Glimmer in the Maelstrom: Shadow Through Time 3

by Louise Cusack

  ‘I stopped at the Airworld first, to strengthen myself.’

  Kraal was impressed. ‘Within moments of birth you are feasting on the Atheyre? I was confined on the Fireworld for millennia until The Catalyst’s birth opened the way between the worlds.’

  The small serpent simply gazed at the pale human form before him.

  ‘Yet here we are, united.’

  Teleqkraal continued his silence and Mihale’s forehead creased into a frown. ‘But … how are you able to stand in my presence, the presence of a White, when I could not in that form?’

  ‘The advantages of mixed breeding,’ the small serpent said.

  ‘Yet you choose to wear the serpent shape.’

  ‘I cannot change form as you did.’

  That took a moment to sink in. ‘Then you have fewer powers than I.’

  ‘I have different powers, those more suited to controlling the talisman.’

  Kraal felt a prickling of raised hairs on Mihale’s arms. ‘You want me to give you the talisman?’ Never mind that he had been unable to focus it himself. ‘It is the coin I would use to gain entry to the One World. For both of us,’ he added belatedly. ‘The Catalyst cannot join the Four Worlds without it.’

  ‘I do not ask you to give it to me.’

  Kraal felt Mihale’s body relax. He glanced back to Kai who still stood poised above him.

  ‘I would rather take it,’ Teleqkraal said, then to Kai, ‘kill him.’

  Kraal stiffened but had no time to act. Kai waited only a heartbeat, Mihale’s last, before bringing down his arm. The dagger sliced into Mihale’s exposed chest with little sound, piercing the skin between two ribs, driving deep into the chest cavity, slicing through the young king’s heart and spilling blood across his pale skin.

  Mihale gasped, his autonomic responses taking over as Kraal weathered the first jolt of shock and prepared to separate his identity and leave, to face his son in his serpent form and fight for the talisman. He must wait until the last moment, just as Mihale was dying. Then he would teach his son to respect him.

  Of course, Kraal had imagined that exiting Mihale’s body would be as simple as entering it had been. He hadn’t anticipated the commotion this death wrought in his own mind. He had been studying pleasure, teaching himself to associate completely with the human sensations Mihale experienced in his body. Unfortunately the pain of death was as excruciating as any pleasure he had enjoyed, and Kraal found he was unable to disengage from it.

  Mihale’s voice came faintly into his mind, I will not die alone, but Kraal could barely hear the words over the searing crackle of screaming nerve endings. Desperation began to well within him, another sensation that was new and unproductive. A compulsion to escape gripped him and suddenly he could wait no longer. Gathering his shattered will, he pushed outwards, towards freedom … but there was no sensation of passage. He went nowhere.

  A gurgling sound issued from Mihale’s lips, then the dying eyes that were yet at his command saw a shadow pass over his body.

  ‘Son!’ he croaked, watching the clawed hand come to rest on Kai’s shoulder. ‘I … trapped.’

  ‘The talisman’, the serpent said, his face shadowed in darkness. ‘Apparently, in extremis, your host has found a way to use it.’

  Kraal felt its full power then, energy closing in like a shroud, condemning him to die with Mihale. To end. He was going to end. In that moment Kraal felt a fatalistic calm wash over him. He stopped struggling to liberate himself from the bag of flesh that was his prison. Instead, he passively listened to the voices above him.

  ‘Do not remove the talisman until after he is dead.’ His son’s voice.

  ‘Yes, my God,’ Kai replied tonelessly.

  Mihale’s peripheral senses were diminishing: sound, sight, smell, even pain. The continuous burble of life was faltering to a halt and Kraal could only observe.

  The final experience.

  Death.

  He had expected to have more time, more experiences …

  The noises in the body around him stilled, then there was silence, nothing. No sound or sight, no senses — no recognisable life. Yet still he thought. Wondered. Had he left Mihale’s form and gone … over? Was this death? Or would there be no death for an immortal God, only an eternity trapped in no-space? He waited … time.

  Then Kraal, who no longer possessed a mouth, screamed the silent scream of the damned.

  *

  Kai reached down and tore the talisman from the dead White’s throat and held it out to his new master. He should feel some joy or fear, knowing Kraal was dead, but he was numb. He suspected that was the only way he could continue to function.

