A Time of Dread

by John Gwynne

  It was one huge circular room, the dome’s arc rising high and cavernous above her, sounds echoing and magnified; even the breath in her throat sounded loud and harsh to her own ears. The floor dropped away from her in a curve of tiered stone steps that cascaded down to the ground a good fifty paces below her. Riv went down the steps, firelight from great iron braziers washing over her. She glimpsed a Ben-Elim standing in an alcove high above, others gliding gracefully through slanting beams of winter daylight that filtered down from shuttered windows set into the dome’s walls.

  She reached the last dozen steps and stopped, looking into the chamber. Below her the ground levelled, crossing a wide expanse towards the room’s centre, where the trunk of Drassil’s ancient tree rose. Before it stood a row of muscle, flesh and steel: a score of Queen Ethlinn’s giants set about a dais. Shield-breakers, they were called, some of them the very giants that had stood and fought against the Black Sun’s shield wall more than a hundred years ago, out on the plains beyond Drassil’s walls. Asroth and his host of dread Kadoshim had filled the skies that day, while his champion the Black Sun had led a warband thousands strong upon the ground.

  And yet we won. The Ben-Elim saved us, Riv thought, sinking down onto one of the cold steps and staring over the heads of the giants below her. Her gaze fixed onto the dais behind them, at what they guarded.

  Two statues forged from black iron, they seemed at first glance. One Ben-Elim, one Kadoshim, joined in battle. Their wings were spread, one feathered, one with wings more akin to a bat, things of leather and skin.

  But they are not statues.

  She stared at the Ben-Elim, his features strained with exertion. Meical, once captain of the Ben-Elim. She could even see a bead of sweat running down his forehead. And in his grip, the Lord of the Kadoshim.

  Asroth, Lord of the Fallen.

  His hair was long, bound with braids and wire, his face regal and handsome, exuding a fierce pride.

  And a deeper malice.

  I’m supposed to stand against that malice, supposed to protect the Faithful and slay the Fallen. What is wrong with me? Why did I do that on the weapons-field? And to the Lord Protector, of all people.

  And why did he say those things to me?

  She felt her belly churn at the echo of his words, a pain deep inside sharp as any skinning knife. Hot tears came to her eyes and she sniffed, wiping them angrily away.

  Footsteps echoed behind her, a familiar stride that Riv would know anywhere. Confident, full of purpose.

  Her sister, Aphra, dark-haired where she was fair, calm and controlled where Riv was not.

  The footsteps stopped.

  ‘You might as well sit,’ Riv muttered, slapping the flagstoned stairs.

  Aphra sat quietly, waiting.

  ‘I hate myself,’ Riv whispered into the silence.

  Aphra took a deep breath. ‘It’s a setback,’ she said. ‘Not the end of your chances to join the White-Wings.’

  ‘I punched the Lord Protector in the face,’ Riv pointed out.

  ‘Aye.’ Aphra nodded, running a hand through her dark hair, close-cropped like all of the White-Wings. Practical and uniform. ‘Granted, a big setback, then.’ She looked at Riv, her hand twitching to reach out and wipe away the stray tear that rolled down Riv’s cheek. Riv saw her fist clench in the effort it took to resist that urge.

  ‘Why?’ Aphra said, instead. Not accusing, or judging.

  ‘Because . . .’ Riv’s voice caught in her throat at the memory of Israfil’s words. She took a deep breath, controlling the emotion that was stealing her voice. ‘He told me I was weak because I have no father,’ Riv said, and then the rest spilt out in a torrent of whispers, Aphra listening in her calm way.

  When Riv finished, Aphra sat there nodding, eyes staring into nowhere. Looking at her sister, Riv saw a few strands of grey in her hair, was surprised at that. Her sister always seemed so strong and capable. Fierce and wise, never-changing.

  She’s getting old.

  ‘He was testing you,’ Aphra said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Many of us are fatherless, and motherless. We are born of warriors, Riv, and warriors die – that is the way of it. Our da was a White-Wing, he fought and died in service of the holy war. It is just a part of our life.’ She was silent a moment, her eyes distant.

