The Path of Flames (Chronicles of the Black Gate Book 1)

by Phil Tucker

  “Old fool,” he muttered. “Temper tantrums. What next? Talking to yourself?”

  He heard the sound of someone moving through the tall grass behind him and turned to see Kethe approaching with the feral focus of a hunting cat. He almost laughed. “Come to kill me? Honestly, you might be doing me a favor.”

  She drew up short and blinked several times, as if awakening from a trance. Then she straightened and frowned at him, hand on the hilt of her sword. “So you admit you’re filth.”

  Her eyes were red, he saw, her young face haggard. “I’m flattered. It’s been a while since thoughts of me have kept a young woman awake all night.”

  Kethe stepped off the ridge and dropped neatly to land on the shingle. Her hauberk barely made any sound. Almost absently, he noted its fine construction. She’d probably paid good coin for that. Her hand never strayed from her sword’s pommel. “Why did you come?” she asked. “In truth?”

  Tiron turned to face her full-on, hands on his hips. She was practically vibrating with the desire to draw her sword. It wouldn’t take much to provoke her to do so. Then he could claim he’d acted in self-defense. She’d attacked him by surprise, and he’d had to kill her. Tragic, but oh-so-neatly explained. “Why?” He paused, considering the question. “It’s hard to explain.”

  “Try.” There was steel in her voice—or the promise of it.

  “Why?” He leaned back on his heels, making no effort to ready a defense. “You heard your mother. She trusts me. Why should I justify myself to you?”

  Kethe slowly drew her sword. The calculated control of her action reminded him of a hunter drawing back a bow to shoot at an unsuspecting deer, as if moving rapidly or making a sound might dispel the moment and set him running. “Why?” Her smile was bitter. “Because of everyone here, I know who you really are. I know what you’re capable of. I saw it in your eyes when you tried your best to kill me.” She brought her sword forward to grasp it with both hands. “I won’t let you hurt my family again.”

  Tiron didn’t say anything. A wave of sadness passed through him, and he felt old and weary. He honestly didn’t know if he had it in him to kill her. Didn’t know if he could live with himself if he didn’t. He thought of Sarah. His son. His gut coiled with tension at their memory. He reached down and drew his sword, the blade whispering as it came free to gleam in the dawn.

  “You think you know me?” The mockery was gone from his voice. “You? A girl of seventeen, eighteen years? You think you can understand my life, what I’ve been through, the depth of my pain, the span of my experiences?” He shook his head. “You have no idea. All you know is fear and outrage and anger, and those only shallowly.” He took a step forward, his foot grinding on the loose stones of the beach. “Have you ever killed a man, Kethe?”

  The muscles of her jaw tightened. “What has that to do with anything?”

  “So, no. You haven’t. Have you ever been fucked?”

  Her pale, freckled face flushed immediately. “How dare you?”

  “So, that’s another no. What have you done in your brief life? Other than play the part of the spoiled nobleman’s daughter, ridden your pretty palfrey, swung a sword in a tournament, and felt a momentary spasm of terror when your life was threatened? You’re a child. Yet you presume to judge me.”

  Kethe smiled, and Tiron recognized it for the predatory expression it was. So, she did have some backbone to her. “I don’t need to have lived to a hundred to know filth when I see it.”

  Tiron took another step forward. He kept his sword down by his side. “Have you ever lost someone you loved with all your soul?”

  This time she hesitated. Her brow furrowed and anger caused her eyes to narrow. “Of course I have. My father.”

  “Your father?” Tiron stopped. “Are you being serious?”

  Her knuckles whitened. “Disrespect him at your peril.”

  “Enderl Kyferin? You loved him with all your soul?”

  “He was my father,” she grated, and tears brimmed in her eyes. Her sword never wavered. “Of course I did.”

