by Hal Emerson
Tears were rolling down his cheeks, and his words died off as his throat closed and choked him. He couldn’t look at her anymore, couldn’t acknowledge her or what he’d just said. He knew such thoughts were the thoughts of a coward, and they unmanned him even as he spoke them. There was no going back from what he’d just said; he could never be with her, even if he wanted to. She knew his secret, knew he was weak, and even if she didn’t tell the others, there could be nothing between them now.
She sank to her knees, and the knife dropped from her hand. It fell and lay abandoned at her side.
“Why …?”
She broke off and swallowed.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me before?”
“Wh … why would I?”
Her jaw clenched and a muscle twitched high up along her cheekbone.
“Because Goldwyn took me in after I … when Davydd told him I tried to … “
She stopped again, then ground her teeth together, pursed her lips, and continued, spitting out the sour, offending words.
“I’ve fought that feeling for years. I’ve fought that feeling since the first night I spent in these mountains, having run away from my parents in Tyne. I fought that feeling when I realized I had no choice but to live life as an Exile. I fight that feeling every single day, even when life is wonderful – and I refuse to lose that fight. I refuse.”
She continued to stare him down, her stony face a mask that held back more than he had ever expected.
“Why?” he asked, searching for hope.
“Because I’m not going down like that,” she hissed. “Because screw the world and everyone in it. I’m going to live because I want to, and I will make of my life something of which I can be proud. That’s how you fight it. That’s how you beat it.”
It seemed suddenly as if all sound had gone out of the world. When she stopped talking and stared down at him, fierce, proud, and invincible, the rest of life ceased to be. Nothing else mattered but her: she was everything. He wanted to be that man she saw; he wanted to drown in her, in everything she was and everything she stood for. She was more than just a woman, she was a symbol of everything that was right and beautiful about living; she was the unashamed, proud embodiment of hope. Not the kind in children’s tales, the kind that came easy to heroes with simple tasks, but the hard kind of hope, and the hard kind of joy, that came from laughter forced through tears.
“I love you,” he whispered.
The stony mask of her face cracked, the barest fraction, to reveal shock, and he felt the same emotion reverberate through him. The words had slipped out independent of thought; but they were true, and they had been since the first time he’d kissed her.
“I love you, too,” she whispered back.
Thin, tendrilic warmth spread through his body, and the cold mountain air caught in his chest. The look of shock on her face was still there; her words had slipped out just as unexpectedly as his. He reached up, folded his hands around her head, and pulled her down to him. She came easily, letting go of the last resistance that had held her up, away from him. Her lips met his, and for a single, perfect moment, everything was fine. The darkness receded, the light took over, and silence cocooned them in the shadow of the grove. Her hands encircled him, pulling him close, and his did the same, wrapping around her waist and burying in her hair.
They broke apart by inches, just far enough so that their lips could form words.
“I want this,” he said to her. “I want it for the rest of my life.”
“I want it too,” she said, “even if it lasts just for the rest of today.”
He swallowed hard, feeling her breath warming his cheek, staring into her eyes, captivated as always.
“I must face her,” he said. “Even if it means death.”
“Then I will get you there,” she said. “Even if it means death.”
They embraced again, feeling the blessed warmth of each other’s bodies, and Raven found himself close to tears.
I want this. I want an ‘after.’ Please, whatever gods may be, give me an after.
Noise very close: horses; shouts of men and women; the clash of steel.
They came apart and were on their feet in seconds. Leah had grabbed up her daggers, and Raven held Aemon’s Blade before him in both hands, curved blade perpendicular to the ground. The noise came from the side of the small clearing opposite them, the side that looked out at the distant sight of Lucien and the Plains of al’Manthian. Raven reached through the Talisman and felt light blossom all throughout the forest before them: the rest of the army were arrayed downhill below them in loose ambush formations.
And closer, just beyond the nearest trees, was the life of Tomaz, burning in his mind like an ember, and the life of Autmaran, Davydd, Lorna, and even Tym.
“Who is it?” Leah asked.
“Tomaz, Lorna, Davydd, Tym, Autmaran,” Raven rattled off, “but they don’t seem to be fighting anyone. I don’t understand what’s going on –”
Small, sickly green pinpoints of light, half there and half not, burst into life before winking out, like stars through cloud cover on an overcast night.
“Death Watchmen,” Raven hissed. “Dozens of them – get ready!”
As soon as he’d finished speaking, the Watchmen shot from the trees, running straight for him. There were dozens of them, and more kept coming, all skeletal figures with flesh and muscle pulled tight against decaying limbs, kept alive only by the Empress’s Command. They raised onyx weapons, axes, swords, scythes, and every manner of cutting implement, and shouted, their voices the rasping echoes of a death cry.
Raven dropped into a defensive stance and raised Aemon’s Blade; Leah threw both daggers, striking two charging Watchmen straight through the eye, knocking them down and giving them pause, but not stopping them. The enchantment that powered them was inscribed into their spine – the only way to kill them was to sever it, though anything else would slow them.
