by Martin Ash
'No, Swordbearer, we didn’t bring you,' said Master Protector. 'You were dying and we offered you life. We showed you a way but you came of your own free will. Is that not so?'
Leth hesitated. Strictly speaking, Master Protector was right. Yet there was more to it than that. 'You have said yourself that you summoned me!'
'We call it the Summoning, but you yourself know it was not. It was more an opening of the way, and an offering of life. We knew from the conjunction of the World's Agony with the Orb of the Godworld that a being from the Godworld was trapped beyond the Sign. We opened the way to you, praying that it would be you, the Swordbearer, who came this time, and not some other, lesser being, as before. But it was not we who put you in the limbo in which you wandered. We do not possess that power.'
'Then how--' Leth began.
Master Protector was seized by a fit of coughing. For some moments he was unable to speak. Leth waited, and eventually the old man sat back, wheezing as he struggled to draw air. His thin, frail hands gripped the armrests of his chair. He shook his head, watering eyes turned upwards, and spoke in a thin voice. 'Surely you know more than we of the how and why you came to be there? If you did not choose to come, then you were sent in response to our need. Your children too. Nothing is by chance or hazard.'
Sent! Leth thought of Enchantment's Reach, of Lord Fectur, Orbelon, Grey Venger. Sent! No, it had been pure coincidence that had cast him into Orbelon's world. Nothing was premeditated. But why was Orbelon not present? Why had he abandoned him?
'You seem troubled, Swordbearer. I am sorry if my words bring you disquiet.'
There are no answers, Leth thought. Every question just extends the mystery and the paradox. He thought of the furrowed night sky, deepest indigo, like an enclosing shell high above, enveloping this strange world. And he recalled the blue casket and reminded himself that somehow he and all of this world were contained within it, and he shook his head. In circumstances such as these how might he expect logic or rationality?
'Did Lakewander tell you of the End of the World?' Master Protector asked.
'She did.' Leth watched him. 'What did she mean?'
'Wait. Go with her. Then you will see. Now, if you will forgive me, I must leave you. Please eat and drink as much as you wish.'
Shakily, Master Protector began to rise. A servant entered, a broad-shouldered, stocky fellow in a long off-white garment, who crossed the chamber in short brisk strides and took the old man's arm. Together they departed. Left alone, Leth musingly completed his early repast, and a short while later was joined by Lakewander. She was clad in the red-toned half armour in which Leth had first seen her in the ools' lair the previous day. Yet again it seemed to Leth that she was not entirely a stranger, though if ever he had seen her before he could not recall it. She cradled her helmet in the crook of her arm. 'If you are ready, Lord Swordbearer.'
She took him to a yard outside where a pair of grooms waited with horses. 'This is your mount,' Lakewander indicated a magnificent black stallion. 'His name is Swiftwind. He is a fine, brave beast who will serve you obediently and well. And here is your armour.'
She gestured towards a wooden frame standing to one side, upon which was borne a suit of fabulous shining ribbed plate armour, its metal tinged with brilliant sapphire blue. 'It has been kept for you. No other has worn it.'
Leth admired the suit, which was clearly of the finest craftmanship. 'I’m to wear this now?'
'You may have need of it, Lord.'
'I was not aware that we were riding into battle.'
'It’s a precaution, that’s all. I can’t say exactly what we will meet.'
Somewhat reluctantly Leth allowed Lakewander and one of the grooms to help him don the armour. It fitted perfectly - almost as if it had been moulded upon his body. And to his surprise, once on, the armour felt both flexible and light. He found it allowed him almost complete freedom of movement; he might have been clad in nothing more than light mail. An ornate visored helm with comb, plume and stylized horns complemented the assemblage, but Leth elected to take a less-elaborate secondary helmet, with peak and cheek- and neck-guards instead. This he donned, curious as to the kinds of perils Lakewander anticipated meeting.
Lakewander stood before him, her hands upon her hips, appraising him with a smile of approbation. 'You are as the artists of yore have portrayed you, Lord. I feel proud and stirred. That you should be with us now gives me such hope.'
