by Phil Tucker
"You all right?" Asho's voice sounded strange in his own ears, hollow and distant.
"Yes." She took a deep breath as if mastering herself. Her eyes flashed and her grin was feral, almost manic. "Oh, yes. Looks like you dropped your sword."
"Yes." He walked toward her. Was there a limit to how much magic he could draw? "Still, I don't think I'll miss it."
"Oh?" Kethe slashed at the air. "You're the cockiest Bythian I've ever met."
Asho didn't answer. He strode right up to her, and when she swung, he simply swayed around her blade.
Everything seemed to slow. Her backhand sailed over his head as he leaned back, and a mad thought seized him, the sense that he could catch her blade with his bare hand. He almost attempted to do so, but some elementary caution held him back. Instead he danced with Kethe, weaving and bobbing as she hacked and cut at him as futilely as if he were a shadow.
"How are you doing that?" She fell back with a gasp.
"Doing what? Embarrassing you?"
Her brow furrowed in anger. "No. Moving like that. It's not fair."
"It's a cruel world, Kethe." He stepped in close again. "You should know that by now."
She launched herself at him with a cry, spearing her sword straight at his head. It was easy to side-step. He let Kethe's momentum carry her past him, then slid his arm around her neck and pulled her tight against his chest in a choke hold. She cried out and dropped her sword, grabbing at his forearm with both hands. He didn't squeeze, but rather held her tight.
"How's this, then, for a trick?"
The white fire that burned off her skin swirled as if a gust of wind had blown into the heart of an inferno. Her grip on his forearm grew as strong as iron, and with a cry of anger she bent at the waist and hurled him over her shoulder. He flew through the air and crashed down to the ground, sliding over the broken stones until he fetched up beside his blade.
Eyes wide, Asho stared at Kethe. She was heaving for breath, hands balled into fists, eyes slitted. But it was the white fire that held his attention. The flames were curling and snapping at the air as if they were alive.
"Kethe?"
"Never." She took a shuddering step toward him. "Touch me like that. Again."
She was tearing the magic from him, inhaling it faster than he could pull. A pink tone covered her brow, then it turned red.
She was sweating blood.
Alarmed, Asho stood and ceased drawing on the magic currents. The roar in his ears was immediately replaced by the sound of his pounding pulse. Kethe let out a small cry and sank to one knee, head lowering, shoulders still heaving for breath. But without his magic pouring into her, the white flames that danced across her body shrank to barely a flicker.
Asho hurried to her side, crouched, and reached out to touch her shoulder before pulling his hand away. "Kethe?"
"I'm fine." Her voice was little more than a gasp. She stood abruptly, swayed, and turned away. "It's nothing."
"Nothing?" That fierce joy had completely evaporated. A wave of exhaustion passed through him, and without meaning to he rocked back and sat heavily on the stone. "You're sweating blood."
She passed her hand over her brow, stared at her bloody palm, then wiped it on the seat of her breeches. "It's nothing," she said again.
"We took in too much," he said. He wanted to hang his head between his knees and just focus on breathing. "We shouldn't - we can't - take in that much power. That's what happened. We went too far."
Kethe stood still, head lowered, hands knotted into fists. Finally she sighed and relaxed. "Maybe." Then she turned and stabbed at him with an extended finger. "But if you ever grab me like that again, I swear by the White Gate that I'll -"
"All right, all right." Asho held up his hands. "I'll not touch you." But he couldn't keep the corners of his lips from quirking up. "I'll stick to hacking at you with a sword from now on."
Kethe couldn't maintain her glare, so she dropped her hand. "Hacking futilely at me, you mean. You never landed a blow."
The reminder caused him to wince. Asho looked down at his side, where a thin line of blood had seeped into his tunic, then tongued the side of his mouth where her pommel had cracked across his jaw. "Fair enough. We're going to have to be careful with this... ability of ours. What we just did was reckless."
"Perhaps," said Kethe. Her expression turned bleak. "But this power is a death sentence regardless. What will caution gain us? We're damned and might as well learn what we can do."
