by Rachel Lee
Ratha nodded slowly and motioned to a chair near the fire pit. A column of smoke rose from the burning logs and vanished through the vent above that revealed the brightest of the night’s stars.
The overmark bowed again, then took the offered seat.
“Would you like hot ale?” Jenah asked. “We were about to pour some ourselves.”
“It would delight me,” Suzza said with a friendlier smile. The tankards were filled, then the chair moved so that the three men sat around the fire pit facing one another. Suzza offered a silent toast, and the other two responded.
“This is difficult,” Suzza said. “I am certain it is as difficult for you as it is for my soldiers. For so long you were our prey. You must loathe us. And some among my soldiers lost loved ones in the recent slave rebellion. So they are rather hardened and bitter.”
“So it is,” Ratha agreed. “Tuzza killed my brother. After my brother killed his cousin.”
Suzza nodded and swigged his ale. “I cannot pretend I come with clean hands. But unlike my men, I have heard from the lips of my emperor why it is we unite. Why we must unite. And why, in the end, we must learn to live together.”
Ratha lifted a questioning brow.
Suzza held out his tankard and thanked Jenah for the refill. “Among my studies in my youth, before I trained in soldiering—which was required of me as the younger son of nobility and the cousin of our emperor—I was taught some philosophy. I believe you know my teacher, Erkiah.”
“Indeed!” said Ratha. “He travels with us.”
“I have heard. With the Foundling and the Weaver, is that not so?”
“Aye, it is.”
Suzza nodded. “Erkiah taught me many things, some of which I was later taught to scorn. Building an empire hardens men, Ratha Monabi. It hardens hearts and minds and perhaps even spirits.” Abruptly he shook his head. “No perhaps about it. It hardens the spirit. Since the age of sixteen summers, I have carried a sword, and I can no longer remember the faces of all I have slain, though they sometimes come to my dreams to remind me. This was my duty. I have been awarded many honors.”
Ratha nodded, his face expressionless.
Suzza sighed. “I cannot say, however, that fulfilling my duty has made me proud. Blame Erkiah for that. He attempted to make me see a different way. Some of his teaching remained with me through it all.”
Ratha nodded. “I was not raised to fight.”
“No.” Suzza looked into his mug, nodding. “But for me and my ilk, you would have been left peacefully in your villages creating the beauty from stone that was our first reason to take you into our cities.” He looked up, smiling crookedly. “I have always suspected that your people never built as well for Bozandar as they did for themselves.”
A sly grin crossed Ratha’s face. “Perhaps their hearts weren’t in it.”
“Most likely.” Suzza shook his head and gave a short laugh. “However it happened, we are here now. Erkiah told me all those many years ago that if I didn’t get myself killed in some battle or other, I would live to see prophecy fulfilled. And here I am.”
“Aye,” Jenah said, pouring more ale all around. “Here are we all. An uneasy alliance against a threat I doubt we even begin to understand.”
“I fear you are right,” Suzza said. “As a youth, Erkiah’s words thrilled me. How much more could a lad ask for than to be involved in the fulfillment of a prophecy. Now…” He shook his head ruefully. “I would say I wished we were already past it, except that there is no way to know what awaits us on the other side if we fail.”
“We will not fail,” Ratha said firmly. “We will not because we must not.”
Suzza nodded agreement. “Is the Weaver as powerful as I hear?”
“In truth,” Ratha said, “I am not sure that even she knows the limits of her power yet. She forever seems to find it within her to do greater and greater magicks.”
“That is good.” Suzza took another swig of his ale. “Well, my new friends, I came to promise you something.”
“Aye?” Ratha questioned.
“Aye. Regardless of the difficulty my soldiers may feel in joining with your army, regardless of how they may feel about Anari, they will follow their orders. You need not fear them.”
“Then they need not fear us.”