Leth made no comment. They mounted their steeds and rode from the place called Orbia, out to discover the End of the World.
IV
A dirt track led them through a narrow belt of trees onto a wider way which plied out across a landscape of scrub and low swells. Leth's intention was to look back and determine the character and extent of the building from which they rode, but as they came from beneath the trees his eyes were taken by an arresting sight. In the sky before him, midway to its zenith, hung the great jewel which Lakewander had described the night before as the Orb of the Godworld.
Its brilliance pained his eyes as he stared, yet he could not for some moments take his attention away. He squinted, shielding his eyes with one hand raised to the peak of his helmet. He realised now that yesterday, when he had stepped through the portal out of Orbelon's empty blue domain and confronted Summoner and his followers for the first time, he had been mistaken. He had glanced briefly skyward and seen what he had taken without question to be the sun's familiar disc. But it was not. It was this, this extraordinary manifestation, the Orb of the Godworld, brilliant and pale, glorious and strange, a sun yet not a sun, a gem that could not be fully described, as mysterious and unreachable as any sun or star, casting pure and unfathomable light upon its own world as it traversed an unnatural firmament.
Eventually Leth could bear its light no longer. He lowered his eyes but the after-image persisted for some time, impressed upon his vision. When he recalled his intention to look back he turned in the saddle, but the place called Orbia, which he had just ridden from, was wholly concealed behind the trees.
He raised his face again to the skies, searching this time not for the blinding Orb of the Godworld but for that other, lesser body which Lakewander had called the World's Agony. It was not, as last night, close below and to the south of the great Orb. But Leth scanned every inch of the unclouded blue and eventually was rewarded by the discovery of a pinpoint of light, pale golden low in the sky, almost directly ahead. To the casual observer it was easily missed, for the brightness of the day veiled its radiance, in contrast to the Orb of the Godworld which blazed with near solar magnificence. Leth's gaze shifted from one to the other, then to the wide blue sky which in daylight appeared perfectly smooth and unmarked. He shook his head. The wonders of this world seemed to acknowledge no physical logic: what he saw could not be explained, nor assimilated in the familiar - if also inexplicable - terms of the celestial wonders of his own world.
Lakewander led him onward, across a desolate plain relieved only by low grassy swells, and in the furthest distance a high ridge which burst stark and strangely gleaming from the raw earth. Leth studied its distant formation as they rode. It was reddish in colour, and to his eyes it appeared curiously moulded, almost visceral.
The ridge passed from view as they began a long descent into green woodland. They came to a shaded dell specked with flowers, where a clear spring bubbled between moss-clad boulders. Lakewander suggested stopping to eat and rest the horses. From her pack she produced meat, cheese, fruit, hard biscuits and a flask of watered wine. Leth ate in near-silence, finding himself in no mood for conversation, no matter that his mind remained aflood with questions. Lakewander, perhaps realising something of his state of mind, made little effort to engage him.
They rode on. A little way down the road they came upon a man crouched at the wayside. Lakewander trotted past, paying him no heed, but Leth reined in his horse, concerned at what he was seeing. The man was naked but for a few soiled, rotting rags. He was huddled upon one k
nee, his spine curved forward, chest pressed to thigh and his head bowed towards the ground and held close against the inner side of the upright knee. His body, what Leth could see of it, was filthy, thin and bony. One spindly arm was thrown across the back of his head, the other hugged his forward shin. He was held in this position, almost wholly immobile, by a series of rigid, interconnected clamps and straps forged of black iron, which were affixed to various parts of his body. A clamp upon his head was linked by a metal strap to one around his left wrist. This also connected to a band around his right thigh, which was similarly clamped to his right lower leg and, in a separate grip, to his left ankle. The left arm was also clamped fast to the inclining left leg. The right arm which was thrown over his head was likewise bound to his neck and left forearm. He could not stretch or twist any of his limbs other than to the most infinitesimal degree.
Leth dismounted and approached the figure. He lowered himself beside him, unable to see his face. The man's head was covered in a mass of filthy, louse-ridden black hair, and a smell rose from him of excreta and unwashed flesh.
