Children of Sun and Moon

by Matt Larkin

  He shook his head in a daze for a moment, then spat blood on the floor. “Oh, he was a madman, wasn’t he?”

  “And Revati!” Chandi leapt onto the bed and pulled him to his feet by his baju. “Was she mad?”

  Naresh looked away. “I didn’t know he would take her.”

  “Didn’t know? But you knew he would murder Rahu? Knew he would destroy our chance for peace? Destroy my family?” She pushed him off the bed and onto the floor.

  A grunt escaped him as he landed. He rose to his feet before answering. “Don’t trust Rahu. Isn’t that what you told me? You knew he was a lunatic and still followed him. So really, whose fault is it?”

  “How dare you! How dare you imply we are to blame for this?” She jumped off the bed and flipped over behind him. Her fist caught him in the jaw as he turned toward her, sending him crashing to his knees. “I loved you! You betrayed us!”

  She swung again as he rose, but he ducked her blow and caught her in the ribs with one of his own. He might not have her supernatural strength, but he was damn strong. “Stop it,” he said, his eyes glowing with the Sun Brand. “You act like a spoiled child.”

  Chandi panted, backing away to catch her breath. Ignoring the pain in her ribs, she drew her Blessings even harder. She pulled her toyaks from the back of her kemban and held them before her in a fighting stance. “Am I a child, now, Naresh? But I’ve finally learned the lessons you tried to teach me about duty.”

  She advanced on him. He stepped to the side as she leapt into the air. She shifted her gravity onto the nearest bedpost. Standing on the post, she lunged with one toyak. Naresh vanished, appearing the same instant across the room, near his keris.

  Chandi craned her arm around the bedpost and spun around it, then placed both feet on the post and ran up it. With a backflip off the bedpost she landed beside Naresh, even as he vanished again.

  Again and again he vanished as she attacked and forced her to dodge and evade, bending backwards and launching herself onto walls. Then she twisted, snapping her fist backward as he vanished. It connected with his face as he reappeared behind her. She swirled to face him again as he staggered back to the wall.

  He wiped blood from his lip. “So be it, Chandi.”

  “How long does that Sun Brand last?” She swung again, and struck the wall.

  She couldn’t turn fast enough to keep his blade from tearing a shallow gash in her back. Another betrayal from a man she so wanted to trust.

  “Long enough.”

  She launched a flurry of attacks, but he was as fast as she was, maybe faster. He Sun Strode from side to side and behind.

  He appeared behind her and got a hand on her shoulder. And then her world spun as she appeared near the ceiling of the room. They were falling, but she kicked at him, shifting her gravity toward him the moment she connected. She landed in a roll and dodged his incoming attack as he appeared beside her.

  He leapt over her counterstrike and pinned her toyak against the floor with his sword. With one hand on the floor she kicked low, sweeping Naresh’s feet from under him. Using the momentum, she bounded to her own feet. Naresh was falling when he vanished, appearing near the ceiling. After a mid-air twist he fell fist-first toward her.

  With a handspring Chandi leapt out of his range. She jumped to another bedpost. Her toyak caught him in the shoulder as he tried to appear behind her again. The sword slipped from his grasp and skittered along the floor, kicking up sparks.

  Chandi feinted toward him then flipped in midair toward the sword. As expected, he appeared on top of it and her stick struck him between the shoulder blades. Her kick caught him in the ribs as he dropped, hurtling him against the wall. Naresh landed hard.

  Nothing could stop her. Not even the Arun Guard.

  Naresh lay motionless, helpless. She advanced, toyak raised. Then she stopped.

  Was this what it felt like to become a lunatic? Had she used too much of the Blessings? Is this how Rahu had felt, looking down at her father?

  Violent shudders ran through her body. She released her Blessings. Her soul cried out in agony, demanding she redraw them all. Her stomach felt full of acid and her heart beat out of control.

  With a whimper she fell to her knees beside him. What had she done? Worse than Rahu. Had she killed the man she loved? His chest rose and fell. Slowly. She had to do the best thing she could for him. She ran.