  ‘What was our father like?’ Riv asked. She had never known him, a White-Wing like her mam, but slain on a campaign, soon after Riv was born.

  Aphra looked down at her, stroked Riv’s hair. ‘A warrior.’ She shrugged. ‘A White-Wing, he gave his all for the cause, died for it.’

  ‘I know that,’ Riv said, ‘have heard it a thousand times. But what was he like?’

  ‘Ah, Riven ap Lorin,’ Aphra said, using Riv’s full name for once. ‘He was like you: wild, like the north wind.’

  Riv liked that, though she thought that quality might not have helped her warrior trial today.

  ‘So it’s our father’s fault I punched the Lord Protector, then.’

  ‘I don’t think that will be an acceptable excuse to Israfil.’ Aphra smiled. ‘Though I wouldn’t worry,’ she added with a shake of her head. ‘Israfil did not mean what he said.’

  ‘Then why did he say it?’ Riv growled.

  ‘Think,’ Aphra said, poking Riv in the temple. ‘The warrior trial is not just about skill of arms, Riv. Think about it. It is all a test to deem if we are fit to face the Kadoshim in battle. For that you need blade-prowess, of course, because the Kadoshim are strong, yes, fierce and deadly, that too. But they also have dread-cunning, and will exploit any weakness. Imagine you were in a shield wall and the right insults wormed their way into your head and heart – what if the rage took you then, and you leaped from the wall in a red-murder haze? The wall would be shattered, and your sword-kin would die.’

  Riv thought about that awhile, and whatever way she looked at it there was no getting away from the sense of it.

  ‘That smacks of truth,’ she conceded, ‘but it doesn’t mean it is the truth.’

  ‘This time it is,’ Aphra said. ‘A similar thing happened to me, on my warrior trial.’

  ‘Really?’ Riv asked, wanting it to be true. It was a far better option in her head than the Lord Protector secretly being a wicked, malice-filled bastard. ‘The Lord Protector?’

  ‘No, it was Kol that sword-schooled me.’ Her eyes took on a faraway look. ‘But he said some hard things to me. Things that were close enough to truth; if you looked at what he said in a shift of light you could almost think, maybe . . .’

  ‘Aye,’ Riv agreed, a hiss of breath.

  ‘But they were not the truth,’ Aphra said, shaking her head. ‘Kol spoke to me afterwards, and told me it was only a test.’

  ‘Will the Lord Protector tell me the same, then?’

  ‘Well, I’m thinking, no,’ Aphra said. ‘I controlled my anger, unlike you, and still passed my trials, remember, where you have failed. You will have to take them again, so the Lord Protector will not want you knowing. I shouldn’t have told you.’ She looked sternly at Riv. ‘Don’t tell a soul, not even Mam.’

  ‘I won’t,’ Riv grunted, almost insulted, as if she would ever betray her sister’s trust.

  ‘And then there’s the matter of punching the Lord Protector in the face,’ Aphra continued.

  Riv hung her head and put her face in her hands.

  ‘An apology may be the wisest step,’ Aphra said.

  Riv’s gut instinct was to snarl NEVER. Israfil’s words were still a sharp knife in her soul, but, if it had all been a test . . .

  It does make sense, and is something the Ben-Elim would do: testing every aspect of a warrior, mental as well as physical.

  ‘It was a great honour, the Lord Protector choosing you to fight, to test. He must see greatness in you,’ Aphra said. ‘As do I.’

  ‘Huh,’ grunted Riv. Shame I didn’t live up to it. ‘I’ll apologize, then,’ Riv said grudgingly.

  ‘Good,’ Aphra said, ta
king Riv’s arm and tugging her to her feet. ‘Now let’s go and find Mam. She’s searching for you all over Drassil.’

  Riv stood, feeling some of her hurt and anger drain away.

  ‘When do you think the next warrior trials will be held?’ she asked her sister.

  ‘A few moons, most likely. As soon as there are enough recruits reaching their name-days to make a shield wall.’

  Maybe still this year, then, Riv thought, before Midwinter’s Day.