'Who has done this?' enquired Leth, outraged. He cast his eyes over the monstrous contrivance which held the man, seeking a means to release him. When the man did not respond he touched his shoulder. 'Friend, I wish to help you.'
'Go away,' came the short reply.
Surprised, Leth said, 'Don’t be afraid. I’m here to help you if I can. Tell me first what crime you’ve committed to be punished like this? Such a sentence is inhuman.'
'Go away,' the man repeated. His voice was gruff, strained and part-throttled due to his unnatural posture. Leth could see no way of releasing him; the contraption had been formed with perverse ingenuity, virtually as one piece. What joints and links there were had been expertly bolted and melded.
Leth scratched his head. 'It will take a smithy to release you from this.'
'Leave me!' growled the man. 'This is my place! Begone!'
'I can’t leave you in this cruel state,' declared Leth, astonished. 'I won’t.'
'This is my place!' the man flared, his chin forced against his chest. The metal device shook and rattled. 'Begone, interferer! Leave me! Leave me!'
Lakewander had turned her horse around. She addressed Leth from the saddle. 'Do as he says, Swordbearer. This is his choice.'
Leth straightened. 'His choice? Who has put him here?'
'He has - that is, he has employed some person to bind him thus and transport him to the roadside. But it is his choice, free and without pressure or coercion from any other. He is a Sufferer, and this is his place.'
Leth stared at her, uncomprehending, then turned and knelt once again beside the confined man. 'Sir, tell me what she says isn’t true. Tell me that you want to be freed and you have my word that I will free you, with no expectation of reward.'
'This is my place!' declared the man, and his voice now was both impatient and imploring. 'Leave me! Leave me!'
'Do you fear her?' said Leth, indicating Lakewander and suddenly suspicious. 'Do you think she commands me, that I’m deceiving you? If so, you’re mistaken, be sure of that.'
'Fool!' spat the man, jerking his rigid shackle hard, the veins standing out on his neck and arms. 'Beef-wit! Dolt! Don’t you understand the common tongue? Your proximity offends me! Your words rankle in my ears! Get gone now, brainless maggot, before I piss on you! Get gone!'
Leth rose, dismayed, and backed away a couple of steps. Lakewander gave him a consoling look. 'Do as he says, Swordbearer.'
'Why won’t he accept help?'
'It’s his choice.'
Scratching his head, Leth remounted. As they rode off he said, 'He’ll die there.'
'Eventually, yes. He is able to shuffle very slowly, and his one hand has sufficient mobility to enable him to pluck tall stalks of grass and other plants and some insects. Hence his body is provided with basic sustenance and moisture, enough that he doesn’t starve.'
'But he has chosen this? Why?'
'He is a Sufferer. That is the short answer. It’s his devotion. No doubt in the Godworld perfection reigns. None feel guilt. None suffer without knowing why. None seek answers to the mysteries and agonies of existence, nor feel the need to petition higher deities for mercy and understanding. Here it’s not like that. Here some are utterly borne down by the burden of living, the privations that have been thrust upon them. Some find only misery in life. Some weep and some seek solace through pain, as if it will purge them of imagined sins. Some, so brutalized, elect to exhibit themselves as he does. They perceive themselves as worthless and undeserving, save as receptacles or embodiments, in some form, of the World's Agony. It’s all they know, and it’s perhaps a kind of affirmation of their existence.'
Leth absorbed this thoughtfully, then said, after a pause, 'You’re wrong. Where I come from it’s not so very different.'
'Then can you understand how one might be devoured by one's yearning and the bitter knowledge that your dreams can never be realized?'
'Aye, but. . . .' Leth fell silent, contemplating this. It seemed hardly an answer, but he expected nothing more.
'Slay Ascaria,' Lakewander said, 'and perhaps he and those like him will suffer no more.'
'Ascaria? She is responsible for all you have described?'
'She is the Kancanitrix, the Dark Flame of the Orb. If her flame is extinguished the true light of the Orb can re-again enter the darkened souls of our kind.'