Suzza nodded. “Right now, I think that is all we can hope for.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The armies followed the Panthea River for nearly two weeks, climbing steadily through rolling hills, before they reached the foothills of the Panthos Mountains. Another three days’ march north brought them to the Aremnos River. Now the army turned west into the broken foothills of the Panthos range, following the river toward the place where Yazzi claimed that Arderon lay.
With each step forward toward the saw-toothed, towering peaks ahead, the armies drew closer to the place where the glorious city of Dederand had long ago existed. The upper two-thirds of that mountain had been hewn off in the firestorm, and what remained was now known as the Ardusa Mesa, but to Archer it would forever be engraved on his mind and soul as the Plain of Dederand, and the Sea of Glass. With each step, Archer’s heart grew heavier. When he had come to this mesa in the past, it had been to visit his own failings and his ghosts.
This time his ghosts did not await his arrival. Already they rode his neck and shoulders like the blast of an ice storm, reminding him.
Reminding him.
Almost without realizing it, he began to talk, a quiet murmur that probably most around him could not hear, not Otteda’s bodyguard nor the other Ilduin who walked behind Tess’s pallet, apparently to give him privacy with her.
Any other time, he would have been amused. But with Dederand up ahead, little could amuse him. He scanned the surrounding rock formations, pointed spires that were the lone remnants of what had once been lush green hills.
“I used to love to ride this way to Dederand,” he said quietly, his words for Tess’s ears alone. And had he thought she could hear him, he might have spoken other words entirely.
“Once there was a wide avenue through here, frequented by tradesmen and travelers. All around the hills blossomed with trees and flowers. The beauty of these hills was in large part the reason so many Samari decided to build a city here, rather than below on the water. First there were a few villas, small ones, used as retreats by those who sought the quiet of the country as a relief from the bustle of the city. But within a few years, the villas grew in number, then the trades they needed followed them, and then, one day it became a city named Dederand. Second City. It seemed like a great thing when our father chose to name Ardred as king of Dederand. The residents of the city celebrated with such joy, for they felt they had taken their place as equals with Samarand.”
He sighed. “An odd thing, surely since all came from Samarand to begin with, and many still had homes there.”
He closed his eyes, remembering the day of Ardred’s coronation, when rose petals had strewn the entire avenue between the cities, when flower petals had seemed to fill the air and the people of two cities celebrated with unadulterated joy the coronations of Ardred and Annuvil as lesser kings of their cities.
To Annuvil, at the time, it had seemed more like an excuse for a celebration than anything more. His father, the High King, had managed to rule quite well without assistance other than his council for many, many years. Neither of his sons had needed a coronet, nor had both cities needed their own kings.
But he had not questioned, for it had been his father’s will. Besides, he had been too busy mooning after Theriel and wondering if she would ever cast her eye his way.
But as the way steepened and he rode closer to Dederand, it now seemed to him that it was that day, that decision, that had set the Samari on the course of destruction.
Perhaps the love of power had always been part of Ardred’s makeup, or perhaps he had learned it as king of Dederand. However it was, the coronation had been the beginning of the biggest changes in him.<
br />
“I should have seen,” he murmured now to the unconscious Tess. “I should have seen that Ardred was in trouble, instead of seeing only that he grew into a nuisance. Somehow I should have averted the course of the horrible things to come. Instead I was preoccupied and unaware, and by the time I saw the truth, it was too late to stop anything. I have only myself to blame.”
How could he have failed to see the changes taking place in his younger twin? Even a man falling in love with the most enchanting woman ever created by the gods should surely have seen beyond the end of his own nose.
He could only lay it to willful blindness. He had not wanted to see. He had not wanted to be distracted from Theriel.
His selfishness had led to the tragedies as surely as anything else that had happened. Even thinking of it made his chest tighten with pain. He had betrayed them all, his brother, his Theriel, his people.
Out of mere selfishness.
“I am so sorry,” he murmured to the ghosts that crowded his memory and mind. “I am so, so sorry.”
