The Second God

by Pauline M. Ross

  But now, his face was stern. “Well, your friends are on my doorstep, and it doesn’t look as if they’re here for a party. Are they trying to smoke me out, do you think?”

  “I have no idea what their plans are,” he said truthfully, for he’d not been privy to the discussions between Axandor and Zand when they’d settled on a strategy. Nor had I, for that matter, or Ly— No, I had to stop thinking of us as a three. For a moment, grief swamped me. Arran paused, took a breath, carried on with only the slightest wobble in his voice. “I cannot see much, since my window only overlooks the parade yard.”

  “So it does. Would you like to see them?”

  “Very much.”

  “Come along, then.”

  Outside, a dozen or so brown-clad guards fell in behind them, but Arran wasn’t bound or shackled in any way. Trimon was either very trusting, or believed his wind-powers were enough protection. They passed down long corridors, with bare stone floors and doors symmetrically placed every twenty paces. Once, they passed a group of golden soldiers, marching in step, but as one they knelt to Trimon, foreheads touching the floor. More corridors, endless corridors, and then stairs, endless stairs, up and up and up.

  “I think we are going up one of the towers,” Arran said.

  I didn’t have time to talk to him. I was racing from the camp to get to the watch post, leaping from one heathery tussock to another, missing, sliding into bogs, not caring in the slightest. If there was a chance, just the slimmest sliver of a chance that I could see Arran again, I would take it. Then I was scrambling over rocks, slithering back down into grass – no, another bog. My trousers were soaked with wet mud, but nothing mattered except to get to the hilltop in time.

  “We are at the top. Are you anywhere I might be able to see you?”

  “Can’t risk showing myself. He mustn’t guess that we can talk.”

  “Oh. Of course.” But the disappointment in him wrenched me apart. If only I dared! But I couldn’t take the chance. There was no knowing how Trimon might retaliate. But at least I could see Arran, if only for a moment. I pushed aside the guard lying, eye glued to the seeing tube and settled in front of it. Tower – which tower? Not that one. Not that one, either. Ah, there he was, his blond hair blowing free, longer than it should be. For a moment my vision blurred with tears and I lost sight of him. A few blinks, and there he was again.

  “I can see you,” I whispered.

  “Oh, sweetheart…”

  “Who are they, all these people?” Trimon said. “Are they all yours?”

  A pause, while Arran caught his breath. “The ones in brown are mine, from Bennamore. The ones in green are from the Port Holdings.”

  “And as if men weren’t bad enough, the fucking lions are back. I hate lions.”

  “The beasts are from the Clanlands.”

  “The Silent Guard revere the plains lions, did you know that? No, of course you didn’t. Well, they do. They model themselves on the lion’s strength and bravery and ferocity. Hence the golden armour. But real lions aren’t quite as disciplined as they are. They frighten me, sometimes, I can tell you. But they don’t seem to frighten your people, because here they are, not deterred by them at all. And so many of them. Is this all of them? How many more will there be? And what do they want?”

  “I cannot say. I have not been at their war meetings.”

  “You know, Arran, you play competently at jumping stones, and you’re a pleasant drinking companion, but I can’t see what other purpose you serve. You know nothing, and I can’t even amuse myself by chopping you up very slowly. Can you think of any reason why I shouldn’t just toss you over the edge right now? It’s a long way down. Maybe you’d bounce, I don’t know, but it would be fun to see, wouldn’t it?”

  “Not for me, I imagine.”

  Trimon gave a bark of laughter. “No. You see, I like you, Arran. You remind me of myself as I once was, before I got swept up in being a god. You’re a very good soldier, a brave soldier, and you don’t shiver and shake and piss yourself when I get mad at you. But you’re still a weapon in my hands, a weapon to be used against them out there. You were supposed to stop them attacking me, but that didn’t work, did it? So what am I supposed to do with you? I’m trying to think of a single reason to keep you alive, and I can’t think of one right now. Can you?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “Except that I’d tear his feeble head from his body if he harms a hair of your head,” I yelled.

