The tepid lake water soaked up the legs of his jeans as he waded in, and he knew he’d have to perform a cleansing ritual later to rid himself of leeches. For now the sensation was bliss. Though only at hip height in the deepest section, there was enough water for his purposes. He turned a circle, looking into the trees around the lake to be sure he wouldn’t be observed, then he closed his eyes and spread his hands out at his sides, close to the surface. The air seemed to hum with more than insect noise and Vandal couldn’t help the leap of excitement that came each time he tested his powers.
He settled, focused, pictured Ennae with his mind, all brown, deep mists, heavy water, no animals, no insects, just people and plants. He pictured his father’s face and was unable to stop himself imagining a frown. When he had that clear in his mind he spread his hands wide and, in the deepest voice he could manage, he repeated the words his father had taught him in their Guardian game — ‘I am the light that warms the tunnel. I am the door that opens the way.’
A minute passed, two, but Vandal held on, knowing one day it would work.
And God help him, today it did.
He felt a jolt within himself, as though his sending towards Ennae had touched and snagged a tenuous hold. His mouth fell open and he breathed through it noisily as he struggled to control his excitement and maintain the connection. It was working. He was linked to Ennae. His hands trembled as he dipped his fingers into the water and inscribed a circle onto the lake.
‘Ancient powers, take from my hand the sacred element of our land,’ he intoned. ‘This water that gives Magoria its hue will forge a way betwixt the two.’
A thrill of sensation ran up Vandal’s spine into his mind and he gasped in amazement at the beauty of what he was seeing — more than colours, it was life, a primordial swirl that pulsed with the stuff of the universe, magical beyond his wildest dreams and yet so real he was already a part of it. The wonder was indescribably intense and, before he could properly appreciate it, intrusive. The sensations grew, overloading his mind. Crushing him.
His hands came up to his head, clutching the sides of it as though to stop it being torn apart. Violent images raked at his mind, and in self-defence he opened his eyes and gazed blindly at his surroundings. ‘Magoria,’ he cried. ‘I’m on Magoria.’ But his mind wouldn’t revert. Jagged sensations ripped behind his eyes, more agonising than anything he could have imagined, and before he could even cry out, he lost consciousness, falling backwards into the water, arms outstretched.
Crucified by his own untrained power.
CHAPTER THREE
‘All is not as I expected it to be,’ Mihale said, fingering the talisman he had returned to his neck.
Talis looked up from where he was tending the unconscious Plainsman. ‘Majesty?’ he said, confident that his duty had been fulfilled. They were returned to Ennae and the stone had not been lost.
Mihale stalked the length of the Royal Crypt, his cloak stirring dust, his shoulder-length snow hair a bright spot in the gloomy cavern, lit only by a thin central skylight above the funeral platform. Around them lay the bones of those who had been killed in the fight over possession of The Catalyst, the one prophesied with the power to join the Four Worlds, Khatrene’s baby.
Prior to that battle, Talis, Khatrene and her dead brother Mihale had fled into exile on Atheyre where they had spent the last eight months, while here on the Earthworld of Ennae more than three years had passed. On the Waterworld of Magoria the baby Glimmer had grown to be sixteen, because each of the Four Worlds moved five times faster than its neighbour in the void. This was how Khatrene, who had been separated from her brother and left on Magoria, had returned to Ennae ten years older than her seventeen-year-old twin.
Now that seventeen-year-old king faced troubles enough to daunt an experienced ruler. Their enemy The Dark had been vanquished, but his allies, the invading Northmen, were yet to be driven from the Southlands. Added to that, the Maelstrom’s destructive force had been unleashed. It was little wonder their young sovereign coveted the stone. He would need every advantage to safeguard his people.
‘The Catalyst is gone,’ Mihale said and Talis was jolted from his thoughts. ‘She is no longer on this world.’
‘But … we just got here,’ Khatrene said in a disbelieving whisper. ‘How could she be gone?’
‘We are the only royal blood on Ennae,’ he told her, his youthful voice echoing overloud in the solemn chamber of death.
