The Land of Night

by Kirby Crow

  He dreamed.

  Scarlet saw a flutter of colors, and a swarm of small people, no higher than his own chin, appeared. He could see they were Hilurin, all black-haired and ebony-eyed, so that for a moment, he felt a rush of homesickness.

  Channels, said a disembodied voice. The face of the gentle prince swam into view. Symbiosis, the prince said, smiling. A true joining of races. None dreamed it could ever be broken, until the ship failed and the miles of ice defeated us.

  Scarlet saw the Anlyribeth and the Shining Ones working together to repair the great beast of iron that rode the black sky between the stars; saw the misery on their faces when they failed time and time again. Decades passed like blown leaves, and a great many of the Shining Ones died.

  Denied their weightless life inside the belly of Deva, the sentient ship, the tall Shining Ones could not adjust to land living. Many walked like old men, hunched over from the weight of their spines and great shoulders, their bare feet dragging in the snow. The prince smiled sadly at Scarlet.

  Over time, they began to notice that we Anlyribeth did not suffer like them. Our bodies were smaller, better able to adapt, better able to exist on scarce food, whereas the Shining Ones needed great amounts of food to sustain their internal heat. Just breathing the thin air was an effort. They had no energy left over to find sustenance. We were industrious and clever. We thrived and took care of our own, but paid little heed to the starved Shining Ones, who had never needed our help in such base matters before.

  At last, the unthinkable happened. Anlyribeth were once trusted helpers and allies, gentle companions and kindred spirits of the mind. Now, they were potential food. The reaction was utter shock and horror. The offending Shining One was quickly slain by his own fellows, but the damage was done.

  We tried to flee. We were not vengeful. We did not wish the Shining Ones ill. All we wanted was our freedom. When we left, we took nothing from the iron vessels. We did not touch the Instruments of Making, knowing the Rshani would need them to survive.

  They had not reckoned, however, that several thousand millennia of mental co-existence would give the Shining Ones an even greater weapon against them. Even if they had been told, they would not have believed it. Scarlet watched as the Shining Ones herded the Anlyribeth back to them with the force of their minds alone, and watched as they sorrowfully put collars on their small necks and silver bracelets on their arms, forcing their new slaves to serve and sustain the race of the Shining Ones.

  It might have ended there. Might have, but did not. We could have served the Shining Ones forever, and eventually forgotten who we were, but the habit of exploration would not leave the minds of the Shining Ones. They must always have something new to conquer, some new path that has not been traveled. They decided to rebuild their homeworld, to make of it a replica of Danaee, but they could not do it alone.

  The Instruments of Making were taken from the ship and the old ones sought out their Channels –the Anlyribeth who their minds were bonded to– once more. Some Anlyribeth had to be compelled to reunite their links with their old companions, now their masters. Many others had died, but there were enough Channels to forge a link, enough to create power and build castles, walls, battlements; a city. A great fortress rose in the shallow bowl of the mountains now called Fanorl, and eventually a civilization where the elder race ruled and the younger Anlyribeth toiled and were made mental thralls to serve the power of the Shining Ones.

  Long centuries we lived like that, locked inside our own minds, our power bound to theirs, mind-blinded, useful only as physical slaves to service their wants and as tools to focus their power. They used us in other ways, too, our women mostly, but even our handsome youths were not safe. This world had made their lusts grow strong. Now they each sought for themselves power, beauty, and sex to fill their appetites. Some of us, however, were loved.

  The prince smiled again but pain edged every word. I was Txaxa, t’aishka to Sadyn, who was high in their esteem, a leader of many. Sadyn treated me well, better than any Rshani. Rshani is the name they took for themselves after they used the Instruments of Making and the genetic material of the snow bears to forge a child race able to sustain themselves on this frozen continent. But Sadyn could not see what it did to me to live with what my kin endured under his people. I tried to tell him, but he, like all Rshani, was blind to it. By this time there were few true Shining Ones from that first landing left. They all vanished into the heart of the mountains called Fanorl, and were never heard from again, save in the Ancients who wandered out many, many years later, and who were themselves also changed from their original form.

  It was I, the trusted one, who finally crept into the stone temple they had erected around the ruins of the metal ship and stole the Creatrix, the Instrument of Making with which the Rshani had forged their city, using only the power of their minds linked through their mortal Channels, the little Anlyribeth. I took it and set free Deva, the powerful sentient force housed inside the ship that drove it through the vast, black abyss of stars. I also freed my kin, and we together created a great Channel to open the boundaries of the world and hurl our physical bodies into the void beyond. We did not know what, or if anything, awaited us there, only that it was our last chance.

  What they found was Byzantur, with its mountain of magnetic iron meteorite that repelled the sensitive aliens of Danaee, but which left the Anlyribeth unaffected.

  “But,” Scarlet fumbled for words, his voice suddenly unlocked. “This... Creatrix. What happened to it? We Hilurin have no legends of it.”

  The prince’s fingers pressed Scarlet’s four-fingered hand, and when he withdrew, a red flower was etched into the skin of Scarlet’s wrist like a tattoo, which faded as quickly as it had appeared.

  “I think you know, do you not? Listen, my descendant...”

