The Skull Throne

by Peter V. Brett

  And doom them all. Arlen might be able to make the crown work without Jardir, but there wasn’t much chance he could escape Anoch Sun alive without help, and he’d never make it to the mind court alone. The Core would call to him, its song more insistent the closer he drew.

  Nie corrupts what she cannot destroy. Words of faith, but there was wisdom in them all the same. Every child had heard the proverb in the Canon that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The Core offered absolute power, but Arlen dare not touch it. He would lose himself, absorbed and burnt away like a match thrown into a Solstice bonfire.

  He breathed deeply to calm himself before he did something rash. Jardir kept his guard up, but his aura showed he had no desire to fight. They both knew what was at stake.

  “I made a promise to you that night as I left you on the dunes, Par’chin,” Jardir said. “I threw you a waterskin and promised I would find you in the afterlife, and if I had not kept true and made the Ala a better place, we would have a reckoning.”

  “Well it’s come early,” Arlen said. “Hope you’re ready for it.”

  Jardir looked at the sky as they exited the tower, trying to deduce where they were from the position of the stars. South and west of Everam’s Bounty, but that told him little. Millions of untamed acres lay between the great city and the desert flats. He might manage to find his way back on his own, but Everam only knew how long it would take.

  He didn’t need to ask the Par’chin his purpose in leading them from the tower. It was written clearly on his aura, mirrored in Jardir’s own. The hope that fighting side by side against the alagai, as they had done so many times before, could begin to eat away at the anger and mistrust that lay between them still.

  Unity is worth any price, the Evejah said. Kaji had called it the key to Sharak Ka. If he and the Par’chin could find unity of purpose, then they stood a chance.

  If not …

  Jardir breathed deep of the night air. It was fitting. All men are brothers in the night, Kaji had said. If they could not find unity before the alagai, they were unlikely to find it elsewhere.

  “They’ll catch our scent soon enough,” the Par’chin said, reading his thoughts. “First thing to do is recharge your crown.”

  Jardir shook his head. “The first thing is for you to return my spear to me, Par’chin. I have agreed to your terms.”

  The Par’chin shook his head. “Let’s start slow, Ahmann. Spear’s not going anywhere just yet.”

  Jardir gave him a hard look, but there was nothing for it. He could see the Par’chin would not budge on the point, and it was useless to argue further. He raised his fist, knuckles scarred with wards Inevera had cut into his skin. “The crown will begin to recharge when my fist strikes an alagai.”

  The Par’chin nodded. “No need to wait, though.”

  Jardir looked at him. “You suggest I take more from you?”

  The Par’chin gave him a withering look. “Caught me off guard the once, Ahmann. Try that trick again and you’ll regret it.”

  “Then how?” Jardir asked. “Without an alagai to Draw from …”

  The Par’chin cut him off with a wave of his hand, gesturing at their surroundings. “Magic’s all around us, Ahmann.”

  It was true. In crownsight, Jardir could see as clearly at night as in day, the world awash in magic’s glow. It pooled at their feet like a luminescent fog, stirred by their passage, but there was little power in it, any more than smoke had the power of flame.

  “I don’t understand,” Jardir said.

  “Breathe,” the Par’chin said. “Close your eyes.”

  Jardir glanced at him, but complied, his breathing rhythmic and even. He fell into the warrior’s trance he had learned in Sharik Hora, soul at peace, but ready to act in an instant.

  “Reach out with the crown,” the Par’chin said. “Feel the magic around you, whispering like a soft breeze.”

  Jardir did as he asked, and could indeed sense the magic, expanding and contracting in response to his breath. It flowed over the Ala, but was drawn to life.

  “Gently Draw it,” the Par’chin said, “like you’re breathing it in.” Jardir inhaled, and felt the power flow into him. It was not the fire of striking an alagai, more like sunlight on his skin.

  “Keep going,” the Par’chin said. “Easy. Don’t stop with your exhales. Just keep a steady pull.”

  Jardir nodded, feeling the flow continue. He opened his eyes, seeing magic drifting to him from all directions in a steady current, like a river heading to a fall. It was a slow process, but eventually the chasm began to fill. He felt stronger.

