He nodded and looked along the great stone wall. There were spots where they could climb. “We can go up here if you like.” Again that ghost of his former self railed at the notion. There were large stretches where the climb was easy, especially now that the winds were gone, but other places where they would struggle.
Delil looked to him. “Don’t ask me. I love climbing. Are you up to the challenge?”
He grinned. There was no more to say. Within minutes they were scaling the sheer stone surface. The way was much harder than he’d expected initially. The endless winds had scoured large areas nearly smooth.
Iron hands dug into stone where necessary. The mounts took the walls in leaps and bounds, their thick claws allowing purchase, their powerful bodies perfectly designed for pushing themselves in areas where human forms could not compete.
There were no Broken here. The Pra-Moresh did not attack. The winds did not slow them. The way was hard but without the challenge and risk of possible attack, Andover found himself oddly disappointed.
Life is pain. Life is struggle. A life of ease was no longer what he wanted from the world.
When they finished the arduous climb he looked down into the vast, motionless valley of the Blasted Lands and frowned. Far, far away he could make out the Seven Forges.
When he turned and scanned the desolate horizon in front of him he frowned again. Far to the south a column of smoke painted the air. Far to the north a caul of lighter colored smoke hazed the skyline into a soft blur.
He pointed to the finger of black smoke in the south. “That was Tyrne, I think.”
Delil nodded. “Yes. It is so. Durhallem now rests there.”
“How can a mountain be in two places at once?”
“Not the mountain. There are two mountains, yes, but Durhallem, the Wounder, the god, now rests where Tyrne once stood.”
Completely unaware of the action, Andover tilted his head in the way of the Sa’ba Taalor, asking a silent question.
“We move to the desires of the Daxar Taalor, Andover. They do not abandon us, they move with us. They are claiming Fellein as theirs. They are making themselves comfortable in their new lands.”
Andover nodded. “So the first of the gods to move? Which was that?”
“You do not know the shapes of the Forges as well as most. You have also not seen it, but the first to move was Wheklam. Donaie Swarl took her black ships out into the waters and found the spot that Wheklam wanted. I saw it in a dream. It was impressive to see.”
“Are you a follower of Wheklam now?”
“I follow all of the gods, but Wheklam has asked that I learn his ways.”
“And will you?”
“Why would I ever deny a god, Andover?”
He nodded his head, expecting no other answer from her. Gorwich moved close and nudged Andover’s arm with his muzzle. He scratched idly at the broad face.
The Forges were still alive, still active, even if the gods were moving from one place to another. Both he and Delil had asked for and received the “Blood of the Mountain,” literally the white-hot metal they pulled from Durhallem.
Andover had metal hands. Delil did not. Neither of them were burned by the metal as they pulled it out and shaped it like so much clay. Both of them should have been ruined by the contact, but that was the blessing of the Daxar Taalor. They were given wondrous gifts in exchange for their loyalty.
Gorwich likewise had been rewarded. The armored mask over the head of his mount was crafted in short order. Gorwich’s mask closely resembled the shape of his face, but Andover had lined the edges with barbs, the better to dissuade fools from trying to cut at the mount’s muzzle or head. Was it necessary? No, but Gorwich seemed to like it.
“Delil?”
“Yes, Andover?” She was currently climbing onto her mount, and preparing to ride again.
“If the Forges are moving so far apart from each other, does that mean the Sa’ba Taalor will have to choose only one god each? Fellein is vast. A thousand or more times the size of the Taalor Valley.”
Delil shook her head. “The distance we rode to the Seven Forges. How long was it?”
“I could not say. The storms of the Blasted Lands hid so much from us.”
“They hid nothing the gods did not want hidden. Sometimes a trip to the Taalor Valley is a trip that takes months. Other times a day or only a few hours.”
Andover frowned, considering that.
Delil continued. “The time it takes to reach any place we are required to go is changed by the gods themselves, Andover. If they wanted us at Canhoon now, if they needed us there, we would be within sight of the city. That is their way.”
Andover rubbed his iron palm on Gorwich’s neck and then climbed onto the mount’s back. If his weight bothered the great beast, it gave no sign.
“So let us see how quickly they want us there,” he said. “But let us be careful. We are now in a land where the Daxar Taalor are not the only gods, and there are enemies here who would see us dead.”
Delil smiled and patted the hilt of her long, thin sword. “Finally,” she sighed. “A war.”
Drask Silver Hand raised his eyes from the ground before him and frowned.
“I tire of this.” Neither of his companions spoke. He was not completely sure that either could any more.
“Brackka! To me!” Drask roared the words and the air around them shimmered as the dust at their feet rippled, impacted by the sound waves.
His voice echoed far further than should have been possible. In the far distant remains of the Mounds, half hidden by the settled ash and soot, a shadow was burned into the very stone where Brackka had stood when Drask and the others fell into the glowing essences that powered the endless caverns of the forbidden underground realm. The resulting contact between living flesh and reservoirs of power locked away in the Mounds had been… explosive.
