Eve of Snows: Sundering the Gods Book One

by L. James Rice

  Dirty prints covered the marble floors, attesting to busier times, but this afternoon their footfalls echoed lonesome in a hall built for hundreds. Ivin’s cousin looked up without a hint of surprise or emotion, his mouth drooping.

  “The Wolverine said you rode north, our only hope if he’s to be believed.”

  “The demons are close; Merutven was ablaze last night. We need sail for the Watch.”

  Eredin’s mouth opened to speak, but his lips morphed into a forced smile, and he waggled his finger. “You know… you know why I’m alive? On the Eve of Snows I got so godsdamned drunk the knives didn’t find me passed out behind a sack of potatoes. Funny, you know, since everyone always said drink would be the death of me.”

  Ivin strode until eye-to-eye with his cousin. “We can share pity and tears on Herald’s Watch.”

  Eredin thrust a sealed scroll in Ivin’s face. “This will travel in my stead; take it to your father for me.”

  Ivin glanced at it, but didn’t lay a hand on the document. “Kotin needs his kin, and the head of the clan. Doom faces the Fost and the whole of Kaludor.”

  “This will solve half that problem. If indeed we are doomed, the clan doesn’t need a drunken boy for its leader; Kotin will lead the Choerkin.”

  “You are Lovar’s heir—”

  “Tregin is Lovar’s heir! And he’s dead, with my sisters between us gone, too, their flesh ashes in the sky to fall with the next snow. I will die seeing my enemy, if die I must, to ease the shame of living. More than my family got, their throats slit in the night.”

  “We will find a way to destroy the Shadows, live to see revenge.”

  Eliles touched Ivin’s shoulder, fingers kneading. “Every warrior you keep here will die beside you, one may even kill you, taken by Shadow.”

  “I’ve not grown mad.” Eredin leaned on the table, tossed the scroll to Eliles. “I accepted one hundred volunteers to be the last to leave, or to die guarding the docks until the last leave. I command no one but myself to stay and die.”

  Ivin’s mouth opened but horns blew from the towers and robbed him of words. The bugle call meant an enemy at the gates. Ivin walked to the Crystal Sword and took it from the wall. “If you promise to take the last ship leaving the docks, you may use this for your battle.”

  His cousin laughed, and Ivin slashed the sword through the air, cleaving an eating knife on the oak table, the sword’s blade sinking several inches into the wood. “Make sure this reaches the Watch; any weapon which kills Shadow is vital to the clan’s survival. That responsibility is yours, by my command as Kotin’s proxy.”

  Ivin didn’t wait for an answer, he strode from the hall with Eliles close behind, and Tokodin trailing.

  “You think he’ll deliver the sword?” Eliles asked.

  “He’ll try. We need to get to a ship, get the Sliver to the Watch.” The wailing horns continued as they reached the bailey, and when Ivin swung into the saddle of his horse, a scream came from the wall. A Shadow stood on the allure with its arms sunk into a guard, another warrior sweeping his axe through the thing’s vaporous form, a futile blow.

  They rode hard into panic-filled streets, the city’s people clamoring to reach the docks. The blue Luxun banner with its array of moons drew Ivin’s eye as they approached the docks and he forced his horse through the throngs of people. The deck of the Luxun caravel with its three masts bore the weight of hundreds, and Ivin didn’t know how many more its decks would hold. Sailors had loosed the ship’s ropes by the time they reached the dock, and the gangplank was nowhere to be found.

  Terrorized voices roared in his ears, and to the west he saw a Shadow greater than a Colok, its massive arms grasping and crushing the people in its path. It didn’t take bodies, it killed, and from behind this horror Taken leaped into the crowd.

  “Jump!”

  Eliles stared at him, frozen. He looked to the ship, its blue-skinned crew darting through the crowd, but Lelishen stood with her arms out.

  Ivin kissed Eliles. “Jump.”

  The ship edged from the dock and she leaped, landing safe in Lelishen’s arms. “Now you, Monk.”

  Tokodin shook his head. “Leave me to die with your cousin.”

  “I gave you the option to die once, not this time.” Ivin grabbed the man and slung him on the count of three. The monk screamed but jumped, clinging to the rail and the Trelelunin’s arm until he found his footing on deck.

