[Sundering 01] - Malekith

by Gav Thorpe - (ebook by Undead)

  Morathi paused and took a deep breath, calming herself. When she continued her voice was low but insistent.

  “Serve Ulthuan and you will be Phoenix King. Protect her from enemies outside and within and she will embrace you in return. Go into the north and learn of the race of men. Head into the chilling wastes and confront the Dark Gods that hunger over our world. Then return to Ulthuan and take up your place as ruler, to shield us against their unnatural thirst. I fear that only you can protect us against the dangers I have foreseen. I see fire and bloodshed sweeping Ulthuan again. The colonies will burn and all that we hold dear will be cast upon the rocks and be for naught.”

  “What have you seen, when will this happen?” asked Malekith.

  “You know that there is no future that is certain,” replied Morathi. “I have simply cast my gaze ahead along the path of my life, and I see death. War will come again and the Naggarothi will be called upon as they were by your father. I warned the First Council that it would be so, but they did not listen. You must learn what you can of Chaos, and of humans, for our future is entwined with both. When you are master of your fate, then return to us and take what has been kept from you for so long. Let Anlec be a beacon of hope again.”

  Malekith saw desire and fear in equal measure in the face of his mother, and his love for her stirred him. He laid an arm about her shoulders and pulled her close to him. She quivered, though whether from anxiety or excitement he could not tell.

  “It shall be as you say,” said Malekith. “I shall go into the north and seek whatever destiny awaits me there. I will return to Ulthuan, and I will guard her against whatever comes to pass.”

  “And I have a steed worthy of such a journey,” said Morathi, pulling away from her son and leading him by the hand back to the window. She pointed out towards the bay, to the huge ship that now lay in a berth along the quayside.

  “She is Indraugnir, named after the dragon whom your father befriended and from whose back he fought against the daemons. The two of them died together upon the Blighted Isle, after Aenarion returned the Godslayer to its black altar. It is not yet time for you to ride upon the dragon, but this dragonship shall suffice in the meantime. That fabled name will not go unnoticed by the folk of Ulthuan.”

  “She is a magnificent vessel,” said Malekith. “Yet for all of her glory, she is beyond the means of the Naggarothi to build. I do not understand how she came to be made.”

  “We spoke of Ulthuan as a coquettish maiden, and she is,” said Morathi. “There are many princes who admire her, and who are willing to aid her when she asks in return for the promise of favour. Prince Aeltherin of Lothern is one such admirer, and it is he who built the first of the dragonships and gifted her to you. Others will be built in the shipyards of Lothern over the coming years, but Indraugnir is the first and ever will be the greatest in the eyes and dreams of our people.”

  “So, you have allies outside of Nagarythe,” said Malekith.

  “Many,” replied Morathi. “Some of the princes of the First Council are dead, by war or age, and their sons now wonder whether their fathers chose rightly. Not all were happy at the time, and a thousand years is a long while to be reigned over by a lesser ruler than Aenarion. There is support for us in every kingdom and across the colonies. The frustration of the common folk builds, for while they live in comfort, their inner spirits are unsatisfied. I do what I can to lift them, to provide their lives with purpose and meaning, but they now live in a world far removed from the times of hunger, fear and deprivation that we knew many centuries ago. They live in idyllic palaces surrounded by a garden paradise, yet many see it for the gilded cage that Ulthuan has become. We pray to the gods for direction, and they answer me through their visions and dreams.”

  “I hear much that concerns the gods and your prayers,” said Malekith. “You tempt fate by courting the twilight pantheon. The likes of Morai-heg and Nethu are not to be toyed with. My father paid a heavy price for the favours of Khaine; do not underestimate the forces you play with.”

  “There is no need to be afraid,” said Morathi. “Only true priests and priestesses perform the actual dark rituals. For the most part these ceremonies are little more than gatherings for feasting and gossiping. Only Bel Shanaar and his deceptively pious coterie feign outrage at some of the rituals, but they know as well as you and I do that Atharti, Hekarti and others cannot be ignored. It is only because we still value the old traditions and the ancient customs in Nagarythe that we are able to perform these rituals at all. Someone must be guardian of the forgotten paths, and if that means that the other kingdoms must turn to us on occasion, then that is all the better.”

