“Father…” The word fell upon him like a physical blow, borne to his ears through the cutting wind. “I knew you would come. I’ve been waiting here for you.”
The greatsword trembled in his hands. “Maelthyn?” he said, already knowing that name was forever dead.
She stepped forward and the white flames about her hands lit up her face. It was the face of Maelthyn, so like that of Alua. And yet it was not her face at all. Her hair had changed from black to bone-pale, and there was nothing of blue left in her ebony pupils. The last traces of Vireon’s blood had been shed like a viper’s skin. Where was the tiny body, the delicate limbs, the pretty face of his daughter?
Elements of Maelthyn lingered in the lovely face, distorted as it was by a cruel smile. A touch of Alua’s chin… the cast of the nose… Yet the cheekbones were all wrong, and the black eyes nearly almondine.
Khyrein. She looked at him with Khyrein eyes.
“Is this all the Giants you could rouse for me?” she asked. Laughter lurked at the edge of her voice. “They must be a lazy bunch.”
The Udvorg growled and the Uduri crouched as one into their killing stances. Yet Vireon stood motionless before the slayer of his wife and daughter.
Lanthe. He must not say the name aloud. Something inside him knew it would mean his doom. Yet it was her. The Claw of Khyrei.
Her smile was wicked and gleeful. The white flame surged and she became a great white panther tall as a warhorse. It bared yellow fangs longer than daggers and spoke to him in Maelthyn’s voice. “You did not think your whore of a wife actually ended me?” The words fell impossibly from the panther’s maw. “You knew all along that something was not as it should be. Tell me you never had the urge to smother the little brat while she slept. To slit her throat and be done with it.”
Vireon tightened his knuckles about the grip of his sword. He took one step closer.
“No,” the beast said, wistfully. “You were a kindly father, and I thank you for that.” The panther glanced at the mutilated corpse of Alua. “And she was a dutiful mother. She brought me here to save me from you.”
A tiny sound fell from Vireon’s lips, almost a whimper.
“She was as ancient as I am,” said Ianthe. “Yet still so ignorant. She thought to burn my life away, but that was only my physical shell. I planted my immortal essence inside her womb like a seed in fertile soil. All I needed was a new cradle of flesh for this world, and she birthed it for me without ever knowing the truth. For seven years I dreamed inside that tiny crucible… until I remembered who I was. Then the bloodshadows came to answer my call… feeding me with the hearts they stole… and I grew.”
Vireon recalled the white panther soaring above the dying Shar Dni. The cries of panic and chaos, the bloody streets choked with bodies. He saw again Alua release the full power of her white flame and the panther dissolve like smoke in its blinding glow. Alua had fallen to earth, scarred but whole, and he had lifted her in his arms. The spirit of Ianthe had already infected Alua’s body, though he would never know until it was far too late.
His daughter’s entire existence was a lie.
“So nice to wear the flesh again,” said the panther. Its black eyes flashed. “So many pleasures to indulge, so much blood to taste.”
Vireon’s eyes darted to the corpse of Alua and back to the great cat. A red tongue slithered out to lick its chops.
“Her heart was tender and delicious,” said Ianthe. “And now her white flame is mine. Yet still I am hungry. Thank you for bringing these lovely Giants to me. Already I smell the power of their ancient blood.”
The cry that escaped Vireon’s lips was something between a growl and a bellow of agony. The blue blade of his sword swept across the panther’s throat. The beast pulled back its head and avoided the weapon’s bite. It reared above him on its hind claws as he brought the blade back in the opposite direction. A crimson weal appeared across the cat’s wide chest, then forward claws and gnashing fangs fell upon him like a storm. Its weight seemed that of a mountain, and he fell beneath its bulk to the floor of the broad ledge.
Twelve great spears came flying. Each one sank deep into the beast’s snowy flesh. Its wounds rained scarlet upon the snow. It caught Vireon’s right arm between its jaws, but the fangs did not break his stony flesh. Its slicing claws tore his mail shirt to shreds. His left hand grabbed a fistful of its underbelly fur, and he heaved it back toward the cave. Spear hafts splintered and cracked as it rolled across the ice and came up on all fours. The seeping wounds did not faze it.