  Then his elation cost him his center, and the flow stopped.

  He looked to the Par’chin. “Amazing.”

  The Par’chin smiled. “Just gettin’ started, Ahmann. We’ve got a lot more to cover before we’re ready to face a court of mind demons.”

  “You do not trust me with the Spear of the Kaji, but you give me the secrets of your magic?”

  “Sharak Ka comes before all else,” Arlen said. “You taught me war. Only fair I teach you magic. The rudiments, anyway. Spear’s a crutch you’ve leaned on too long.” He winked. “Just don’t think I’m teaching you all my tricks.”

  They spent several more minutes thus, the Par’chin gently coaching him in how to Draw the power.

  “Now hold the power tight,” the Par’chin said, producing a small folding knife from his pocket. He opened it and flipped the blade into his grip, passing the handle to Jardir.

  Jardir took the small blade curiously. It wasn’t even warded. “What am I to do with this?”

  “Cut yourself,” the Par’chin said.

  Jardir looked at him curiously, then shrugged and complied. The blade was sharp, and parted his flesh easily. He could see blood in the cut, but the magic he’d absorbed was already at work. The skin knit together before it could begin to well.

  The Par’chin shook his head. “Again. But keep a tighter grip on the power. So tight the wound stays open.”

  Jardir grunted, slicing his flesh again. The wound began to close as before, but Jardir Drew the magic from his flesh into the crown, and the healing stopped.

  “Healing’s great when your bones are in the right place and you’ve got power to spare,” the Par’chin said, “but if you’re not careful, you can heal twisted, or waste power you need. Now let out just a touch, sending it straight where it’s needed.”

  Jardir let out a measured trickle of magic, and watched the cut seal away as if it had never been.

  “Good,” the Par’chin said, “but you might’ve done with less. Two cuts, now. Heal one, but not the other.”

  Holding tight to the power, Jardir cut one forearm, and then the other. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, releasing a fraction as much magic as before and willing it to his left arm alone. He could feel the tingle run along the limb, and opened his eyes to see the cut slowly sealing, the other still oozing blood.

  There was a howl not far off, the sound of field demons. Jardir looked in that direction, but the alagai were still too far off.

  “Draw power from that direction,” the Par’chin said. “Take it in through your eyes.”

  Jardir did so, and found that even though there was no direct line of sight, he could see the creatures in the distance, running hard for their position.

  “How?” he asked.

  “All living things make an imprint on the ambient magic,” the Par’chin said, “spreading out like a drop of dye in water. You can read the current, and see beyond the limits of your eyes.”

  Jardir squinted, studying the approaching creatures. A full reap, more than a score of demons. Their long, corded limbs and low torsos glowed fiercely with power.

  “They are many, Par’chin,” he said. “Are you certain you do not wish to return the spear to me?” He scanned the sky. There were wind demons beginning to circle as well, drawn to the glow of their power. Jardir reached for his Cloak of Unsight, ready to pul
l it close, but of course the Par’chin had taken that, too.

  The son of Jeph shook his head. “We can’t take them with gaisahk alone, then we got no business in Anoch Sun.”

  Jardir looked at him curiously. The meaning of the word was clear enough, a conjunction of the Krasian gai, meaning “demon,” and sahk, meaning “unarmed,” but he had never heard it before.

  “Sharusahk was designed for men to kill one another.” The Par’chin held up a warded fist. “Needed to change it up a bit to bring the wards to bear properly.”

  Jardir crossed his fists before his heart and gave a shallow bow, the traditional bow of sharusahk pupil to master. The move was perfectly executed, but doubtless the Par’chin could see the sarcasm in his aura.

  He swept a hand at the rapidly approaching field demons. “I eagerly await my first lesson, Par’chin.”

  The Par’chin’s eyes narrowed, but there was a hint of smile on his lips. His face blurred momentarily, and his clothes fell away, leaving him in only his brown bido. It was the first time Jardir had truly seen what his friend had become. The Warded Man, as the Northerners called him.

