“Guess we can't write it off as swamp gas,” grumbled the lieutenant, a huge greenish ogre-blood in a rumpled, half-buttoned uniform. The whole of this makeshift garrison was either northerners or mountain folk: Krovik turncoats, Wynds, Darronwayn. Soldiers who could bear the cold, the thin air, or both.
Soldiers who, for all Erevard could tell, considered this a good place to fraternize with the locals and not be bothered with such things as Imperial strictures and vital missions. No real Kerrindrixi on the roster, of course; they couldn't be trusted to police their own, not even if it was Low Country versus High Country folk. But plenty of them coming in and out of the place, since this 'outpost' was really just a commandeered gathering-hall at the center of a tiny town—to the point that Erevard had needed to spook a few locals from the front room to keep them from eavesdropping.
There was only one mage, one specialist—bodythief Kina—and no other White Flames that Erevard had noticed, which made sense. Mages were scarce; the other White Flames suffered without the sun; and their quarry included the specialists' so-called Maker—the man who had designed the bodythieves like the thing in that girl and the ruengriin like Erevard himself.
He didn't care about that. Felt no reverence toward the man, like others did. The red lady wanted him dead, and so he would die.
Didn't care about Reivus' suffering either, though the broken blade ached at him like a bad tooth. He almost regretted retrieving it from the Palace pit, but he needed it. His mission would be difficult otherwise.
Soon, my lady, he thought to the bloody presence at his back, and sensed her smile.
The lieutenant sighed heavily, then said, “Specialist Erevard. This is your business, so you, the second and third teams, and Magus Rale will investigate this light. If your sword reacts, have Rale scry in the assault group. If not, approach close enough to ascertain the identity of the travelers and eliminate them if needed. Understood?”
“Sir,” he affirmed flatly. Reivus would know its marked prey, but likewise the prey would sense Reivus. The moment he felt its corruption surge, he would break away to make a solo approach. They would not rob him of this with their waiting wraiths.
He would kill Cob, kill the Maker, kill anyone with them, and then claim his lady's reward.
“You have your orders,” said the lieutenant. “Equip yourselves and go. Kina, guide them.”
As the leisure-disrupted soldiers slogged off to obey, Erevard simply moved to the door to stand beside their guide. He had all he needed. Anything else—or anyone—was just baggage.
*****
There were few trees of any height along the narrow valley the high path fed into. On the south ridge, the treeline was a mere streak, stunted and half-buried in snow; on the north side it rose further, but not by much. The trees at the upper edge had been dwarfed to shrubs, clinging stubbornly to the frozen soil in hope of an eventual summer, and in some places the forest had been stripped away by recent avalanches—not from tectonic activity like in the Khaeleokiels, just from the endless weight of winter.
Problematic, since Cob wanted to cut a staff to test the snow and ice they’d meet ahead.
“It could be worse,” Enkhaelen told him. “The world was colder once. Before humankind—before even the Great Spirit, when only elementals lived.” The necromancer's breath made no mark on the frigid night, nor put frost on his masking scarf; Drakisa's enchantments kept his heat closely encased. His goggles glinted in his own wisp-light. “Back then, everything north of here was covered in glaciers. They carved the Pinch and the Daecian swamp-basin—scraped them out of the bedrock.”
“The Muriae were around back then?”
“Of course. In their high mountains and the hot depths. They built their civilization long before we came about. Discovered magic, too. Didn't need the wraiths to teach them. But they abandoned that, like they abandoned the surface world once humans started overrunning it. It took direct edicts from their Primordial to make them interact with us.”
“I thought the original Aloyan Erosei brought them out,” said Cob, eyeing the trees as they snowshoed along. The sky was empty, beaming cold down upon them; the crust on the snow was thick, stable, old. Good for travel, but the further they went, the more gnarled the forest became. It would be a miracle to find a straight limb before they reached more treacherous ground.
Enkhaelen chuckled. “Erosei the Elder climbed their mountain and banged on their great doors, but they wouldn't have let him in if not for the Primordial's word. Brancir—you remember, the Trifold's Forger? She was interested in mortals, if only because she had all you Kerrindrixi camped in her mountains. And she was near the surface. The other Metals had been driven into the depths by the wraiths after the Descent, but the Muriae were never attacked.