  (1194 AP)

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  The pillars came into view as Malin crested the top of the path leading up to the Astral Temple. Below the path were the sprawling beaches known as Astral Shore. Three years would have washed away the blood, but Malin did not look at them.

  Instead, he continued up the path to the Temple. Not long ago he had helped tear down the wooden gate the Solars had built into the white granite wall. Now a pair of Macan Gadungan worked to repair it. Ketu wouldn’t trust ordinary slaves near the Astral Temple, not even for menial work.

  The Stranger—Kala, he called himself—followed some distance behind him, Revati in his arms. Malin had asked why he took the girl.

  “Cataclysm approaches these Isles, and Kakudmi would have his daughter far from it,” Kala answered. The child didn’t seem afraid of Kala. The two had spent most of the trip below decks in the hold.

  Ratna would be livid over the loss of her daughter, and Malin doubted Chandi would take it well either. But he had picked his allies, and it was too late to seek new ones now.

  “Wait here,” Malin said to Kala, as he approached the weretigers. Many of the Macan Gadungan remained camped on the mountainside outside the crenelated temple wall. Making camp on the beach would have been easier, but Malin could not bear to make camp on Astral Shore. None of the Macan Gadungan who had seen that battle would want to return there.

  Many of the weretigers waved at him, some even rushed over to greet him. He embraced one he had seen grow from a babe into a young man. Malin could smell tension on the boy, so he met the boy’s eyes and squeezed his shoulder in reassurance. “We will be ready.” Most of them were nervous, of course, though the older ones hid it better. He gave the Macan Gadungan the same instructions as the crew—never to reveal that the Stranger or Revati had come here.

  Malin left the camp and headed toward the temple, waving Kala on behind him. The guards at the gates bowed as he approached. Even after all they had done to reclaim the temple, Ketu still demanded the Macan Gadungan remain outside. Only his precious Moon Scions dwelt within the temple, but they would not try to stop Malin himself from entering. They would not dare.

  The Moon Scions inside watched him with wary eyes, however. And well they should. Malin bared his teeth at one who drew too near, in what he would have claimed, had he been asked, was a smile. The man scurried away and Malin headed on toward the eleven pillars at the heart of the temple.

  Malin took little interest in ancient history or theology, but he had been curious to learn that the script covering the pillars was not a single language, but rather that each represented the words of a different deity. Moon Scions gathered around one in particular, on the north side, jotting notes and conversing. Chandra’s pillar, then.

  Kala had told him to travel beneath the surface of the temple. “It’s where Rahu came from. And where I followed from. You see this place as a relic of the gods, but it is also a gateway. I will take Revati through, and you will not see either of us again soon.”

  Ketu would be down there, too, of course.

  Amidst the pillars the makers of this place had carved two hemispherical bowls into the ground, each lined with an unknown metal and carved with astral coordinates. Malin slipped into one and slid down to its center, nearly ten feet below. Kala already crouched at the bottom of the bowl, Revati in his arms. Malin hadn’t been sure if his distraction with the priests would give Kala enough time, but it appeared to have worked, and someone would have to stand on the edge of the bowl to see the foreigner now.

  The bowls were constructed of many sheets
of metal aligned to appear almost seamless, but Ketu had discovered a secret years ago. Malin turned in place, searching for the correct sheet, then knelt and pressed down hard until the sheet gave way, pushing it down a handbreadth. He twisted the sheet under the adjacent one to the right, creating an opening in the bowl and revealing a hidden ladder carved into the rock wall.

  As far as he knew, Malin was the only non-Moon Scion to know of this place. Kala claimed he wasn’t a Moon Scion, that his abilities came from another land, another source. Perhaps that explained Rahu as well.

  From the top of the ladder Malin gazed into a fathomless pit. Even his eyes, well suited to dim light, could not see the bottom. With a sigh he mounted the ladder and began the long climb down. “Keep going down after I dismount,” he whispered to Kala. Odd to think he’d never see the man again. No—best the foreigner be gone. And Rangda take him if anything happened to Revati.