  Teleqkraal, who had been watching Kai closely, reached out a clawed hand to take his prize, but hesitated just short of touching it. ‘You suffer no ill effects from contact with the stone?’

  Kai shook his head.

  ‘I sense no power in it now. You cannot use it.’ A pause. ‘But you can hold it.’

  Kai said nothing. He merely continued to offer the stone to his master who hesitated again, then closed the remaining distance to touch the unremarkable brown oval with the tip of a claw. He held it there, a second. Two. Then Kai felt a huffing of hot breath on his face.

  ‘It is mine!’ the serpent roared and snatched it from Kai’s hand, slicing the palm with his sharp claws, but the pain was a distant thing, no worse than his ribs, bruised by Teleqkraal’s firm grip on their journey from Sh’hale.

  Kai watched dispassionately as his new master snapped the stone from its thong and gouged it into his scaly chest plate where the flesh immediately grew around it, securing its potential power within his own body. A fingernail-sized sliver of the brown stone remained visible amid the glistening scales of otherworld hue.

  Then Teleqkraal dropped his powerful arms and looked around, furled wings rustling against his body. His attention settled on an elegant table beside the carved stone fireplace. He stepped forward and swept its contents to the floor. Dried Verdan fruits flew in all directions and a knife and board clattered into the shadows.

  ‘I will create matter as my father did,’ he said and gazed down at the now empty table, his eyes narrowed in concentration. An expectant silence filled the room.

  Nothing happened.

  A low grumbling roar built in the serpent’s chest. Then Teleqkraal’s frustration overcame him and he spun in a circle, knocking Kai to the ground with his muscular tail. Dislodged bed drapes and the contents of a bedside table rained down on him.

  ‘How does it work?’ the serpent roared.

  Kai should have felt fear, but he merely pushed off the threaded gold drapes and stood, avoiding the broken crystal that now littered the soft carpeting. ‘I was never told,’ he replied.

  Teleqkraal narrowed his eyes again, gazing at the gilt timber door. Seconds ticked over and still nothing occurred. At last he bellowed in frustration. ‘If I cannot use the stone against her, I will destroy the anchors. That will weaken her.’

  Weaken who? The Catalyst?

  Kraal had never intended to harm The Catalyst. By his own admission, he had taken the stone only to survive the Maelstrom. Teleqkraal, however, appeared to have none of his father’s subtlety. Nor, perhaps, his intelligence. What might he do with the memory stone? Prevent the Four Worlds from being joined?

  Kai watched the serpent smash through the wall into the corridor beyond where the Royal Guard fell back in terror. ‘Your king is dead,’ he told them, then turned to glare at Kai, as if his inability to use the stone was his servant’s fault. ‘Follow me,’ he commanded, then turned on the Guardsmen.

  After their initial shock, the Royal Guard rallied and called for reinforcements, but to no avail.

  Teleqkraal, impervious to their weapons, began to eat.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  ‘You will win her back,’ Barrion said from his litter, and Pagan knew from his friend’s expression that he longed for a hand to rest on his shoulder in consolation.

/>   Pagan nodded, keeping pace with the four Guardsmen carrying Barrion as they crossed the cobbled courtyard for the castle’s north gate, as far as his friend would allow him to venture. The journey across the Plains would be perilous and the Guardsmen who had agreed to go knew well that they might never reach the Verdan Hold, let alone return to Be’uccdha.

  The time between storms was growing shorter. It was madness to leave the shelter of Be’uccdha Castle, but Barrion lived only to return to his people. This morning the wind had dropped and he had begged leave to go. Lae, caring for nothing but her new husband, had blithely agreed.

  ‘This is mere infatuation,’ Barrion said softly. ‘And if it is short-lived it will aid your cause by taking her past grief. You must not lose hope.’

  ‘I will try not to,’ Pagan replied, but his heart felt no surge at the words, either to pain or joy. He had wearied it in grief at the loss of his beloved and the realisation that Vandal had only married Lae to punish him. To cause him the same pain he had apparently caused Sarah.

  Sarah. Pagan knew of her now. Vandal had given him that at least, although probably out of spite and the need to share the pain of his mother’s death. While Lae slept on a nearby couch, they had laid hands on each other’s brows and performed the mind-sharing ritual that allowed Pagan to see the years he had spent in Magoria, albeit through the eyes of a child.