In his mind's eye Asho saw the Virtue he'd killed collapsing in black flame. Felt his own breath catch. Damned. For Kethe that might mean being reborn as a Zoeian. For him? The Black Gate. He didn't know what to say. "You're not damned." His fear turned to anger. "You're connected to the White Gate. You might become a Virtue.
Kethe wiped her brow again with her other hand. "You couldn't have killed Makaria without my help. I'm damned. They'll never Consecrate me and let me become one of them. You know it. I know it. So why pretend?"
Asho forced himself to his feet. "No. You don't know that."
Kethe slid her blade into her scabbard. "Poor Asho. Do you really think that?" She stepped right up to him. The look in her eyes chilled him. Scorn. Pity. The deepest flickerings of anger. "We're damned, Asho. You and me both. This power. This ability we have. It will kill us if we're not hunted down and killed first. Understood?"
Asho didn't know what to say. A great and blank denial arose within his chest. "No. I don't believe that."
She patted his cheek and he flinched back. "That's all right. Go on pretending. But you'll have to do so alone. I've never been good at lying to myself." She gave him a bitter, condescending smile and walked away, into the great hall.
Asho stared straight ahead. He felt as if he'd been punched in the gut. Was he being naive? His old anger came flooding back, an anger he'd harbored since Lord Kyferin had first started abusing him and his sister, fury at a world that was unjust and cruel and which mocked his every effort. He'd not asked for this power. He'd not asked to be attacked by a Virtue.
Asho closed his eyes and lowered his head. His breath hissed through his teeth. He'd not felt this dark and terrible anger in some time. His old friend. It warmed him, gave him strength. But then Ser Wyland's words came back to him, words he'd oft repeated to himself:
"You, Bythian, are blessed. As unnatural as it is, your ascension to knighthood affords you the greatest chance to suffer. Your suffering elevates you. If you are to serve Lady Kyferin truly, you will disdain excuses. You will ignore insults. You will let nobody drag you down. You will fight with all your heart, and when your death comes, as it surely will, you will die at peace with your life and your deeds, knowing that you have brought more light into the world than dark, that your suffering had purpose, and that you have served the Ascendant with all your soul."
Asho took a deep, shuddering breath and forced his hands open. His suffering had purpose. It redeemed him in the eyes of the Ascendant, purified his soul even as he darkened it with his magic and violence.
"I am a Black Wolf," he whispered. "A knight. I will not despair. I won't break." He took another deep breath, then a third. Waited till his pulse began to slow, till his anger started to subside, then opened his eyes and looked down at his blade. Its length was badly notched. How hard had he been striking at Kethe if he'd damaged a castle-forged sword in such a manner?
A murmur of voices filtered out of the great hall. People were up and about. Gethis the undercook would be preparing breakfast for another day in the ruined Hold.
Let Kethe embrace misery. He'd not break. He'd not despair. He would hold onto hope until his very last breath, hope that their suffering had a purpose, hope that Kethe might yet redeem herself, even if the fate of his own soul lay in doubt.
Asho slid his blade home into its scabbard and followed her into the hall.
CHAPTER THREE
Tiron was adrift in an ocean of pain and desire. Sitting with his back against the alien black w
all, with a battlescape of slaughtered ancients and kragh extending beyond him beneath a slumbering layer of mist, he felt tormented and feverish. With his eyes closed, he could still see her: pale, beautiful, terrified and outraged, Iskra Kyferin, stepping into his arms, where she rested her head on his shoulder and trembled.
The thought was sweet torture. He could almost hear Sarah's cries of outrage. Iskra's husband had slaughtered Tiron's wife, killed their son, and thrown him into a dungeon to rot forevermore. He'd sworn to avenge them, and yet there he had stood, doltish and calf-eyed, holding their oppressor's wife as if she were a delicate bird that he had liberated from a cruelly barbed net.
And yet. And yet. That one moment had extended in duration out toward infinity. He had held her, and everything had stilled. The pain of his wounds had grown distant, along with the jagged spike of bloodlust from killing Kitan. He'd wrapped his arms around her slender frame, and for a moment a vision of a different future had blossomed before his eyes, one in which he might release his pain and find joy once more with a woman by his side who thrilled and fulfilled him. A future painted in bold colors instead of the black and green and gray that he'd imagined previously.
