Valley of Embers (The Landkist Saga Book 1)

by Steven Kelliher

  “I imagine he thinks so,” Kole said, spitting and drawing a throaty laugh from the barrel-chested Ember.

  “Off with you then,” Garos croaked out, waving his hand as if he were shoeing a fly. “Jakub, off with you. Take him to see the wielders of ink and parchment. Take him to the Merchants, and do bring back our Captain if he still lives. Your father is there as well.”

  Kole only remembered flashes of having spoken with Karin when he first entered the city with the twins. He had to get north, but seeing the state Hearth was in, it seemed as though that road was closed to him. As First Runner of the Lake, perhaps Karin would know a way.

  Of course, there were other reasons to want to speak with his father. The dream had yet to fade from his mind. It had stuck there like a jagged stone in a mire. But father and son rarely spoke of such things. If there were to be a time, however, Kole thought it might be now.

  Kole allowed himself to be dragged away. As they walked, he reflected on how strange it was that he knew so little of how Hearth worked despite living in the Valley his entire life. But then, traveling the roads and ways was only safe in the Bright Days. In the distant past, the Dark Months had merely held the small possibility of encroachment as the World Apart drew closer to their own. As the packs had turned to swarms and now the swarms to armies, the Bright Days had changed from periods of celebration to preparation.

  The Emberfolk were tribal by nature, Kole knew from the tales from the desert. According to Ninyeva, Hearth and Last Lake were actually more intertwined than the various tribes had been in the north. The Scattered Villages of the Valley were a more apt representation of their former communal habits. Kole wondered how those villages were faring right now. He wondered how many of the army come against them carried the blood of the Valley peoples and how many had been victims from other lands.

  An image of the burned and broken earth before Hearth’s gate came up like bile. He noted now what he had skimmed over during his talk with the First Keeper: the twisted limbs poking out from the ash and dirt, black paint all washed away to leave pale skin where the fire had not reached.

  And then he heard it. Fihn’s screaming amidst the flames. He heard it as if for the first time, and it made him double over in the middle of the courtyard, struggling not to retch as soldiers watched him and made their private judgments. His vision blurred, clearing a bit as Shift moved into his line of sight, whining softly. He noted the boy’s muddy boots.

  “Jakub,” Kole said, straightening a bit. “I need to see my friends. Take me to them.”

  The boy known as Jakub frowned, shaking his head slowly.

  “Captain Caru,” he said in a rough voice at odds with his appearance. He could speak, then.

  “Yes,” Kole said, standing up straight and wiping the drool from his bottom lip. “In time. But now, take me to the sick and wounded. Take me to my friends.”

  Jakub shook his head again, looking panicked this time, as if he feared retribution. Kole thought he might fear the Captain, but everything he had heard of Talmir painted him as a thoughtful and kind figure, if a little stern. Was it Kole the boy feared?

  “No,” Jakub said, repeating it several times as he shook his head back and forth.

  Kole sighed.

  “Very well, then,” he said, closing his eyes. “Lead on. First to Captain Caru and my father, and then,” he emphasized the last, “to my friends.”

  Jakub almost smiled then and took off at a walk that bordered on a run. This caused Shifa great stress, as she doubled back continuously, barking at Jakub to halt for a spell as Kole strode through the cobbled streets, staring in wonder at the city he had only been in as a child and held no memory of.

  They walked a wide street that sloped steadily upward, as all roads in Hearth did. Unlike the rural brown roads of Last Lake, those here were inlaid with flat stones that grew slick in the mist. They allowed for the easy passage of carts and other wheeled contraptions, many of which now sheltered under dripping awnings.

  Where the homes and buildings of the Lake were largely horizontal, Hearth’s confining walls had forced new construction up. It was like a forest of odd replicas of Ninyeva’s own tower, one leaning in on the other, the orange and red tints of the candlelit windows flashing their own brand of beauty.

  “Where is the meeting place?” Kole called out, and while Shifa’s white tufts perked up, Jakub’s barely twitched. Kole sighed.

