As intense as the pain was, it only lasted a few seconds and when he looked up she was still there, looking at the palm she’d pressed into his head.
There was metal left over, hot and steaming, and she had painted it across her cheeks in two nearly white-hot streaks that had cooled down and now looked almost like the golden trails of tears. Her flesh was not burned and he could not understand that. He did not want to know what his forehead looked like. The coin she used had been quite large.
The pain was gone. Theran was grateful for that much. It was all he had. They’d let him stand when they were done and he wanted to run, wanted to hide away, but he found he was too exhausted to do more than stand and shiver.
The last of them finally lifted the faceplate on his great helm and revealed a face that glowered just as well as the iron visage that hid him away.
They spoke among themselves and he listened. Currently he was not capable of much more. The pain was gone, but the memory of it lingered and now it seemed he had a fever.
The biggest of them, the one with the iron helmet, studied him carefully. Each of the man’s hands looked large enough to cover his face.
“I do not care if he likes us.”
Their words were not the common tongue of Fellein or any of the other languages he knew but he understood them well enough. They had their own sorcery then.
NO. NOT YOUR SORCERY. THAT IS WHY YOU ARE HERE. THAT IS WHAT WE WILL NOW UNDERSTAND.
The words smashed through his mind and Theran fell backward, his limbs moving and dancing, his teeth clenched in a sudden fit that threatened to break his teeth in his mouth. He could not breathe, could not control his movements.
The gray-skins around him watched on, not speaking, not moving, but staring as if he were a new form of bug they had never seen.
The thunderous voice was gone, but the presence that roared at him was not. He could feel it probing him, moving under his flesh, peeling his self away layer by layer as it examined him in great detail.
It was a violation that made control of his body impossible, and he continued to seize and kick for the eternity that the assault lasted.
When it was done Theran groaned. It was the only sound he was capable of.
When he finally had recovered enough he stared out at the waters, at Canhoon where it now rested, a city that had fallen from the sky.
He and the people around him stood on the edge of the waters amid the destruction caused by the city’s arrival. There was debris, of course. There were also corpses, though not as many as he might have expected. A great number of the citizens of Goltha also stood nearby, though they were not there by choice. They were injured or too scared to fight. In any event, they were there and they watched on as well.
The woman spoke to him.
“You are a sorcerer. You can make magic.”
It wasn’t truly a question, but he sensed that she wanted a response and so he nodded and said, “Yes.”
“You have spoken to a god. You have been judged by the Daxar Taalor. They wish for you to obey us.”
Theran sighed and nodded again. “Yes.” He liked to think himself a good man, but he was not strong. He never had been. One of the reasons he loved Goltha was that his vices had always been easy to accommodate. Women. Otha and other narcotics. Whatever helped him feel pleasure, he could access. A good man, but weak.
So very weak.
“We want to cross the waters. As they are, we would sink. You must freeze them.”
Her hand touched his hair again and he flinched. She lifted his sweaty bangs from his face and looked at the damage she had done to him with a coin and her hand. Her palm was unmarked. The gold on her face shone. Once again her fingers moved through his hair.
“You and I, we are linked. I have marked you and made you mine. The gods have willed this. You will obey me. You will do as I say. If you do not, there will be pain.”
He nodded. “Yes.”
Then he tried to reach out to Corin. He wanted only to warn them.
The pain was so much that he fell forward and vomited. His body felt broiled in heat, lit afire from the very inside of his bones outward. He could not move. He could not scream.
An eternity later the pain was gone. There was no lingering aftermath. It simply was not there.
“No.” The woman shook her head at him. “You will never speak to them again. If you try, you will hurt.”
Theran sobbed. “Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.” He nodded his head so hard he feared he might break something.
“Freeze the lake.”
“I can’t.”
He screwed his eyes shut again, fearing the titanic wave of agony. It did not come.
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why can’t you freeze the lake? Your people move cities through the air. Your kind brings lightning from the air. Why can you not do this?”
“Sorcery takes power. It has a cost. If I tried to freeze the whole lake, I would die. It would drain all of my life from me.”
She nodded her head and looked to her two companions. Though they spoke, he could not understand the language. The one with the skull helmet looked to him and then pointed to the people gathered together nearby.
“Then use them.”
“What?” He could not keep the shock from his voice.
“If you cannot do this thing alone. Use them. We will only kill them in any event.”
“I cannot do tha–” That was all he could mutter before the pain ruined his world again.
The woman said, “Use them.”
“Yes.” He cried as he spoke, but none of them cared.
She crouched down next to him as he once again became aware of the universe beyond his personal agonies. For the first time he looked into her eyes and realized that they shone with their own light. He might have been fascinated were he not so utterly terrified. “If you betray me, if you attack any of us, your pain will never end. Do you believe me?”
“Yes.” He nodded as hard as he could.