The first Watchman construct attacked him with a heavy axe, which Raven managed to sidestep, before slicing a blow to the thing’s knee, sending it tripping to the floor, where he swung for its head, slicing its spine. The creature fell to the ground, and began to decay immediately, producing the sickly-sweet smell of putrescence and then the horribly nauseating scent of weeks-old rot. Two more came for him, forcing him back, and he realized the true extent of the trouble they were in: these creatures didn’t have life, not in the conventional sense. There was no power for him to absorb when they died; in this fight, he was just an ordinary man.
Leah came to his side, and together they fended off the attack of the Watchmen, retreating around the tree, only to see more coming from the other side in a huge wave.
“Where did they all come from?!” Leah cried.
“I don’t know!” Raven called back.
An onyx dagger came whizzing through the air past them, just inches away from Raven’s left ear. Two of them rounded the far side of tree and came at them with matching half-moon axes bigger than Raven’s head.
A roar sounded from behind them, and Raven felt the red-hot life of Tomaz burst through the pack of Watchmen, ripping two apart as he went. Lorna came in after him, moving half a step faster than possible, making her movements somehow jerky and incompatible with normal eyesight; her axe sliced the head of another Watchman clean off.
But none of the Death Watchmen turned to defend; none of them even broke stride as they all came in a huge wave for Raven, even jostling each other aside in their haste to move forward.
Raven and Leah parried again and again, now standing back to back as they rotated, trying frantically to defend against all sides. Raven was reaching as far through his Talisman as he could, his senses on fire with a thousand different impressions, all coming to him at the same time. He ducked a blade, only to roll away from another as it struck the ground where he’d just been, feeling every root and twig as it pressed against his back and shoulders. He swung around back to Leah’s side, just in ti
me to deflect a blow that would have caved in her head just as she threw a dagger and knocked a Watchman that was about to do the same to him off its feet.
The Death Watchmen’s blades were getting closer, though, and Raven cried out as he felt the first one score a slice along the back of his arm. Another blow glanced off the armored breastplate he wore, but a third cut a line of fire across his cheek even as he tried to recoil and avoid it.
Leah’s eyes were flashing with blue light, and she avoided nearly every blow that came her way, until there were just too many. The sheer weight of the Watchmen pinned them down, and Raven knew there was no way they were getting out of this on their own.
With a flash of steel, Tomaz cut his way through the Watchmen to Leah’s side, just in time to save her from being run through by one of the razor-sharp onyx blades. Autmaran came in next, mounted on Alto, cutting left and right, shouting Commands in the faces of the Watchmen, but to no effect: they were already under the Command of the Empress herself.
Davydd was mounted as well, and the left half of his body glowed with golden veins as he swung about him with Titania; Tym brought up the rear, a simple short sword in his shaking hands, killing Watchmen that had fallen but weren’t yet dead.
They all came in and surrounded Leah and Raven, and the battle turned. With each of them fighting side by side, using the Aspects, the Death Watchmen didn’t stand a chance.
A sudden silence fell, and Raven realized the only sound left was their heavy breathing. He looked around him and saw all the other Aspect bearers scanning the area as well, wide-eyed and staring.
“I’m glad you’re all here,” Raven gasped, “but how did you know to come?”
“Davydd,” Autmaran said, trying to work moisture back into his mouth. “Davydd came shouting from the Healer’s –”
“Went to take a leak and saw them running up the Mountain,” Davydd panted, “dunno if I’d call that lucky, but I’ll take it.”
“There were more,” Tomaz rumbled. “I have the feeling they came here for one reason – if I were the Empress, I’d do that same thing.”
“Send them all running into the Mountains,” Autmaran said, nodding and turning to Raven, “on a suicide mission straight for you.”
“There were two groups,” Davydd said looking around. “That was the first –”
“And here comes the second,” Lorna said, raising her axe.
Trees rustled to their right, and more figures burst from concealment: another wave of Death Watchmen. Before they could more than shift in that direction, there was a whole two dozen of them, and they split the group in two. Raven found himself forced back nearly all the way against the tree in the same spot Leah had thrown him. He cut down two of the Watchmen attacking him, and saw the others faring well against their own opponents, but then he tripped over a gnarled root and fell.
He crashed into the ground, his cheek slamming into the dirt. He looked up and saw the closest Watchman raise his onyx sword, ready to bring it down. Raven rolled away as best he could, but the sword still caught in his cloak. He rose as far as he could, pulling himself free, raising Aemon’s Blade, but he’d lost too much time. The Death Watchman was over him, swinging his sword with lightning speed. Raven managed to throw him back, calling out desperately to the nearest person to him:
“Tomaz!”
The big man swung around and sized up what was happening in an instant. He ran forward, abandoning the Watchmen he was fighting on his own, and brought Malachi up in a huge swing, parallel to the ground. The Watchman, too far away to swing its sword, pulled out a dagger instead, and hurled it at Raven even as Tomaz’s sword cut into the construct’s side.
The dagger flew straight and true, right for Raven’s head.