  ‘Before then you’re going to have to do something about that temper of yours, though. It seems to be getting worse, not better, and that’s not the kind of quality the Ben-Elim want in their White-Wings. Discipline, control,’ Aphra said, putting an arm around Riv’s shoulder and steering her up the stairs towards the open entrance.

  ‘Aye,’ Riv agreed, knowing that was a truth harder in the doing than the saying.

  I’ve never been the calmest, never as calm as Aphra, but she’s right, it is getting worse.

  ‘Otherwise one day it is likely to get you into a whole lot of trouble.’

  I think it already has.

  ‘Why did you come here?’ Aphra asked her.

  ‘Don’t know.’ Riv shrugged, though she did know, pausing and looking back into the chamber, her eyes drawn to the figures of Meical and Asroth upon the dais.

  They had been frozen like that since the great battle, over a hundred years ago. The Seven Treasures had all been present, forged from the Starstone, and it was by the Treasures’ power that a portal had been opened between the Banished Lands and the Otherworld. Through that gateway the Kadoshim had poured like a dark plague, death and destruction their sole purpose, but fortunately the Ben-Elim had followed close behind them, saviours of humanity.

  Somehow the Treasures had been destroyed, reduced to molten metal, and Asroth and Meical had been caught up in their destruction, coated in the cooling ore, frozen for all time. Whether they were dead or alive, no one knew, but the Ben-Elim in a humbling act of self-sacrifice had elected to stay and guard mankind against even the possibility of Asroth’s return, and to hunt down and destroy the Kadoshim that had survived the Battle of Drassil.

  That was why she had come to this hall. To remind herself why she had trained so hard, each and every day of her remembered life; to remind herself of what was at the heart of all the blood and sweat, the dark mornings, the muscle straining, the exhaustion, sacrifice and discipline. Something that was bigger than her insignificant life. Something that gave her meaning and purpose.

  The great fight. The holy war. And I must be a part of it.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  DREM

  ‘Grab the branch!’ Drem heard his da shout. He splashed about wildly, saw the branch as it loomed close and reached out, the fingers of one hand wrapping around it. He felt the river current still tugging at him, his arm and shoulder muscles stretching and straining – for a moment he was sure the river was going to win – then Olin was pulling him into the shore, a hand under his arm helping him rise. Drem hobbled onto the riverbank, his ankle a throbbing pain.

  Olin didn’t look much better, grey hair hanging lank, his face pale and gaunt, dark hollows under his eyes. The sleeve of one arm was torn, a long red wound beneath it pulsing blood.

  ‘Need to l-l-look at that,’ Drem said, trying to stop his teeth from chattering.

  ‘Let’s get warm first,’ Olin muttered, eyeing the darkening sky.

  The river had carried them out of the foothills and into the plain that surround the Starstone Lake. Drem looked back up at the hills and mountains, his mind filled with the memory of the white bear that had come so close to killing them both. He shivered.

  Fire.

  Both their kindling pouches were soaked through, but they found dead rushes close to the river and gathered great bundles of them, then used their striking irons to set sparks leaping. Drem groaned in pleasure as the first warmth of the flames lapped against him. They stripped their wet clothes and hung them close for drying. Both of them were covered in cuts and bruises where the river had introduced them to rocks and branches on the turbulent journey from the foothills to the plain. Drem’s bone-handled seax had managed to stay within its sheath; he kept it close, the white bear never far from his mind.

  Olin splinted his ankle, which was swollen and bruised purple, but didn’t feel broken, and then Drem set about stitching his da’s arm. A claw from the bear’s parting swipe had gouged a long furrow almost from shoulder to elbow. Drem boiled some water, let it cool awhile and then cleaned the wound out. He took a fish hook and thread from a pouch on his da’s belt and began methodically stitching the wound up.

  ‘Last time you did this I’d drunk half a skin of mead first,’ his da hissed, grunting each time Drem pierced flesh and popped through skin.

  ‘Quiet,’ Drem whispered, wiping fresh blood away and concentrating on his stitching. It was a task he enjoyed, found it fascinating, seeing the flesh pull together. There was something appealing about the regimentation of the stitches, and something wonderful in the fact that this act helped the body to heal itself, that it would allow flesh and skin to grow and knit back together.