  “If you move against Bel Shanaar, it will be treason,” said Malekith. “I know that you seek to undermine his power and influence. Be careful that you do not destroy Nagarythe in the process. No prince of Ulthuan will betray the Phoenix King, and if you move too fast, you will leave Nagarythe friendless and weak.”

  “I will make no moves at all,” said Morathi, sitting down in the chair behind Malekith’s desk. She swept her long black hair over her shoulder and looked at her son. “The position of Phoenix King should always command great respect and authority. I would not erode the power of the Phoenix King and leave you a tarnished crown worth less than a copper cap. It is Bel Shanaar that will be found weak, not his rank, and in time the princes will entreat us to help them. Upon the wave of their desire and need will you be swept to the Phoenix Throne and the power of Anlec rightfully restored. I am merely the means for you to achieve this. I cannot become Phoenix King. Only you, the son of Aenarion, can claim what is yours; it cannot now be given, it must be taken.”

  Malekith pondered these words in silence, refilling his glass. He walked to the window and gazed at Indraugnir. It was well named, for just as the dragon of his father was a foundation of the stories told about him, so too would this ship become a pillar upon which to build the story of Malekith. His mother was deft at manipulating popular opinion, and recapturing the imagination of Ulthuan with this new ship, stirring up the oldest tales of courage and heroism from the time of the first Phoenix King, would set the stage for whatever adventures next befell Malekith.

  Yet there are only so many times and so often one can return to the well before it eventually runs dry, and Malekith knew that Morathi’s sway over the other princes waned the more she used it. If Bel Shanaar was replaced by another elected Phoenix King, not of Aenarion’s line, the precedent set by Bel Shanaar would be sealed in tradition; it would end all hope for Malekith to see Anlec as capital once more.

  “And what of the Everqueen?” asked Malekith after much thought. “Should I succeed Bel Shanaar, I cannot marry my half-sister.”

  “It is of no consequence,” said Morathi. “I have persuaded many of your fellow princes that Bel Shanaar’s marriage to Yvraine is merely a technicality required because the Phoenix King must be of the line of Aenarion. You are his son and have no need to marry into the bloodline. If we oppose it, there will be little support for such a sham marriage to be repeated. Though there was once a dream that we might return to the peace of the Everqueen’s reign shortly after the war with the daemons, there are few of us surviving now that can even remember the time before Aenarion. The Everqueen is a figurehead and nothing more, the real political power of Ulthuan lies not in Avelorn but in Tor Anroc. She is irrelevant, a priestess raised above her station.”

  “What of Morelion?” said Malekith.

  “Aenarion’s first son lives in solitude in the islands to the east,” Morathi said. “He has no will to succeed Aenarion, and even if he did he has not the resource nor influence to make a serious bid for the Phoenix Throne. Trust me, and trust in Nagarythe. When you wish to resume your father’s duties, there will be those of us ready to raise you up to where you belong.”

  “Then I shall await the will of the gods,” said Malekith. “When the sign comes, I will know it. I shall bring Ulthuan back to greatness and the memory of my reign
will echo down through the centuries as loudly as my father’s.”

  “Good,” said Morathi with an amused smile. “Now, which of your palaces do you recommend to your weary mother?”

  As Malekith had expected, Morathi was accompanied by a great many retainers: guards, cooks, entertainers, gardeners, food tasters, painters, poets, chroniclers, actors, costumiers, handmaidens, dressmakers, acolytes, soothsayers, priests and priestesses. There were nearly seven hundred in all. All came directly from Nagarythe, and were unlike anything the colonists of Athel Toralien had seen before.

  For several decades there had been fewer and fewer émigrés from Ulthuan, and so the most recent styles and fashions remained unseen. Morathi deplored the sheeplike mentality of those elves that followed court styles so slavishly, but was never one to miss an opportunity and so she exploited the somewhat fickle nature of elven taste whenever it suited her.