“So when Jernizan—well, it was the Altaeran Empire back then. When it invaded, planning to eradicate the Kerrindrixi and mine the mountains, Brancir urged her people to help Erosei. I think she’d been watching the Kerrindrixi build shrines and make offerings and felt...fond of them.”
“So they wouldn't've helped if she hadn't made them?”
Enkhaelen's shrug barely moved his many layers. “Isolationists, you know? They certainly wouldn't have aided Erosei the Younger if it hadn't been against me.”
“Because of your wife.”
“Because… Yes. And Orrith, and the Trifold temples, and Mariss. But yes. I made myself the enemy of a Primordial goddess and an elemental race—and so they opened their doors to Erosei the Younger, despite his attitude I'm sure, and led him to Howling Spire to fight me. Not that it helped him.”
“He said you threw him down the mountain.”
Enkhaelen made a waffling gesture. “I didn't actually see what happened with him. I'd just taken on the Seal and there were Muriae everywhere, and him with his antlers—I think we were on a ledge. And I was calling the lightning. It was summer, no other time that I could do it under my own power, and summer means storms. My saving grace. I think I blasted a chunk out of the peak, getting away, then just glided down toward Jernizan. They couldn't follow.”
Cob grimaced behind his scarf. “No storms now.”
“Snowstorms, maybe.”
“Can y'harness those for lightning?”
“No.”
As silence fell between them, Cob stopped to touch a tree. It felt sluggish beneath his spirit-hand, alive but deeply asleep, and like all its neighbors it was warped by wind and cold—nearly huddling among the upthrust rocks.
“Problem?” said Enkhaelen, halting.
“Everything's too stunted.”
“Grow it, then.”
Cob blinked. “What, jus' like that?”
Enkhaelen sighed through his scarf. “Yes, just like that. You're attuned to wood. You've worked it before, and you know how to push and pull energy through the environment. Take from the ground, give to the tree, shape it as you need. Go on then, don't just stare at me.”
Cob frowned, then tucked his single snowshoe pole through his belt and cautiously gripped a bent limb, using both flesh-hand and spirit. He could feel the sap in it, all but frozen, and the numbness that lingered in its twigs like frostbite. It suddenly seemed terrible to be a tree: feeling sunlight, bleeding sap, sprouting, stretching, only to be locked in place when winter came, or the woodsman with his ax. Being forced to endure it all without the ability to react.
Nor could it resist him. He felt its roots clinging to cracked stone and meager soil, its crown like a tangle of brittle fingers, its surface bare but for a thin fur of needles and bark. Hunkered against the blistering cold, it was as desperate for spring as he was.
Sorry to wake you, he thought, then pushed himself at the branch the same way he'd pushed at the portal-stakes. It wasn't the proper way, he knew—Enkhaelen had just told him to draw from the ground—but he could feel the Dark waiting beneath the surface. He didn't want to risk it, not when he still had some strength to spare.
So he pushed, and felt heat pulse dow
n his bad arm, awakening his spirit-fingers in vicious pins-and-needles. Soon sap began to stir, the branch warming in his grip. It took special effort to keep his energy from flooding into the trunk; he didn't want to wake the whole tree only to leave it, since that would likely kill it. Just straighten this limb and stretch it outward, accelerating its growth with the strength of his life.
Inch by inch, it obeyed, green wood crackling out from old growth, bark crawling onward. Its twigs fell away like atrophied fingers, its end thickening to an unnatural knob-shape—nothing to trim, nothing to waste. Finally, satisfied, he cut off the flow of sap and pinched the wood apart at the base, leaving a knot where the join had been.
The sudden weight of the staff nearly sent him to his knees. He gasped as the muscles in his weakened right shoulder took the brunt of it, his spirit-hand still locked around the living wood. A wave of dizziness rose up, washed over him, then subsided.
“Cob, really?” said the necromancer, making no move to help.