  As he walked, his thoughts could not help but turn back to the dream, and, curiously, to the Faey Mother. Kole had stated his intention to venture north to the peaks after the great ape had breached their timber walls. Ninyeva had not openly championed him, but she had certainly not stood in his way. He remembered the night his mother had died. It was the first night he had the dream, and he woke to find the Faey Mother in their home, consoling a father gone mad with grief.

  Did she know of the White Crest’s presence? Did she know what Kole planned to do if he found him?

  None of it had ever made any sense to Kole. After all, the White Crest was thought to have fallen in battle against the Eastern Dark. Even if he hadn’t, why would he turn against the people he had sworn to protect? Perhaps it truly was the Eastern Dark he saw all shrouded in light.

  Kole tried to cast the thoughts away like a rotted cloak, but they would not quit. He tried to turn his mind to Linn and the others, but his heart simmered, calling for the same thing it had for over a decade: revenge.

  Kole felt a tug on his sleeve and looked down to see Jakub, his expression irate. He had slowed too much for the boy’s patience, whose tugging only ceased when Shifa tested a growl low in her throat. Jakub’s worst fears of dalliance were about to be realized, as a figure broke the plane from road to sky, his profile framed in the light of a neighboring tavern.

  The figure stood a bit shorter than Kole, but he may as well have been looking at an aged mirror. Karin’s face broke into a broad smile, white teeth showing. He came down the slope in a gait lighter than matched the mood of the city, but for now, all that mattered was their embrace. Shifa wagged her tail and barked excitedly, while Jakub was the picture of frustration, his arms crossed as his mission experienced an unexpected delay.

  Karin pushed his son to arm’s length.

  “You’re looking none the worse for wear,” he said, looking Kole up and down. “I know he’s late,” he tossed over his shoulder to Jakub, “but I thought it important to catch him before he entered that pit of vipers.” He smiled at Kole, but now it was the strained look he knew so well. “Come,” and he took Kole by the shoulder and turned him east, continuing up the rise.

  Jakub skipped off ahead, weaving in and out of passers-by with Shifa close at his heels. He never let Kole out of his sight, but their forward progress seemed to have appeased him some.

  As they crested the rise, the streets grew thicker with traffic. Men and women very young and very old went about their business, but there was undoubtedly a note of panic to their movements. Karin watched him.

  “This attack is unlike any other,” Karin said. “They go about their days as if the dark tide will recede, as it always has.”

  “It won’t,” Kole said.

  “No. It won’t.”

  They walked in silence for a spell, watching Jakub and Shifa disappear and reappear in the snaking crowds as the land began to slope steadily downward.

  “I’m wasting time,” Kole said.

  “You’re lucky to be alive,” Karin answered, more sternly than was usual. “I did not make for Hearth until I was certain you were on the mend. Even so, I never thought you’d be fool enough to leave the Lake in the state you’re in—in the state we’re all in.”

  “I’m fine. You said so yourself.”

  Karin stopped dead in his tracks and Kole turned to regard him. His father had closed his eyes, squeezing them tight and clenching his knuckles at his sides. Jakub and Shifa paused farther ahead, but they held their peace.

  “Kole,” Karin started. “Which one
is this for, this quest of yours?”

  “Which one?” Kole asked, incredulous. “It’s for all of us.”

  “What is?” his father sounded exasperated, desperate even. “You’re going to take on the Eastern Dark yourself? You’re going to fight the Sages?”

  “I’m going to fight whoever’s responsible,” Kole said, his tone a challenge.

  From their position on the hill, they could see straight to the walls, Garos’s glowing brazier lighting the crenellations, the churning fields beyond alive with movement. Kole swept his hand out.

  “This isn’t the Dark Kind,” Kole said. “This isn’t some random incursion from the World Apart.” He pointed up at the sky, at the roiling clouds overhead. “That is the work of them,” he said, nearly shouting. Some of the traffic slowed or stopped around them, but he did not care. “You know it is.”

