Unbroken Chain: The Darker Road (single books)

by Jaleigh Johnson

  Ashok and Cree sprang up to restrain the big warrior. Skagi said nothing, but the tension in the warrior’s muscles told the extent of his rage. Ashok strained to keep Skagi’s weapon in its sheath.

  “Whatever it is, he isn’t worth it,” Ashok hissed.

  “Listen to Ashok,” Cree said, speaking low and rapidly. “This is old blood, already spilled and turned to dust. It means nothing, Brother. Nothing.”

  Cree caught the side of his brother’s head and forced him to look at his face. Skagi stared into his brother’s remaining eye. Something passed between them-old battles, old memories-and eventually Skagi nodded as if he understood. Tense muscles relaxed, and Ashok let go of Skagi’s arm. The brothers sat back down together, ignoring the quiet stares of the caravan crew who’d seen the altercation.

  Ashok remained standing. He faced the bard. “Tatigan needs to keep you on a shorter lead,” he said quietly.

  Daruk smiled ruefully. “I’ve made an enemy of you now, haven’t I? Maybe if you heard me sing, you’d feel differently.” He stepped away from the fire, inviting Ashok to follow. Ashok reluctantly left the others and walked away from the camp with him-anything to keep the bard away from Skagi.

  “My quarrel is not with Skagi,” Daruk said when they were out of earshot of the brothers. “Though his tale is an interesting one. I’ll tell it, if you’re curious?”

  “I’ll hear it from Skagi and no one else,” Ashok said.

  Daruk sighed. “Pity. It would help explain why he hates the humans in Ikemmu so much.”

  “I’ve never known Skagi to hate anyone other than his enemies,” Ashok said.

  “Oh, I see. You know him so well, after less than a year fighting beside him? How well do you really know any of them, Ashok?” Daruk asked. “How well do they know you?”

  “They know me better than the brothers who raised me,” Ashok said. He cursed himself. Why had he told the bard that?

  But Daruk said nothing about his revelation. He watched the campfires from a distance and wrapped his dark green cloak close around himself. “You’re a mystery to Ikemmu in so many ways, Ashok,” he said. “I’ve heard your name whispered with so much confusion and doubt. The city doesn’t know what to think of you. It sparks my collector’s heart. Your secrets might be worthy of song.”

  “Why do you want to sing tales of the shadar-kai?” Ashok said. “As you said, we look down on your people. Where’s the glory in singing for a race that scorns your creations?”

  “Not you,” Daruk said. His voice betrayed his excitement. “You keep yourself apart from all those petty grievances. Nothing ties you down-even the gods don’t touch you. The sword of Tempus hasn’t marked your flesh. Do you have any idea what you could do with such freedom?”

  “No more or less than I do now,” Ashok said. “I fight for Ikemmu-”

  The bard scoffed at that. He waved a dismissive hand. “Ikemmu will not last another generation. Trade is all that keeps the city from dissolving into civil war. Abandon the dreams of idealistic leaders, Ashok, and you’ll sleep better at night.”

  “If you’re so certain the city will fall,” Ashok said, “why do you make it your home?”

  “There’s enough there to interest me, for now,” Daruk said. He smiled and waved to the camp. “You’d better go back to your friends. I don’t want them thinking I’ve dragged you off into the darkness.” He chuckled as if at some private joke. “But listen to my songs, Ashok, and judge for yourself if they don’t stir something in your blood.”

  He walked back to the large fire, and Ashok went to rejoin his friends. Mareyn had gone back to check on the Martucks; Ilvani was asleep by the fire wrapped in Ashok’s cloak; Skagi had retrieved his bowl and ate in silence. Cree leaned over to speak to Ashok.

  “What did the bard want?” he asked.

  “As far as I could tell, he wanted to hear himself talk,” Ashok said.

  Cree nodded. “He looks harmless, but if he knows things about us …” He glanced uneasily at his brother.

  “Then he isn’t harmless,” Ashok said. “Don’t worry about him now. Tomorrow, before dawn, we spar-just the three of us.”

  “We’ll be there,” Cree said.

