But his father refused to let him go. The flames licked over them both, but all Orsin could feel were his father’s strong arms holding him tightly, his presence unlocking the chains that had held everything in.
Orsin looked around at the distraught faces of his family and friends, at the pain and suffering of those in other times as the ash came down and covered their world, at those who had emerged from the darkness hoping to find freedom.
“What have I done?” he whispered.
“All life is a cycle,” Chonrad said. “Life leads to death, and from death springs life.”
Behind him, Orsin saw the woman lying on the ground, struggling to bring forth a child, and next to her the slim green shoots of a new tree.
“Let us end this,” Chonrad murmured in his ear.
“I do not know how,” Orsin whispered.
“I will help you.” Chonrad tightened his arms.
Behind him, the Arbor shook in the wind, and Orsin finally understood. Tears coursed down his cheeks, and he closed his eyes and finally let go.
The small part of Tahir’s consciousness that still remained saw Orsin finally give in to his father and submit himself to the light. At the precise moment that he joined with Cinereo, there was a rush of fire like a backdraft and the volcano behind the Arbor completely exploded, scattering the remnants of its top across the city. Ash came down like snow, a hot, thick carpet that covered the world in grey and white.
But for the first time, Tahir could see what he needed to do.
Cinereo turned and spread out his arms. Every man and woman who had lived and who had loved the Arbor came together as one in a glorious explosion of blinding light. Orsin, Tahir and Geve joined hands, and as they touched, their physical forms crumbled and became the ash blowing across the arena. They gave up their lives to the tree, and the energy flooded through the sunstones to Horada, and through Horada to the tree’s roots and thence to all corners of the world.
Tahir’s mind joined with the others, with Chonrad, Valens, Gavius and everyone else who had gone before him, and with the soul of the tree itself, to become Cinereo, the guide who had worked so hard to bring the three sides of the Apex together, and to try to ensure the fire elementals did not destroy the world forever.
Cinereo saw Demitto, Catena and Manifred backing away into the depths of the cave, driven there by the fire and ash that threatened to choke the entrance. At the same time, he could see that all across Anguis, Incendi soldiers were emerging from caves and tunnels into the sun. Battles broke out across the land – battles that could only be resolved in one way, as the heat built and the elementals turned the bodies of those they inhabited to ash and covered the world in flame.
Drawing the power from the lives that had been sacrificed, Cinereo reached out and curled the Arbor’s roots around the foot of the mountain. The roots tore at the mountainside, bringing rocks crashing down, covering the mouth of the cave and burying the people inside the mountain for the next few thousand years. But he did not worry. He had watched the Nox Aves prepare the old Cavum beneath the Arbor for years, hoarding supplies and preparing the Night Birds for a lifetime below ground, so that one day they would be ready – like the Arbor – to rise again.
The screech of the firebird cut across the Apex and made them all cower for a moment. For even as the mighty Pyra emerged from the mountainside to swoop exultantly across the land, so it saw its doom thousands of years in the future, a fixed point in time that it could not change, no matter how hard it tried.
Cinereo could feel himself beginning to suffer from the weight of the ash falling across Heartwood. His leaves had crumbled, the branches and twigs burning and disintegrating, and now all that remained was the great trunk, holding the Pectoris containing the loving hearts of every man and woman who had died in its name.
Drawing on that love, Cinereo gathered his strength and sent the remainder of his power through Horada to the sunstones. Energy poured into the golden gems and radiated out, blinding everyone who stood nearby. Horada screamed, her voice ringing out across the arena, and as the final moments of the Apex approached and the timelines converged, her scream turned into the cry of a newborn baby, the sound travelling through the sunstones to echo through space, through time.
That high-pitched cry bounced between the sunstones, gathering speed and strength, and then burst through from the pendant in Comminor’s hand until it brightened a hundredfold, making him hold up an arm to shield his eyes. The light engulfed the shoot at his feet, and with a tearing crack, the shoot exploded into life.
Roots sunk down into the ground, deeper and deeper, spreading at an incredible speed through the land, breaking up the burnt ground and crumbling the scorched earth. And still they spread, racing beneath the surface across miles and miles of ash and blackened ground.
Above the surface, the shoot began to grow. It surged upwards, and as it grew taller, so it began to sprout tiny, thin branches and small, waving leaves. The shoot broadened, thickened, grew strong and supple, developed a thick skin to protect its vulnerable heart. The shoot turned into a narrow stalk, the narrow stalk into a slender stem, the slender stem to a slim trunk. The trunk expanded, branches lengthening. Twigs grew from the branches, stiffened and sprouted thick, glossy leaves, which unfurled as if stretching their arms after a long sleep.
Nele backed away, pulling the others with him, and Amabil and Betune covered Sarra and the newborn baby as the tree reared above their heads.
The new branches penetrated the dome that had protected them, and beyond it Pyra surged forward eagerly as if certain this indicated his chance to attack, but the new tree had other ideas. Its growth quickened, and those watching gasped as it doubled in size, almost exultantly, as if overjoyed at finally being able to grow after so long in the darkness.