  As he finished, he felt a pang of guilt. His father’s anger had blown out, leaving him barren. He looked at Kole with nothing but love and the fear that came with it.

  “Linn, or your mother?” he asked, stepping closer. “Which one are you going for?”

  Kole’s mind worked, steam rising from his skin as the mist grew thicker.

  “Linn,” he said, not knowing if it was the truth. “They’re out there now. Out there,” he pointed beyond the walls. “And I’m here.”

  Karin nodded and took his son by the shoulder. “They need as many as can be spared here.”

  “I can’t be spared,” Kole said.

  “I know.”

  There was another pause, but Jakub was relieved to see them continue on, taking the slope down into the Bowl that made up the central market of Hearth.

  “You looked like an Ember of old out there,” Karin said, keeping his voice low. “Even the Dark Kind, or the Corrupted—whatever the wretched things are—seemed stunned. They backed off from the walls for half a day, and none have tried for the gate since, something that’s been irking Balsheer.”

  “The twins, father,” Kole said past the lump in his throat.

  “Taei is fine,” he said.

  “And Fihn?”

  “Less so, but she will recover.”

  “How bad?” Kole asked, a hint of desperation in his voice. “I should see her.”

  “No. Not now. There are several Faeykin here. Some trained under Ninyeva at the Lake and others under the Faey of the Eastern Valley. They’ll have her back soon enough.”

  “Would that Iyana were here.”

  “If she were, do you really think you’d make it out of Hearth?”

  Kole found himself chucking despite the mood.

  “I take it that means you won’t try to stop me?”

  Karin paused.

  “I doubt very much if I could. But I have to be honest, Kole. I don’t know if the answers are in the north.”

  “They’re not here.”

  “No, they aren’t. But some are starting to see you as an answer, Kole. And they have more sway than I.”

  “This Merchant Council?” Kole nearly spat the words.

  “The very same. You’ve been at the center of some bright events in all this darkness, son. People are starting to take notice. The leaders of Hearth have noticed, and they wonder if keeping you here might not serve our people better.”

  Karin continued to talk, telling his son of the Merchant Council’s various members— what he knew of them, at least. His father was probably the most well traveled person in the Valley. It stood to reason he knew much and many. He seemed to have a great deal of respect for Captain Caru. It was strange, Kole thought, that he had no memory of meeting the man whose bed he had occupied the previous night. And there was another kernel of guilt, that Kole had slept once again as the Captain had defended his people.

  As his father spoke, Kole was split between listening and seeing. Even now, in the midst of a siege out of nightmare, the central market of Hearth bustled with activity, and not all of it was concentrated on the wounded that occupied the great billowing tents. When compared to the open air of the lakes and forests to the south, the Red Bowl was a confused press and jumble, people rushing to and fro. Normally, they would be peddling their wares, but now, merchants were replaced by physicians, some of them sporting the glowing greens of the Faeykin. Instead of baubles, they carted the wounded, groaning and grasping.

  On the battlefield, the scents of rot and mess were masked by ash and ozone, which covered the slow horrors beneath the fighting. Here among the sick, the rusted smell of blood covered the sweeter odor of infection. Where the Faeykin were too few to purge it, they used flame to burn it.

  In all the years of war with the Dark Kind and in the sorry conflicts before, a sight like this had never been witnessed in the Valley.

  Jakub’s expression did not so much as quiver throughout their walk, the sick and wounded seeming apparitions to him. For some reason, it made Kole pity him for the childhood he had lost. In that moment, Kole felt thankful for his own, however fleeting it might have been.

  After a time, they came to a looming structure carved of white stone. It was same rock that ringed the northern section of the city. Its gate was adorned with gold reliefs, and a bronze dome capped its central tower, albeit one caked with green decay as if it, too was wounded beyond saving.

  As they passed the gates, which sat on the borders of the market, Kole studied the depictions. They marked an obvious attempt to pay homage to the Emberfolk of the desert, but they came off gaudy and strange. The interior was no better.

