by Hal Emerson
“Shadows and bloody fire, princeling!” he said finally. “Warning would be nice!”
He shifted in his saddle, and it was clear the wound he’d suffered yesterday leaving Lerne had been healed. Still ignoring him, Raven dismounted and went to Lorna. When he reached her, she was watching him with reserved, cold eyes; if she had been surprised by what he’d just done, she wasn’t showing it. She and Leah should have a staring contest; rocks would weep before either one of them revealed a thing.
“I have something that belongs to you,” he said, and reached out to grab her hand. She watched him carefully, her eyes narrowed, but she let him do it. Before she could object, he interlocked his fingers with hers, and their cold palms were touching.
Raven closed his eyes and placed a hand on Aemon’s Blade, then reached inside himself and grabbed hold of both the Raven Talisman and the Wolf Talisman. He felt the markings on his back and chest heat, and he felt an awareness of Lorna’s life, a bright golden knot in his mind that radiated the smell of horses, the feel of iron bars, and the sound of a howl.
He pulled the Wolf Talisman out of him, and added it to Lorna’s life.
Instantly, he felt fatigue overcome him, and he realized just how much he’d been relying on the Talisman to keep him going. He staggered back, and disengaged from Lorna’s life, leaving the Talisman with her and pulling his fingers free of her grip. He opened his eyes – shadows and light, even my eyelids are tired – and saw that her hands and feet were glowing so bright and hot that gray light was shining up and out of her boots and gauntlets.
She was staring at him, shocked, but a new vitality infused her that quickly occupied her thoughts. Her eyes unfocused, and Raven knew she was mentally checking in with her body, feeling the new surge of energy that would power her past all bounds of human endurance. She swallowed, and looked at him once more, her former stoicism cracked and showing gratitude.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice the same raspy quality he’d always known but with an edge of energy to it, like a crackle of thunder off in the distance.
Raven nodded, let her, and turned back to Davydd. The young man was watching the proceedings with a combination of surprise, annoyance, and gratitude as Raven approached him, all of which made for a very interesting facial expression that hovered somewhere between “I just bit a lemon” and “I smell excrement.” Reaching out, Raven stopped him from turning his horse away.
He won’t listen, he never does, but I have to warn him anyway.
“Be careful,” he said. He was holding onto Davydd’s saddle with an iron grip, preventing the man from leaving. Even the man’s horse, Aron, was looking at him with annoyance and indignation, a look that was now mirrored, and only slightly better concealed, on the face of his rider.
“I’m always careful,” Davydd said.
“No,” Raven said, “you’re not. And this is not a time for mischief. You’re known in Tyne, and I know you have your own history there with your family – ”
Davydd’s eyes widened and then quickly narrowed as his jaw clenched and his nostrils flared; Raven continued before the man could break away in anger:
“But now is not the time to settle scores.”
Davydd stayed where he was, but still looked like he had half a mind to ride the Prince over as he left.
“Davydd, the Fox Talisman is intoxicating – you have to think of it like a drug. Remember me, in Vale, when Henri Perci slipped me dopalin? It’s very similar. That euphoria that you feel, like nothing can touch you, like you’re all powerful? That’s what will get you killed. You may be lucky, but you’re not invulnerable. When you’re up against Rikard, luck will only get you so far. And if you get too close … if you get too close, there’s no telling what he might be able to make you do. He’s mad, and powerful beyond what you can understand. Do not test him. If you come up against him, run and do not look back.”
“Of course, my Prince,” he quipped through a mocking smile that showed he’d listened to all the advice and heard none of it. He spurred his horse hard in the sides, and Aron leapt forward. The Rangers followed him – men and women in black, tight-fitting leather armor and green and gold tunics, all bearing a variety of personalized weapons.
Raven cursed as he watched the Eshendai disappear northward through a haze of trail dust, and only realized Lorna had stayed behind when her husky voice broke through his brooding thoughts.
“The Talismans will offset, like they always do when the Children come for you … correct?”
“No,” Raven said quickly. “No – each of them reacts differently. I don’t know why mine works the way it does – I doubt even the Empress knows. I’ve always had the most effect on the other Talismans, but some, like the Snake Talisman, are barely hindered at all by mine. I have the most effect on the Eagle and the Fox – and so does Rikard.”
Lorna was watching him solemnly, and Raven, recognizing a receptive audience, continued on, desperate to make sure that if Davydd wouldn’t watch out for himself, at least someone else would.
“When the Fox Talisman gets to him, and it will, you need to be ready to pull him back,” he said, holding her gaze with all the intensity he could muster, trying to impress upon her mind as if with a physical stamp just how important his words would be to her in coming confrontation. “Rikard will have little problem commanding him if Davydd loses his concentration. If Davydd lets go of the Aspect for the barest fraction of a second, just enough for Rikard to grab hold of him, then it’s over. You, on the other hand, will have an easier time. The Lion has more difficultly holding the Ox and Wolf, or at least he did when Dysuna and Ramael bore them, and while he may affect you a bit, you will have a better chance, a far better chance, than Davydd.”
Lorna nodded slowly, taking in every word.