  “Enderl Kyferin.” Tiron shook his head. “You know, when they first threw me into that dungeon, I hated him blindly, completely, and without any discrimination. I really can’t convey how much my hatred consumed me. I would howl in that hole each night with my desire to tear out his throat. Did you ever hear me? Probably not. The guards would have had to come down and beat me unconscious.” Tiron shrugged. “It turns out that you can’t sustain that kind of hatred for very long, no matter how good the cause. So, after a month or two of that screaming, I fell into a simmering level of insanity. I just paced and paced and talked to myself. I almost went mad. I think I might have, for a while. There are stretches that I don’t remember. I lost most of my fingernails at that point.” He stared down at his gloves. “I can show you, if you like. I think it was from clawing at the walls.”

  “Shut up,” said Kethe, her voice thick with emotion. “I don’t care how you suffered. No, that’s not true. I’m glad. I wish you had gone insane.”

  “After a while, however, that madness receded. In the end it was just me, in that hole, with time to think about Kyferin. And I came to realize that he was exceptional.” Tiron paused, raising an eyebrow at Kethe, but she simply glared at him. “Exceptionally violent, yes. Exceptionally cruel. Capable of hurting people in ways your mind can’t encompass. But more than that. He didn’t care about anything but himself. He was completely free to do what he liked, no matter the consequences. He broke all customs when he convinced your Sigean mother to abandon her lofty mountain city and descend to his level. He did it again when he elevated Asho and Shaya, bringing them up from Bythos itself to sit at his table. He was a force of nature. Is it any wonder he was so feared and respected?”

  “I don’t understand,” said Kethe. “What are you saying? I thought you hated him.”

  “Oh, more than you’ll ever know. If you were to throw me back in that dungeon for the rest of my life but give me Kyferin to torture every single day, I would now consider that a life well-lived. But what I’m saying to you is this, Kethe. You may have loved him, but he never loved you.”

  “Shut up!” Kethe flared her fingers around the hilt of her sword and gripped it tighter.

  “He couldn’t, you see. He was incapable of doing so. Perhaps he was fond of you, like he was of his horses, but that was all.” Tiron smiled. “And the worst of it is that you know I’m telling the truth. You know in your heart that he never truly loved you. Perhaps that made you adore him all the more, in order to compensate for that lack. But when you look into that dark hole in your center—”

  Kethe screamed and attacked him, whipping her sword around in a wide arc to take off his head. Tiron darted back, and her sword sliced through the air an inch from his neck. She recovered and brought her blade up and down in a vicious chop. Tiron turned quickly so as to present his profile, her sword missing him again by a hair’s breath. She staggered past him with a cry and reversed her sword to crack her pommel into his face. He ducked and jumped back, stones skittering underneath his feet.

  “You lie!” She was heaving for breath, sword weaving drunkenly now. “You twisted, bitter, filthy—” She launched herself at him once more, and this time he was forced to parry, over and again. He slowly gave way before her fury, moving back toward the far end of the crescent-shaped beach. The sound of their blades echoed out over the lake, flat and muffled by the mist.

  Finally he stepped into her swing and blocked her sword with his own at their bases so that they stared at each other with only a foot of air between them. “I’m not lying.” His words were harsh growls. “Your father was a murderer.” He shoved and she fell back, stumbling on her heels as she fought for balance. Just as she caught it, he slammed his blade against her own, sending her stumbling back again. “A rapist.” She fell into a crouch, caught herself with one hand and stood just in time to take another blow. “And he never loved a damn thing in his whole life but himsel
f.”

  Kethe’s sword flew from her hand into the tall grass and she fell back onto her ass. Her eyes were glassy with shock and pain, and her lips were trembling, and suddenly Tiron felt sickened with himself, disgusted. She was just a girl.

  He reared back, breathing heavily, and lowered his blade. “You can’t judge me,” he said. “Not when you don’t know shit about the world or about yourself.”

  She raised a shaking hand to her face and turned away from him, silent sobs causing her shoulders to shake. His breath rasped in his throat, and he felt a ridiculous urge to apologize to her. He clenched his jaw and restrained himself from hurling his blade out into the lake. He sheathed it instead, then turned away and looked back at her. Kethe had dragged herself into the lee of the drop from the grass to the beach, and was curled up and shaking as if she’d taken a punch to the gut.