Tiron shivered. Was he a fool? Would she have stepped into the arms of any man who had been present at that point, overcome as she had been with emotion and anger?
Tiron cracked open an eye and glanced over at where Temyl was standing, searching the curvatures of his ear for dirt as he scowled down at a corpse. No, she'd not have embraced just any man. But had she only reached for him in a moment of weakness? Would she do the same after she had been restored to Kyferin Castle, with all the honors and power that came with being a ruling lady?
Oh Sarah, he thought. I am weak. Forgive me. Tiron leaned his head back against the cold wall and tried to master his thoughts. There was no profit in pointless speculation. He should be focusing his energies on their current situation, not wondering about Iskra's intentions like a lovelorn fool. But she had felt so good in his arms. So right.
"Tiron, I just discovered something."
The note of shaky fear in the magister's voice brought him back to the present with a snap. Tiron looked over at where Audsley was standing, pale and quivering like a newborn bullock.
"I think I know where we are," Audsley said.
Gritting his teeth, Tiron pushed himself back up onto his feet. If the news was bad, he'd hear it standing. The pain lanced through his side, but he smothered a grimace. He'd not show weakness now, as the other three guards crowded in close, ragged loops of improvised rope in their hands.
"It's about time," he said. "I was starting to doubt your abilities."
"Ha ha," said Audsley weakly. He rubbed his hands together like a washerwoman. "I, ah, it's but a theorem, but it's entirely possible, given the age of the bodies and the symbol I found around that corpse's neck that we're, well, I feel -"
"Out with it." Tiron used the same tone he employed with fractious squires who thought they could get away with horseplay under his watch. "Where are we?"
"Starkadr," whispered Audsley, his eyes going wide.
Tiron pursed his lips. Starkadr. The name meant nothing to him. The other three men seemed equally nonplussed. But Audsley was watching him expectantly, as if that name should have thrown him into hysterics. "All right. What's that?"
Audsley threw up his hands. "Oh, for the love of the White Gate and the seven holy Virtues. Don't you Ennoians learn anything about history?"
Fierce, flinty anger flickered in Tiron's breast. "No. We spend our time learning how to kill the men and women who would bother you Noussians in your libraries. So, talk."
"Starkadr. The fabled Starkadr! The Sin Casters' stonecloud!"
Temyl blanched. "That's but a children's tale."
"Is it?" Audsley actually managed to sound coldly mocking.
The Sin Casters' stonecloud. Tiron had heard of that, all right. He fought down a reflexive spasm of fear. It might be a children's tale, but he was no boy. "Where are all the Sin Casters, then? This place is supposed to be crawling with them, each just waiting to corrupt us."
Audsley turned to survey the mist-filled room and gestured at the corpses. "There they are. The black robed corpses. Centuries dead. Killed by the Order of Purity. Left here in their floating fortress, forgotten and forbidden, their magics lost, their legends reduced to nursery tales."
The four men stared out across the vast room with new appreciation, their silence solemn.
"You sure?" asked Tiron.
Audsley scowled. "No, not completely, but it fits. It all fits. The Order of Purity was short-lived. I assume, of course, that you've never even heard of them. They were created by the third Ascendant after the second was murdered -"
Temyl gaped. "The second Ascendant was murdered?"
Audsley ignored him and pressed on resolutely. "The third Ascendant, blessed be his name, responded by forging the Order of Purity, which was to evolve shortly after their great victory over the Sin Casters into the Virtues. None of this resonates?" He paused, searching their faces. "Amazing. The Sin Casters' greatest fortress was their infamous stonecloud, Starkadr. Once the third Ascendant closed the Black Gate and deprived them of their magic, the Order launched its final attack, annihilating the Sin Casters forevermore and expunging them from the empire – and, apparently, common history."
"All right," said Tiron, breaking the silence that had followed. "Good. So, now we know where we are. What do you know about Starkadr, then, that can be of use to us?"
