and cries of the heretics outside; he could see the fires beginning to consume the buildings around the plaza.
The destruction was terrible to see. It made Nico want to weep. “This is what You wanted of me, Cenzi,” he prayed. “Let me continue to do Your will…” He hugged Liana. “I have to go,” he told her. “I have to help. Take care of those who are hurt. And be careful.”
“Nico…” He could see the fear in her soot-streaked face, and he embraced her quickly, kissing her. She clung to him and he let himself sink into her for just that moment, trying to sear it into his mind and keep it forever. He wondered at the impulse. Then he pushed away and kissed her again. “Be safe in Cenzi’s love, and mine,” he told her.
“I love you, Nico,” she answered. “Be careful.”
He smiled. “I have Cenzi’s protection,” he told her. “They can’t harm me..”
And with that, he left her.
He pushed his way through the wreckage, toward where Ancel was standing. He peered out from the ruins of the main doors toward the plaza. “Where are they?” he asked, but then he saw them. A line of gardai rushed out of the pelting rain, with swords raised, their mouths open as they shouted, all jumbled together so he couldn’t hear what they said, if there were words at all. Nico raised his own arms as the chanting of the war-teni intensified. He felt the coldness of the Ilmodo envelop him, wrapping all about him, and he gathered that power with the language of Cenzi and his gestures, and he threw it away from him. He didn’t know the spell he created; it came to him unbidden and complete-a gift as natural as breathing.
A wave pulsed outward from him, visible in the broken doors and pillars of the temple it sent flying outward, as it threw the rain backward as if storm-wind were blowing it, as it slammed hard into the gardai and sent them tumbling and crashing backward, the power ripping and tearing at them. When it passed, they were gone, the plaza before the doors was swept clean as the rain returned. “Absolute…” Ancel breathed. “I have never seen the like…” The war-teni had stopped their chanting as well, staring at him with awe on their faces.
But there were sounds of battle now behind him, in the temple itself; Ancel and Nico turned as one to see gardai pouring in from the aisles of the side-chapels as well as from behind the quire. There was hand-to-hand fighting among the pews, with scattered spells being cast by the Morellis who were also teni. Nico could feel other spells being cast, far too quickly to be done by teni-so the Numetodo were here as well. However, the war-teni’s spells-meant for mass destruction in open battle-were useless here in a confined space; they would kill Morellis as well as gardai and Numetodo. The war-teni, trained also as swordsmen, drew their weapons instead.
The battle was raging all around, and under the great dome itself, Nico could see Liana, her face pale, chanting and gesturing as she readied a spell. Varina was there also, entering into the temple from the same door she’d left not long before, and she, too, was casting spells.
Cenzi, I need You now. Please help me… The prayer rose up in Nico, and he felt the coldness rise again around him. He started to gather it, but one of the Numetodo-was that Talbot, the Kraljica’s aide?-had seen him, and with a gesture and a word, the man sent fire hurtling toward Nico. Nico had to use the Ilmodo to cast the spell aside. “There’s Morel!” he heard Talbot cry as he pointed toward Nico, and he could feel the Ilmodo being twisted and warped all about him as the Numetodo turned their attention to him. They gave him no respite. As fast as he gathered the Ilmodo, he had to use it to fend off their attacks, and now he was tiring, the exhaustion of using the Ilmodo so strongly and often making his mind and limbs heavy. Once, there was a moment, and he sent Varina, Talbot, and another of the heretics hurtling backward into the walls of the Old Temple, but there were so many of them, and the gardai were closing in around them also…
Cenzi, I need You…
He ignored his weariness. He closed his eyes, pulling in the power and encasing himself in it so that their spells reflected from him like the sun from a mirror. He could barely see the temple through the swirling haze around him. I will take them all, Cenzi. I will destroy them as You want me to…
The war-teni were quickly preparing smaller spells. He could see them readying to cast them at the Numetodo and gardai spilling into the Old Temple. The Numetodo were wielding devices like those Varina had carried, and they pointed them at the war-teni. There were loud reports, and puffs of smoke, and the war-teni cried out in the middle of their chants and collapsed to the ground. There was blood soaking their green robes. This was a magic he’d never seen before, a terrible magic.