  There had been many amazing sights on that world, but what remained strongest in his memory was Sarah — funny, wise and thoughtful Sarah with her sometimes brusque manner unsuccessfully disguising a soft heart. Seeing himself with the Magorian woman had been a revelation and Pagan could not deny that there had been love between them as they had raised Glimmer and then Vandal, though it was obvious that Sarah’s love had far exceeded his own. Yet Pagan had loved her. Not the burning, desperate love he felt for Lae. But love all the same.

  Despite that, he had abandoned them. At sixteen, Glimmer had left Magoria to begin her destiny as The Catalyst, and Pagan, as her Champion, had been required to follow her. Vandal had shouted after him, but to no avail.

  The Pagan who viewed these memories was only beginning to feel the first pangs of guilt when the scene was cut short. He opened his eyes to find his son stepped back from him, undisguised hostility marring his handsome features. Pagan had felt confused and saddened himself, so he had left his son and returned to his rooms to be alone with his thoughts.

  Sarah’s grief was easy to imagine. Pagan had been her husband in all the ways that mattered, though they had never officially married. It was entirely plausible that his return to Ennae had caused her the unbearable sadness Vandal had insisted had led to her death. And though he had been spared the vision of that death, Pagan knew his son held him responsible.

  Pagan hugged his thick cloak more tightly about his shoulders now to ward off the chill of an unseasonable cold that had settled in the south. Even the dark stones of the castle walls seemed to exude a chill. He could only hope that Verdan was not frozen when his friend arrived home. With the Great Guardian’s blessing and considerable luck, Barrion would soon be returned to his hold. His people, if they survived, would rejoice at his return.

  Rejoicing.

  Pagan wondered whether he would ever again know that lightness of heart. Violent jealousy had lodged itself firmly in his breast, but trepidation dwelt there also. He had seen the way his son touched Lae, and had sense enough to know that Vandal was using his Guardian powers in ways their code prohibited — for pleasure and for personal gain. Not to serve.

  Vandal knew the Guardian code. Pagan had seen that in his memories — instructions he himself had hidden within fairytales of ‘The Brown Kingdom’. Once Vandal’s powers had begun to manifest and he’d realised he was a Guardian, those precepts should have been his boundaries, never to be crossed. But whether out of anger or arrogance, Vandal used the power in his blood as wantonly as though it was coin to be spent on whoring.

  With his youth and good looks, it was entirely possible that his prowess in the bedchamber, enhanced by his Guardian power, was the only incentive he had used to woo Lae to his side. If it was more, however, if Vandal was controlling Lae’s mind, Pagan must somehow get her alone and reverse his son’s handiwork.

  ‘I will end soon,’ Barrion said, and Pagan glanced at his friend, confused for a moment between his thoughts and those words. They had stopped at the solid iron entry gate with its embossing of leaping waves and drowning enemies. This was where they would part.

  ‘You will reach the ending of your journey,’ Pagan corrected, hoping the earth shakes held off that long.

  ‘Ellega is waiting for me,’ Barrion said with quiet resolution.

  ‘You will join your sister in death one day,’ Pagan agreed. ‘Yet must that day be soon? You have struggled so hard to live, despite your injuries.’

  ‘I live only to return to Verdan,’ Barrion said. ‘I would die among my own people.’

  Pagan nodded. He felt immeasurably saddened, but he had been raised as a warrior. Death was every man’s choice. To die in battle or defending those under your protection was the highest honour. Barrion had lived through terrible times and his courage and indomitable will had brought him more honour than Pagan had thought a man could own. It would be no dishonour now to choose death over the helpless life his injuries had reduced him to.

  ‘You will be greatly missed,’ Pagan said, and felt a premature upswelling of grief which he quickly struggled to subdue. Memories flooded his mind: of Barrion beating him in ale-drinking competitions before his Guardian powers had developed and he’d been able to distil the intoxicants from his blood, of his friend’s booming laugh and the thump of his ale tankard striking the table as a sign of approval. ‘But you will see Ellega again.’