  Daruk’s voice drifted across the camp. “All right, then, you’ve all had your supper and are no doubt congratulating yourselves on having survived another day of Tuva and Vlahna’s death march, am I right?”

  Chuckles and scattered applause met this pronouncement. The caravan leaders made rude gestures at the bard. In response, Daruk bowed.

  “As some of you no doubt heard, the inestimable Tatigan Carrlock has recently suggested I earn my keep on this journey.” More laughter. “Friends, I’m here to answer that call. Shall we have a song or a tale?”

  “Song!” the Martucks called out. “Something we can dance to.”

  There were groans from the other side of the camp. “We’re too damned tired to dance,” someone complained. “Give us a tale, Daruk.”

  The crowd went back and forth for a minute or so, until Daruk held up his hands. “My people have spoken”-Ashok detected a hint of disdain in the words-“and so it shall be a tale and a song.”

  He turned, raised his hand straight up in the air, and the campfire twisted, shooting toward the sky in a violent cyclone.

  Some of the caravan crew gasped and scooted back from the flames, but others acted as if they’d seen the spectacle before. Mareyn and the Martucks, except for the boy, whooped and applauded. The dwarf, Thorm, didn’t even look up from his meal.

  Daruk spread his hands, and the fire split at the top and widened like a chalice in the air. “It’s all about theatricality, my friends. What is life without dramatics or scale? The fire is not a fire-it won’t burn you.”

  “Tell that to my singed cloak,” one of the guards grumbled.

  Daruk ignored him. “The fire is the field of battle, and if you look closer, you’ll see-”

  Ashok saw. Rising up out of the flames were riders, tiny figures made of fire that rode in ordered lines. Daruk’s illusion made it look as if there were dozens, hundreds that rode off into the distance until they became smoke clouds.

  From across the camp, Tatigan laughed and applauded. “The Tuigan at last, Daruk? I thought you’d never tell that tale.”

  “Everything in its time, green-eyed man,” Daruk said. “It’s been more than a hundred years, but true warriors and their quest for glory will never be forgotten. Though their conquest ended in tragedy, some of their spirits are still here. Those of us who’ve walked this road before have seen them wandering the wastes, waiting for a battle that was lost a long time ago. The nomad warriors of the plains rode out of their country with dreams of conquest in their hearts. Their leader, Yamun Khahan, took his armies into the west and fell to a Cormyrian king. But no one told the ghosts.”

  Sparks fell from the fire and hissed as they hit the snow. Behind a curtain of steam, Daruk stared up at the fiery riders and began to sing.

  “I hear the echoes

  Of these fallen flames

  I speak with their voices

  These tombs of the dead.”

  Ashok listened to the melody created by the bard’s voice. He sang unaccompanied, but the flames and their phantom story amplified his presence. Ashok had to admit, he’d never heard music like this. Daruk’s song had none of the wavering qualities of Darnae’s music. He sang with the assurance of a master. The music did stir him. Ashok felt the restlessness in his blood, the need to hold his weapon in his hands. When he glanced over at Skagi and Cree, he saw them similarly affected, despite Skagi’s efforts to ignore the song and the fire.

  Near their smaller fire, Ilvani had her eyes open. She listened to the bard’s song, but she was not as enraptured as the others were. She closed her eyes again and pulled Ashok’s cloak up over her ears.

  The sparks fell like glittering jewels, each a fallen warrior. Daruk sang for them, and Ashok lost himself in the music. His breathing quickened. He remember
ed riding in his own fire upon the nightmare’s back across the plains.

  Suddenly, he had a vision of himself alongside the warriors of the steppes, men clutching their shortbows and guiding their horses with their legs as they fired on the armies of Faerun. He looked at the warriors on either side of him, friends whose faces he’d never seen.

  “If we’re meant to die today,” one said, and stretched out his hand to Ashok, “then I am more blessed than any other, to have you fight at my side.”

  “Yes.” Ashok had never heard the warrior’s language before, but somehow he understood the words. He reached for the warrior’s hand. His vision blurred, and he was back at the camp, listening to Daruk’s song end. The flame column dwindled until it was a simple cookfire again.