  ***

  Liall heard a shout echoing down the dark corridors of the deserted ruins. It was not a Rshani voice, but higher and lighter. He grabbed a smoking torch and ran with Alexyin, shoving the burning brand into every doorway down the long maze of corridors, but they were lost.

  Alexyin grabbed Liall’s arm and made him stop. “Listen!” he hissed.

  The torch sputtered in the dark. Wind howled thinly from a hundred cracks in the walls, and below that, faintly, he heard the sound of chanting.

  The maze confused them. Sounds seemed to come first from one direction and then another, tricking the ear. At last, he heard another sound, a shimmering metal noise like chains sliding over rock, and it gave them a direction to follow.

  Liall prayed as he went, or tried to. He had no tongue for it, but Scarlet believed. Surely his goddess would save him, even if she wouldn’t listen to Liall. They stumbled over a broken step in the corridor and saw that it led to a higher level, and from there, through a bricked archway, they saw a faint glimmer of yellow light.

  “Scarlet!”

  The light grew much brighter, and when Alexyin and he burst through the last doorway into the round chamber, they found it filled with torches.

  Incredibly, Melev was there, toppled over like a fallen tree in the center of the sunken floor, his bare legs sprawled out. Liall had little thought to marvel at his presence, because he saw Scarlet across from Melev, crouching with his small wrists chained to the floor. Scarlet’s body was bent double with his forehead resting on his knees, and he was silent and deathly still.

  Like Cestimir, Scarlet did not move as Liall approached him. Liall knelt. “Please,” Liall whispered, reaching out to touch his hair. He slipped his hand under Scarlet’s chin and lifted Scarlet’s face to see if he still lived.

  Scarlet gave a gulping sigh and coughed on the thick smoke. His eyes opened a crack. “Liall?”

  Liall groaned and embraced him, chains and all, too grateful to form any thoughts except thank you, thank you, oh thank you for this!

  Alexyin knelt beside Melev and rolled him over, and Liall heard Alexyin gasp. He looked over to see Alexyin backing away from M
elev’s body in horror, and he saw the twin black holes scorched into Melev’s face. The great lamps of Melev’s luminous eyes had burned out.

  11.

  Mourning Call

  Liall was there when Scarlet woke, sitting on the edge of the great bed and holding his hand. Scarlet looked around, seeing the now-familiar outlines of their bedroom, blinking. He tried to sit upright and found that he could. Someone had dressed him in a plain sleeping tunic and the pain was gone. “Melev…” he began.

  “Is dead,” Liall said gently. The prince was wearing something odd. It looked like a virca, but was very plain with no buttons or ornament. The fabric was all in muted shades of gray and violet mingled together, so that when Liall moved, it resembled a brooding cloud in a thunderstorm.

  Mourning clothes, Scarlet thought. He closed his eyes. “And Cestimir?”

  Liall took a shaking breath. “Him, as well.”

  “Oh, Deva… Liall, I’m sorry. So sorry. If we hadn’t gone—”

  Liall cut him off. “Do not. This was no one’s fault except Vladei’s.” He stroked Scarlet’s dark hair away from his face. “What happened in the ruins, when you were alone with Melev?”

  Scarlet lay back down and closed his eyes. “I saw dead ones in the stone circle, Liall. My parents, people I’d known, my old friend Kozi. Many spirits.”

  “It was a dream, t’aishka.”

  “No,” Scarlet said, knowing better. “It was real. And.... Liall? I think I was the one who killed Melev. My Gift isn’t the same as it was in Byzantur. It’s changed. It’s so much stronger now.” He looked at Liall with dawning comprehension. Channels, he thought. “It’s changed because of you, because of us.”

  “Hush, you must rest,” Liall soothed. Clearly, he thought Scarlet to be babbling.

  “It was real,” Scarlet insisted, but how to explain? He barely understood it himself.

  “Real or not,” Liall choked out, seeming grieved beyond words, “the man who put you there is dead, and Vladei is dead, too.”

  “Vladei,” Scarlet echoed, hating him and not sorry at all. “But…. are there any are more like Melev?”

  “Not here.”

  “Oh,” Scarlet said, disappointed. Scarlet sensed that it was hugely important for him to find one like Melev, but the why of it was beyond him.

  Liall frowned. “What is it?”

  “The spirits were Anlyribeth, those who were Hilurin before we took a new name. We used to live here, Liall. Thousands of us,” he rushed on, aware that his voice was unsteady and he sounded like a madman. “I saw so many things… the crash, the Rshani enslaving the Anlyribeth, then the earth shook and cracked and the Anlyribeth left. Melev said we took something from the Shining Ones when we left here, a great instrument called the Creatrix. He wanted it back and I tried to tell him we didn’t have it, but he didn’t believe me. We don’t have it, Liall, but I know where it is!”

  Liall looked almost frightened. “Scarlet!” Liall snapped, silencing him. He took a deep breath and reached for Scarlet. “These are forbidden things, my t’aishka. You must never mention them outside of this room, to anyone else. Do you promise?”

  Scarlet sensed how right Liall was. No one must ever know what he had discovered in the temple ruins. Who could be trusted with such knowledge? “I promise,” he said.