  The seer-queen had carefully cultivated a reputation as a trendsetter and paragon of exquisite aesthetic. She was always at the forefront when it came to patronising an up-and-coming singer or poet, or endorsing some risqué but popular movement. In this way, Morathi managed to appear to move with the times, while Bel Shanaar and his supporters seemed outdated and staid. It helped that through her sorcery, Morathi never appeared to age a single day, even less so than any long-lived elf, while almost imperceptibly the years crept up on the Phoenix King. To young and old alike, Morathi was ever the perfect blend: a guardian of tradition whilst also being a forward-thinking visionary.

  Her huge entourage reflected the wide variety of concerns and movements with which Morathi involved herself. From satirical poets who moped about the wine houses hidden behind white veils, to outlandishly tattooed jugglers and fire-eaters who entertained in the plazas, the hundreds of Morathi’s followers made their presence felt all across Athel Toralien. Most prominently it was the arrival of the priests and priestesses that changed the city.

  Malekith had resisted such developments in Athel Toralien, having been raised by his father to be distrustful of the priesthoods who had denied Aenarion the guidance he had sought. Although Malekith never openly opposed any temple or shrine, he ensured that a priest establishing any such building within the boundaries of his lands soon fell out of favour. Followers were hard to come by under such circumstances and most priests left within a season of their arrival. With the coming of Morathi’s entourage it was as if a flood gate had been opened as priests and priestesses of all descriptions began plying their trade in the city.

  In the earliest days of the Everqueen, the elves had worshipped and placated their gods at certain places on Ulthuan sacred to each of them. Elves would travel to these holy grottos, auspicious streams and sinister caves and peaks to entreat with the gods or to offer their praise.

  With the elves now spread across the world, Morathi had slowly revolutionised the role of the priesthood. Once they had tended to the shrines that had grown over the sacred sites down through the years. Through Morathi’s manipulation, now they were vessels of the gods’ power. All were ordained in the time-honoured fashions of the past, but now rather than elves making pilgrimages to the holy places, the priests took the blessings of their gods out across the globe, so that all might still worship Asuryan and Kurnous, Isha and Lileath. Priests could now find spots sacred to their gods in the wider world, and even in the cities of Ulthuan shrines and temples were founded.

  Long denied a spiritual release, the citizens of Athel Toralien embraced these newcomers and flooded to their rituals. When the prince complained to Morathi one morning, she laughed away his concerns.

  “Your distaste for religion is quite unnatural, Malekith,” the seeress-queen said. The pair walked upon the outermost wall of the city, gazing out across the wind-tossed ocean. “If you are to rid yourself of your loathing, you will have to overcome your unspoken fears.”

  “I am not afraid of priests,” Malekith snorted.

  “Yet you never enter a shrine, nor give a moment’s praise to the gods,” said Morathi, stopping and leaning her back against the parapet so that the low sun blazed down onto her fair skin. “Perhaps it is the gods that scare you?”

  “The gods have never favoured Nagarythe, I see no reason to debase myself in their name,” the prince countered.

  “Yet the gods have their part to play in your life,” Morathi warned. “It was Asuryan’s blessing that made your father the Phoenix King. It was the blade of Khaine that he wielded to free our isle. His first wife was the chosen of Isha. Your blood calls to the gods, and in turn they call to your blood.”

  “There are other, stranger and stronger gods now,” said Malekith, his gaze unconsciously straying to the north, to the unseen Realm of Chaos. “I fear that even Asuryan is now humbled.”

  “Then if not for your spirit, embrace the gods for your power,” Morathi said. “By participating and sponsoring religion, as I have done, you will come to control that from which you are currently distanced. It matters not whether you believe the gods are listening. The important point to remember is that your people do. If they believe you have the favour of the gods, their dedication and loyalty is that much stronger.”

  “I will not rule with falsehood,” Malekith said. “One day we will be free of the gods and the better for it.”

  Morathi said nothing in reply, but her face expressed her doubt without words.

  * * *

  As the time to leave Athel Toralien approached ever closer, Malekith fretted more and more, wishing to be gone. Morathi’s arrival had disrupted all routine and semblance of order in the city, as Malekith knew it had been intended to. Knowing how fickle elves could be at times, Morathi had ensured that the spectacle of her arrival, her gift of Indraugnir and Malekith’s departure would all blend together into a story that would stick in the memory and be debated in the city for many years to come.