"I - well." Audsley blinked rapidly. "As in, of practical benefit? It confirms my theories about the nature of the place, their usage of flight, and is astounding in and of itself! Starkadr!" Audsley waved his arms. "Nobody has visited this place in centuries! Who knows what wonders we shall discover?"
"Details, Magister. What do you know about the men and women who fought here?"
"Details? Let's see. The Order of Purity. Um, it was composed of men and women who wielded the power of the White Gate like the Virtues do today. There were rumored to be hundreds of them, which we can now corroborate from the white robed corpses." Audsley stopped suddenly. "You said that white-robed individuals fought on the defensive side as well?"
"So it would seem," said Tiron.
"Fascinating." Audsley cocked his head to one side in thought. "A schism? More took place here than was preserved in the histories. There was no mention of the kragh taking part, for example. And why... hmm."
Tiron watched him long enough to decide nothing more of use was forthcoming. "Right. How are we doing on that rope?"
"Well enough," said Meffrid, who extended it between his hands and gave it a sharp tug. "It's old and liable to snap if we jerk it too hard, but it should hold if we can tie it to something up there."
Tiron nodded. "Audsley, get your firecat down here and give it instructions. We need to keep moving."
In short order they had a good length of frayed rope coiled in Meffrid's hands. Aedelbert winged his way down and landed on Audsley's shoulder. Tiron left the magister alone with his firecat and stood to one side, hands on hips.
The Sin Casters' stonecloud. There was supposed to be no eviler place in all of existence. He gazed somberly up at the twisted pillars of Portals, then at the hunched corpses in the mist and the devastating and unnatural gouges in the rock. It was impossible to imagine the battle. Had they thrown magic through the air as a normal army might fire arrows? How long had it lasted? From the layout of the bodies, it had been a grinding retreat, each foot of territory grudgingly relinquished. Somewhere in the expanse of this room there'd be a hill of corpses where the last of the defenders had fought back-to-back before being slaughtered.
Tiron shivered. He had to stay strong. Meffrid was a good man, but Temyl would crack if given the chance and turn Bogusch in the process.
He'd not get it.
Tiron glanced at the others, crowded at the base of the wall. Aedelbert was sniffing at the rope. Taking advanta
ge of their distraction, Tiron slid his hand under his breastplate and probed at his wound. A spasm of nausea roiled through him. The wound wasn't bad, but he couldn't continue to ignore it.
"Meffrid."
The young soldier hurried over. "Ser?"
"Help me with this wound. I want it stitched and bound before you can finish the Ascendant's Prayer. Let's go."
Meffrid nodded and began to unbuckle the straps that held Tiron's armor. He lay each piece down on the ebon floor, and then helped Tiron shrug his way out of his chainmail. It took less than five minutes. Tiron allowed nothing more than a couple of grunts to pass his lips, though twice he nearly swayed as the pain washed over him.
"Your undercoat, ser?"
"Fine. Take it off."
Meffrid undid the side and peeled it away, exposing Tiron's bare torso. The air was cold, and the entirety of his left side was crimson. Tiron and Meffrid stared at the puckered gash. It was as long as his hand and seeping slowly. It wasn't the worst wound he'd ever received, but it was plenty bad. Tiron was an old enough campaigner to know what a practiced field doctor would order: stitches and a month's bed rest without exertion, along with regular bleedings and who knew what medley of foul concoctions. Tiron set his jaw. He'd not be getting that here.
"Ser?" Meffrid was looking pale.
"It's just a cut," Tiron said tiredly. "Not my first, not my last." He took a deep breath, and as his chest expanded, the wound pulled open just enough to pulse another wave of blood. "Get to work."
Each soldier carried in his pouch a curved needle and thread. Meffrid dug his out, frowned at the wound, and set about stitching it with clean, firm movements. Tiron stared out at nothing, jaw set, inhaling slowly through his nose as he fought to ignore the pain. The procedure took another five minutes, and by the time Meffrid was done, Tiron's entire side smoldered with new pain.
"Done?" He forced his voice to come out smoothly.
Meffrid nodded, leaning in to examine the wound. "Yes, I believe so."