  He hung his head and rubbed his brow. He’d been a father once, something close to a good man. Clearly that was no longer the case. “Look. You’re right: I’m filth. Ignore what I said. What do I know? Believe what you want.”

  She didn’t respond. Her sobs were pained gasps, as if each breath were a stab in her back.

  Just walk away. She’s not your damn daughter. You don’t owe her a thing.

  But he couldn’t look away. Couldn’t leave. Something held him. A truth, something he in all his vaunted wisdom had failed to see and appreciate. He frowned at her, and then it hit him. She’d been hurt by Kyferin, perhaps as badly as he had been. She was a fellow victim, just like him. He’d been in his dungeon for three years. She’d spent her whole life in her father’s shadow, and here he was, rubbing her face in her wounds. Hurting her even more. Was this how he’d honor Sarah? Avenge himself on Kyferin?

  The words clawed at his throat, crude and scabby and terrifying. I’m sorry.

  He couldn’t breathe. Kethe’s gasps turned into broken weeping.

  I’m sorry. Two damn words.

  He thought of Kitan. Any true man would want what you want. A rusted blade turned in his heart. He thought of Sarah lying on their broken bed, heard Kyferin’s laughter as he walked away. Kill her, he thought, then stepped back. No, kill yourself. End it. End it now.

  That old madness began to take hold of him. He needed to run, to get away. Kethe’s soft cries were cutting into the fabric of his mind. He stepped back again and shook his head.

  He could see Sarah asleep in the sunlight, their son cradled in her arms.

  It was too much.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered, then he turned and scrambled up the bluff and was gone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Tharok was not invited to the celebration. As night fell and the great shadow of the far mountain swept across the valley, a couple of Red River kragh let him down but then promptly chained him directly to the tree, wrapping the thick links around the trunk twice before locking them once more. Tharok didn’t resist. He was too tired, his headache was bloody murder, and all he wanted to do was sleep.

  He awoke when somebody kicked him, hard. The roughshod boot dug deep into his thigh, and he snapped awake, a growl tearing free from his lips. It was full dark now, the stars blistering the sky above, and in the center of the great camp a large bonfire was burning. Two kragh were standing above him, hunched and scowling. Tharok recognized them both: Olok and Urok, Wrok’s youngest brothers. Both were powerfully built, though neither matched Krol in size and their tusks were only of medium length. As one they reached down to grip his arms as a third kragh unlocked the chains from his neck.

  “Come on, slave,” said Olok, his voice thick with disgust. “You’re going to pay for your lies.”

  Tharok didn’t bother to answer. The cold was vicious and his legs were in searing pain; his feet were swollen and the hide around his ankles had chafed them to bleeding. At least the headache was gone. The brothers hustled him forward roughly, trying to make him trip, but Tharok kept his feet as he was brought from the outskirts into the center of the camp.

  There were at least two dozen great huts set up in a rough circle around the fire, thick white mountain goat fur stretched taut across the whip-like branches that had been bent down into half-globes. A few kragh were watching the perimeter, but it was in the central circle that the mass of the Red River tribe was assembled.

  The Red River tribe was large, perhaps one of the largest highland tribes, though it paled in comparison to the size of the lowland kragh tribes below. Arrayed about the fires were perhaps a hundred kragh, from the most powerful of the warriors, some sixteen summers strong and dark of skin, to old and toothless males in their final years. The males only gathered like this four times a year; normally they ranged the valleys and slopes in small family clans, hunting and protecting the central camp. Only the women and children lived here throughout the season, the crones, the young females, and the women of the women’s circle.

  The fire leaped and danced, its thunderous reds and oranges causing hundreds of black eyes to gleam like wet stones as they turned to stare at him. He recognized a good half of them from previous meetings with his tribe. More clans had come during the evening to join Wrok’s tribe, endorsing his leadership by simply being here. By sheer numbers, he was doing well.

  Wrok himself, however, was not pleased. He was standing by the central fire, hands on his hips, Toad sitting bloodied and silent at his feet. The air was tense. What had once been a celebration was now a sleeping great bear, roused to the point of near-waking and massacre. All eyes turned to Tharok, who grinned, showing his tusks to full vantage. They might bring him forth bound, but he was no slave.