Talis shook his head. ‘Majesty … why would she leave?’ The Catalyst could only join the Four Worlds from the Earthworld of Ennae. Was she defying her destiny? ‘The Maelstrom comes, she … should be here,’ he said, aware of his beloved’s stillness beside him. Khatrene had waited all of her daughter’s life for this reunion. Talis could not begin to imagine her disappointment.
Yet it was disbelief that sounded more prominent in her voice. ‘How do you know she’s not here?’ Khatrene asked. ‘Did the voice tell you?’
Talis was still confused by this talk of a disembodied voice that had spoken first to Khatrene inside her mind and, on leaving her, apparently to her brother. Certainly on Atheyre, while Talis had been using his Guardian powers to assess his king, revived from death but not yet awake, he had heard whispers in the boy’s mind. Khatrene had assured him that the voice she had heard was sage and offered her nothing more than advice, yet Talis felt unsettled. His young king’s behaviour had been uncharacteristic since the moment of his awakening.
‘The talisman tells me,’ Mihale said, fingering the dull stone.
Khatrene frowned at this and even Talis felt uncomfortable. If the stone had not aided Mihale to open the way between the worlds, it was unlikely to be offering him portents now. The more likely truth was that he heard the same voice she had. Yet he denied it.
‘Where is Glimmer then?’ Khatrene asked.
‘I know not,’ Mihale replied, and Talis felt his discomfort grow.
The King gazed at his sister in defiance, and she back at him in suspicion. Talis looked upon them both, and despite their different ages they were like two sides of the same coin.
Their royal ancestry had endowed them both with snow hair and royal-hued eyes which set them apart from every other occupant of Ennae whose colouring of skin, hair and eyes was from the palette of their world — brown. Even the White Twins’ skin was of a different hue, pink Khatrene called it and had told Talis that on Magoria the people were all of that shading, and more — there were green trees, blue sky, purple sunsets.
Talis had learnt the words but had been unable to imagine them while he lived in a world of brown seas and skies — until Khatrene’s divinity as The Light had been revealed. Now, exactly as it had done when she had been last on their homeworld of Ennae, his beloved’s magical aura burst forth into multihued brilliance as sunlight struck her from the skylight above. Rainbow colours.
Mihale dragged his gaze away from his sister and turned to Talis. ‘Heal the Plainsman so we can be on our way,’ he said and resumed pacing the crypt.
Talis took his beloved’s hand. ‘We will find your daughter,’ he said softly. ‘Our journey is not wasted.’
Khatrene tried to smile. Failed.
Talis knew there was little he could do for her in that moment so he returned his attention to the Plainsman, lowering his hand to the wrinkled forehead and using the power that resided in his Guardian blood to test health and vitality. Both were still low. Talis’s own strength had been sapped by their recent journey, yet he prepared his mind to transfer a portion of his life-force into the old man. When he had gathered the glow inside his mind, he said:
‘With Guardian power do I bestow the strength that you have lost.
‘Into your body, take it now. My own to bear the cost.’
The spark departed his mind and raced through his arm into the Plainsman’s body. Talis felt his vitality slump, but the result of his action was a slowing and steadying of the Plainsman’s breath and a return of colour to his cheeks. If
Talis had been able to use the stone, no doubt the healing would have taxed him less, but Mihale had snatched it back the moment the Column of Light had disappeared. Talis doubted he would have the opportunity to touch it again.
‘Majesty, the healing is done,’ he said. ‘We may leave at your leisure.’
Khatrene shook her head, silky hair sliding over the shoulders of her well-worn gown. ‘You’re too tired,’ she said. ‘Let’s rest here first.’ But Talis was eager to leave for her sake. Though he would love her as much in rags as in finery, he knew she would find comfort in fresh clothes and a hearty meal when they returned to her brother’s Volcastle. In the Airworld of Atheyre they had required no food. Every sustenance they needed was ingested through the thick air. Here they would soon feel the pangs of hunger. Besides, the seeing-storm had shown him the placements of their enemies and Talis was anxious to traverse the safe routes he had mapped in his mind.