Chapter Nineteen: Elders
The dagger spun end over end in perfect form, even as Malachi cut through the Watchman’s decaying flesh and severed its spine. Raven reversed his sword, swinging as fast as he could, but without the benefit of added strength and with the decided detriment of battle-weary limbs, it was like trying to swing an oar. He saw the dark, nearly black, onyx blade slice through the air toward him, almost as if time had slowed. He wasn’t going to make it – the hilt of the Blade couldn’t get there in time. The dagger was so close, its blade sliced through the swirling fabric of his cloak –
Something heavy hit him, and he was falling sideways. He slammed once more into the ground, the dagger flying harmlessly through where he’d been to imbed itself in a tree trunk twenty feet farther away.
The Death Watchman construct died and slid off the end of Tomaz’s sword where it began to decompose on the forest ground. Beetles and worms dug themselves out of the fertile, black earth and began to gorge, making a meal of it then and there. Raven looked up to see his savior, expecting it to be Leah or Davydd, but instead the figure above him was dressed in simple gray robes of plain homespun. His hem was travel-worn, and the hood, shoulders, and back stained by the spring rains. A simple, well-cut gray beard, blue eyes –
“Elder Crane?”
The sounds of battle came from behind him, and before he could even force his tired body to react, Crane pushed his way past, lifting a bow nearly as tall as he was. In the blink of an eye he’d drawn an arrow, notched it, and sent it flying through the gloomy mountains, striking a Death Watchmen engaged with Leah straight through the neck, felling the construct.
“Do it now!” he called out.
Raven looked around in shock and saw a number of other figures in the robes of the Elders of Vale, in red and blue, green, tan, and all the colors in between. Lymaugh and Stanton led the charge with the others close behind, all shouting words of power that blistered the air. Spader and Ishmael were there as well - Spader with a long staff held tight in both hands, and Ishmael with a pair of daggers, one long and thin, the other thick and curved like a fang.
On Elder Crane’s word, they all reached into their robes and pulled out the shining opal daggers slung about their throats on long silver chains. Unsheathing the daggers, they slashed the blades against their hands, and began chanting. Raven couldn’t understand what was being said, but he didn’t have to; the sound of it rolled over and around him, leaving him unaffected, only to drop dozens of Death Watchmen dead in their tracks, with flashes of green light leaving them just before they dropped.
In seconds it was over. The Elders had secured the clearing, and Raven saw that a number of Rogues had come with them: it looked like there were two for every Elder, acting as bodyguards. It was the last group of people Raven had ever expected to see here, everyone from Elder Dawn, the Dragon Lady herself, to Elder Ekman with his high forehead and bright blue robes.
“Spader, Ishmael,” Crane said quickly, taking command even as the final body hit the ground, “I need you here. Everyone else, down the hill – the Visigony will attack shortly. Do whatever you can to slow their progress.”
“We are weaker when we are not twelve,” Elder Pan said, standing tall in his long brown robes, the color of a strong, healthy buck.
“The Visigony are no longer twelve either, but seven,” Ishmael rasped, cleaning his daggers. “You will still outnumber them – show them the power of pure magic.”
“We will,” Elder Ceres said in her beautiful golden-tan robes, the color of blooming wheat fields. “I will lead.”
“Good,” Crane said. “I will speak with the Prince and his companions and be with you shortly. Buy us what time you can.”
They nodded and were gone, leaving Crane, Ishmael, and Spader to wrap their cut hands while Raven and his companions all stared on, uncomprehending. As they left, Raven saw that Davydd was limping, having dismounted his horse. He crossed to the Ranger and touched his neck, holding Aemon’s Blade and the Talisman. Davydd let out a gasp as if he’d been plunged into freezing water, and then started sputtering and coughing, yanking himself away from Raven.
“Shadows and fire – warning, princeling, give me warning!”
He looked do
wn at his boot, and Raven was pleased to see he had his weight evenly distributed. Whatever had caused the blood loss and limp was gone, the wound healed. Raven shook his head to clear the fatigue that had settled over him, and turned back to the others.
“So it does work,” Elder Crane said quietly. His icy blue eyes were watching them both intently. Davydd, still shivering from the touch, looked like he couldn’t decide whether to hit Raven or thank him.
“Elder,” Tomaz rumbled, pre-empting any such conflict, a tone of wonder in his voice. “How are you here?”
“We received Elder Spader’s message of Keri’s death,” Crane said quietly, his eyes flicking away from Raven to rest on the giant, “and we knew that our first plan had failed. You needed three Elders to rededicate the sambolin – and now you had two.”
How much do they know? Raven thought frantically, keeping his face as calm and composed as possible. What are they here to do?
“But it was more than that,” he continued. “We could easily have sent one or two of us with an armored guard racing along the Imperial Road to meet you along the way, but on the same night we met to plan the journey, we had something happen that has not occurred in my lifetime.”
He turned to Spader and Ishmael.
“Elder Iliad came to Council.”
Spader and Ishmael reacted in very different ways.
Spader let out a snort of disbelief and turned around to the others as if saying ‘look at this – even in the middle of a war the guy makes jokes. What a leader!’ before turning back to Crane and seeing he was serious.
Ishmael blinked.
Once.