  As he climbed lower Malin could see torchlight on the level below. He stepped off the ladder and found Ketu studying the underground pillars. They were the same pillars that rose above ground, but here the scripts changed. They extended even to the lowest level, and there the scripts changed again. Thirty-three different languages, and despite the claims of the priests, no one knew where they came from.

  Ketu sat, legs folded, studying what would have been Chandra’s pillar above, making notes in a book. At a glance, it didn’t look like he had made much progress. He paid little attention as Malin neared.

  “Ketu, I bring news from Kasusthali.”

  Ketu did not look away from the pillar. “I told you to remain there and watch Rahu.”

  Malin knelt beside Ketu. “Rahu is dead. Murdered by the Stranger.”

  Ketu set the book down, then turned to look at Malin. “You are certain?” When Malin nodded, Ketu rose and ran his hands over the pillar, as though he might translate it by touch. “So they have betrayed us as we knew they would.”

  “Rahu was a lunatic. The Stranger did us a favor.”

  Ketu shot him a glance over his shoulder, then beckoned Malin to follow him toward the ladder. Malin saw no sign of Kala. Chandra help them both if Ketu spotted the man. The priest stopped and handed Malin a torch, then began to climb down to the lowest level, his pace awkward with one hand. Even Malin found climbing with a torch in one hand difficult.

  “My brother…” Ketu paused, as if uncertain whether to continue the ruse. But his claim to the War King’s throne would be stronger if everyone believed he were Rahu’s brother. “Rahu was a lunatic, yes. But the Solars are still responsible for his death. Their favor must be repaid in kind. And we will have work ahead. I must prove to the Lunars my worthiness.” Ketu stepped off the ladder onto another stone level.

  Malin had never seen the lowest level, though he had heard of it. As expected, the pillars continued here as well. The rest was less expected. Metal doors led into side chambers, strange circular knobs and levers lined the walls, and blue crystals stood out in the center of the room. Never had anyone but Rahu and Ketu and their most trusted Moon Scions been allowed down here. If Kala told him the truth, he and Rahu had come from one of those rooms. Rangda alone knew how an empty room could send one anywhere.

  “Do you know where we are, Malin?”

  Malin shook his head, and turned about, trying to take in the strange room.

  “The gods built this place,” Ketu said. “Above, we can study the heavens. Below, we can control them. They entrusted us with the Pact, a pact of guardianship. But the Solars broke the Pact, and now this place is ours.”

  Malin paced the room. Light came from under one of the doors. Light and a faint scent, the same milky scent he had smelled on Chandi. The Amrita, precious secret of the Moon Scions. The lie that had separated them from other Lunars for centuries. It took all he had to force himself to keep walking. If he gave away what he knew, if Ketu saw it, he would not leave here alive, and his knowledge would never benefit his people.

  Ketu continued unabated. “This place holds the power of the gods, Malin. And now we will turn that power against the Solars.”

  Malin started to growl, but caught himself. “How will a ruined observatory help us in war?”

  Ketu turned from the strange devices and approached Malin. “You have not been listening, tiger. Take the Macan Gadungan, those that are here, and prepare to assault the Solar villages around this island. You’ll know when the moment is right. The power of Chandra will be on your side.”

  Malin nodded. When this was over, one day he would lead his people down here for the Amrita. Then the power of Chandra would indeed be on their side.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  A Warak Ngendog reared up on its hind legs. The ground trembled as it landed, crushing helpless Lunar soldiers beneath it. Its tail smashed through a trio of warriors even as it bit another in half. From the rail of his ship Naresh could see the Deputy Minister of War had the beach engagement well in hand. Still the screams of battle and the clang of steel reached him.

  The Lunars had begun to surround the Warak Ngendog, concerting their efforts. A Sun Stride brought him into their midst. The Lunars might have expected an easy victory at this Solar river village. He intended to disabuse them of the notion they could attack villages without consequence. Two Lunars had died before they realized Naresh was among them.

  He waded among the remaining Lunar soldiers, dispatching them without mercy. If he had stopped the Stranger, maybe none of this would have happened. Maybe he could have prevented war. Maybe he could have found a place with Chandi.