There were Raider caves nearby, and though few of the misshapen exiles of society appeared to have survived the violent wind storms sweeping Ennae, they would eagerly attack royalty if the opportunity arose. The invading Northmen had occupied Fortress Sh’hale for years and were still sieging the Volcastle. It was unlikely their positions had changed. Still, Talis’s only chance of passing the Northman blockade was to rally aid from inside the royal Volcastle when they reached it. The Northmen might be weakened by hunger and lack of shelter but there were enough of them to overcome the swords of Talis and his king if they were intercepted this far from their destination.
‘It is three days march,’ he told the twins. ‘We should move while the Maelstrom is inactive.’ He smiled to reassure his beloved before turning to address his next question to her brother. ‘Majesty, are you well to travel?’ It had only been hours since his lord had awoken from his deathlike state in Atheyre and Talis did not want two burdens to carry.
‘Well enough,’ Mihale said.
Khatrene glanced at her brother, obviously irritated by his dismissive tone. ‘It’s not Talis’s fault that we’re here instead of the Volcastle,’ she said. ‘We were lucky to have made it back to Ennae at all. And you’re lucky to be alive.’
‘I make my own luck, sister,’ he said, and once again paced the Royal Crypt, as though eager to be away from them both.
Talis felt his disquiet deepen.
Khatrene turned back to him and her frown faded. She leant forward and pressed her lips briefly to his. Yet even as he accepted this reassurance of the love between them, he wondered if it could be the source of his young king’s displeasure. Talis was a Guardian, a Champion. He had no claim on a princess of royal blood. But while they had been fleeing Khatrene’s evil husband, she had willingly returned the desperate love Talis had been unable to hide from her. Away from castle and crown, their love had felt no constraints; but for the king, this match would likely be distasteful, his sister in love with a man who, though esteemed, was not suitable to wed her.
And yet, in love, they had shared the pleasures of the marriage bed. They could not go back. Indeed, Khatrene would not hear of such ‘nonsense’ as she called it. But Talis worried, and seeing Mihale’s distant expression, that worry grew.
‘I see into your heart,’ she whispered, looking deep into his eyes. ‘We will not be parted.’
Talis had no recourse but to nod, yet though love burnt in his heart like a scalding iron, he knew their future was uncertain. Khatrene’s will was formidable, but her brother’s word was law. And though Talis’s love was deeper than the Everlasting Ocean, it was not within him to disobey a king. Not for his own selfish desires.
CHAPTER FOUR
Kai of the Side Clan, leader of the remaining Northmen of Ennae, stood alone on a dust-covered parapet. In the stillness between storms he watched a golden sun sink into the mists beyond the pale sandstone battlement of this fortress his people had invaded and occupied. How long ago? Months? Or was it years since they had left their homes in the northern mountains to overrun the Southlands and take possession of the unprotected Fortress Sh’hale? Kai couldn’t remember. His youngest wife, his favourite, had been new with their child at the time. Yet she had not lived to birth it. And another child by his second wife had been sacrificed in the Wind Ceremony. He had done that himself, to keep his leadership strong and to prove …
Kai struggled but couldn’t recall his reasons now. Yet he remembered he must shave his right side each morning as he had done from childhood: half a scalp, one arm, leg and half a torso. The mark of their clan, Side Clan, must be maintained. To let his hair grow back would not only dishonour him, it would upset his balance and diminish him in his men’s eyes. And though he had lost the memory of many things, he could not forget that he was their leader. The ceremonial cloak of threaded jewels now hanging in his bedchamber proclaimed that, though Kai could not remember when he had worn it last. The jewels had snagged in his unshaved chest hairs, he remembered that. And he’d been wearing the gloves of blood, hands stained with a fresh kill, to honour his god.
Kraal. Ruler of the Fireworld of Haddash. Tormentor of Kai’s soul.
Kai had grown to hate the very air he breathed because it might contain a whisper of his God’s breath, yet he knew he would never disobey. The punishment for such a transgression would be far worse than any of the tortures Kai had suffered in obedience.
‘Husband?’