  “Except that my drusse-holder would be upset about that,” he went on smoothly. “She is quite fond of me, for some reason, and when she gets upset, she gets very, very angry.”

  “I’m a fucking god,” Trimon yelled, his nose next to Arran’s. “My army is led by a god. Is yours?”

  “No.” So much regret in that one word.

  “So what can this one woman do against me, eh? I’m not afraid of a woman.”

  “She controls all those lions you hate so much,” Arran said mildly. “Also, she has the ear of all the war leaders out there. If you want to negotiate a settlement, she is the person you want on your side.”

  “Negotiate? I’m going to fight!”

  “And do you think you will win?”

  “My army is invincible!”

  “Against lions?”

  “Ha! Lions don’t like my windstorms any more than men do. You! Take him back to his room. No, I have a better idea – take him to the black cell.”

  ~~~~~

  For three suns, Trimon hurled windstorms at us. The first hit some of the larger Port Holdings’ pavilions while I was asleep one afternoon, and by the time Hethryn had run to wake me and I’d managed to take the magic out of the storm, the devastation was widespread. After that, I stayed awake during the hours of sun, but I couldn’t see every storm. I primed eagle riders to keep watch, and Kalmander alerted me a couple of times, and between us we destroyed them almost as fast as Trimon could create them. Almost, but not quite. It was surprising how much damage a gale can produce in two or three or four heartbeats.

  I was relieved to find that the magic didn’t build up in me the way it used to. Probably that was the effect of Ly’s blood in me, stabilising the way magic affected me. I no longer had the deep craving for regular infusions of magic, and now I discovered that I could keep absorbing large amounts of magic without getting giggly and needing a man in my bed.

  It was probably good for me to have so much to keep me busy just then, otherwise I might have given way totally to grief. Ly’s death was as painful as a hole in my heart, and Arran was back in his dark cell and any moment might be his last. For two suns he’d had nothing to eat or drink, but that had changed.

  “One of the guards is a bit kinder than the rest. He brings me hot food, and this morning he left an extra flask of water, and I am sure it was not an accident.”

  “Is it the same one who brought you proper food before?”

  “Yes, I think so. He never speaks, in fact, he keeps his head down and will not look me in the eye, but when I thanked him this morning, he grunted, almost as if he understood me.”

  “Well, he might have a kinder heart than the others, but he’s still the enemy, so don’t get too friendly with him.”

  Sho’s summoning was over, and the slower beasts were beginning to arrive – bears, the pig-like sukarah and the strange armour-plated and tusked rinnfarr, who might be slow but were large enough and heavy enough to trample anything that got in their way. The whole area north of Greenstone Ford was swarming with them, but Sho, with the lion guard’s help, was controlling them without difficulty. He was stretched, but he hadn’t collapsed into animal incoherence, as Ly once had. The lion guard made all the difference. Everything was now in place, but still we waited.

  “What exactly is the plan?” I asked Hethryn one evening, when Arran was asleep and couldn’t overhear. “Are we going to sit out a siege, or are we going to break down the walls?”

  He sighed. “The original idea was to break down
the walls. With Ly, we could have done that, with or without these god-powers he wanted. But Sho… I like Sho well enough, but he is so young, and we know so little of him.”

  “You don’t trust him.”

  “We all grew to trust Ly,” he said seriously. “He was one of us, a Bennamorian, and… and he loved you, Drina, everyone could see that. But this boy is an unknown quantity, and untested in battle, and his magic is weak still. So we have decided now that we will sit it out. They have wells, presumably, but unless their cellars are astonishingly full, they will not be able to feed an army that size for very long.”

  “What about our own supplies?”

  “We have the river for water, and we control the road. The bridge is under repair and then we can get wagons from Bennamore, as well as from the south. We can stay here for the whole summer if need be. Everything has been considered.”