  Panting, caught between the dream and reality, Ashok looked around. The crew and passengers prepared to sleep, and the watches had already set out from the camp. He felt light-headed and strange, as if his skin were too taut for his body. It must be the inactivity. His need for stimulation was manifesting in half dreams.

  He settled down with his bedroll and tried to sleep. The watches changed shift twice before he was able to drift off into oblivion.

  Ilvani stood at the edge of the camp and scanned the darkness for signs of movement. She saw none, but that didn’t mean they weren’t out there. Daruk’s song still echoed in the air like a summons.

  The fool, Ilvani thought. He should know better than to whisper to old ghosts.

  She walked back to the camp and noticed Ashok tossing fitfully in his sleep. He shivered as if in the throes of a fever. Slipping his cloak from her shoulders, Ilvani covered him and stepped back.

  “You feel it too,” she whispered. “But you have no name for it.” She sighed. The night wasn’t over yet. Something was coming.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Ashok awoke to find Ilvani crouched at his side. She watched him intently, her brow furrowed in consternation.

  “Do you know yourself?” she asked.

  He looked around. The camp slept on peacefully. The fires burned steadily, fed by the watch guards.

  “I dreamed that I was … not myself,” he said. “Someone called to me-”

  “He’s waiting,” Ilvani said. “We have to go.”

  “Where?” Ashok stood up, fastened his cloak, and checked his weapons. Ilvani was already walking north out of the camp. She removed a crystal sphere from her pouch, spoke a word, and shook it. Reddish gold light filled the sphere and illuminated the night. Ashok untied the nightmare’s reins and led the stallion after her.

  “The flock is short one blade,” the witch said. “Always alone, always left behind. Not tonight and not ever again. Maybe Daruk’s song did serve a purpose.”

  “Daruk’s song? Stop-Ilvani, wait. What am I walking into?”

  She looked back at him over her shoulder. “A ride you’ll never forget,” she said. “Are you afraid?”

  He shook his head.

  She scowled. “Then stop making sounds. Come with me, so we can all be at peace tonight.”

  He followed her without another word, but he unlooped his chain from his belt and held it taut between his hands. The wind wafted snow crystals across the open ground and into their faces. Soon Ashok’s exposed skin was numb from the cold.

  This lack of feeling unnerved him and made him feel displaced from his flesh. They couldn’t be away from the fire too long. The cold was becoming dangerous out here on the deep open plain, and Tuva was right about the snow blindness. A more violent wind could make a seasoned tracker lose his way and freeze to death.

  They reached a dip in the land-the remnants of a dry streambed. Boulders and dead brush had filled the streambed long ago. Ilvani went down on her knees and moved aside one of the lighter stones.

  “This is the hard part,” she said. “It may not work.”

  “What won’t work?” Ashok kneeled beside her. “If we stay in the snow like this for very long, we won’t be able to walk back to camp.”

  Ilvani closed her eyes. She seemed to be concentrating on something very hard. She set the sphere in the snow and removed the glove from her left hand. She held her hand up in the air between them.

  At first, Ashok didn’t comprehend what she meant by the gesture, but then she looked down at his hands. He let go of his chain and took his gloves off. He raised his right hand but hesitated with his palm an inch from hers.

  With a quick, striking movement, she grabbed his hand. Only then did Ashok realize her other hand rested on the stones, the remnants of what looked like a funeral cairn.

  Energy pulsed through his body. Ashok’s heart stuttered, but he kept hold of her hand. The blowing snow froze in her hair, making stiff rods around her face. Her lips were blue as she spoke the words of a chant. The pulse came again, and Ashok had to close his eyes against the force of it even as he reveled in the awakening. The sensation was like plunging his frozen body into scalding water. He came alive again. He opened his eyes and tilted his face to the sky to savor the moment, though he did not understand its purpose.

  By the light of Ilvani’s sphere, he saw the rider.

  The human lay slumped across his horse, his arms dangling aside his head. Blood streamed from an arrow wound in his horse’s flank. The beast took a step forward and collapsed, dumping its rider in the snow.

  Ashok pulled away from Ilvani and jumped to his feet. He ran to the man’s side, but he didn’t immediately see a wound. He brushed aside the human’s dark hair to examine his head and feel for a life beat at his neck.