Cenzi, please…
He saw Liana readying her own spell, saw
Talbot staggering up with his head bloodied. The man pulled out a strange mechanism much like the one Varina had, and-still on his knees-pointed it toward Liana. Sparks glittered, and there was a loud bang, and smoke curled from the long end of it.
And Liana… Liana staggered backward, clutching at herself, and there was a growing dark stain on her tashta between her breasts.
“No!” Nico roared, but his voice was lost in the chaos swirling around him. “No!” He released the Ilmodo wildly, the energy spilling outward without control, sending gardai and Morellis and Numetodo alike tumbling. A wind rushed through the Old Temple, extinguishing the guttering fires and bringing down more of the walls. There were screams and wails, but none were as loud as that which issued from his own throat. “No!”
He was running toward Liana, who had crumpled to the ground, but there were gardai everywhere and hands clutching at him, and they were bearing him down, taking him to the ground even as he fought and kicked and scratched at them. Something hard collided with his head, and the room spun once wildly around him and he could no longer see Liana and the world descended into darkness…
Brie ca’Ostheim
The carriage lurched and jounced and shivered. The ride from Stag Fall to Brezno Palais was nearly as uncomfortable a ride as any Brie had experienced, and the rain and two unhappy children made it no better. Elissa and Kriege were with her; Caelor and Eria were in the following carriage with the nursemaids. A carriage before them carried Paulus and her domestiques de chambre; those following held the rest of the staff. Gardai from the Garde Brezno rode on the horses flanking the train, miserable in the weather.
“Matarh, are we there yet?” Elissa grumbled. She stuck her head out from the nearest window but pulled it back in quickly, water beading her hair and face. Thunder grumbled at the intrusion. “I want to be there.”
“So do I, dear one,” Brie told her wearily. “Why don’t you rest, if you can? Look, your brother’s asleep. See if you can sleep like him; that’s what a good soldier does-you sleep whenever there’s a chance, because you never know how long you’ll need to stay awake.”
Elissa glanced over at the sleeping Kriege, and Brie knew she was tempted-as Elissa always was when she thought she was in competition with her brother. But she scowled. “I’m not sleepy. I just want to be home. When is Vatarh coming back? Why can’t I go with him the way Great-Matarh Allesandra went with Great-Great-Vatarh Jan?”
“Because your vatarh would send you back, and I was here to make certain you didn’t hide in the supply train like your great-matarh did, that’s why. Here, I brought a deck of cards; we can play Landsknecht; I’ll be dealer, and we can play for pins…”
They played for a time, and despite the lurching of the carriage, Brie saw Elissa’s eyelids growing heavier, until finally her cards dropped from her fingers and spilled over her lap. Brie picked them up and stored the deck in its box, setting it under the seat. She leaned her own head back against the cushions and closed her eyes.
She fell asleep faster than she thought possible, but it was a sleep haunted by dreams.
Jan stood in moonlight, arms crossed over his chest. He was in Nessantico, or at least she believed with dream-certainty that the city with its strange architecture was Nessantico. Behind Jan was the facade of a huge palais, stained glass windows cracked and broken, its walls blackened by smoke. The dream shifted, and Brie realized that there was a woman with Jan. For a moment she thought it must be Allesandra, but the hair was dark and when the figure turned slightly she saw Rhianna’s face. The two were close, yet not touching, but Brie still felt a hot surge of jealousy. Both of them stared at the palais. There was a blade in Rhianna’s hand, and she drew it back as if to strike…
… But the dream shifted again and she saw her own children, but there was another one with them. Strangely, Brie felt that all the children were siblings. The new one was a young woman perhaps four or five years older than Elissa, yet Brie couldn’t see her face at all no matter how she looked. Jan came into the room, and he went to her and embraced her, kissing first her, then Elissa. “Vatarh!” the woman said
… and Brie was holding a baby, looking down into the face of an infant. “Dear little girl,” she whispered. “You poor thing…” The baby curled its tiny fingers around one of Brie’s own and she smiled, but there were shadows in the room, and black smoke and fire, and she clutched the baby to her, trying to run. She thought she could see Jan, and she started toward him, but the fire enveloped him and she heard him scream…
“Matarh?”
Brie woke up and realized where she was, the carriage jerking and bouncing over the road. She rubbed at her eyes, dispelling the panic of the nightmare. She realized her heart was racing; she could hear the blood pounding in her temples. Elissa was looking at her; Kriege was still sleeping. “What is it, Elissa?” Brie asked her daughter.