  Another Lunar fell beneath Naresh’s blade. A dozen paces away a Lunar bludgeoned a Solar to death. Naresh Sun Strode behind the Lunar and cut him down.

  Soon, the fighting dwindled. Between the Warak Ngendog and the Arun Guard, the Lunars could not win. The Deputy Minister of War picked his way around the carnage toward Naresh. “The beach is ours, Guardsman.”

  “The village?”

  “They killed many of the people before we got here, razed many buildings. It’ll take the villagers months to repair all the damage. The Lunars didn’t want the village, they wanted to cut off our food supplies. They’re attacking other villages as we speak. We captured a few prisoners, but I doubt we’ll get much out of them.”

  “We’ll deal with the other villages when we’re finished here,” Naresh said, rubbing his face. “I want the survivors evacuated to Kasusthali. Prisoners too.”

  The Deputy Minister nodded. The man commanded the troops, but he would defer to Naresh in most other matters. Not just because of the Sun Brand. Everyone on the battlefield looked to the Arun Guard as leaders, protectors, champions. Naresh wasn’t sure he wanted or deserved the role anymore.

  He walked back to the edge of the water and knelt in the sand. The incoming tide washed over his knees. Though blood stained the beach and the river red, the seawater remained crystal blue. Naresh glanced back at the carnage behind him, unable to reconcile what he had just done with the pure sea before him. He cupped his hands and splashed water over his face. His muscles ached and the bruises Chandi had given him hadn’t even begun to fade.

  He forced himself back to his feet and picked his way through the soldiers, both living and dead, trying not to gag at the stench of death. Those who lived would need to see him strong now, however he felt. A groan escaped a body on the ground. Naresh knelt beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Look at me,” he said. “Look at me.” The man’s eyes fluttered open. “Medic!”

  The man lifted his hand and Naresh grasped it. Terror blanketed the fallen soldier’s face.

  “It’s all right, you’ll be all right.”

  The man tried to speak, but it came out as a groan. His eyes grew wider and he lifted his other trembling hand to point at something beyond Naresh. When he turned, Naresh saw the medic running toward them. Other men stood as if in awe. Staring at the sky. At the sun. The edge of a shadow had fallen across the sun, a growing sliver of darkness. A chill ran through Nare
sh and his breath caught in his throat. Not possible.

  An eclipse.

  Solar astrologers predicted such events years in advance. They would have known.

  A roar erupted from the rainforest beyond the village. And another, and another. A chorus of nightmares.

  They didn’t have time to retreat to the ships. The Deputy Minister had seen it, moved to call the troops back into their battalions. One of those battalions he had sent to the rainforest to hunt for stragglers.

  Naresh ran from the beach to the top of the nearest hill. From there he could see that scouting battalion, falling back in confusion, in fear. They had no Arun Guardsmen with them, no one to protect them from the horrors descending upon them.

  The edge of the rainforest was a wall of green.

  At first a single tiger emerged. Tigers followed on either side. The animals waited, watched as the Solar battalion tried to order itself back into fighting companies.

  And then the tigers charged. The Macan Gadungan poured from the rainforest, an army of beasts. They shouldn’t have been able to assume animal forms, the Guard couldn’t have prepared for this. The moon passing before the sun would give the weretigers a few moments as tigers. Naresh could see they would break through the Solar battalion and reach the beach in those few moments.

  The last rays of sunlight winked out behind the shadow of the moon. They hadn’t known, hadn’t prepared. It was madness to think the Lunars could create an eclipse.

  Naresh pulled back his baju to check the sunburst tattoo. Already it had lost much of its luster, faded to a lifeless gold. He should have saved the energy. Shouldn’t have been so free in using it to slaughter Lunar soldiers when the battle was already won. Few of the Arun Guard would have full stores of energy now. They could recharge with a phase in sunlight, but with the sun hidden behind the moon they were lost. As Naresh slid the keris from its sheath once again, he prayed the eclipse would not last long.