  “Good.” Liall pushed Scarlet’s black hair out of his eyes. “How do you feel?”

  “Well enough, now.” Scarlet spared him the knowledge of how Melev had pressed him and tortured him in that odd no-space between worlds. He looked miserable enough. “Oh, Liall, I’m so very sorry I lied to you about the withy magic. I shouldn’t have. I should have trusted you.”

  Liall pulled him close. “No. I am the one who should apologize. The truths I withheld from you are far worse. No more. I will never keep anything from you again.”

  Scarlet clung to him. Deception, he thought, suddenly remembering the cryptic, ruddy-haired Fate Dealer in Ankar, and the cards the Fate had read for him: Be on your guard. You will be told a lie or you will fall in love with one, and you will follow it to the ends of the earth.

  Well, he was at the end of the earth, no doubt, and if Liall had told him he was an exiled prince when they first met on the Nerit, Scarlet would have laughed at him. If Scarlet had shown Liall the withy magic when they barely knew each other, Liall would have left him entirely alone, and Annaya might be dead. Perhaps not all lies were an evil, or else they’d both be damned by now.

  “I don’t want to keep anything from you either. Liall... I saw Cestimir in that place,” Scarlet said haltingly. “The stone circle.”

  Liall drew back and looked as if he might weep. “You did?”

  “In the Overworld, I think. That must have been what it was. He looked happy.”

  Liall covered his face with his hands and sat for several moments like that before his hands dropped in a useless gesture. “I wanted so much to save him,” Liall said. “Like Nadei. But I failed both times.” He drew Scarlet to him again, hugging him fiercely. “All this time I have been trying to shield you so much. I failed to see you did not need protecting. I have been a fool.”

  Scarlet was too heartsick over Cestimir to be glad that Liall was finally seeing things right. It was only a tiny glow against the heavy pall of sorrow over his heart. “It doesn’t matter now.” And truly, it didn’t. Liall’s secrets had been needlessly withheld from him so long that they had lost their importance. He hoped Liall felt the same way about his magic. Scarlet wanted to end that difficult part of their lives together with no more words, like closing the pages of a book. Story over. Tell me another one, mum, this one’s played out.

  Carefully, he pulled away from Liall. “I’ve got something else to tell you,” Scarlet said, and watched how Liall’s face went still and cold in that way he had, the old walls rising up between them.

  Liall’s mouth trembled and he bowed his head. “T’aishka, please do not leave me.” He drew in a shuddering breath. “I will beg if you like.”

  “It wouldn’t do any good, you fool,” Scarlet said impatiently, “for I’m not going anywhere.”

  That took a moment to sink in. “Oh,” Liall said thinly. “Forgive me. There is still a part of me that believes I do not deserve your love or your loyalty. It is very easy for me to believe that you would wish to depart.”

  “Well, I don’t,” Scarlet scolded. “Now stop that, you want-wit, before I clout you one.”

  Liall smiled a little. “Speak on, then, my lord.”

  “I just wanted to tell you that I’ve been wrong. I was out of my element here, and instead of turning to you, I got angry. I was angry that I had to depend on you. It made me feel weak and it made me take risks to prove myself, when there was no need. You’d never asked it of me. This place is... so foreign. I can’t learn it all in a day. You’ll have to teach me, Liall. Please?”

  Liall leaned forward and cupped Scarlet’s cheek, drawing him in for a brief and loving kiss. “I will. And I want to tell you the truth about Nadei,” he said, his voice very soft. “I want you to know why I lied to you, why I tried so very hard to deceive you and keep you ignorant of my past.”

  Scarlet blinked.

  “You were not expecting me to say it in that way,” Liall murmured. “Have I never admitted fault to you before? I want to tell you everything now.”

  “Now?”

  “Yes.”

  Scarlet nodded slowly, greatly troubled. “All right. If you’re sure. I want to get out of this bed, though.”

  Liall helped Scarlet into a heavy robe, and they moved out of the bedroom and into the den, sitting side by side on the large couch.

  ***

  Liall sat stiffly, not looking at Scarlet. It was harder than he thought to begin. Where to start? How do I say to him the things I cannot admit even to myself?

  Liall formed several sentences in his mind, discarded them all, and finally looked to Scarlet helplessly. “It is difficult for me to talk about him,” he a
dmitted. “I know that no one believes it, but I did love Nadei very much.”

  “I believe it.”

  There was an ache in Liall’s hands, and he looked down and saw that they were clasped together so tightly that he had bruised his knuckles. “You remind me of him a little,” Liall said softly. “Of his good qualities. You are cocksure and you are stubborn and you are proud to a fault. Those were the things I loved about him.”

  Liall took a heavy breath before continuing, steeling himself. “He was my brother,” he blurted. “My elder brother, but only by two years. By the time we were youths, our age difference was invisible. I believe that is when it began. Someone mistook me for the elder once, because I was a little taller than Nadei, and I think someone must have whispered something to him later, that perhaps I was getting too big in other ways as well, that perhaps I had begun thinking of myself as more suited to the kingship than he. Royal courts are full of gossips and mischief makers.”