  A hundred or more people were swimming, or drowning, in the icy waters, unable to make the jump to fleeing vessels, or pushed from the crowded docks and decks. The giant Shadow loomed, and Taken ripped through the crowds, screeching shrill with every kill. Instinct wanted to fight, to kill, to protect these people, but instead he leaped into Eliles’ arms, panting, terrified, relieved… sickened by his own relief.

  The ship eased further from the dock, people careening through the air as they jumped, arms extended in desperate hope for a helping hand. Several folks made the jump at first, and Ivin leaned as far as he could while trying to catch one woman’s hand, but his grip failed: she clunked into the side of the boat and dropped into the bay with a horrifying splash. Safe from the Shadows, but caught by the desperate hands of a drowning man, she sank into the waves, and Ivin could only stare.

  The Shadow arrived on the end of a dock and raised its arms, a chant emanating from an invisible mouth, and the waters of the bay crackled into ice stretching from the pier, spreading toward their ship. Taken feared water, but leaped to the ice to give chase.

  Ivin nudged Eliles, and she rose from tending a boy’s broken leg. Flames swarmed the Shadow, disappearing in and out of its substance, but the Shadow didn’t flee nor dissipate, it ignored the assault and ice crept closer to the stern.

  “I come for you. I come. Always and forever.” The voice reverberated through air with an unnatural temblor of power that rippled the waters.

  Eliles trembled in Ivin’s grasp, and said, “Ulrikt.”

  The ship’s sails drew taut and snapped in the wind and the caravel separated from the encroaching ice.

  Ivin’s breaths came easier, and he hugged Eliles tight, kissed her hair.

  “Eliles!”

  A man in monk’s habit and bearing a broad smile worked his way through the crowd until he and Eliles wrapped in a hug. Ivin stared, the man wasn’t a bad-looking fellow, and his familiarity with Eliles and a pang jealousy made him forget the pain all around him for a flicker.

  “Jinbin, gods be kind, good to see you.”

  “You, too. I’ve seen so few faces from Istinjoln.”

  The hug tightened and Ivin coughed.

  Eliles turned and took Ivin’s hand, letting go of the monk. “Ivin Choerkin, this is Jinbin of Gules, a friend of mine from Istinjoln.”

  Ivin clasped forearms with the man, shamed over his interrupting the reunion. “Well met, Jinbin.”

  “Likewise.” Jinbin glanced at Eliles. “Hand-in-hand with a Choerkin? Only One Lash.” And he chuckled.

  Lelishen interrupted. “Ivin, I’d like to introduce you to Captain Intœño.”

  Ivin nodded and drew Eliles in for a brief kiss. “I’ll be back in a moment.”

  Lelishen guided him through the masses and they climbed the steps to the quarterdeck, a place onboard reserved for the Luxun command. It was a relief to find elbow space.

  The captain stood with his first mate at the helm, his hands tucked behind his back. The captain’s skin was the color of turquoise and his head was covered in long black feathers highlighted by streaks of blues and purples and greens in the sun. If Ivin didn’t know better, he’d call it a fanciful headdress.

  “You are the Choerkin.” His voice was higher in pitch than Ivin was used to, but his Silone was easy to understand.

  Ivin towered over the man by a foot and only came eye-to-eye when he bowed. “On behalf of the Clan Choerkin I thank you for use of your vessel.”

  The man’s feather-hair fluffed and relaxed to lay on his head and down his neck ag
ain. “A small service to repay a debt, but I may ask a favor someday.”

  Ivin smiled. “Anything within my power.”

  The captain bobbed his head, green eyes capturing Ivin’s attention until he felt uncomfortable, as if he were staring at this exotic man. “Do me the favor of knowledge. What is this enemy we faced on the docks of your Fost?”

  Ivin inhaled deep, rocked on his heels, and began the story of the Shadows and Istinjoln, but in between breaths he couldn’t help but glance to the main deck. Eliles and Jinbin still spoke, sharing sad faces over their words. Amid Ivin’s tale of sorrow and horror and blood, he couldn’t help but wish he stood by her side, consoling her losses instead of sharing his own woes with a stranger.

  43

  CASTLES AND PEARLS

  A child’s mind, a child’s heart,

  sweet, sweetly, swine,

  Wine-glazed pork to feed our souls the

  Innocence of their odious self-centered nature

  And the endearing evil of its perpetuation.