  ‘I long for that,’ Barrion replied, then fell silent. At last he returned his attention to Pagan and said, ‘Farewell, friend,’ the glisten of tears in his eyes. ‘I have been lucky to have not led a tedious life.’ He tried to smile and Pagan found that he could laugh, though tears stood in his own eyes.

  He rested his hand on what remained of Barrion’s shoulder. ‘We will meet again.’

  ‘When the Four Worlds are joined,’ Barrion said and closed his eyes.

  Pagan would not contradict this, though The Catalyst was dead. Let his friend have whatever hope he could muster. He stood back for the Guardsmen to pass, carrying the mound of flesh which was all that remained of Verdan nobility. Barrion was the last of his line, and this would have been cause for much grief if the destruction of the Four Worlds had not brought all their deaths nearer.

  Some nights while Pagan lay unable to sleep, thinking of Vandal and Lae together, he wondered whether he should even consider his own love. So little time remained to them all. Yet watching Barrion depart Castle Be’uccdha, Pagan realised his love for Lae was all that remained undone in this life. His king did not require his service, and there was no other duty calling for his attention. Lae would not need a Champion while Vandal stood at her side; besides she rarely ventured outside her chambers these days, and then always with her husband.

  Her ceremonies in the Altar Caves had ceased with her marriage. When Pagan had queried her about this over dinner one night, she seemed to have forgotton she was The Dark. And lately her vagueness was even more pronounced, as though Vandal’s very presence distracted her mind.

  ‘My Lord Guardian. The Dark calls for you.’

  Pagan turned to find Ragnoth, the new captain of the Be’uccdha Guard, behind him in the shadow of the gate. As solid and hulking as his cousin Mooraz had been, Ragnoth thankfully appeared to lack Mooraz’s dishonourable bent.

  ‘Very well,’ he replied. ‘Let us attend her’

  Ragnoth nodded and led the way back through the empty courtyard and into the castle proper, then through dark chambers and hallways sparsely lit by guttering candles. In Pagan’s eyes, Ragnoth’s competence and loyalty were beyond question. Not so his predecessor Tulak, who had been found blin
d and babbling, his face badly burnt by fire not long after Lae had returned to Be’uccdha. Death had followed shortly thereafter and Pagan had owned himself relieved. Although he had been demoted, Tulak had been Djahr’s man, and Pagan had never trusted him in any commission. By comparison, Ragnoth’s slow, thorough eyes, so like his cousin’s, could not help but inspire confidence.

  ‘In here, My Lord Guardian,’ Ragnoth said at the door to his lady’s audience chamber. He inclined his wide head and the heavy braids Be’uccdha warriors favoured fell forward onto his shoulder.

  Pagan took a calming breath. This was where Vandal had seduced his beloved away from grief. They had described the moment to him often, Lae with the innocent blush of new love and Vandal intent on wounding his father.

  Ragnoth knocked and opened the door. ‘The Guardian Pagan,’ he announced, then he stepped back to let Pagan precede him before taking up a post inside the door.

  ‘Pagan,’ Lae said from her seat on a low couch, enfolded in Vandal’s arms. She wore a pale gold gown of a soft clinging fabric which enhanced her figure — curves his jealous eyes told him had grown more voluptuous in his son’s hands. Vandal wore plain black and looked handsome and supremely confident. Next to his son, Pagan felt outdated, dusty and useless.

  ‘Father,’ Vandal said, the gleam of possessiveness in his eyes challenging even as it gloated. ‘We have something to tell you.’ He gestured for his father to sit across from them but Pagan chose to stand stiffly before them.

  ‘Good news?’ he asked, alerted by the excitement in Lae’s eyes. He would not let his attention slip lower to where Vandal openly caressed her arms, the impropriety of his son’s gestures deliberately flaunting his status as her lover.

  ‘I am with …’ Lae began, then turned to smile at Vandal with such love that Pagan felt his heart turn to stone. ‘We have been blessed with a child.’ She turned to face Pagan. ‘Your first grandchild. And if that is not good news …’ She smiled at Pagan now, as though expecting his joy at this disclosure to be suitably expressed.

  Pagan simply nodded, his eyes now following his heart and turning to stone. They could not move from Lae’s. Yet he managed to construct a travesty of a smile. ‘You have always wanted a child of your own.’