Pyra swooped and breathed fire over it and the flames scoured the earth. Without the dome, he had clearly hoped to incinerate those who remained, but the tree arched its branches over them as they huddled beneath it, keeping them safe. And although its leaves curled and died and fell as ash to the floor, new ones immediately grew to replace them, growing quicker than before, and Pyra circled and hesitated in the air.
The tree’s roots reached the coast on all four sides of Anguis, and Cinereo waited as its power built within its new, huge heart. Then it erupted forth in a burst through its roots.
Across the land, the crumbling, broken earth cracked, and new shoots appeared. At first they were barely noticeable, only tiny green specks on the black and brown, but the shoots lengthened into blades of grass that rapidly spread in a carpet of green.
Pyra bellowed and turned a broad swathe to ash, but they merely grew again, grass and flowers and trees, burgeoning and blooming in a riot of colour that dazzled those who watched the explosion of growth.
Cinereo concentrated on the sunstone in Comminor’s hand and drew his consciousness along the rays of light that still connected them, away from the old disintegrating tree and into the flourishing new one.
The old one crumbled and died, buried beneath a blanket of ash and molten rock, and lava coated the city and killed everyone it touched: the King and Queen, the shopkeepers and guards, rich and poor alike. Across the land, fire flourished. Forests burned, houses collapsed, animals and people died amidst the fire and flame. The world turned black, and the Incendi spread joyously into their new domain, ready to begin their reign.
Pyra saw it happen through the mists of time, even as his own death loomed. He rose higher in the air with a mighty flap of his wings, hoping to escape the new tree’s rising power, but he was too late.
The tree’s loving life-force expanded from it in a widening ring, clearing the air of the fog and ash and smoke, and letting the full, clean heat of the sun break through. As one, every blade of grass, every petal on every flower, turned towards it, and Pyra cried out as the green energy engulfed him. The firebird expired in a billow of flame, falling to the ground in a shower of ash that sank quickly i
nto the earth.
The new Arbor arched above the land. Its new heart beat deep within its trunk, safe and secure, the love of its followers contained in its beating form. It reached out its roots, spread its branches, turned its leaves up to the sun, and let out a shivering sigh. And as Cinereo broke into song, his voice splintered and became a thousand, thousand voices, echoing through time to the ears of those who would carry its memory through the dark years until it could rise again.
The lava buried Demitto’s sunstone where he had dropped it on the ground as he fled the falling ash, and with its disappearance, Horada’s connection with the other timelines dissolved, and the Apex collapsed.
She crumpled to the ground in a heap. Figures rushed to lift her, but grief and loss combined with physical exhaustion overwhelmed her, and she passed out.
When she came to, she lay on a bed in a darkened room. It was empty, apart from one person sitting in a chair by the bed, his head in his hands.
She turned onto her side, her whole body aching, and looked at him fondly. “Hello, Julen.”
His head snapped up and relief flooded his face. “You are awake!”
“So it seems.” She smiled tiredly. “How long have I been out?”
“Two days.” He picked up her hand and pressed it against his cheek. “I thought I had lost you.”
“It was not I who fell.” Grief rolled over her and tears trickled down her face.
“Horada…” He moved close and pulled her into his arms.
She cried for a while as she thought of her oldest brother, remembering the way his form had suddenly seemed to take all the fire into itself and had disintegrated into ash that blew away in the wind.
“All those people,” Horada whispered, burying her face in Julen’s tunic. She could not shake the memory of the ash falling and smothering the bodies.
“I know.” He stroked her back.
“I cannot believe Orsin was responsible for it, Julen. How can we live with the fact that we let him down so badly?”
He hesitated, and then he pulled back to look at her. She pushed herself up to a sitting position, and he took her hands. “The thing is,” he said, “the Nox Aves are certain that the Apex needed to happen. Nitesco described it to me as how sometimes a field of wheat stubble has to be burned and the field rested before the crop is grown again. In the future, for whatever reason, the Arbor knew that fire would rise and it had to die. Because of this, the Nox Aves believe that it engineered for the events to happen the way they did.”
“You mean it made Orsin betray us?” Her voice filled with horror.
He tipped his head from side to side. “Not made him betray, exactly, but I suppose it knew he had the strange connection with fire and it contrived for him to be tempted, because it suspected what would happen. Orsin fulfilled his purpose the same as we all did.”
She clenched her fists. “The Arbor made him kill all those people. How could it have done that?”
“I cannot pretend to understand its reasoning. I am not a scholar.”
“We are just pawns in its game of life,” she snapped, dashing away more tears. “If the future is so set in stone then why do we think we have any say over what happens to ourselves at all?”
“It is the price we pay for its love,” said a new voice from behind them. They turned to see their mother standing in the doorway. Horada stared – Procella wore a simple green gown, and her long blonde hair, peppered with grey, hung loose around her shoulders. She looked beautiful, but exhausted.
She came forward and sat on the side of the bed, taking her daughter in her arms. She kissed her forehead. “How are you feeling?”
“I ache, but my head is clear.” Horada fingered her mother’s gown. “Why are you dressed like this?”
“I have been holding a vigil,” Procella said.
“For Orsin?”