  But this careful plan fell apart within hours. The eagles reported clouds of dust to the north – a cohort of golden soldiers marching six abreast in perfect step to relieve their compatriots. And when they scouted further afield, they found a second golden stream on its way from the river towns to the northwest. And, the worst news of all, far to the east on the open plains, a vast cloud of Vahsi heading in our direction, and moving fast.

  “We can’t fight the Vahsi as well!” I said.

  “We will have to,” Hethryn said grimly. “The bridge is not complete, so we cannot retreat that way, and if we try to escape to the south, the Vahsi will cut us off. Their horses are very fast. This will all come to a head tomorrow, and if the golden army inside the walls comes out to join in…”

  He didn’t finish the sentence, but then he didn’t need to. We had come to the final battle of the war, and it was likely to be bloody and swift.

  And then, in the midst of all the gloom and hastily revised plans, a little miracle.

  “Drina? Arran?”

  “Ly? Ly! What happened? Where are you?”

  “I am by the pool, and it worked! I know how to call on the god-powers. I can defeat this wind god and we can be happy again.”

  “Oh, Ly! You can’t get here in time – the battle will be tomorrow. You’re too late.”

  43: Battle

  The most immediate problem was to get Ly out of the dragon’s tunnels. He was alive and whole and full of power, but he couldn’t see in the dark and had no torch to light his way.

  “I will get him out of there,” Arran said. “I am used to the dark, and I have nothing else to do. You are needed elsewhere, Drina. Three tunnels round, and the correct one has marks on the wall – I can do this. It will make a change for me to be useful.”

  Sho and I sat on the hilltop near the watch post, impervious to the weather. Neither of us slept, and I don’t remember eating, either, although guards trooped back and forth with bowls of food and flasks of water for us. We were in constant communication with the lion guard and, through them, the army leaders. Somewhere on the plain to the south of us, in the sprawling city of tents and cook fires, Axandor and Zand made their final preparations for battle. To the north, the war-beast riders were organised into groups. From three sides, enemies approached us in strength, and the town of Greenstone Ford was filled with soldiers ready to die to defend their god.

  And yet my heart sang. Ly was alive! Somehow, by the grace of my gods or his, he had survived the fall into the pool, and was alive and powerful and on his way back to me. Maybe I wouldn’t live long enough to see him again, but he, at least, would survive this war. And if, by some miracle, I escaped the coming destruction, he would be with me and I wouldn’t be alone.

  Hethryn had spent all afternoon closeted with the war leaders when he made his way to the watch post with a flask of wine for me.

  He jumped and swore loudly when he saw me. “Gods, Drina, what happened to you?”

  “What? What do you mean?”

  “Your eyes are bright blue!”

  I laughed, and explained about Ly, who, it seemed, was now an elder, amongst everything else. And whatever he became, I became too. And Arran, presumably. He was unsurprised when I told him.

  “He has been in the blue pool, so I suppose he has swallowed some of the magical water. It is not unexpected.”

  “How will you account for it, if Trimon asks?”

  “I will tell him that the gods have blessed me. Which is true enough.”

  “It’s not much of a blessing being stuck in that box of a cell in the dark.”

  “The gods sent me to you, my love,” he said. “I have been your drusse for six and a half years, and what greater blessing could I ask for? Oh sweetheart, you must not cry. You must be strong now. Ly will be here soon. He is out of the tunnel, and only waiting for Diamond to arrive.”

  I didn’t ask how long it would take Ly to fly back. A ten-sun, perhaps, or a little less, since he would be travelling as fast as Diamond’s wings could carry him. It hardly mattered. Unless he could arrive tomorrow, he would be too late and the battle would be over.

  The dawn brought no good news. Both columns of the golden army were within sight from my hilltop perch, and the eagles gave me a view to the east where the Vahsi were steadily advancing. To the south, the armies of Bennamore and the Port Holdings lined up in battle order, waiting for the signal.