The swipe of a great claw caught the side of Vireon’s head, and he tumbled toward the lip of the plateau. He would have fallen into the great chasm below, had he not driven the sword’s point into the ice like a climbing spike.
Uduri and Udvorg circled the raging beast, some jabbing with spears, others swinging iron maces or axes. The panther moved faster than the wind itself. Its long claws found throats and eyes, puncturing both. Udvorg hunters screamed, and their violet blood stained the snow. The weight of the beast’s front and back legs shattered more spears, snapping their shafts like twigs. Bronze spearheads went flying and Giants toppled bleeding.
Vireon climbed to his feet, barely noticing the lacerations on his arm where the fangs had finally broken through his skin. The panther vomited a gout of white flames now, and the blue-skins burned, wailing. Some of them fell, or leaped, from the ledge, hurtling into the glacial dark, smoldering until they hit the snows far below.
Dahrima cleaved the beast with her axe, opening its flesh in three places. Her sisters fought with sword and spear, though the beast was too fast for most of them. It swirled, a whirlwind of claw and fang, knocking Giants back, wounding, killing, or casting them from the mountain.
Vireon charged through the great legs of the Giants and found an opening. He drove the point of his blade deep into the panther’s heaving side. Already it bled from a score of wounds, yet it did not slow or howl with pain. Unlike a real panther, it did not growl or roar. It only breathed another flood of white flame, catching Vireon in the blaze.
He lost his grip on the sword as the full force of Alua’s stolen power fell upon him. Never before had he felt the sensation of burning. It was a new agony for one immune to the earth’s natural heat and cold. He stumbled back, howling, and his stubborn flesh steamed.
The panther grabbed an Uduri’s head in its fangs and crushed the skull to pulp. Dahrima screamed as the first of her sisters died. The beast lapped at the hot blood spilling from the headless body, and Vireon watched its score of wounds closing and steaming with white flame. How could he kill this abomination?
He took up a fallen Giant’s spear and charged forward again, his skin red and blistered. Again she caught him in the sweep of a mighty claw and sent him flying. He crashed into the hulking body of an Udvorg, solid as a marble wall. Regaining his senses, he saw that it was Thurguz.
“Up, King of the South!” howled the Giant, raising his bloody mace. “We kill or we die!”
Thurguz leaped into the fray, where Dahrima and the others suffered beneath a new blast of flames from between the beast’s jaws. The Uduri howled their pain across the mountaintops, a sound that would chill the bones of the Gods if they bothered to listen. Several Giants of both tribes died in that single moment, flesh turned to ash over blackened bones. Death played no favorites.
Thurguz slammed the panther to the earth with his great mace. Now it was a panther no longer, but a young woman once again. Naked and savage. The distorted face of Alua gleamed, the last remnants of Maelthyn’s smile lingering there. Her dark eyes flashed and the Udvorg huntsman fell strangely still. Vireon leaped forward but it was too late. Ianthe wrapped her lithe arms and legs about Thurguz, digging fangs into his neck. She ripped through the solid flesh as if it were straw, drinking deep of his cold, indigo blood.
The blue-skin hunters rushed forward again. She whirled the Udvorg body around to shield her as she feasted. Three spears and a sword blade plunged
into Thurguz’s gut and chest. His allies had not been quick enough to turn their attacks.
Vireon watched the life go out of the huntsman’s ruby eyes while the battle paused, the Giants and Giantesses horrified by their own error. Now the huntsman’s body fell forward on its face. The snow-maned woman crouched on his back, dripping purple blood from her narrow chin.
Vireon lunged for her, but the force of her scream held him at bay. A winter storm poured from Ianthe’s gore-smeared mouth. The shrill wailing of a cyclone rose from her throat into the sky, and the mountain itself trembled beneath her. Great sheets of ice broke off from surrounding peaks and tumbled into the darkness.
Then the peak of Kyorla, Mountain of Ghosts, shattered into a storm of frozen splinters.
