The iron crown sat on Tarag Paedori’s brow. His eyes looked coldly at each of the people before him, his face once again hidden by the veil that obscured most of his features. Still, there was no mistaking the man.
“We meet again, Merros Dulver.” He nodded. If he was at all put out by Merros not bowing to him he hid it well.
“I wish we were meeting under different circumstances, Majesty.”
The Iron King nodded his head slightly and gestured. “I bring with me your charge, Kallir Lundt.”
Merros blinked and felt a heat of shame bloom in his chest. He’d forgotten the man again. A charge that he should have never forgotten, now returned to him by the King who had promised to do what he could to mend the injured wretch.
Kallir Lundt stepped from up from the edge of the Temmis Pass when his name was called. He was a tall man, but small in comparison to the king. To be fair, most men were dwarfed by him and that included all but a handful of the Sa’ba Taalor Merros had met.
Kallir Lundt wore an iron mask over the ruin of his face. There was a twinge of guilt there again. The Pra-Moresh had attacked and torn the bastard’s face away. That he had lived at all was an accomplishment.
And then Kallir spoke, his mouth moving, his iron face changing as he spoke and Merros felt his knees go weak.
“It is my pleasure to see you again, Merros.” He smiled and showed teeth – some of white enamel and some that seemed cast in iron – and gums of red flesh beneath the moving iron.
“How?” It was the only word Merros could manage. Desh Krohan said nothing, but merely stood where he was and watched in silence.
“The Sa’ba Taalor are generous and their gods can be merciful. I am here as proof of that, Merros.”
He felt himself staring, but could not stop. The face moved. It was impossible, of course, but so were the hands of Drask and Andover Lashk. Still, this was different, or it should have been. By the gods, how had the man endured having the metal cast upon his flesh?
“I am still Kallir Lundt, Captain Dulver.”
“I know.” He managed to look at the darkness where the eyes should have been visible. There had to be eyes, of course. It was merely hard to see them through the rest of the black iron face. Merros shook his head. “I know and I am truly grateful to see you again, my friend.”
He reached out and took Kallir’s hand in both of his, shaking it warmly. The tint of his skin was wrong. He had a sickly cast to his flesh. Still, he was alive, and he moved and saw and spoke. That seemed nearly impossible.
“Are you here for the parley, Captain?”
Merros nodded. “General. I’m General Dulver these days.”
Kallir looked at him and slowly nodded.
The King in Iron stepped forward. “Is it you I am here to speak with, Merros Dulver? Or does your Emperor’s replacement come to speak as well?” He looked at Desh Krohan as he spoke.
Desh replied in the language that Merros had learned through sorcery. He spoke softly, but carefully. “Nachia Krous, Rightful Empress of Fellein and Ruler of the Twelve Kingdoms, is here to negotiate with you. She will join us soon, Majesty.”
Tarag Paedori nodded again and crossed his arms.
Desh stayed nearly motionless, but Merros doubted that anything remotely like calm was going on under that cowl.
The Sisters came out from the main tent and with them came Nachia Krous, dressed not in finery, but in armor of her own. Merros tried to hide his surprise. He had no idea she owned armor, let alone knew how to wear it. The armor was functional and fit her like a second skin. That was for the best when wearing the stuff. It stopped a body from getting battered and reduced the encumbrance caused.
She wore a crown, but not the one she given to her at her coronation. The simple band was as unadorned as the Iron King’s though made of finer metals.
Merros Dulver called his men to attention and they listened, moving quickly to form a rank along the passage the Empress would walk. The men were in armor as well, each of them bearing a heavy sword and a light spear. They stood at attention and faced the Iron King and Kallir Lundt. The two men scarcely seemed to notice.
As Empress Nachia Krous stopped before him – looking really quite tiny in comparison, but holding her head and posture as she had been trained to for her entire life – the King in Iron offered a formal bow. His eyes did not leave her face.
After just exactly enough time to avoid insult, Nachia Krous returned the bow.
Desh Krohan spoke. “Empress Nachia Krous of Fellein, ruler of the Twelve Kingdoms, this is Tarag Paedori, Chosen of the Forge Truska-Pren and King in Iron.” He stepped forward and moved next to the Empress. “We meet here on this morning to discuss the difficulties between the Sa’ba Taalor and the Empire.”
Nachia Krous spoke clearly. “You have called for parley, is that what you and the other kings seek?”
Tarag Paedori spoke just as clearly, his voice holding that odd echoing quality that all of the Sa’ba Taalor shared. “Empress Nachia Krous of the Fellein Empire, your representatives sought to capture and hold a King of the Seven Forges against his will. He was within his rights to defend his honor and struck down the agents sent against him.”
He looked to Merros. “We had your men delivered back to you. Should we see more of them we will do the same.”
Nachia’s face remained calm, but Merros could see the tension under the surface as it rose. “Your people came to us as guests. One of them, a woman called Swech, murdered the Emperor, my cousin, and killed several others before fleeing the palace and the city. At the very least we demand her return to us, so that she may be punished in accordance with our laws.”