  When he was done Drem sat back, smiling at his handiwork. His da twisted to inspect it and nodded approvingly.

  ‘Ever decide you’re done with hunting, you’ll make a fine healer,’ he said. ‘Or maybe a seamstress.’ His lips twisted in a smile.

  ‘So, what now?’ Drem asked.

  ‘We could limp home to our cabin,’ Olin said, ‘but what would be the point of that, when we’ve got half a year of trapping sitting back in those foothills?’

  ‘The point?’ Drem said, raising an eyebrow. ‘I’d imagine it would be avoiding death by giant bear.’

  ‘Aye.’ His da laughed. ‘And that’s a good point. But that bear should be long gone by now. He’s meal enough in that elk he felled to last him a ten-night. He only chased us because he thought we might be after a bite of his supper.’

  There was logic in that, and Drem liked logic. More than that, logic was the cadence by which he walked through life. But the memory of that bear, its claws and teeth, was still vivid in his mind.

  ‘And we need those pelts to sell, if we don’t want to starve through winter,’ Olin added. ‘We’re not farmers, have no crops to see us through.’

  Drem looked up at the foothills and mountains beyond, solid slabs of darkness now as night settled like a shroud about them.

  ‘Back to the camp it is, then.’ He nodded.

  ‘With first light,’ Olin said.

  They settled about the fire, dressed in their dried-out clothes, but all the time Drem was going over the bear attack in his mind. He’d travelled and lived in the Wild for many years with his da, and he was no stranger to the savagery of the Banished Lands and their bloodthirsty predators. Packs of wolven, blood-sucking bats – once he’d even seen a draig. But never had he come across something that had affected him like that white bear. He’d been frozen with fear. There was respect, too; for the staggering majesty of its power, and for its indomitable will. Any creature that made the wild of the Desolation its home was a force to be reckoned with.

  He thought of his da, standing over him as the bear charged.

  And my da is not so different from that bear. He is indomitable, too.

  ‘Thank you,’ Drem whispered.

  ‘Huh?’ Olin grunted, his back to him. Drem had thought he was asleep.

  ‘I said, thank you. You saved my life.’

  ‘Well, I’m your da. It’s my job.’

  ‘Life and death is no jest,’ Drem muttered.

  His da shifted to look at his son, his face deep-lined, all dark grooves and shadow in the flickering firelight.

  ‘No, you’re right.’ He sat up, pulled his knees up to his chest. ‘The truth of it is, there are not many things I’ve done right in this life. Getting handbound to your mam was one of them. You’re another, Drem; the one good thing I have left. And I’ll be damned if
I’ll let anything take you from me. Not without a fight, anyway.’

  Drem felt a surge of emotion at his da’s words. They were both practical men, both viewed life logically, rarely given to emotional displays. Neither of them were much for long words or long conversations, and Drem had never heard his da say such things as this to him.

  Maybe it’s coming so close to death. We both stared it in the face this morning.

  His voice did not cooperate as he tried to speak. He coughed, cleared his throat.

  ‘I wish I could remember more of Mam,’ he said. ‘If I think hard enough I can see something of her face, her eyes. Her smile. But no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember her voice.’

  The fire crackled between them, the only sound as Olin stared into the flames.

  ‘Her voice was beautiful,’ he eventually said. ‘Like a river to a parched man. At least, it was to me.’ He smiled to himself. ‘She laughed a lot, cried little. She liked a good jest, did your mam. Ach, she would fall off her chair she laughed so hard.’ He shrugged, finally looking at Drem. ‘She loved you fiercely.’

  As I love her.

  His memories of his mam were vague and half-formed, like figures in the mist.

  Long, dark hair, laughing eyes.

  Fractured memories flickered through his mind. A song, hummed in his ear, a tight hug. Another face, a woman, tall, blonde, a stick in her hand, bending down to lift him up. A tower on a hill.

  Drem had only been a bairn when his mam died, three or four summers old, but he remembered how she made him feel: a warm glow in his chest, edged with the melancholy of loss.