  And then we waited, as the inevitable moment drew nearer. How many of us would survive the next few hours? How many of my own family, even? Axandor would be in the very thick of the fighting. Hethryn was on the watch post with me, but he could still be swept up in the battle. Mother and Cal, Sallorna and Krant were with the other mages in the Bennamore camp to help with the injured. They were well away from the action for now, but it was likely the action would eventually come to them if things went badly for us. And then there was Arran, the most vulnerable of us all, despite his resistance to injury.

  Looking back, I wondered if there had been some moment when this could have been averted, when perhaps good sense might have prevailed. But I couldn’t think of one. The nearest we’d ever come to resolving the issue was when we’d talked to Trimon alone outside the town gates. If we’d known then who he was and how events would go later, we could have killed him on the spot and stopped the war in an instant. But perhaps even that wouldn’t have been enough. The golden army might have gone on an even worse rampage, who could tell?

  Still we waited. In my mind, the steady beat of Ly’s presence made me feel whole again, for the three of us were one unit, one person. When he’d been gone, there’d been a gnawing emptiness that nothing would fill. Now he was back, a part of me again. While I didn’t understand what had happened, and I felt that he didn’t either, there would be time enough to wonder at it later. For now, all I felt was a profound gratitude.

  At mid-morning, the first war-beasts were sent in to harry the advancing lines of the golden army. That was when the windstorms started again, and I was kept busy stopping them. Kalmander had disappeared, but I had several other eagles aloft, spotting the storms as soon as they started. Twice the hilltop where I stood was attacked, but I dispersed them in a heartbeat. The soldiers had learned to crouch down and cover their eyes to avoid the dust swirling about, but many of the war-beasts found the storms very trying, and some of them had to withdraw to recover. Only the rinnfarr were unaffected, and so the golden army marched on virtually unopposed.

  Then the gates of the town opened. A golden flood poured out in all directions, and battle was joined in earnest. All around the town walls, steel clashed, commanders shouted and the injured screamed, in the bloody chaos of war. And slowly but inexorably, our troops were split and pushed backwards, one group retreating towards the camp to the south, the other being forced towards the river.

  “Drina? Do you want to try something?”

  “Ly? Where are you?”

  “A long way away, still, but I should be able to funnel my power through you.”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “The lightning. That is the m
ost destructive. Hold the amber in one hand, and point at something you want to hit – one of those towers, maybe.”

  “I’ll try. There, I’m pointing.”

  There was a rush of power through me, filling me with warmth. For an instant, I felt giggly and excited, just the way I used to when I took in a lot of magic all at once. Then there was a bang and a spark, and all the power dissipated. I’d made lightning, but it was no more than the length of my hand.

  “Well, that was disappointing,” Ly said.

  “Maybe you’re too far away,” I suggested.

  “Our connection works no matter how far apart we are, so it ought to work.”

  “How about the mist?”

  “I do not see why that should work any better.”

  “Well, we won’t know unless we try it, will we?”

  “Hmm. Very well. Point again, then.”

  “Pointing.”

  The power was different this time, cooler, less strong, less abrupt, a steady flow that made me feel good but not over-energised. And there was mist. It fell from my finger like water from a spout, straight down to the ground, pooling round my feet. And it didn’t dissipate. I moved to where the ground fell away from me, and the mist flowed at a regular pace down the hill towards the river.

  “This is working, although it’s slow,” I said. “How long can you keep this up?”

  “It takes no effort, once it is underway. Is it helpful? Do you want me to continue?”

  “Yes, keep going. Let’s see what effect it has.”

  I sat cross-legged at the top of the hill as mist spilled from my hand and rolled down the hill. It was a thin stream, but steady, and after a while it began to form a large puddle at the bottom of the hill. Then, very slowly, it expanded across the river and inched its way onto the battlefield.