  Show the child their bloody hand,

  Not today’s, tomorrow’s.

  Innocence destroyed is truth perpetuated.

  —Tomes of the Touched

  The Migu Tortoise looked Kinesee in the eye, but the peak of its mottled green-brown shell swelled three feet above her head.

  “Shoo! Get! Go away you stupid turtle!”

  She waved her hands in the creature’s face with her only ally, a small but determined black goat. The fight would go poorly if it came to it. But old Fank, marked by teeth scars in the crown of her shell, wasn’t out to pick a fight with anyone. Every year she came ashore before winter in search of a spot of sand to lay her eggs before swimming south. While she’d make enough stew to last a season, they let her go about her business so long as she stayed on the beach and didn’t head for the family’s garden.

  The giant beast headed straight for the sand palace Kinesee’d been working on since morning chores, no small feat keeping it intact, considering a prancing goat, and adults with more important tasks to attend. “Alu! Help me!” She poked the turtle between its fist-swallowing nostrils, and Tengkur clunked its shell with her horns. The beast stopped, cocking its head with a cranky grin.

  She retreated far as possible without stomping on her castle, preparing to leap on the creature’s neck or back, or something, and whoop on it until it surrendered.

  Alu sauntered into view carrying a stick. “What and by gollies are you doing?”

  Kinesee struck a menacing pose, coiled her legs for a running start. “Saving my palace!” Alu shoved her and she tumbled in the sand, snarling at her older sister. “What’s that for?”

  Alu ignored her, strode to the tortoise and poked it in a nostril with the same stick Solineus used to save Kinesee from the rapers. Fank snorted, her head raising high, but not high enough to avoid a second poke in the fleshy soft of its throat. “You go on now, no tromping on the kingdom today.” Fank pivoted, shying from the branch, and with another jab to its nostril, the animal’s path spared the sandy walls and towers.

  Alu eyed Kinesee, the crinkle in her eye similar to Papa’s when she’d been acting a fool. “You were really going to jump on that thing, weren’t you?”

  Kinesee trenched sand with her toe, sheepish, but never answered. Screams came from over the dune, from home.

  Kinesee’s feet drove her homeward, but she lurched as Alu collared her. Their father’s words echoed in her mind. Young girls don’t run to danger, they hide. But where? The beach lay wide open, trees a hundred strides away.

  “Come on.” Alu dragged her, putting Fank between them and the noise. Another scream, cut short. Odet, she thought, but no time to consider before more screams.

  Kinesee eyed the strait, no boats in sight. The fishers weren’t due to return for candles, leaving Regir and old Dom the only men to help the women defend the home.

  “Whata we do? Alu, whata we do?”

  “We hide, we run. First chance we get make for your pearl hole. We’ll come back after the raiders leave.”

  Kinesee nodded, peeked around the turtle as shrill cries grew louder. Odet sprinted toward the beach, her dress bloodied and shredded. An animal ran on all fours, coming for her from behind, but it was no animal. A man, his tongue flapping as it lolled from his mouth, and from here she’d swear his eyes were hollow.

  The man-thing leaped onto the woman’s back, ramming bloodied fingers into her throat and ripped so hard Odet’s head flew from her shoulders, rolling into the lapping waves of the surf.

  Both girls crouched with backs pressed to Fank, praying. Alu clamped a hand over Kinesee’s mouth.

  Kinesee’s lungs surged, her thoughts whirling, shrieking for her to run but her legs were numb with terror. Uncle Dom wailed in pain, worse than when he’d lost a finger gutting fish. Her hands shook as she peeked around Fank.

  The monster who murdered Odet paced the beach, staring at the head rolling in the surf, as waves came in and withdrew. The creature danced with the water, following it out, retreating as the waves came in, until it snagged soaked hair. Prize in hand it retreated inland to feed.

  “They’re afraid of the water.”

  “Shhhh. Maybe, and what, freeze to death while it stares at us? Waiting for Papa?” She held Kinesee tight. “We follow this tortoise inland, moment that thing’s gone, we head for the pearls, hear? We run and don’t look back.”

  Kinesee nodded, but she wanted to run now. Tengkur made a noise and they froze, but the feeding thing paid the goat no mind. She snagged the goat’s horns and dragged her close to hug Tengkur tight.