He must not fail this time, he reminded himself. He must save these people who had grown in the place of the Firstborn, must protect them against evils they really couldn’t begin to imagine. Even when they looked upon the plain of Dederand, and the Sea of Glass, he doubted they would grasp the evils that had been unleashed. That could once again be unleashed.
“It is so dark.”
Startled by the sound of Tess’s voice, he glanced down at her and saw that she still slept. At once he slipped from his saddle to walk beside her litter. Not caring who might see, he reached out and grasped her hand. “We approach Dederand,” he said.
“So dark,” she murmured. “Everything here is blighted.”
“Aye.”
“So dark,” she repeated as if unaware of him. “The scar…the scar…the darkness here reaches deeper than reality. What? What?”
Then she fell silent again, and a small sigh fluttered past her lips. Her hand in his had remained slack the entire time.
He swallowed, squeezing his feelings back into the box inside his chest, which was the only safe place for them. If he ever let them out, he did not want to think of what he might be capable.
Deeper than reality. Her murmured words returned to him and he felt a jolt. The darkness here reaches deeper than reality.
He looked around, noting the rock spires, seeing that in some places burn marks still survived. “Cilla?” he called out.
“Aye, my lord?” She was walking with her sisters, and now she strode faster to catch up with him. Despite being an Ilduin, she was still a soldier, and she carried a quiver and bow over her shoulders, and a dirk at her side.
“Cilla, Tess is murmuring in her sleep. She said the darkness here reaches deeper than reality.”
Cilla opened her mouth as if she would answer, then quickly closed it. “A moment, my lord.”
Gripping the edge of the litter for steadiness, Cilla closed her eyes. Archer watched her from the corner of his eye, noting that after a moment her dark features were suffused with an almost rainbow glow. It shimmered and glowed, and moved in gentle waves over her and about her. Truly, he thought, the Ilduin bore a remarkable beauty. To one with eyes to see, they could never be otherwise.
Slowly Cilla opened her eyes. “I think she is beginning to awaken, Lord Annuvil. A little. There is a struggle.”
“But can you tell what she meant? Or was it mere dream rambling?”
Cilla lowered her head. “What our forebears did here left a permanent scar, my lord. It burned through the warp and woof of the world to whatever lies beyond it. I think it will never go away.”
Archer’s mouth tightened. “I fear not.”
Cilla lifted her face, and something very like awe shadowed it now. “I had no idea such was possible.”
“The eleven who formed the circle did,” he answered grimly. “They sought to retaliate for the murder of Theriel, but this…this is beyond that.”
“I agree.”
His smile was bitter. “They helped birth the world. I suppose they thought they had a right to unbirth part of it.”
“I am glad I know this.”
He lifted a brow. “Glad to know this ugliness?”
“Glad to know I have the ability to commit such an atrocity. I will be wary now not to repeat it.”
“Good.” He walked a few more paces before he spoke again. “You think she may awaken?”
“It feels more likely now. Whatever took her seems to have weakened a bit. Or perhaps she is fighting free. I cannot tell.”
He nodded. “Let me know if you sense anything else.”
“I will.”
She dropped back, leaving him to walk between his mount and the litter, and to wonder if he was equal to the task before him.
Perhaps, he thought, it did not matter which brother died. Perhaps all that mattered was that one of them did. Whatever sport the gods sought in their conflict would then be gone.
And if he died, he could not be responsible for whatever mischief they might devise next.
It was as if the legions came up against a great, invisible wall. Once they emerged from the desolate hills and negotiated the slope of the Ardusa Mesa, they halted. To a man they stopped in their tracks and stared.
Before them lay the Sea of Glass, the place where an entire city and most of the mountain on which it had been built had vanished in a heat and fire so intense that all that remained was black glass, whipped into wavelets as if it were water, frozen for all time.