“How long will you be gone?” he asked. “How long will it take to get there and meet us before Lucien?”
“Without needing to slow down for infantry,” Lorna said, “we’ll be there and out before the week is done. We’ll meet you as you finish the journey north.”
“The day before our time runs out,” Raven said.
“Just so,” she said. “Time enough for one final battle.”
He nodded, and turned to mount Melyngale.
“Thank you.”
Raven turned back and saw she was looking at him with huge, unspoken emotion in her eyes.
“I’ve never felt this complete before,” she said. “I feel … I feel like me.”
He swallowed hard and nodded.
“Keep him safe,” he said. “And yourself as well. We’ll need you both before this is over … and I want to see you again before it ends.”
She smiled at him, a huge, beaming smile, the first he’d ever received from her in all the time he’d known her, and then she wheeled her horse about and took off. Raven watched her until she was out of sight, and then followed suit, making his way back to the Kindred.
* * *
After he found Leah and Tomaz, they wasted no time in leaving Whitestone themselves at the head of the Kindred Army. They were truly marching against the clock now, and everyone, even the Commons, knew it. The first day passed quickly, and so too did the next. Raven, Leah, Tomaz, Autmaran, and now Tym, met with the Elders and Generals every night to finalize plans, but everything truly hinged on whether or not Davydd and Lorna returned quickly enough to provide them with more information. If they had to deal with Rikard already in the city of Lucien, or if they had to deal with another Bloodmage crystal, foreknowledge of the fact might be the only thing to save them. Their supply chains were stretching far too long, and the small amount of food and forage they’d been able to collect in Whitestone wasn’t enough to help augment it for long. They really would only have one shot at this – an all-out attack, and only that.
“We present ourselves on the Plains of al’Manthian,” Autmaran said, “and we attack the city. There is no other way to do this. We will need to figure out a way how once we get the
re, but we have what the Empress needs: Raven. She cannot wait behind her walls anymore than we can wait outside them. This will come to an all out battle with hundreds of thousands of men. We will need each captain to be in charge of their group independently, with general, flexible instructions about what to do. I will be in contact with each officer over the next few days to tell them what I expect on the day of battle, and to clarify our objectives.”
He turned to Raven, Tym, Leah, and Tomaz.
“Our job is to stay in the center of the army until we know where we need to commit,” he said. “They will have something readied for us – they know we have the Talismans now, and they know that you, Raven, are leading this army. We stay together in reserve, until the time comes when we are needed to bolster the most heavily attacked parts of the army. Each of you is worth fifty soldiers on your own – and if the troops see you, they will rally.”
The days passed and the plan solidified as the road continued leading them to Lucien. The trees began to thin out, and grass began to take its place. Spring took firm grip of the weather, and the days and nights both grew warmer. It rained at night, and then cleared up during the day, leaving behind fresh green leaves and the smell of damp bark.
When they rode during the day, Raven thought of the map of Lucia he’d had to memorize as a child and mentally charted Lorna and Davydd’s progress. By his calculations, on the third day they should be at the city, and on the third night they’d infiltrate it and find out if what had happened at Lerne was happening in Tyne. As it was, the Kindred army itself was only days away from the Plains of al’Manthian, the wide, barren expanse of land that encircled the city of Lucien.
Raven watched the soldiers carefully as they marched, watching for signs of attrition or fatigue, and while he saw plenty of the latter, he saw barely any of the former, even though they woke as soon as it was light enough to see and marched until dusk. Raven expected protests, but there were none. Even when the Healers were inundated with requests for blister salves and soldiers had to sleep with their feet elevated because they were so swollen, no one left or deserted. They just rose the next day when woken, and put one foot in front of the other, with grim looks and set jaws.
“They’ve seen their Prince defeat an entire army, watched a capital city disappear beneath a mountain of rubble, and seen Dysuna, Ramael, Tiffenal, and Symanta cut down their friends, companions, and family,” Autmaran told him when he brought it up. “Waking up early probably doesn’t hold a candle to that, now does it?”
“I … suppose that’s a very good point.”
“Besides, they want to be here,” Autmaran continued. “You may have been the one to start this rolling, but it’s become a movement far greater than you could have manufactured on your own.”
“I suppose that’s good though,” Raven said. “After all, I’m not the Commander.”
Autmaran quirked an eyebrow at him; he seemed to become more and more non-verbal with every day that passed, something Raven had noticed before the other major battles they’d fought together.
“Well,” he continued with a sigh, “there’s only one Talisman left.”
“The Lion,” Autmaran said.
“The Lion,” Raven confirmed.
Silence fell between them, and in it both saw the recognition in the other that the new bearer would be Autmaran. Raven wasn’t sure why it had ever been a question, really. He was the Commander of the Kindred Army. If anyone should inherit the Lion Talisman, if anyone should be able to turn it from its black Bloodmagic purpose and make it a pure Aspect again, it was the man riding beside him. Now all they needed to do was engineer a situation where Raven managed to kill Rikard, without Autmaran dying in the biggest battle fought in any single war since the founding of the Empire.
At least it wasn’t a hard task they’d set for themselves.