  It was easy to see why the greenlanders thought him the Deliverer. Every inch of his visible flesh was covered with wards. Some were large and powerful. Impact wards. Forbiddings. Pressure wards. Like Jardir, a demon could not touch the Par’chin, but that he willed it, and his punches, elbows, and kicks would strike the alagai like scorpion bolts.

  Other wards, like those than ran around his eyes, ears, and mouth, were almost too small to read, conveying more subtle powers. Midsized ones ran up and down his limbs. Thousands in all.

  That in itself was enough to amaze, but the Par’chin had always been an artist with warding. His patterns, simple and efficient, were rendered with such beauty they put Evejan illuminators to shame. Dama who had spent a lifetime copying and illustrating sacred text in ink made from the blood of heroes.

  The wards Inevera had cut into Jardir’s flesh were crude by comparison. She would have needed to flay him alive to approach what the Par’chin had done.

  Magic ran along the surface of those wards, crackling like static on a thick carpet. They pulsed and throbbed, brightening and dimming in a hypnotizing rhythm. Even one without wardsight could see it. He didn’t look like a man anymore. He looked like one of Everam’s seraphs.

  The field demons were close now, racing hard at the sight of prey. They stretched out in a long line, a few loping strides apart. Too long spent fighting the first would have the second upon him, and on and on, till he was fighting all of them. Jardir tensed, ready to race to his friend’s aid the moment he began to be overwhelmed.

  The Par’chin walked boldly to meet them, but it was warrior’s bravado. No man could fight so many alone.

  But again his friend surprised him, slipping in smoothly to grab the lead demon and turn its own momentum against it in a perfect sharusahk circle throw. Cracked like a whip, the field demon’s neck snapped a split second before the Par’chin let go. His aim was precise, crashing the dead alagai into the next in line, sending both tumbling to the ground.

  The Par’chin glowed brightly now. In the seconds of contact, he had drained considerable magic from the first demon. He charged in, stomping down on the living demon’s head with an impact-warded heel. There was a flare of magic, and when the Par’chin turned to meet the next in line, Jardir could see its skull had been crushed like a melon.

  A crash and shriek stole Jardir’s attention. While he had been focused on the Par’chin, a wind demon had dived at him, hitting hard against the warding field that surrounded Jardir’s crown for several paces in every direction. Including up.

  Everam take me for a fool, Jardir scolded himself. In his younger days, he would never have been so reckless as to lose track of his surroundings. The Par’chin feared that the spear had made him lax—and perhaps it had—but the crown was more insidious. He’d begun to drop his guard. Something that would cost him in Anoch Sun. The demon princelings had shown at Waning there were still ways they could strike at him.

  Jardir collapsed the field, dropping the wind demon heavily to the ground. It struggled to rise, more dazed than harmed, but as Drillmaster Qeran had taught so many years before, wind demons were slow and clumsy on the ground. The thin bone that stretched the membrane of its wings bowed, not meant to support the demon’s full weight, and at rest the creature’s hind legs were bent fully at the knee, unable to straighten fully.

  Before it could manage to right itself, Jardir was on the demon, kicking its limbs out and using his own weight to knock the breath from it once more. The wards scarred onto Jardir’s hands were not as intricate as the Par’chin’s, but they were strong. He sat on the demon’s chest, too high for it to bring its hind talons to bear, and pinned its wings with his knees. He held its throat with his left hand and the pressure ward cut into his palm glowed, building in power as he punched it repeatedly in the vulnerable bone of its eye socket, just above the toothed beak. Impact wards on his knuckles flashed, and he felt the bone crack and finally shatter.

  Then, as the Par’chin had shown him, he Drew, feeling the alagai’s magic, absorbed deep in center of Ala, flood into him, filling him with power.

  Another wind demon dove for him while he was engaged, but this time Jardir was ready. He had learned in lessons long ago that wind demons led their dive with the long, hooked talons at the bend in their wings. They could sever a head with those talons, then spread their wings wide, arresting their downward momentum as they snatched their prey in their hind talons and launched back skyward with a great wingstroke.