  “You!” said Wrok, striding forward. “You’ve come to your death. You’ve filled Toad’s head with nonsense, and he speaks of you, the stinking issue of your mother’s foul hole, as having the blood of Ogri himself running through your veins! Ha!”

  Tharok shook himself free of the twin brothers’ hands and stepped forward. He raised his chin, fighting back the nausea and fatigue. “Ogri’s blood flows within me, yes. How else do you think World Breaker came to my hands?”

  “World Breaker is mine!”

  “Only because, like any carrion crow, you took it from me as I lay unconscious. It doesn’t take much bravery to rob a sleeping kragh.”

  The crowd hissed, gazes flipping from Wrok to Tharok, and several kragh began to pound their fists onto the dirt, creating a dull drumming sound of approval.

  “Your clan and tribe are finished. The Sky Mother saw fit to have your father gutted, your brothers slain, and your womenfolk scattered. The Gray Smoke are gone, and here before everybody I am going to split you open like a lowland pig and feed you to my hounds.”

  The gathered kragh went silent. Wrok could not have offered greater insult. Destroying a body by either burning it or feeding it to animals would destroy the kragh’s very soul.

  “I carry Ogri’s blood in my veins. I am of the line of the Uniter. You would use the World Breaker for your own selfish ends, and in doing so, bring ruin upon this tribe. If you would kill me, then do so in a manner befitting a warlord. Let us fight to the death!”

  “You dare make demands?” roared Wrok, spraying spittle. “You are a slave! I have brought you here to kill you and show them all that this talk of Ogri is nonsense! There shall be no fight. You have been summoned to die.”

  “I see Krol is not here,” said Tharok, looking about the crowd, a small smile carving itself across his face. “No wonder you are too scared to fight.”

  Again the crowd hissed, and more of their number punched the ground. Wrok snarled, drew World Breaker and strode forward. Tharok stood firm and turned to stare at Maur, who stepped out of the crowd into the space before the flames.

  “Enough!” she cried. Wrok froze, fury contorting his features, but he dared not disobey the wise woman. “Enough. Wrok-krya, stay your hand. We cannot risk offending Ogri on this sacred night. The spirits that live amongst us would never forgive the insult, and our fortunes would shatter.”

>   “Maur,” said Wrok, turning and forcing his tone to remain polite. “Our fortunes rise. We have gold, we have shaman stone, we have World Breaker. I will lead us to glory. Only this fool needs die before we do even better.”

  “You hold World Breaker,” said Maur. “Yet you deny that Ogri is involved in these events. Tharok claims Ogri’s blood runs in his veins. You are bringing great honor to our tribe, but we think it wise for you to accept Tharok’s challenge. After all, he has been bound for days and can barely stand. If Ogri’s blood does not run in his veins, the chieftain of the Red River should have no difficulty killing him. Am I right?”

  Again the assembled kragh hissed so that the air filled with the sound of a thousand snakes, and now all of them pummeled the ground, great iron knuckles shaking the earth.

  Wrok glared about him as if he had been cornered, then turned to stare at Tharok, who chose that moment to let his knees buckle. Only Urok’s swift hand stopped him from crashing to the ground.

  Wrok pursed his lips and glared at Maur, who held his gaze with firm assurance. He looked past her at where the women’s circle was standing, Krilla looming over them all, and saw no give, no deviation from Maur’s request. With a growl he snapped his gaze across to where old Golden Crow was sitting, the blind shaman grinning a yellowed grin, his face so wrinkled that he looked half-mummified. The shaman was rocking back and forth, clearly enjoying himself, and for a moment it looked like Wrok would ask him his opinion, reach for the shaman’s aid against the wise woman. But then he shook his head, retreating from that desperate move.

  “Of course,” he growled. “I have nothing to fear from this filth. His father was the true warrior of his tribe. This runt is nothing but a lying windbag. I’ll slit him from throat to gizzard, and then we can resume our great celebration, turning our minds to the future, to our glory.”

  He raised his hands, seeking the crowd’s approval, but only received a meditative murmur. They would not side with him before the fight.