Her hand found his hair again and stroked through it. “Freeze the lake. Whatever it costs.”
“Yes.”
Theran didn’t trust his legs. He crawled through the muck and the debris, barely aware of what was beneath him even as he slithered over the corpse of a dead woman and her dead child.
When he reached the waters he reached forth with his hand and the gray-skinned monster that promised him pain crouched over him. Her hand moved over his chest and belly like a person petting a dog, or restraining it. His body moved over more corpses, dead and drowned, but he didn’t dare change his course.
“Not yet. Not yet, no.” She looked out at the waters, and the black ships that were crawling closer to the city.
One minute passed. Then three, five, ten and finally, “Now. Do it now.”
Theran did not dare disobey.
His hand touched the water and the water screamed.
Where his fingers touched, the ice started and grew quickly. The saturated mud under his body rose as ice formed, and the beach and shoreline all along the way did the same.
The surface of the water was not all that froze. He dared not take that chance. Instead he pushed with all that he had and the lake howled at the sudden change in climate.
A crust of ice ten feet deep formed in seconds and raced toward Canhoon.
Theran was aware of the screams behind him and felt his eyes sting once more with tears. They had to die. It was not a choice, still, he felt their deaths as they happened, felt the life ripped from body after body, torn from flesh that fell lifeless to the ground.
No matter their pain. He had already endured worse. He could not dare it again.
He was a good man, but he was weak. He kept telling himself that as the water froze and the air steamed with the change in temperatures.
The woman’s hand moved lower, until she touched his privates. “Good. That is good.” Had she been the most perfect female he had ever seen he could not have g
rown hard for her. She was a terror to him, a scarred, hideous beast that would haunt him for as long as he lived.
“Come now.” She stood up and looked out at Canhoon in the distance. “It is time for us to run.”
Around them, all along the shoreline, horns sounded a cry to war.
The Sa’ba Taalor moved, stepping onto the ice with ease, their great mounts moving with them.
Theran could not guess how many of the hellish folk there were. The fog from the frozen waters was too thick to give the faintest hint.
He could not see the corpses that he left behind, either. That was for the best. He had felt two of them freeze beneath him as he touched the water and he would never get past that sensation in a hundred lifetimes.
Thirteen
Captain Callan looked at the ice and shook his head, simply shocked beyond his ability to understand for a moment. One thing to hear about sorcery. One thing to even travel faster than a man should ever manage. The ice was a different beast. It was an actual impossibility made reality.
“How is that happening?” He watched as the ice overtook every one of the black ships around them. Waves froze in an instant and even the ship he stood on – a ship that had managed not to get destroyed by a dozen impacts with other vessels, that had traveled miles in minutes against all possibilities, even so incredible a boat as that – was slowed and then suspended in the ice.
Daivem looked his way and frowned. “Powerful sorcery. More powerful than any I’ve seen, besides that city.”
They’d watched as Canhoon dropped softly from the sky and landed. They’d felt the surge of water lift all of the ships around them and theirs besides. It had been an experience not easily prepared for.
The air was warm with spring. The trees were blooming along shorelines that teemed with green, but now the whole of Gerhaim, virtually an inland sea, was frozen in minutes. Heavy mists rose from the ice, making even the closest of the ships little more than a silhouette, but still he could see the Sa’ba Taalor’s shadowy forms as they climbed from their trapped ships and started walking across the ice. Hundreds of the bastards were heading toward the island city.
“I don’t see how we can go after them at this point,” he said. “I mean, it’s one thing to hit their ships and another for a small crew to try to kill that many.”
Daivem nodded and then pointed. “Still, your crew will try, yes?”
Sure enough, the ghosts of his crew were scaling down the sides of the ship.
“What can they possibly do?”
Daivem frowned and shook her head. “Nothing. They are dead. They can do nothing once they leave the ship, except remember that fact.”
He wondered for only one moment what she meant. As they left the ship and walked a short distance, they flickered out of sight.
“Where are they going, Daivem?”
“To where the dead go. I am not dead and cannot say beyond that.” She sighed and looked his way. “I hear that they go to a place of peace. I hope that is true.”
“What do we do now?”
The Inquisitor looked at him and shook her head. “This was never my fight. Never Louron’s fight. This is your battle. We have merely provided you with a means to get here.”
He looked at the woman for a while, not sure how to respond. “How do you mean?”
“You asked for our help and we gave it. But you have lost your crew. What you do now is your decision, but we will not be staying.”
“Where will you go?”
“Home. The same way we got here.”
“With this ship?”
“No. We will follow the Shimmer.”
Callan nodded. He’d understood that something unnatural to him allowed the ship to move so quickly and he’d certainly seen the distortion around them. The Shimmer was as good a name as any for it.
“Do you come with us, Captain Callan? Or do you stay here?”
Callan looked to the city and felt the ship beneath him and was uncertain.
Drask looked down at the ice and nodded slowly. “That makes sense.”