Leth looked back at the solitary huddled figure beside the road, diminishing slowly into the distance. They rounded a bend and the Sufferer was lost to sight.
Throughout their journey Leth had seen no human settlements nor, with the exception of the Sufferer, any indication of human life at all. No fields nor farm beasts. The terrain they crossed was predominantly bare, almost a wasteland. Wild beasts and birds were evident in some small number, and were indistinguishable in most respects from the common creatures of his homeland. But his overall impression was of uncanny emptiness.
Now things began to change slightly, though not in ways he might have anticipated. He became aware of metal statues at the roadside: one on its own, initially unremarkable, then a little way further another, and another. Now a cluster of three in close proximity to one another, with others visible in the distance.
In size they were more or less uniform: bald, almost featureless leaden or iron figures cast in human form, but somewhat more massive than a man. In the first few that Leth passed their postures were similarly without variation. They simply stood, their legs melded together, their arms at their sides, likewise melded to the torsos. But now he came upon one kneeling, its metal hands upon its metal thighs, blank face turned towards the sky. Another stood with arms outstretched to either side; one knelt with spine curved, chest upon the tops of its thighs, elbows hugging calves and thighs, fingers clutching knees and face almost in the soil. Some of the figures appeared to have been set in place quite recently, others bore marks of weathering and rust, suggesting they had stood for a long time, perhaps years or even decades.
As Leth and Lakewander rode on they passed more and more of the metal statues. The variations in posture became the norm. A handful were mounted upon plinths or pedestals; one had been affixed high atop a tree trunk which had been shorn of leaves, branches and bark, and sawn clean through at its top. The statue stood perhaps forty feet above the ground, sentinel still, a metallic stylite gazing blindly into infinity.
Leth assumed the figures to be solid until he noticed that one feature common to them all was a mouth orifice, which suggested that they might in part be hollow. He eyed them somewhat uncomfortably. Their silence and number gave them an eerie presence, and he was bemused as to their purpose in so desolate a place.
The woodland had begun to thin. Leth and Lakewater emerged now onto a dusty plain, and were confronted by scores of the metal statues spread across the landscape before them. Many were high on up-ended tree-trunks or pinnacles of rock, others stood, sat, knelt, squatted, sp
rawled on the earth. Leth pulled up his horse. He had never seen a sight like it. And as he gazed around him, to his shock, the nearest statue spoke.
Or rather, it uttered a series of sounds.
Leth wrenched himself around in the saddle, the hairs at the nape of his neck standing on end. His horse shied and he struggled for a moment to control it. He peered at the statue, which stood less than five paces away. The sound came again, a voice so close to human as to be almost a mockery. It moaned, shaping words of a sort, but he could not make them out for they were faint and oddly distorted.
'She is asking for water,' Lakewander said. She had halted her horse and walked it back to stand beside him.
'What? She?'
'She is a Soul.' Lakewander gestured out across the plain, and back to the woodland out of which they had ridden. 'All of them are Souls.'
The voice spoke again, sibilant and hoarse through the metal mouth orifice, and this time Leth made out the words. 'Waa-terrr. Pllleease, sir. If you ha-ave a hea-arrtt. Waa-terrr….'
Shaken, he reached reflexively for the flask strapped to his saddle-pack. He dismounted, then hesitated. He knew nothing of these strange metal beings. Was he being tricked?
He turned to Lakewander. 'Should I?'
'You will come to no harm, if that is what you are asking, Lord,' she said, then added with unexpected sarcasm, 'and no doubt it will salve your conscience. But in all truth it will do little else except prolong her suffering.'
Leth felt his temper rise. 'Listen, what is going on here? Am I to help her or not?'
'It is as I say. You will relieve her suffering in the short term, but prolong it in the long.'
'What is she? She, and all these others? Souls? What do you mean?'
'They are women, like I, and men--' she hesitated, looking at Leth, then away, '--like other men, whose faith, belief, conviction or, as some would conceive it, madness, has driven them to the extreme of having themselves encased forever inside these metal shells.'