The man loomed over her and let his arms rest at his sides, far too close to that insane sword of his for Merros’s comfort. “Swech Tothis Durwrae followed the orders given to her by the Daxar Taalor. If she killed your cousin it was because the gods decreed it was his time to die. In addition she has not been within the Taalor Valley or within the Seven Kingdoms of the Seven Forges in well over a month.”
“Then where is she?”
He could not see the King smile, but Merros could hear it in the man’s voice. “She remains among your people.”
Nachia lost a bit of her composure. “Should we find her, we will kill her. She will suffer for what she did.”
“You will not find her unless she wishes to be found.” A gesture with one hand, a dismissal of the conversation and just exactly casual enough to be insulting. No one missed it, least of all Nachia.
“If you do not seek parley, why do you come here, Tarag Paedori?”
“I offer you the mercy of a surrender. Should you offer yourself to me as a bride, your Empire will be spared the pain of being destroyed by the Sa’ba Taalor.”
Desh Krohan made a noise. Merros made a noise of his own. Neither was precisely polite.
Nachia Krous shook her head. “Go back to your Seven Forges and your kingdom in the dust.” She turned her back on him, the insult very clear in her dismissal. “You and your filth are no longer welcome here.”
The behemoth laughed at her, and Merros felt winter bloom in his guts.
“Tuskandru said you were a fool, Nachia Krous. He was right. I have offered you the only mercy possible and you have denied it.”
“You have offered nothing!” She jammed one finger toward the King in Iron. “You have offered me a chance to grovel at your feet! I should have my men kill you where you stand as a lesson to your people. We are an Empire! Run back to your foolish gods and hide in the cold and dust, you swine!”
Merros stepped closer to his Empress and let his hand rest on his sword’s pommel. If there were bloodshed, he would die defending her.
Behind her, the priests and the soldiers and the entourage that had come along stood and watched. The soldiers at least were prepared to stand with him and kill, or die as their Empress demanded.
“Here is my offer to you, Tarag Paedori.” She stepped closer to him and Merros mo
ved with her. Desh Krohan watched on, but there was a presence about him that rivaled that of the Iron King and even the monarch noticed it. For the Empress herself, she held her temper at bay and stared coldly at the man who stood before her without an army, without support of any kind. “Lay down your sword and surrender. Offer me your fealty and I will spare your life and that of your people when the rest of your kingdoms are foolish enough to attack my Empire. That is the one mercy I will offer you.”
When Tarag Paedori spoke again his voice was calm, but low with menace. “Mock me if you will. Mock my fellow kings and our people, but mock the Daxar Taalor and you risk their wrath.”
The King in Iron drew his sword and raised it high above his head with both hands. Merros stepped toward him, pulling his weapon, looking for any weakness in the heavy armor the man wore. He prepared to strike and stepped between Empress and King.
And Tarag Paedori drove his sword into the ground before him, breaking the hard soil with ease.
The King in Iron spoke in his own language, but the words were understood by Merros and Desh Krohan. “The Daxar Taalor are not kind to their enemies.”
The ground shook.
Not close by, but far away.
Tarag Paedori pulled his blade from the ground. If he so much as noticed Merros standing before him and ready to fight, he hid it well. He stepped back four paces and Kallir Lundt moved with him.
Kallir Lundt said, “I am sorry for this, Merros Dulver, but they gave me back my life.” His voice was heavy with regret.
And the ground shook on, a growing vibration that reminded Merros of the Mounds deep within the Blasted Lands, though the vibration came from the wrong direction.
“By the gods, no!”
He turned his back on Tarag Paedori and stared at the column of clouds rising into the sky in the distance.
He did not need a map to know, of course. He knew even before he looked, knew it in his heart and felt a sorrow that could not be turned back.
Great gouts of flame and smoke ripped into the sky, but from several days’ march away.
From the direction of Tyrne.
The ground shook only once and then exploded.
The black rock punched through the ground as easily as a dagger through a heart. Tyrne screamed as it died and burned.
The Summer Palace shuddered and the stone and mortar that had formed the walls broke, falling and crumbling even as the first tide of magma boiled from below. The heat was enough to melt steel, to incinerate paper and to boil flesh from bones. There were many people left in Tyrne when the eruption started, but for most of them death was quick.
It was the people beyond the outer wall of Tyrne who suffered. The great clouds of burning ash and fiery gasses scorched flesh and lungs, seared eyes in their sockets and burned hair to scalps. Those who thought to breathe in, the better to scream, filled their lungs with smoldering soot and died quickly before the ash buried them.
Still the ground shook and the skies screamed and the black rocks rammed their way from the ground, rising higher and higher, pushing aside the accomplishments of men and nature alike, even as those monuments were incinerated or crushed.
Fire. Ash. Fury. The lands around Tyrne had not been marked by anything so violent since the Great Cataclysm.
The mountain rose slowly, pushing itself from the ground, forcing itself upon the Fellein Empire with no regard for the history, for the city or the people who had once lived there.
Tyrne died, and the skies above wept lightning and thunder on the growing mountain to mourn the city’s passing.
On the Imperial Highway many people screamed when the eruption took place, and just as many found themselves praying to the gods.