  Flush with magic, Jardir moved impossibly fast, catching the demon’s wing bone just under the lead talon. He pivoted and threw himself forward, preventing the demon from spreading its wings and throwing it to the ground with the full force of its dive. Bones shattered, and the demon shrieked, twitching in agony. He finished it quickly.

  Looking up, he saw the Par’chin fully engaged now. He had killed five of the field demons, but the rest, more than three times that number, surrounded him.

  But for all that, he did not appear to be in danger. A demon leapt at him and he collapsed into mist. The alagai passed through him and crashed into one of its fellows, the two going down in a tangle of tooth and claw.

  An instant later he reformed behind another of the beasts, catching it under the forelegs and locking his fingers behind its neck in a sharusahk hold. There was an audible snap, and then another demon came at him. He misted away once more, reforming a few feet away, in place to kick a demon in the belly. Impact wards on his instep flashed, launching the alagai several feet through the air.

  Jardir was the greatest living sharusahk master, and even he could barely hold his own against the Par’chin’s mist-fighting. Against the alagai, with their powerful bodies and tiny brains, it was devastating.

  “You cheat, Par’chin!” Jardir called. “Your new powers have made you lax!”

  The son of Jeph had caught an alagai’s jaws in his hands, and was in the process of forcing them open well past their limit. The demon let out a high-pitched squeal, thrashing madly, but it could not break his hold. He looked over to Jardir, amusement on his aura. “Says the man hiding behind his crown’s warding field. Come and show me how it’s done, if you’ve had your rest.”

  Jardir laughed, pulling open his robe. The Par’chin’s body was wiry and corded like cable, a sharp contrast to the heavy bulk of Jardir’s muscles, a broad canvas Inevera had painted with her knife. He pulled the crown’s warding field in close and strode into the press. A field demon leapt at him, but he caught its foreleg and snapped it with an effortless twist, dropping it in time for a spin-kick that took the next demon at the base of its skull. The impact ward on his instep was enough to break its spine, killing it instantly.

  The other demons, their ravenous fury turned to a more cautious aggression after their battle with the Par’chin, circled, issuing low, threatening growls as they look
ed for an opening. Jardir glanced at the Par’chin, who had stepped back to observe. His wards of forbiddance glowed fiercely, and Jardir could see the edge of the warding field they formed. It bordered several feet in every direction around the Par’chin, like an invisible bubble of impenetrable glass.

  His own warriors had been ready to name the Par’chin Deliverer that night in the Maze. Jardir had thought it due only to the Spear of Kaji at the time, but it seemed the Par’chin was destined to power. It was inevera.

  But destined to power did not mean he was Shar’Dama Ka. The Par’chin balked at the final price of power, refusing to take the reins his people thrust at him. There was still much he had to learn.

  “Observe, Par’chin,” Jardir said, making a show of setting his feet as he took one of the most basic dama sharusahk stances. He breathed in, taking in all his surroundings, all his thoughts and emotions, embracing them and letting them fall away. He looked at the demons with calm, relaxed focus, ready to react in an instant.

  He lowered his guard, pretending distraction, and the alagai took the bait. The ring around him burst into motion as all the field demons moved at him together with all the precision of a push guard.

  Jardir never moved his feet, but his waist, supple as a palm frond, twisted and bent as he dodged the attacks and turned them away. He seldom needed more than the flat of his hand to redirect tooth or talon, slapping at paws or the side of a field demon’s head just enough to keep them from touching him. The creatures landed in confused tumbles, dazed, but unharmed.

  “You fighting, or just playing with them?” the Par’chin asked.

  “I am teaching, Par’chin,” he replied, “and you would be wise to attend the lesson. You may have skill with magic, but the dama would laugh at your sharusahk. There is more than dogma taught in the catacombs beneath Sharik Hora. Gaisahk has merit, but you have much to learn.”

  Jardir sent a pulse of power through the crown, knocking the alagai back in a tumble as if from the press of a shield wall. They shook themselves off, growling and beginning to circle once more.