Vireon and the Giants fell, many pierced by lances of ice, others tumbling amid the great boulders of frosted stone. Vireon reached out and grasped the lip of the ledge with the fingers of his right hand. The wind tore at his blistered skin and the screeching cry of the sorceress shivered the world. He dangled above the roaring abyss.
As the last of the Giantesses sailed past him and was lost in the chasm below, his only thought was to hold on. She could not escape him a second time. Her crime was too great. The Bitch of Khyrei must die this day, on this crumbling mountain. A howling void yawned below him, eager to swallow his tiny form.
Now she stood on the flattened summit of the mountain, atop a pile of bloodied ice and torn bodies. At the bottom of that frozen cairn lay the remains of Alua, unless the demon winds had already scattered them to nothing. At last the screaming stopped and the white flame raged about Ianthe’s lean body like a torrent. She was laughing, awash in the glory of her new power, stolen from the heart of Alua and the blood of Uduri and Udvorg alike.
She did not look at the dangling Vireon. Her flaming eyes stared southward.
In the ecstasy of her seething sorcery she ignored him. She was bloated on the blood of Giants, and she must have thought him fallen, dead, or lost with the rest of them. Now was his chance. He strove to bring his left arm up to join his right one, grasping a narrow spar of ice at the terminus of the ledge. He sank powerful fingers into that ice and pulled himself upward. He would lunge at her from below, and once he got his fingers around her neck let her burn and bite him. He would not let go until she was dead. Even his own death would not prevent this.
It was not the strength of his limbs that betrayed him. It was the ice that crumbled beneath his double grip. He clutched only a meaningless chunk of it now, and he fell into utter blackness.
For the second time he fell watching a pale comet speed away into the sky.
Khyrei. The name lingered in his mind as he plummeted into the chasm, a far greater fall than that from his tower.
The white flame soared across the southern sky, and he knew exactly where it would alight. Ianthe was going home.
He would have shouted a promise to pursue and destroy her once and for all, but the sudden impact of his body carried him deep into a vast bank of frozen snow, and on through the layer of ice beneath it. He knew only darkness then, and all thoughts faded as rushing snow filled his mouth and throat.
How does one measure time when trapped in the jaws of death?
How long he lay sleeping under the ice he could not guess.
The first inkling of his own continued existence was a burst of sunlight on his face. Deep cracking sounds filled the cocoon of ice and snow in which he lay. Something had broken through above him, admitting the sun’s golden rays. He blinked into the brilliance. The shaggy head of an Udvorg looked down at him, then called out to his fellows. They tore the compacted snow and ice away from him and lifted him from the hole.
The day was painfully bright. The flesh of his arms, chest, neck, and face was red, and he bled from a score of wounds. He was unaccustomed to feeling such discomfort. Yet when he focused on his suffering, it gave him a kind of reckless strength. He stood by himself on the surface of the frozen snow.
The surviving Udvorg had been digging out their fellows all day. Nine Uduri lay senseless but alive on the bright snow. They had also been dragged from icy graves. Seventeen Udvorg had survived the collapse of the mountain peak. Hot tears brimmed in Vireon’s eyes and ran across his burning cheeks.
Dahrima…
Her name was a sudden flame bursting to life in his breast.
She lay among her sister-cousins, weaponless, her armor battered and torn, dried blood crusted or frozen along her limbs. She, like him, had been burned. Yet she lived. Even now she groaned and lifted her head from the snow. The Udvorg milled about them, sniffing the snow for other survivors they might dig free. They found none. The White Mountains stood high and imperious about them in all directions. The peak directly above was broken Kyorla, standing like a crownless king among his glittering brothers.
Vireon stood near to Dahrima as she raised herself into a sitting position. She moaned and cracked her back with a stretch of her torso. She blinked into the sunlight. Her gaze fell across her sleeping sister-cousins.
“How many?” she asked.
“All but nine,” he answered. “I am sorry.”
She ignored the apology.
“And the panther bitch?”
“Gone,” he said. “To Khyrei.”
“Then we march…” She paused to spit a mouthful of blood from her torn lip.