  Of her vast entourage, only a few handmaidens and gifted seers were returning to Ulthuan with the queen. The rest were, as she put it, her gift to Athel Toralien and the other cities of the east. She had ensured that though Malekith was leaving the colonies that he had almost single-handedly created, his name would live on there in his absence.

  When it came to the time for the expedition of Malekith to leave, the Naggarothi prince stood upon the deck of Indraugnir as she swayed at anchor in the harbour of Athel Toralien. Alandrian stood with him, as did Yeasir. Morathi was in one of the spacious cabins preparing for the voyage. The three of them looked out over the city, which was more than ten times the size it had been when they had first sailed into the anchorage more than thirteen hundred years before. All knew how much things had changed in that time, and they shared the memory of it without having to say a word.

  “Where will you go?” asked Alandrian.

  “Out to the snow and the ice,” Malekith said, pointing to the north and west. “I go to meet my fate, whether glorious or ignoble.”

  “It will be glorious, of that I am sure,” said Alandrian with good humour. “You have been marked by the gods for great things, my prince. It is in your blood to bestride history like a colossus while we mere mortals must labour in your immense shadow!”

  “Well, my shadow and I will be moving along shortly,” said Malekith with a smile. “Feel free to enjoy what warmth and light you can in my absence. If what you say is true, then when I will return I shall eclipse the sun and the moons from several miles away!”

  The tide was fair and the prince bid Alandrian farewell. The two parted with Alandrian promising he would keep the city safe, and renewing his loyalty to Nagarythe. Morathi came up on deck just as they were about to depart, to wave to the adulalatory crowds who again lined the dockside to see her. With the wind filling her sails, Indraugnir got under way, and by noon the city was out of sight below the horizon.

  ——

  The Call of Khaine

  West they sailed, as Malekith had said they would. Across the Great Ocean Indraugnir carried them, towards an unch
arted world. Yet for all their grand destiny, there was a more mundane duty to perform first. Morathi was returning to Nagarythe, and would need to be taken to Galthyr before Malekith’s host could continue westwards. Thirty days after setting out from Athel Toralien, aided by a strong wind and Indraugnir’s swift lines, they sighted the northern isles of Ulthuan.

  Standing out from the tossing sea as pinnacles of rock, the northern isles protected the coast of Nagarythe and Chrace from the heavy swells and high waves that were stirred up by the north wind. In their midst rose one island larger by far than all the others, and most westerly of the archipelago: the Blighted Isle. It was here that the Shrine of Khaine was located, a black table of rock from which protruded the Widowmaker, the weapon of Khaine.

  Morathi knew it well, and she stood at the port rail looking south as the Blighted Isle came into view through the fog and crashing surf. Malekith joined her.

  “You think of my father,” said the prince.

  “I do,” replied Morathi. “It was more than a thousand years ago that he flew here upon the real Indraugnir and breathed his last. He is but a memory now, a myth to be told to children who will gasp in awe at his feats, yet not wholly believe them. Even I only truly knew the legendary Phoenix King, for we did not meet until after he had drawn the sword. Even I knew of him only by reputation before that, and of the time before his blessing by Asuryan there is nothing left but mystery. He is gone from us now, he who was the greatest. There is nothing left of him but you.”

  Malekith stood there a while, the spray from the sea wetting his face as he looked at the bleak, dark rocks.

  “There is something else that remains,” he said finally.

  “What is that?” asked his mother. “Something that remains of what?”

  “Of my father,” said Malekith. “No one has been to the Blighted Isle since Aenarion returned the sword. He and Indraugnir lie there to this day. We should return their bodies to Anlec where they can lie in state, and all the princes from all over the world will come to pay their respects to the first of the Phoenix Kings. Even Bel Shanaar will have to kneel before his remains and pay homage. All the princes will see that, and when my father is interred in a mausoleum that will rival the pyramid of Asuryan, with the bones of the largest dragon of Caledor standing guard at its entrance, I shall lake his armour. The princes will remember Bel Shanaar bowing before that armour and the people will see anew that I am Aenarion’s son; Aenarion reborn.”