“Yes.” Procella’s eyes brimmed with sorrow, but she looked calm. “I know I failed him, and I cannot make any excuses for that. When I saw him fall, I was filled with such guilt that I did not think I could survive the pain. I spent two days and nights by the Arbor, battling with my feelings, trying to understand. I hated the tree for taking your father from me, for what it has done to us all, and now for taking Orsin from us. For a while I did not want to live. It hurt too much.”
Procella’s gaze had drifted away, her eyes shining. Horada bit her lip and squeezed her mother’s hand, and Procella’s eyes focussed. She smiled. “But last night, your father appeared to me.”
Horada’s eyes widened. “Truly?”
“Yes. He told me I must not blame the Arbor for the events that have unfolded. Our connection with the tree is a special, holy one, and it called on us because it knew we were able to help. I thought it treated our lives lightly, but Chonrad helped me understand how much value it places on our sacrifices, and how much it loves us.”
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I regret not being able to see Orsin again, and to tell him that I do love him and I am sorry for not treating him better. But Chonrad assured me he is at rest now, and he will always be a part of us, here.” She touched above her heart.
“And what now?” murmured Horada. “The second phase of the Apex – Tahir told me he lived five hundred years in the future. Can we not warn them? Tell them to prepare an army, ready themselves for the Incendi invasion?”
Julen shook his head. “They will record much of what happened in the Quercetum for future generations. But what we must take away from this is that we cannot – must not – try to change the future. Heartwood will fall, and the Arbor will die. Nitesco has said that we must not talk about what we have seen to anyone. The Nox Aves will record what they think future generations need to know. And we have to trust in them.”
“It is strange to think of the people we saw in the future,” Horada murmured. “Those who were banished underground – how will they fare? And the woman with the baby. What will happen to her?”
Procella smiled. “We may never know. But we must rest assured that we have fulfilled our role in the course of history, and that is all we can do.”
She and Julen continued to talk about future events, but Horada lay back and closed her eyes, tired again. She thought of Cinereo – of the fact that he had been formed from all those who had gone before. Orsin would now have joined them, and one day she herself would become part of him too.
All life is a cycle…
She yawned and stretched, turned over and settled down to sleep. She would grieve for her brother in the proper manner, but deep down, she had seen enough of death. She rested a hand on her belly as she thought of the baby that had been born beneath the new Arbor’s leaves. Perhaps one day she would get married and have children. And maybe those children would be the ancestors of those who played a part in the Apex.
Life leads to death, and from death springs life…
It was time to start living.
II
Deep in the mountainside, Demitto sat with his back against the wall of the cavern and drew Catena into his arms. She sat with her back to his chest, and where he rested his hand on her ribcage under her breast, he could feel the steady, reassuring beat of her heart.
It had been a chaotic day. As the cave entrance had collapsed and filled with rubble, the refugees had moved deeper into the cave system and waited for the clouds of dust to clear. Sunstone pendants crafted by the Nox Aves and hung around the caves provided them with a source of light.
As the dust settled and they went back to investigate, it had soon become clear that they would not be able to clear the cave entrance. Hundreds of massive boulders that they would not be able to move filled the way out. Manifred, Demitto and the other Nox Aves members had gone through the supplies that had been stored away for the past few hundred years, but although they had tools and weapons and plenty of building supplies, they knew they would not be able to make anything strong enough to lift the heavy stone.
They had come to that con
clusion with a positive outlook, however. They had suspected this would happen, and presumed that the Arbor had blocked them in on purpose to keep them safe from the volcanic lava as well as to make sure the Incendi elementals did not discover their presence as they took over Anguis. Now all that remained was to speak to the people who had followed them down into the caves, and to allay their panic and explain that they had prepared for this eventuality.
“My friends,” Manifred began, and waited for the talk to die down. He stood atop a flat shelf that protruded from the cavern’s edge, and widened his arms to encompass the hundreds of people sitting huddled in small groups. They were from all walks of life – some were rich dignitaries who had been visiting Heartwood for the Veriditas, others were town guards or council members, some were merchants and ordinary townspeople, even some of the poorer folk from the outer districts of the town. Old and young alike, they comforted each other during this hour of need.
“My friends,” Manifred said again as everyone fell quiet. “I think by now most of you will be aware of the events of the day. The volcano above Heartwood has erupted, and we believe the lava has completely destroyed the city.”
Shock registered on everyone’s faces. Demitto tightened his arms around Catena and touched his lips to her shoulder, thanking the Arbor that she was safe.
But of course, the Arbor was dead. He screwed his eyes shut, unable to believe it had actually happened.
Manifred continued, “The cave entrance has been blocked by boulders too heavy for us to clear. We have no way of knowing what is happening outside, so for now we have to come to terms with the fact that we will be here for some time.”
He waited a moment for everyone to digest that news. Demitto opened his eyes and glanced around, wondering what they were all thinking. The Nox Aves had come to the decision that they would not discuss the Apex with everyone. They would keep to themselves the news that they were probably the only remaining people alive in the whole of Anguis. Hope would be the single most important thing that would keep everyone alive now. Hope that one day they would make it to the surface again.
ARC: Sunstone Page 47