Andover looked his way. “What do you mean?”
“Why swim when you can walk? Freezing the lake was sensible.”
Whereas the Fellein were unsettled by the notion, neither Drask nor Andover was particularly shocked. Both had seen the actions of the gods.
Tega looked on and then shrugged. A moment later the mount under her moved forward.
Why it obeyed was something that Andover could not fathom. The mount had been Delil’s and she was not only dead, but now she was gone as well.
The night before, with Canhoon only a short distance away, he had taken her shrouded body and laid her upon the ground. He had uncovered her face one last time. She was perfectly still, but had not decayed. The Daxar Taalor had given him that. Or perhaps it was Drask. He hadn’t bothered to ask.
He touched her face one last time then covered her and set about the task of building her funeral pyre. He did not ask for help, but Tega and Drask gave assistance just the same.
There were no tears shed, but he felt the loss of Delil deeply.
In the end he could not decide if she would want to come back and so he left her death in the hands of the gods. Had they wanted her back they would have brought her back as they had Swech. Her body burned hot and the blaze was bright enough to light the area.
Eventually he slept and when he awoke all that was left of Delil was ashes.
Andover stared at the frozen lake and followed Tega and the silent fool who rode with her, Nolan.
Drask rode out onto the ice beside him. Theirs was a comfortable silence, at least for the moment. There were decisions to be made and that time was upon them.
“You should present yourself to the Empress.” The words were unexpected and Andover looked to Drask and shook his head.
“You jest.”
“Not at all. You were sent on a task by her cousin, the Emperor. You return now from that task and you should present yourself.”
“I suspect the guards throughout the city might object.”
“They might indeed, but you will be safe from them. Tega and I will see to that.”
“You discussed this then?”
“Yes. It is a matter of protocol. This is not your war unless you choose to make it your war, Andover. You have been tasked with a duty by gods, yes, but your Emperor also tasked you with a duty.”
“I don’t see how I can go back before them. I’ve changed.”
Drask sighed. “An honorable person is only as good as the vows they choose to make and keep. You have made vows. Would you not discharge them properly?”
“What will the Daxar Taalor say about it?”
“The Daxar Taalor were the ones who taught me about honor. There is a time and a place for conflict, Andover. If you choose to fight for the Daxar Taalor that is acceptable, and you may present yourself as their champion if they have, as you say, chosen you for that purpose.”
“They have.” He did not take offense from Drask’s words because he understood the meaning.
“Then you have even more reason to present yourself to the Empress. Fellein has suffered greatly and will continue to suffer. That is the way of war. One side must win and one side must lose and the losers are seldom pleased with the outcome. There is death, there is destruction, there is disease and often poverty. In this case there are also the Seven Forges. Five have now been relocated. They will change the very shape of the land in all directions. That change can be gentle, or it can hammer Fellein into a new shape as it does now.”
“Why do you say these things, Drask?”
“Am I not one of your instructors? Do you see any of the others here?”
Andover nodded.
“You speak for the gods on this and you must let the Empress know that she has an option aside from all-out war.”
“Drask, do you not want a war?”
“What I want does not matter. The war is already happening and is the will
of the Daxar Taalor. It is also their will that you are their champion and must present yourself as such. It is not me who suggests an alternative to combat, Andover Iron Hands. It is the Daxar Taalor.”
Drask looked his way, his eyes glowing in the light. Andover knew the man, respected him, and still, even after all this time, found him unsettling. He was the only other member of the Sa’ba Taalor that Andover had ever seen with symmetrical Great Scars. He had the balance that Andover himself was seeking.
“As you wish, Drask.”
Drask shook his head. “No. As the gods wish. In this I will act as their agent. You will reach the Empress safely.”
That was all there was to say for the moment. They moved on, the mounts carrying them with ease.
The ice was thick enough to hold them and the mounts were fast. The heavy fog hid them and only hinted at the great obstacle before them. They rode hard and though he wobbled for a moment, even Nolan reacted properly. The man’s hands moved to Tega’s waist and held to her as she leaned forward over the shoulders and neck of the beast.
Drask leaned forward as well when the mounts moved faster and Andover followed their lead. The brutes tore across the frozen lake, claws adjusting when they started to slide, their speed whipping back the hair of every rider.
The city of Canhoon was a massive affair, indeed, easily dwarfing Tyrne. Andover had enough time to look at the vast wall ahead of them and the shapes of men that stood along it.
The wall was too high for even the mounts to hurdle and though he knew that, he kept moving forward at the same frightening pace. Tega or Drask or the gods themselves would have to either open a way or peel his broken body from the stone surface.
The shapes atop the vast wall moved, and Andover reached for his shield. They might have arrows or spears and both he and Gorwich would need the protection if it came to that. Closer still they rode and then the air flickered around him and Andover grunted, surprised to find himself in a different location.
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