Swech rode among them and prayed, but not to the same deities.
On the Jeurgis River the boats that carried passengers from Tyrne rode on, and Captain Callan thought about how very fortunate he was to be on the water when the fires started. The heat was fearsome but not enough to stop them.
Later he would hear tales of the birds that fell from the sky, poisoned by the very air they breathed, and he would feel a deep and abiding fear creep through him. The closest bird fell dead only half a day from where he was traveling when the city died.
Far to the east of Tyrne the Pilgrim stopped in his tracks when the ground split and the fires tore the skies asunder. He was too far away to hear the sounds or to feel the ground shudder, but still he knew.
It was his place to know these things.
It was his place to try to stop these things.
He hoped, briefly, that he was not too late and then lowered his head and moved on.
There was no time left. No time at all and he had so very far to travel.
Desh Krohan shuddered within his cloak. The winds picked up and whipped furiously at every single one of them as he watched the Sooth’s warning come true.
He stepped closer to Nachia Krous even as the Sisters moved closer to him. The same instinct drove them all: there were loved ones who needed protecting.
Merros Dulver looked back toward the King in Iron with a horrified expression. He did not speak. There were no words left in him at that moment.
The winds lashed harder still and several people staggered as the heated air came in a rush.
Nachia Krous was not staggered. She looked at the sky and looked at the place where Tyrne had been and felt her heart clutched in a gigantic fist of sorrow, but she did not flinch.
When she turned back to look at the Tarag Paedori she did not make threats. She marked him in her mind and studied him carefully.
And she vowed to herself that she would see him dead at her feet before she died, no matter how long that might take.
The winds pushed harder still and caught the veil of clouds over the Blasted Lands pushing them aside, scattering them and revealing the land below for the first time since the Cataclysm.
And revealing the vast forces waiting on the fields below.
Tarag Paedori swept one hand back to gesture toward his armies.
Merros Dulver looked down and saw the people that he would be asked to defend his nation from.
There were so many more than he had expected.
They were small from here. They were far enough below that they looked like ants, really. Ants with banners and sigils and weapons and armor. Ants regimented into companies, and battalions and legions.
He could not count them all. There were simply too many.
Even as he stared, the clouds took back what was theirs, fighting against the winds and winning. The veil of mists that hid away the Blasted Lands thickened quickly, boiling his view of the enemy into obscurity.
When Tarag Paedori spoke again his voice was bereft of all humor. His tone was a lash across the back, a vicious cutting hiss. He had to bellow to be heard over the roaring winds and the death of Tyrne. “For one thousand years we have trained ourselves. We have dedicated our lives to our gods in preparation for this day.” His eyes sought out Nachia Krous and narrowed with barely restrained hatred. “Your Empire rose on the ashes of our people, on the blood and bones of Korwa and the First Empire. You killed us a thousand years ago, but you did not kill us all.”
He sheathed his sword.
“Gather your armies. Prepare your weapons. If you can even remember your gods, find them and pray to them. You will find the Sa’ba Taalor are ready for you and you will find the Daxar Taalor are unforgiving.”
He stepped toward the Temmis Pass and looked at Merros Dulver. “Like your people before, we came to you and offered gifts. Like your people before, we offered friendship and a promise of peace. And like your people before, we have drawn first blood. As our ancestors were betrayed by the Fellein, so we have betrayed.”
Finally he looked back to Nachia Krous. “Prepare yourselves. We will destroy your nation, your twelve kingdoms and you.”
Seven Forges Book III
City of Wonders
This book is for Caroline’s Ellie.
May you always know joy, little one.
This book is also dedicated to the memory of Tom Piccirilli, gone far too soon, missed, loved and remembered.
Special thanks to my Robot Overlords for their amazing patience, to Charles R Rutledge and Chris and Connie Golden, Scott Goudsward, Amy Young, Paul McNamee, Jonathan Maberry, Sara Jo West, Dan Brereton, Cliff Biggers, Allison Pang, Linda Robertson and Martel Sardina. You all know why.
Prologue
Teagus stared at the smoke that pointed down toward the ruins of Tyrne like an accusatory finger.
He could not seem to catch his breath.
Not a hundred feet away from him, the Empress stood in consultation with her wizard and her general. It was the general that caught his eye right then. Merros Dulver. His lip curled. Dulver was the one who’d ordered him from Tyrne.
“Etrilla.” The word crept past his lips.
Etrilla, the god of the cities. Etrilla, who demanded that the priests of his faith dwell within their cities for life, as they were the eyes and soul of the city. As the head of the Church of Etrilla in Tyrne, Teagus should have been there, should have protected the city as best he could from the disaster that fell upon it.
Merros Dulver would likely claim that he had saved Teagus’s life.
Blasphemy.
The man was godless.
Teagus had a god. Teagus had Etrilla, whom he had now betrayed because of Merros Dulver.
He walked toward the general even as he took in a deep breath that tasted of ashes and loss.
Merros Dulver looked around the area and forced his hands to relax. They had a powerful desire to ball into fists, but there was nothing to hit, no one to hurt.
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