“Don't care,” Cob answered through his teeth. “Doin' it my way.”
"You'll kill yourself if you persist like that."
"Rather die clean than be eaten by the Dark."
Enkhaelen sighed and turned away, gesturing his red wisp forward. "Fair enough. Just try to keep up."
Carefully, Cob let go with his spirit-hand and braced the staff in the crusted snow. He ached from his teeth to his toenails, legs wobbly as if he'd just been sprinting. If not for Drakisa's insulating wards, he guessed he might have frozen himself, because the comfortable warmth of exertion had vanished, leaving him clammy beneath his layers.
Enkhaelen's aggravated pace had already taken him a distance across the snow and rock, deep red shadows stretching in his wake. Forcing himself upright, Cob hobbled after.
*****
As much as he wanted to bolt ahead, Erevard restrained himself to following their guide. He cared little about other specialists, but understood that the bodythief had absorbed its host's memories when it took over her body; thus it had some knowledge of the terrain, the trails, the dangers. Though he'd been raised in the rugged foothills of upper Wyndon and done his time smuggling up the Rift, he was under no delusion of mountaineering skill. These cold white cliffs were beyond him.
The other soldiers trudged at his heels, huffing frosty plumes in the cold. They were perhaps two marks out from their base and making good time, well-rested and supported by Magus Rale's spells, but if they had to stay out here too long, Erevard didn't think much of their chances. His own were good; the White Flame armor covered every inch of him, protecting him from the elements, and the ruddy presence of his patroness counteracted its enervating drain.
The mage was their lifeline, connected both to the portal at the outpost and the Field Marshal’s allied wraiths back at the siege camp. That was a problem. Though tactically smart, it shrank the likelihood that he would be the one to shed Cob’s blood, and that was unacceptable.
Unfortunately, they weren't on their quarry's direct trail, so even if some disaster befell the rest of the group, he couldn’t forge ahead easily. The guide was taking them on an intersect route, following the base of a ridge with the occasional pause for her to hike up it and peek over.
“If we cut across here or try to tail them, they'll see us long before we get in range,” she'd explained. “But the valleys connect at a col ahead. We can take them by surprise there. Shouldn't be much longer.”
Erevard took her word for it, not even sure what a col was. The White Flame helm made it difficult to see far, his vision restricted to patches of light and dark: snow and trees, starlight and rock. He'd noticed it on the trek through the swamp too, the White Road and the pilgrims' robes the only clear objects in a world of shadows.
He wondered how his companions had fared. Whether they'd found their ways home.
Whether that girl, Lark, had found some way to contact Cob and warn him.
A part of him regretted not interrogating her, but it didn't matter. She hadn't been involved in Jas's death, nor had Cob come for her—nor had his lady mentioned her. Therefore she wasn't important.
Cob wasn't involved in Jas's death either, said a traitorous little part of him. Trevere admitted as much. Cob was just a bystander.
But that was a lie, spat by one conspirator to save another—and even if it wasn't, Cob had still let Jas die. He still deserved this. The lady assured him of that.
He shouldn't have stayed with the pilgrims for as long as he had. With his armor, he could have hiked on while the pilgrims flagged, skipped the excursion to the Grey, and been in Thynbell days earlier—been here, ready and waiting.
Instead he was tailing travelers who might not even be his quarry. Certainly Reivus had not reacted—though with the ridge between them, perhaps the blade had simply not sensed its mark yet. But if this wasn’t Cob… If Cob never came...
He touched Reivus' hilt for comfort against the thought. Before Jas Fendil, he had been a Gold Army deserter, having bolted to escape punishment for crimes against his comrades. He’d turned to banditry in the western woods, and when his hunters had gotten close, he’d fled down a hidden Rift path—and nearly met his death at the smugglers’ camp it led to, for he wouldn't take orders, not after the army. Not even to save his own life. But Jas had given him a chance, first as lookout and leg-breaker, then bodyguard, then lover.
He missed that time. Even when they'd operated on the knife's edge of starvation, it had been good, because Jas had been there.