“We’re insane,” Raven said out loud, startling both himself and Autmaran. “Really – we are.”
“War is insane,” Autmaran said. “Besides – insanity is what historians call genius.”
He glanced at Raven, a small, wry, smile playing about the corners of his lips.
“We’re only insane if we lose.”
“And if we win?”
“Then we’ll tell everyone we knew what we were doing all along.”
“So we lie to the historians?”
“Maybe bribe them.”
“Fair. And there’s always blackmail – that doesn’t cost money.”
“Or extortion.”
“Certainly an option.
“We could counterfeit an eye witness account.”
“We could counterfeit two eyewitness accounts.”
“Ah – corroboration, I like the way you think.”
“Great minds, you know.”
“Maybe we should try them all – that way at least one will work.”
“Probably the safest way to go about it.”
“Right.”
“So it’s a deal?”
“Sure. But if I die, you make me out to be a hero.”
“Likewise.”
They caught each other’s eye and both broke into laughter at the same time, and the good clean happiness of camaraderie lifted the malaise that had fallen on them. There had been too little laughter lately – and there would be precious little more in the time to come. Melancholy rode with the army like a palpable force, it seemed, always just behind them, ready to overtake them should they falter.
But something held it at bay.
The change had begun after Lerne. Where before each step had seemed to take something from them, to drain away an essential part of what it meant to be human, now each stride felt like a conquered piece of land. The wind seemed to watch them with approval now as it blew past, racing south bearing news of their passage, and the sound of their feet on the ground was no longer the ringing of a death knell, but the beating of a strong and healthy heart.
And it was because of Tym.
Raven still, in his heart of hearts, wished that he had kept the Snake Talisman. For that matter, he wished that he had kept all of the Talismans, and found a way to turn them into Aspects without having to give them to the others. He still felt, and always had, that the burden was his to shoulder; he was one of the Children, he had a stain in his very being, turning the blood in his body black as night. It was his duty to repent for what his family had done to this land; it fell on his shoulders to bear the original task of Aemon and atone for the work of his Mother.
But when Tym walked through the camp now, not as a young boy but as a teenager on the cusp of manhood, he pulled away some of the stones Raven had used to barricade his heart from caring. When the boy picked up a sword for the first time and had the soldiers teach him how to use it around the evening fire, it soon seemed as if the whole camp was watching and laughing with him as he made an intentional fool of himself. On the march, when the men and women were the most tired, he appeared as if from nowhere with a smile and a welcoming hand, his eyes and neck glowing with the pure, innocent green of spring, echoed in the blooming world around them.
He was, in short, everything that Raven couldn’t be. In a matter of days he became the heart of the Kindred, something Raven supposed the boy had always been, even though no one had realized it. They rallied around him in a way that was so natural it was eerie; it wasn’t that they shied away from Autmaran or Raven, or even Leah, Tomaz, and the two Elders still with them. If anything, their relationship with the entire command unit had been enhanced. Tym gave the soldiers something they had been missing from all of the veteran commanders: hope and innocence. He reminded them what they were fighting for; reminded them that younger brothers, sons, nephews, even children not yet born, lived and breathed back home in the Kindred cities of Vale and Eldoras, Chaym and Marilen and Aemon’s Stand.
And though Raven knew the world didn’t work that way, he still felt as though it was Tym and what he stood for that drew the others.
As soon as they w
ere far enough distant from the city of Lerne, they found traces of the refugees that had been so severely lacking on their way from Banelyn: discarded clothing, bloody bandages, raided houses and burned ruins. The first group of people they saw was thought to be an aberration; when they were sighted, they were assumed to be nothing more than frightened Commons fleeing a war that was slowly and surely consuming the entire Empire. They came from what was left of the countryside to the north and east, from what Raven and the others came to realize was the implosion of Geofred’s old province, the Eyrie, as the Most High found themselves unable to hold the city together.
I knew he wouldn’t kill them. I knew it.
More came hard on their heels, from every corner of the Empire, some even from the south on half-wild horses, bringing word that the countryside had been swept clean when Dysuna had marched north; she and her men had raped the land and taken what remained of the winter harvest and seed just as planting season had arrived, depriving thousands of life-giving crops, and leaving deeply rooted hatred. With nothing else to live for, they’d followed the rumors of a Kindred revolution, ready to extract a price from the Empire that had left them to starve.
And when they came, they didn’t ask for food, nor did they ask for shelter. They asked for swords and armor, men and women both. Children, if they could still be called that after what they’d seen, volunteered for any work available. Soon, there was barely enough of anything to go around. Tomaz, Leah, even Autmaran himself, were soon found giving fighting lessons with any spare moment they had. Stannit became invaluable, and Jallin, the former Kindred captain, became his right-hand man. Together they formed what became known as the Free Commons, and they infused a fire into the rest of the army that burned hot and high.
Raven offered his help, but was universally declined. In many cases it was out of fear: the men knew him on sight by the armor and clothing he wore, and the rumors of his deeds had spread far and wide. The men spoke of little else, and his legend grew still more around the campfires, stoked now by Kindred and Imperial legends both.