All had heard of this place, but none had ever dared come here. It was known from earliest childhood that this was a place of unmatched evil, that nothing could grow here, that those who had ventured to cross its vast expanse never returned.
But now they were being asked to march across it, this black sea that devoured the unwary. Not a soldier budged.
Annuvil had ridden to the fore to join the commanders when the army came to a halt. They were all conferring, trying to decide whether to let their armies balk, or order them to march ahead.
“Let them camp here,” he said. “’Twill take more than a day to cross the mesa and ’tis better if we start the journey at first light. They are less likely to be unnerved.”
The emperor agreed. “The men need time to overcome childhood warnings. Let them rest and accustom themselves to what they see. And send men out among them to remind them that this evil occurred in the distant past. The powers that caused this are no longer with us.”
If only that were true, Archer thought, but he remained silent. This time, however, the Ilduin were divided. Five marched with him. Ardred might have taken the other seven. His brother’s ability to charm and persuade was in itself a form of magick. Although it was possible, he supposed, that some Ilduin still remained free and unaware of events. Some might not even be aware of their potential.
Even though the ground near the plain was bare of all comfort, rocky and uneven, the soldiers seemed glad not to have to venture out onto the glass yet. They lit fires with what brush they could find, and cooked quick meals. Then they huddled as close as they could get, for the breath of winter, which seemed to have lessened for the past few days, began to deepen again.
Ardred, Archer thought, knew they were here. The cold and snow that had killed so many at Derda was about to be inflicted on this army.
As the temperatures steadily fell, the seasoned troops began to deal with it. They found sheltered places out of the wind, built large fires and surrounded themselves with horses if they had them, transport mules, and every bit of clothing and blankets they carried.
They arranged themselves in circles two deep around their fires, those outside switching with those within often enough to prevent the cold from endangering them.
The Anari, who had until recently never known such cold, were happy to take instruction from the Bozandari members of the Snow Wolves, and soon, light-skinned and dark, they gathered together against the cold. Any distance they
had maintained because of past conflicts vanished in the basic need for survival.
A sardonic smile lifted Archer’s lips as he watched the transformation take place from the very edge of the plain. “So, brother,” he murmured, “did you imagine your winter would tear us apart? For you certainly did not imagine that it would draw former enemies together.”
But the cold alone was not enough for Ardred. No. As darkness blanketed the world, snow began to fall, at first with gentle beauty, but then with increasing fury. The flakes turned to icy pebbles, striking with a sting, and the wind picked up even more, finding its way even into the protected crannies the soldiers had found or built and blew hard on the flames of their fires as if trying to extinguish them.
Ignoring the bite of the blizzard, his cape blowing out behind him, then wrapping around him as if it wanted to bind him, Archer walked out on the plain. Alone.
He didn’t go far, for the glassy ground was treacherous at the best of times, and the wavelets that covered it were often as sharp as razors. Here, however, the snow could not stay. For whatever reason, the flakes melted the instant they touched the ground, although behind him he could have seen it deepening on the ground where the men camped.
In all the years he had walked this world, in all the times he had come here to brood and remember, he had never seen anything of life on this plateau, not even the snow. Tonight was no different. The icy pellets melted, and even the water they left behind vanished quickly.
Sometimes he wished he could do the same thing. Sometimes he wished he could come out here, lie down and be absorbed into the glass that was the mark of his shame.
Never had it happened.
Now the moment had come. The moment he had yearned for and dreaded ever since this plain had been blasted into reality. The time of his reckoning. The time of Ardred’s reckoning. He must face the brother he had not seen since the beginning of the Firstborn Wars, and there was no doubt in his mind that both of them could not survive the meeting.
It filled his heart with grief and anguish, not because he cared whether he died, but because two brothers should not come to this end. Because if two brothers had not come to this to begin with, thousands would never have died, Theriel wouldn’t have died, and this plateau wouldn’t have been blasted in the world as a reminder of arrogance and evil.