  The screams stopped, not a sound except the sand shifting beneath the tortoise and the surf washing the shore. Their escort moved so slow. She risked a glance around the tortoise’s tree-thick leg. A Shadow stood on the hill like a soul missing its body and the man-monster loped to its side. Uncle Dom strolled to the pair, but the thing was no longer their uncle.

  The girls took turns sneaking desperate glances to the crest of the dune, and one-by-one the evil things disappeared. Alu’s breaths quickened and Kinesee tightened in anticipation, throwing hair from her face and focusing on the woods only thirty paces away.

  “Keep low, go.”

  Kinesee ran hunched a few strides but pent-up terror released drove her into a sprint. Alu’s feet came fast behind her, and Tengkur passed them both, bucking and bouncing. Oh, to be a goat right now!

  They sailed over underbrush and hit a deer trail. The temptation to duck behind a tree, to see if a dead thing or a Shadow gave chase grew, but if they followed, she didn’t want to know. Kinesee’s feet knew every root and stone of the trail, a familiarity which saved her life when running from the bad men to find Solineus. In her mind she ran to him again; he waited at her cave to save her. This time he wouldn’t wield a broken branch, but a sword, and he’d avenge Odet and Dom and the others. He had to come, he promised.

  Alu screamed, and Kinesee glanced over her shoulder. A flash of Shadow in the distance, and Kinesee stumbled over a stone, her sister running into her. Alu clutched Kinesee’s shoulders, able to hold her from hitting the ground.

  “Run, Kinesee.”

  They bobbed and weaved through trees, leaped over a small creek, following the water. Leaves crunched and twists of grass and vine grabbed at her feet and legs. Kinesee stumbled through the growth.

  The Shadow rushed from the opposite bank, floating silent across the turf. It halted at the running water, emotionless, still as stone.

  Kinesee slid to a greasy stop on the soggy soil of the bank and Alu stepped in front of her, branch ready to swing. The Shadow didn’t move.

  Alu spoke between gasping breaths. “Get to the cave.”

  Kinesee trotted, legs gone weak from battling the last hundred strides of underbrush, but her tree lay straight ahead. The hoary oak stood at the top of a steep embankment, its ancient roots exposed by years of washouts to create a web of wood, and in its depths a small cave. She du
cked over and between roots and slid head first through the mouth of the bank into darkness.

  Alu slid in moments later, followed by Tengkur, and they crammed into the back. It had taken the sisters a year to expand the hollow into a cave, and their father badgered them about it collapsing and killing them, but it was their refuge after Momma died. He didn’t have the heart to make them stay away.

  Kinesee prayed the Shadow hadn’t seen them as she fumbled through her bag of oblong pearls until she found the special one.

  Alu glared. “Don’t you dare make that glow and give us away.”

  Kinesee nodded, but she wanted to summon Solineus so bad. He said he’d come to her call of need, and she needed him now.

  The Shadow arrived silent, a darkness darker than the oak’s shade, and the girls wailed as its head slithered into the cave’s mouth. Rabbits in a hole without a backdoor, the snake’s meal was easy.

  Kinesee rubbed the pearl in her palms, the glow surged, and the Shadow paused. Alu grabbed the goat and shoved the bleating animal at the Shadow, a sacrifice to save their lives, but furious, Kinesee yelled, “No! Tengkur! Alu, no!”

  Alu forced the scrabbling goat into the entrance, hooves first. Kinesee expected the Shadow to grab her precious goat, rip it to black-and-blood pieces before her eyes. The thing lurched from the hole instead, waited. Alu pulled the goat to her chest, and the Shadow moved for the entrance until she stuck the goat in its way again. It receded to skulk beneath the roots of the oak. It waited a quarter-candle before gliding away.

  The girls slumped into the cave lit by Kinesee’s pearl. Tengkur’s eyes glowed in its light as both girls petted her, rubbing between her horns.

  Kinesee felt a presence, and the words came faint between her ears. I’m coming. She clutched her sister’s shoulder and burst into tears at the sound of Solineus’ voice.

  “He said he’s coming. But he sounded so far away.”

  Alu’s arm tightened around her shoulder. “I’m sure he will.”

  “He will. He promised.” Alu never believed in the pearl, not even after seeing it glow.