  In Kole’s experience, there was nothing in the Valley that could be considered ornate of a scale to match the stories of old. An antique tea set, perhaps, or maybe a carpet designed in the old way. Ninyeva had some of these things, as did Doh’Rah. Even Karin had an eye for art—silverware and the like. But the truly magnificent was reserved for the desert palaces that had passed into legend, where jewels adorned every handle on every door, the only things shining brighter than the sun above being the structures of its desert children below.

  The inside of the Merchant Council’s shared meeting place was not one of these structures, but he recognized an attempt when he saw one. If the myriad artistic styles on display—from the carpets ringing floor and wall to the murals on the flat ceiling—matched the egos he was about to endure, facing one Sage or another would seem nothing by comparison. In its own way, there was a sickness here that ran deeper than that festering in the tents outside.

  Kole tried to lose the thoughts as they crossed to the bottom of a spiral stair. Mahogany steps ringed by a black rail curled up into the light of too many lanterns, and he bade Shifa sit at the base. Jakub glared at him, daring him to try the same.

  Kole did not, but the boy stayed with Shifa anyway.

  At the top, Karin opened a door that seemed older than the rest and ushered Kole into a shockingly modest den. In place of the lanterns ringing the stairwell, the whole affair was cast into a strange light from twin hearths on opposite walls. Faces turned to regard him that may as well have been masks for all he could read from them at a glance.

  “Karin Reyna,” a middle-aged man standing at the head of an oval table said. He carried himself with the bearing of a man at arms, and though he wore no formal mark of rank, Kole remembered him as the Captain of Hearth’s white walls. “And his son, Kole Reyna.”

  Talmir Caru did not wait for a response from the assembled merchants and approached Kole with his hand extended.

  “Welcome again,” Talmir said in a low voice, sharing a conspiratorial smirk. “I know our first meeting may have been lost on you.”

  “There was a lot going on,” Kole said, trying to sound more sure than he felt, which was distinctly uncomfortable. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

  Someone at the table scoffed, and Kole craned his head around to see a woman in white shaking her head, bemused, her raven-black hair swaying. She met Kole’s stare and winked.

  “If you think those chambers hospitable, my boy, you’d think mine w
ere fit for the gods,” she said, all silk.

  “And how would you know the difference?” a peevish-looking man asked from her left. He wore a crooked lavender hat and no small degree of irritation.

  The woman offered him a smile, though Kole noted a subtle shift in her eyes, a steeliness that seemed to make the older man squirm ever so slightly. Just as quickly as it appeared, however, the look was gone, replaced by a burst of girlish laughter.

  “Oh, come now, Yush,” she said. “We are all progressive here, are we not?” She looked back at Kole—looked him up and down. His martial mind attributed the roving of her eyes to an attempt at sizing him up, and his masculine side came to the same conclusion. “Though I am more progressive than most.”

  If the Captain was at all embarrassed by his sometimes-lover’s display, he covered it well, leading Kole and his father over to the table, where Karin took the woman’s proffered hand and offered a kiss.

  “Rain,” she said, reaching for Kole. He took it and gave it a squeeze, injecting a bit more heat than usual. She withdrew with a sharp yelp that turned into a chuckle.

  “Rain Ku’Ral,” she finished, shaking out her hand. She watched Kole with intense interest as Talmir made the rest of the introductions.

  There was Yush Tri’Az, he of the purple hat. He was flanked by two female council members. Kole noted the way the three of them watched he and his father with keen interest, if not outright suspicion. He also noted their standoffish attitude toward the Captain.

  Kenta Griyen was a thin man who looked as though he bore the collective weariness of all those gathered. He was the head physician and his eyes kept darting toward the door. Kole knew he would rather be helping his people than basking in the formality of a council meeting.

  Aside from them, the final member of the council—or perhaps just an observer—was a man whose skin was darker than any Kole had seen, painting a stark contrast to irises that bore the burnt amber hue of overripe honey. Kole wondered if he was the exotic result of Emberfolk mixing with the Faey. Even from a distance, Kole could feel the heat radiating from the alcove in which he sat. He was an Ember, and a strong one.