“Why didn’t you go with Vatarh?” the girl said.
“Because he asked me to take care of you and your brothers and sister.”
Elissa frowned. “I would have gone with him,” she said. “I would have helped protect him. I wouldn’t have cared what he said.”
“Having you there, dear, would only have made your vatarh worry more.”
“Did you want to go with him?”
She remembered the argument they’d had. The echo of the nightmare haunted her. “I did,” she answered truthfully. “At least part of me still wishes I had, yes.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
“I would have gone with him… I wouldn’t have cared what he said…” Brie had the nagging sense that Elissa was right. She had made a terrible mistake; she should have insisted. He would need her with Allesandra, if nothing else-the two of them were too much alike, and Brie could nearly see how they would spark against each other. She should be there.
It might be essential that she was there. The premonition seared her, as strongly as if she held her hand in a fire.
Elissa was staring at her.
“Driver, stop!” Brie pounded on the roof of the carriage, waking Kriege, who looked around groggily. The driver pulled up the reins; Brie heard quizzical, worried calls outside, and Paulus came running to the carriage. “Hirzgin, is there a problem?”
“No, and yes,” Brie told him. “I need to have Elissa and Kriege put in one of the other carriages. Take their trunks with them; leave mine on this carriage. I’ll be rejoining the Hirzg and the army. The children and the rest of the staff are to go on to Brezno.”
Paulus was shaking his head by the time she was halfway through, and the children were protesting. “Enough!” Brie said to all of them. She gave Elissa and Krieg hugs and a kiss, and pushed them in the direction of Paulus. “Go now!” she told them. “I’ll come back when I can. But go now!”
Elissa was smiling.
“Hirzgin, are you certain…?” Paulus began, but Brie gave him no chance to voice his protest.
“I’ve already given you my orders,” she told him. “Now, take my children and go, or I’ll appoint a new aide here and now.”
Paulus gulped and bowed his head. “Yes, Hirzgin,” he said. He took Elissa and Kriege’s hands, and began shouting orders. Brie laid her head back on her seat and thought of what she would say to Jan when she arrived.
Varina ca’Pallo
She stared at him and there were no words she could summon up.
“I’m so sorry, Nico,” she said. “So sorry…”
He only stared back at her. His hands were bound in chains, his head encased in the metal cage of a silencer. His hair was caked with blood, his face and arms a patchwork of cuts and scratches. In the chill of the cell of the Bastida, he curled against the wall like a broken doll.
I warned you, Nico. I tried to tell you it would end this way.. . She wanted to say the words, but she couldn’t. They would only have been further wounds to this already terribly injured man. She sank down to her knees in front of him, on the wet, dirty straw of the Bastida, not caring t
hat she soiled her tashta or that her joints ached with the effort. She reached out to touch his face, as she’d done years ago when he’d been just a child. He turned his head and closed his eyes, and she stopped the gesture just short of him.
“I have nothing to say that can comfort you,” she said. “I don’t believe in your afterlife or the mercy of your Cenzi, but I’ve lost people I’ve loved myself. I’ve lost Karl, and so I can at least understand a portion of the pain you’re feeling.” His eyes opened again, though he wasn’t looking at her but at the filthy floor of his cell. The place reeked of ancient urine and feces, the foulness contained in the very stones of the cell. She spoke to break the horrible silence as much as anything, because if she didn’t speak, she didn’t think she could bear to be here. Her breath was a white cloud before her in the dungeon’s chill.
“The baby…” Liana gasped the words as she died in Varina’s arms, as the blood poured from the terrible wound in her chest. “Take the baby, now. She should be named… ” Liana paused, her eyes closing, and Varina thought she was gone, but she took another gurgling breath and opened her eyes again. “… Serafina.” Liana’s bloody hands clutched at Varina’s sleeves. “Take her. You must…”
And she did. It was the most horrific thing she’d ever done in her life, carving open the woman even as she died, but from the body she lifted a child who squalled and squirmed with life.
“You have a daughter, Nico. Liana… There was nothing we could do for her, but we took the child from her as she died. Your child, Nico. Liana told me that she wanted her to be called Serafina. I have her in my house, and she’s safe and healthy and beautiful.”
Tears were running down Nico’s cheeks, leaving clear trails on his filthy skin, and he made a terrible strangled sound as he sobbed.