Kai turned to find his eldest wife five paces behind him on the open parapet, her hands clasped respectfully in front, her head bowed, long dark hair hiding the blank expression which was all she offered him.
‘Yes?’
‘The evening meal is prepared.’ She waited, not meeting his eyes. Even when they discussed the son they had created between them, her gaze did not touch his. It was the way of their people, yet Kai felt angered by it.
He looked away from her in disgust, and something on the ground between them caught his attention. Amid the dust and detritus of the storm, a leaf wriggled blindly searching for its vine. A week earlier Kai had touched one of these strange animated plants and it had sucked his finger like a babe sucking at its mother’s breast. He had shown it to the others and a Southwoman they had spared when they’d captured Sh’hale had spoken of a forbidden forest on the other side of the Plains. This Forest of Desire possessed a siren call able to ensnare even the strongest warrior into its grasp, thereafter to condemn him to a life of mindless pleasure. The lands thereabouts were taboo but the Maelstrom’s ponderous force knew no social custom and did not even honour the boundary between the worlds.
Kai wondered what other interesting flotsam might find its way to his fortress.
‘Husband?’
His head snapped up and he glared at his wife, sure he had heard condescension in her tone.
‘I will tell them you are coming.’ She bowed and left with a soft tinkling of the peacetime anklets he had finally allowed the women to wear beneath their voluminous robes. Why hadn’t he heard her approach? Was it because the sound of the fortress creaking at sundown had bothered him and he’d taught himself to stop hearing it? What other sounds had he lost? His finely tuned instincts, like those of his men, were fading, worn away by victory and excess. By the lack of an active enemy.
It was almost full dark. He should go and lead his people in the feasting that was their right as the conquerors of this fortress, but on this night, for the first time, Kai wanted to resist the custom. His lieutenant had been right a year ago when he’d warned that the Southlands of Ennae, with their luxuriously appointed castles and outspoken women, would make them weak.
Most of the Sh’hale women who had inhabited the fortress were dead and forgotten, but the recent visit of a snow-haired royal, The Catalyst as she had called herself, had not been forgotten. A direct descendant of the Ancients, she was what Kai’s God called The White, one whose very presence on this world kept Kraal from entering it. For that Kai was grateful.
The Catalyst’s visit had stuck in Kai’s mind and the ‘anchor’ —
a huge narrow mirror she had planted in their midst — still rose from its pit in the main hall up through an opening in the carved stone ceiling and into the sky beyond. Yet firmer in his memory than her actions was the way she had stirred his blood. She had brooked no resistance to her will and Kai had believed her to have magical powers to back that authority. But despite the threat she had presented, Kai had felt desire in her presence such as he had not experienced since the death of his youngest wife. Memory of The Catalyst’s pale skin against her glittering black gown stirred him yet. And the thought of his dark hands against that tender royal skin, his thick fingers twining in her fine snow hair, would not leave his mind.
Again and again he was compelled to call for one of his wives. Yet no sooner was his desire quenched than the thought of The Catalyst would stir him again. It was madness. Weakness. She invaded his dreams and …
Kai’s roving gaze stilled on the shadows of mist below his parapet as a sudden chilling thought entered his mind. What if it was not lust that fired him, but the machinations of his devious God? Kai turned away and peered along the parapet to the torchlit stone stairwell which breathed light onto his dark platform.
‘You seem … disturbed, my servant.’ The familiar voice, deep as a Northern mine shaft and twice as chilling, emanated from behind Kai where a sheer drop fell fifty man-heights to the ground below.
Had Kraal returned to Ennae in physical form, or was this merely another manifestation of his voice, come to torture Kai for entertainment? ‘My God and master has the keys to my obedient heart,’ he whispered.
‘And your mind?’
Kraal was reading his thoughts. He would surely be dead before the sun disappeared completely behind the mountains. Yet how many times had Kai believed that, only to be forced to live on, to endure what no man should have to? His God had spoken truly when he had said there were worse things than dying.
Glimmer in the Maelstrom: Shadow Through Time 3 Page 3