  The man opened his eyes and spoke at the same time Ashok felt the dead, hollow space where his heart should have been beating.

  “Palum,” he said, “have you come to take me to the army?”

  Ashok breathed in and out, harsh breaths that formed steam clouds. It took every bit of discipline he’d ever learned not to hurl the dead thing away from him and draw his chain to attack. The quavering in its voice stopped him. The thing that had no heartbeat looked at him with such imploring dead eyes that Ashok couldn’t look away.

  “Have you?” The man spoke again, but his words changed to a language Ashok had never heard before.

  “You must answer him,” Ilvani said. “We have to go soon, or they’ll be on the move.”

  “I don’t understand him,” Ashok said. “I don’t understand any of this. That thing shouldn’t be talking. It should be in the ground.”

  “He is,” Ilvani said. She laid her hand against the gravestones. “He sleeps, but he’s not at rest. Two worlds fade into one. Didn’t you hear him call to you?”

  “I heard-” Ashok looked at the dead man’s face, though it unsettled him greatly. The face did look vaguely familiar, and then he remembered his vision, the man who’d reached out his hand before some distant battle.

  If we’re meant to die today …

  “I’m Palum,” Ashok said. The dead man looked at him and for whatever reason saw his friend’s face. When Ashok said the name, the dead man’s eyes filled with tears.

  “I thought … you would leave me behind,” the man said. The language had reverted to Common. “I rode all night to be here, but the brigands were waiting. I managed to evade them, but it was a hard fight.”

  “You were victorious,” Ashok said. “Yet your horse-”

  “Is here,” Ilvani said. She stood up and took the nightmare’s reins. The stallion watched the witch’s movements but allowed her to lead him to Ashok’s side. “You can ride together.”

  The man looked up at the nightmare with an odd expression. “The horse is not … I don’t see it.…”

  “It’s all right,” Ashok said. He draped the man’s arm over his shoulder and looked to Ilvani. She nodded, so he lifted the man to his feet and half carried him to the disguised nightmare. The stallion did not react to the dead man, so Ashok placed him across the nightmare’s back and mounted in front of him. The man’s hands came around his waist in a weak grip. Ashok held on to his arm and guided
the nightmare with his legs.

  “Where are we going?” Ashok asked Ilvani.

  She pointed to the north. “Ride fast but not far. You’ll make it in time. I’ll meet you on the other side.”

  The man turned to look at Ilvani. “Thank you,” he said.

  “Hold on tightly,” she said. “You’re almost there.”

  “You heard her,” Ashok whispered to the nightmare, and dug in with his heels. “Let’s see where the ride takes us.”

  The nightmare took off across the snow-covered expanse. The wind turned fierce and drowned out all sound. Ashok could barely see through the blowing snow to keep them pointed north. He had to trust the nightmare to lead them. He felt the heat of the creature’s body and took comfort from that buried fire. They could use it if they had to. Would Ilvani be so warm, walking the plain alone? He had to trust her, too, the same way he trusted that the man clutching him was not some dead yet animated abomination.

  You wanted to walk in Ilvani’s world, Ashok told himself. This might be your one chance to know the world as she knows it.

  When he felt the man’s voice at his ear, a voice with no breath behind it, Ashok gritted his teeth against the wrongness, the need to lash out and destroy.

  “Who are you?” the man asked.

  Ashok searched his memory for the name the man had called him. “Palum,” he said.

  “That’s right. I thought.… Just now, I thought you were someone else. We will fight together, you and I?”

  “Yes,” Ashok said. To a battle that was already lost. If the man was one of the Tuigan from Daruk’s song, he had no idea that his invasion failed and his people were defeated. All he knew was that he could not bear to be left behind.

  “It would be safer for you to stay here,” Ashok said. He thought the spirit didn’t hear him above the wind, but he answered.

  “To be safe is to lose my soul,” he said. “I am a warrior. I must fight.”

  Ashok felt a chill that had nothing to do with the biting wind pass through him. The man spoke like a shadar-kai. “You’re human,” Ashok said. “You could be anything you wanted.”