Now he just had Reivus—and the red lady. Her orders intersected with his revenge so well that it almost felt like a trick, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. She had salvaged him from the pit in the heart of the Palace, had filled his empty places with her burning light. Let him be a blade in her hand, as Reivus was in his. Let him quench his rage in blood. Only when he stood over the bodies of Cob, Trevere and the Maker would he be satisfied.
If they weren't here, then he would simply hunt them elsewhere.
*****
The longer they walked, the more Cob's mind cleared. His eyes traced the path and its hazards, extrapolating toward the future. If these cloudless conditions continued, then the climb wouldn't be so dangerous; if they reached the mountain during a decent phase of the moon, they would have light enough for a sane ascent.
Right now, the mother moon was rising in near-fullness, giving them three nights of perfect illumination ahead before she began to wane. The gibbous moons afterward would also be good for climbing, and if pressed, he supposed he would attempt the ascent under a half-moon. He didn't relish the thought of assaulting the mountain any later, and wished they'd begun the trek before this bright period so they could have gotten closer by its start.
Still, it made the walk easy, which he needed. This valley was filled with well-crusted and unbroken snow, but weariness gnawed at him, and the new weight of the staff across his shoulders didn't help. In retrospect, he supposed he should have listened to Enkhaelen—and Lerien. He couldn't spend his whole life jumping away from the Dark. But the thought of touching it felt like needles in his heart, and when he closed his eyes, he saw his mother's black hair floating like seaweed in that endless crushing depth.
He couldn't go to her. That would solve nothing.
He didn't even know if she was real.
Exhaling, he felt the heat of his breath wisp across his cheeks as it was recaptured by the wards. As helpful as they were, he had begun to think of them as a problem. He’d already lost all his acclimatization during his years of lowland living, and hiding behind magic couldn’t prepare him for the cut of the wind through the gaps in the ridgeline or the black-ice glitter of the sky. If—when—the wards failed, would it be in a shock of frost or a slow seeping chill? Would he have warning? Would he be halfway up an icefall at the time?
I should acclimatize at the base of the mountain, he told himself. Shake off all wards, try to adapt naturally. If the Guardian can shape me to its will, then surely I ca
n shape myself, somehow. I still remember how it felt to belong to this place, even if it's like a dream now.
If he did it right, he wouldn't need to worry about others' magic failing. He'd have his own.
It was a strange thought. The only power he'd ever wanted was to make people leave him alone—but perhaps this was it. If he had mastery over himself and his environment, he could go where he liked, live how he liked, with no one to follow him or tell him what to do. He could escape for real.
To where? The Garnet Mountains had been nice in places. The edge of the Haarakash wilderness as well. Or he could stay here, among the sanctums of his ancestors. Perhaps the hermits on the peaks were like him, drawing strength from the mountains to sustain themselves.
But he had more than just himself to consider. Arik, Fiora, the baby…
Ahead, Enkhaelen trudged in silence, engulfed in his own thoughts. Cob had to wonder about them. This trek resonated with the necromancer no less than it did with him: a path he had walked before, a place where family dwelt. In-laws, in his case, and not friendly ones.
They still needed to make a plan for if they met any Muriae. He didn't want to fight them; in the back of his mind, he still held them sacred, even beyond his ingrained Imperial distaste. But they hated Enkhaelen, and if they attacked, Cob doubted he could stand them off with words.
“Hoi,” he huffed, glad his voice went further than his breath did. Enkhaelen didn't react, so he said it louder, and saw the necromancer's hooded head lift. As it turned toward him, he started, “The Muriae, we should figure out what we're—“
A gloved hand rose sharply, energy sparking at the fingertips. He lurched back in alarm.
Yellow light sliced past him from behind, banishing his vision in a silent flare.
He raised his arm to shield his eyes, too surprised to make sense of it. An instant later, something slammed into his back, a thunderous crack! striking his ears as the comfortable shell around him shattered. Deafened, blinded, he lurched sideways from where he'd last seen Enkhaelen, sure the necromancer would be pitching spells back at their unseen assailant.
The Drowning Dark (The War of Memory Cycle Book 4) Page 60