Drask was not even now completely certain what the energies had been. He only knew that they were still changing him, altering his mind and his body alike. One look at his silver hand was enough to make that point clearly. Striations of silver ran all the way up to his bicep now, slithering slowly up from his wrist like arteries of liquid silver.
He knew something else as well. He knew that Brackka was dead, and how he had died, burnt into naught but a shadow.
One last thing he knew. He knew that when he called for Brackka, his mount would come to him.
In the distance, in the Mounds, left far behind, the shadow of Brackka rose, and pulled itself away from the stone. It moved quickly and took on flesh as it ran toward Drask’s voice. Flesh, and familiar armor, leather and straps and supplies and a dozen weapons long since forged by Drask.
By rights it should have been days or at the very least a long night before Brackka could reach Drask.
It took only minutes.
Drask did not wish to wait for his mount, and so he did not have to. For some beings, time works differently.
There was a moment of joy when Brackka got there. He patted his friend’s thick neck and ran his flesh fingers through the thick mane and murmured nonsense to his longtime companion.
And all the while he contemplated what it meant that he was able to so easily bring his friend back from complete destruction.
What, he wondered, makes a god a god?
Merros walked the Mid Wall, looking into the stone faces of each of the Silent Army. They were easy to tell apart. Some were male, others female. All wore the same armor, archaic breastplates and helmets that did not cover their faces. Each looked slightly rough, reflecting the fact that they appeared carved from the very stone of the wall. But each had a different face.
Each still had the features of the person who had died for them, that they might live again.
Now if he could only remember the face of the Pilgrim, a man he had all but ignored, Merros might be able to get somewhere with the notion of speaking to the literal army of stone men surrounding the city.
The top of
the wall was clear of refugees. It seemed the notion of staying near the moving statues unsettled them. Merros could understand that. Sorcery of any sort made him uncomfortable.
“I called for you.” Nachia’s voice, coming from behind him, was more amused than annoyed.
“I have not received a message, Majesty.” He turned and bowed formally. Nachia stood with two soldiers: Darfel, her bodyguard – chosen by Merros himself – and Lauro Larn, the grandson of General Dataro Larn, who before his death had been one of the men who held the seat Merros himself now claimed. Both men nodded and stayed properly at the Empress’s side.
“Likely the messengers are looking in and around your offices.” Nachia raised one eyebrow and crossed her arms. “Where one would expect to find a commander of the armies in a crisis situation.”
He felt his skin blush a bit. “I’ve been trying to remember exactly what the Pilgrim looked like.” He gestured to the closest of the Silent Army, a female. “Before he turned into one of these.”
Nachia did not bother answering him, but instead stood face to face with the feminine statue, looking up to stare it in the eyes. Male and female alike, all of them were taller than the Empress.
“I am the Empress Nachia Krous of the Fellein,” she said formally. “I would speak to the one who called himself the Pilgrim and I would do it as soon as possible. Please convey that message to him.”
Merros stared at her, not quite sure when she had lost her faculties.
Nachia looked back at him and frowned. “It can’t hurt to ask.”
“They’re statues, Nachia.” He shook his head, immediately regretting the tone. A wise man did not scold his Empress, especially in a public setting, and doubly so if her name was Nachia Krous.
Nachia shot him a withering stare. “I know they’re statues, Merros. I wasn’t the one trying to find one out of a thousand or more. Also, they’re statues that move.”
“Well, yes, there is that. It’s why I was hoping it might be possible to talk to the one called the Pilgrim.”
Nachia stepped back and so did her guards. It only took a moment for Merros to understand why. To his right and slightly behind him a stone man was rising from the ground. The shape was definitely one of the Silent Army.
He was tall and he stood straight, one hand resting on the hilt of a sword made from the same substance as everything else. His face was familiar, but if Merros were honest with himself, he would never have located the one from the thousand others. There simply weren’t enough remarkable features.
The expression, however, he would have remembered. The face twisted into a cold scowl.
“You have called me, Empress. I have come.” The Pilgrim’s voice was oddly hollow, as if coming from a vast distance. There was a faint echo as well, making Merros think that the source of the voice came not from the mouth but from deep within the chest. Merros repressed a shudder. Sorcery.
Nachia stared up into the Pilgrim’s visage and then pointed a finger toward Merros. “He wanted to speak with you.”
The Pilgrim regarded him coldly. “You are General Merros Dulver.”
“Yes.”
“I remember you. What do you ask?”
“I was, well, I was hoping you could explain to me why you have come here and where you are taking Canhoon.”
“The gods have summoned us to come and protect their city.”
“But where are we going?”
“Where the gods command.” The Pilgrim stared to the east.
“Can you tell us what the gods want?”
“What they have always wanted. The safety and fealty of their children.”
Without waiting another moment, the Pilgrim started to melt back into the stone.
“Wait! We have more questions!”
The stone face turned to look at him again, and that scowl deepened. “We are here to protect the Empress of Fellein. For that reason I answered your query, but we do not serve you, nor do we serve the Empress. We serve only the gods. This body is not designed for speech. We are called the Silent Army for a reason. No more questions will be answered.”
With that, the form of the Pilgrim melted once more into the Mid Wall.