“Yes,” said Vireon. “We march. But remember our bargain with the Udvorg.”
“Must we go with them?” she asked.
“I would go regardless,” he said. “To see the Ice King. To win all his forces for the Long March.” “Majesty?”
“War,” he said. “War on Khyrei.” Dahrima stood and dusted the frost from her limbs. “You will join with the Sword King of Uurz?” Vireon nodded, focusing on his pain. His reminder. His touchstone.
“I will bring the wrath of Giantkind down upon her head,” he said. “I will crush her black city into dust. I should have done it long ago.”
Dahrima’s voice sank to a whisper. She touched her King’s shoulder tenderly. Her lips came close to his ear. “What of the little one? And the poor Queen?”
Dead, he wanted to say. Both are dead.
One never had a chance to live at all.
Instead he said nothing, but only sat down in the snow and wept.
12
The Red Wine of Khyrei
Sunlight became an unpleasant memory. Sharadza slept by day in the tower of her rebirth, its windows shuttered behind tapestries of black wool. Each evening the moon called her forth, the invisible weight of it hanging above the city. Wisps of silver moonlight crept across the onyx stones of the palace. She met Gammir in a sunken courtyard beneath the diamond stars. In that place a wild grove of the jungle had been re-created for the Emperor’s pleasure. The gnarled, crimson trees twisted their branches into the night like grasping claws. Leaves the color of ancient wine fell upon the cobblestones and faded to the pallor of dead flesh. This was the Red Garden. Here the deadliest of Khyrei’s flora grew from roots watered with the blood of young slaves.
Among those sharp-edged leaves grew the ruby blossoms of the bloodflower. Sharadza walked with him in the grove of poisonous foliage and watched his long pale fingers pick the choicest blossoms. She carried a wicker basket into which he tossed the scarlet petals. They sat on a garden divan carved into the likeness of a winged Serpent with a pair of great bloodstones for eyes. A slave girl brought Gammir’s long pipe of silver and pearl; Sharadza watched as he stuffed the red petals into the bowl of the pipe and lit it with a burning taper. So it went every night.
She had learned to enjoy the acrid yet sweet smoke of the bloodflower. It elevated her perceptions, showing her the sea of blood constantly moving and flowing about the city. With the dun smoke creeping from between her lips, she saw the red glow of that blood, singing and surging in the body of every slave and soldier, every courtier and courtesan, every peasant and noble. Any of them might offer her a meal to thrill
and amaze her newborn senses.
The first few times the hunger came she fell immediately upon some hapless slave and drained him dry. Gammir watched laughing from the dark divan. In time he taught her not to rush the feeding. He showed her how to savor the hunger, to enjoy the onset of the Great Thirst… to take her time in choosing whose sacred fluid would fill her belly.
It was a lesson she had taken to heart.
Each night, after sharing the bloodflower, they rose above the city as leather-winged shadows. She soared with him about the forest of ships’ masts in the harbor, the black and red reavers that made Khyrei the terror of the Golden Sea. Swarms of sailors crawled like ants across the decks and wharves. They winged above the peaks of noble estates where the upper class of Khyrei conducted their feasts. Along a thousand streets and alleys they fluttered and careened, sending wary nightwalkers running for the comfort of hearth and home. They fed on the blood of wayward harlots and drunkards, leaving bodies drained and withered in the filth behind squalid taverns. In the palace victims were carefully chosen and prepared for them; in the streets they were predators snatching easy prey for the savage pleasure of it.
South toward the jungle they flew. Sharadza looked upon thousands of slaves gathered about tiny huts among the vast and bountiful fields. Companies of Onyx Guards on charcoal steeds kept order in this second city lying outside the high walls. Hearthfires gleamed in the shadow of the great wilderness. On they flew, diving into the deep shadows of the jungle itself, where the moonlight could never reach. He showed her terrible things that lurked in the red gloom, told her the secrets of the venomous herbs and insects that made it their home. At times these night flights even took them far out over the Golden Sea, where the waves danced madly and the bloated moon reigned supreme. There she discovered the origin of that sea’s name by the yellow glitter of moonglow across the main.
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