Merros stared at the spot where the stone man had been and made an obscene gesture. When one considered his position in the city it certainly seemed there were a lot of rude people around him.
The Empress spoke. “Well, I’d wanted to know if you’d had any luck figuring out where we are going. I guess I have my answer.”
Merros shook his head. “Near as I can guess we are going straight east. If that does not change, the only thing we are going to meet is the mountains. After that the only thing we are going to see for quite some time is the river below and then Lake Gerhaim and Goltha.”
“How do we get out of this, Merros?” Nachia’s voice was soft and worried.
“We work on solutions. If that doesn’t work I might suggest that the Sisters teach us how they fly.”
“The Sisters fly?”
Merros nodded. “Oh, yes. Apparently it’s contagious. They’ve lifted the entire damned city.”
Nachia swatted his arm and laughed. “For that humor alone I’d keep you in my court, Merros.”
He had no response for her.
Instead of speaking he merely broke protocol and put a companionable arm around her shoulders. She did not protest, but instead leaned into him. It was only for a moment that they acted human, and then only because they could trust the witnesses.
The columns of the Sa’ba Taalor moved along at a steady clip: the riders with mounts to the front, the rest behind them, trudging over terrain that was sometimes rough and rocky and often pleasantly flat near the edge of the river.
From a distance they could see the City of Wonders as it moved steadily through the sky.
Tusk moved along beside Tarag Paedori, who rode his mount contemplating the vast stone cloud on the horizon as if it might be an apple he wanted to take a bite from.
Their scouts had prepared them. Up ahead was a small town. Beyond that was a great stone structure, the likes of which none of them had ever seen before. All they knew was that both were occupied. The scouts had been warned not to engage the enemy.
The King in Iron shrugged his shoulders and rattled in his armor. Tusk smiled. He knew he was not the only one who was restless.
“Durhallem says the city ahead is for me. The tower is for you.” He spoke conversationally, knowing full well that Paedori’s god had spoken to him as well.
“So it shall be, Tusk.”
“I think we should send the scouts ahead a day or more, to see if there are opportunities to reach the city in the sky.”
“You are thinking of the mountains ahead.” Tarag Paedori nodded his head as he spoke. “This is wise. Send Stastha with them if you like. She is a good strategist and can assess better than most, I think.”
Tusk made a small gesture and Stastha immediately rode forward. “My kings.” She lowered her head for only a moment. The horns on her helmet rose from near her neck and thrust upward like the tusks of a great boar. She looked toward Tusk and studied his face.
“We will send you ahead, Stastha. Go to the mountains. Seek weaknesses and ways that we might reach that city. They will not escape us for long.”
Stastha looked toward the horizon. The mountains were several days away at a guess, but the city only moved at one speed and the mounts were capable of covering the distance at a much greater pace.
She nodded and Tuskandru continued. “Be aware. They must know we are here, and arrows from that height would cut through any possible armor.”
“I will only approach the city in darkness, my king.” Tusk felt himself stir. Stastha was a woman he admired for her strength and her tactical skills. Her scars fairly glowed in the sunlight and he found himself in a mood to examine them closely.
Now was not the time.
“Make Durhallem proud, as you make me proud, Stastha.”
She s
miled at that and nodded her head. A moment later she was moving forward, calling names. Several other riders obeyed her summons and joined her.
“It is a small town?” Tusk asked.
Tarag nodded.
Tusk sighed. “I want that city, but this should whet the palate, yes?”
“I am curious about the tower. Why is it all alone? What is there and who protects it?”
“It is my experience that something all alone is more deadly than a gathering of like minds.”
Tarag nodded and frowned. “Unless you are talking of the Pra-Moresh. They are much worse in packs.”
Tusk chuckled deep in his chest and then spurred Brodem forward. The beast let out a rumble and charged forward at great speed. Behind him others began to ride faster, a few pulling out their horns for when the time came to announce themselves.
Tarag Paedori looked to Kallir Lundt, the Fellein who now sported a face of iron and served him loyally. “It is time, Kallir. Find four others to come with us, the rest will continue on the path and seek whatever they can find by way of combat.”
Kallir nodded his metal face and then looked over his shoulder, seeking the ones he felt best qualified and deserving. He had watched all of the Sa’ba Taalor close to Tarag. “Ehnole, Tenna, Mardus, Kopora!” he called and the followers of the King in Iron responded, sitting straighter on their mounts and looking toward him.
It was Tarag who finished what he started. “We ride!” There was nothing more to say. The six of them moved forward and the rest of the long columns moved on. The followers of Tarag Paedori were, easily, the most disciplined of all the Sa’ba Taalor, that is to say, the best at following orders they did not like. None would dare disobey a king. To do so was to disobey a god. Still, Paedori’s army waited with more patience than most, fully prepared to take down the vast, floating city above them.
Andover Lashk looked at the lake where Canhoon should have been. It was an impressive lake, to be sure, but it was not what he’d been expecting to see. A few buildings remained around the edge of the water. Most had been destroyed by whatever catastrophe had removed the city itself.
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