Ashes of a Black Frost

by Chris Evans

  “Whoever’s up here in the fort . . .” Feylan said, his voice trailing off.

  “Exactly,” Konowa said, letting go of the soldier’s collar and patting him on the shoulder. “We’re relatively safe in here as long as we don’t do anything stupid. Even if the rakkes do climb up the hill they’ll have a devil of a time trying to get in. This fort isn’t much, but it’s on top of a chunk of steep rock, and that counts for a lot.” He put his hand on Feylan’s shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze. “Sometimes, lad, the smartest thing you can do is nothing at all.”

  “But . . . you mean we just sit here and watch?”

  Konowa pointed toward the desert floor. Black frost etched jagged lines in front of the oncoming rakkes. Icy flames rose from the ground then guttered out. In their place stood the shades of the regiment’s dead. The deathly remains of Regimental Sergeant Major Lorian sat astride the great, black warhorse Zwindarra. Konowa shivered in spite of himself. “We let the Darkly Departed do what they do best.”

  Lorian charged, leaning forward over Zwindarra’s thick neck. The horse glided more than galloped across the snow and smashed into three rakkes. Blurred images of slashing hooves and Lorian’s ghostly saber flashed among the rakkes and blood splattered the snow in great swathes.

  The other shades followed suit, cutting through the rakkes with a fierce abandon Konowa couldn’t remember seeing before. Something, or someone, had definitely fired them up.

  “Major, a word?”

  Konowa turned. Pimmer stood behind him with his pistol in one hand and a brown leather wrapped telescope in the other. The Birsooni map was folded and tucked in the front of his belt and his small brass storm lantern now hung from a loop of heavy twine around his right shoulder. In his layers of Hasshugeb robes the diplomat looked like a desert warrior ready for anything.

  “You were right,” Pimmer said.

  “About?” Konowa asked. He really didn’t have time for this, but hearing “you were right” granted the man a little leeway. It wasn’t often Konowa heard those three magic words.

  “The map. It turns out that notation does mean tunnel. I think you’d better look.” He handed Konowa the telescope and pointed to the ladder leading up to the southern walkway.

  “That’s good to know, but exploring it will have to wait at the moment,” Konowa said, turning back to watch the unfolding battle on the desert floor below. At first he thought a fog had rolled in, but realized it was the freezing mist of spilled blood. His stomach heaved. The black vortex continued to move forward, but as of yet had made no obvious signs of joining the fray. That worried Konowa. A hand on Konowa’s arm spun him around to face a stern-looking Viceroy. “I’m afraid I didn’t make myself clear. I know it’s a tunnel because people are emerging from it as we speak.”

  Konowa grabbed the telescope from Pimmer’s hand and tore across the courtyard. “Keep a close watch on that twisted Emissary, but don’t do anything. I’ll be back!” he shouted over his shoulder. He skidded to a stop at the foot of the ladder and leaped, barely touching the rungs as he vaulted up the ladder and landed on the wood plank walkway attached to the wall. It shook alarmingly, but he barely noticed as he ran across it to where Private Meswiz stood clinging to the top of the wall. He pointed down toward the desert.

  “They started popping up like rabbits by that pile of rocks. At first I thought I was seeing things, but they’re there all right.”

  Konowa peered into the night. “Are you sure? Maybe it was just rakkes roaming around. I can barely see anything.”

  “I know I saw people with muskets, sir, at least, I’m pretty sure that’s what they were.”

  Konowa pulled the telescope open to its full length and sighted it where the soldier was pointing. Everything was black.

  “What’s wrong with this thing?”

  “The lens cover . . .” Private Meswiz said.

  “Damn it,” Konowa muttered, ripping the cover off and re-sighting the telescope. He struggled to find the spot again. “I don’t see . . . wait, there are figures there.” Something about that one looks familiar . . . He moved the larger tube to bring the image into focus.

  He lowered the telescope.

  Kritton.

  Do you see? This is what that fool Konowa has brought down upon us all!” Kritton said, throwing his hands around to encompass the snow-covered desert. He glared at Visyna. There was a certainty of purpose in his eyes that would brook no dispute. In someone else it might have been viewed as fierce determination, but Visyna knew this was something different, something lethal.

  He’s losing control, she realized. It was only a matter of time before he tried to kill them all.

  Kritton continued to rage, all the while flailing his arms around. His uniform hung in tatters from his lean frame. His hair was unkempt and his caerna was little more than a rag.

  She lowered her head and turned away, partly to avoid antagonizing him further, but also to protect her face from the wind-whipped snow buffeting her. After the warm confines of the tunnel, she was finding it difficult to catch her breath in the cold. None of them were dressed for this weather, and all of them were tired, hungry, thirsty, and nursing wounds. They wouldn’t last more than an hour or two in these conditions.

  She waited, bringing her hands in tight to her chest to warm her fingers in case she had to begin weaving. Kritton cursed and walked away, shouting orders to the elves to keep their muskets pointed at the prisoners. Visyna searched their faces, looking for a sign of compassion, of regret, or even shame, but all she saw were masks of indifference. The look in their eyes was as cold as the steel of their bayonets. Visyna had no doubt in her mind they would kill all of them without hesitation.

  Hrem appeared beside her a moment later. “I think I was right. There’s a fort just ahead of us on those rocks. That has to be Suhundam’s Hill.”

  Visyna squinted into the wind. What at first she took to be more darkness resolved itself into the outline of a jagged collection of rocks topped off with a squat, square box. “We need to act before we get inside there. Kritton is coming apart.”

  “Elves could die,” Hrem said, his gaze still fixed on the fort.

  “They made their choice. It’s time we made ours,” she said, echoing his words from earlier. She tested the air around her. Now that she knew what to look for her fingers easily found the elves’ threads in the storm. She gasped when her touch found one more surrounded by a cold, black power. Could it be? “I think Konowa is here,” she whispered, looking up at the fort.

  “That means the regiment is here, too,” Hrem said, glancing around them before looking back to the top of the wall. “I thought I saw movement up there, but I figured it was just the wind. If the regiment is already inside the fort then Kritton is going to walk himself right into a trap. All we have to do is stay calm and let it happen.”

  Visyna couldn’t believe their luck. Would it really be this easy? Kritton barked more orders and the elves and their prisoners began to move. In this weather it would be easy for one of the soldiers to slip away into the night unseen, but where would they run? With no shelter from the storm they would freeze to death out here. She looked at the huddled group of soldiers and realized none of them would be running anywhere. Zwitty, Scolly, and Inkermon were keeping each other upright in a swaying, stumbling fashion. Chayii walked with one hand firmly gripping Jir’s mane. The elf stopped and started to swoon, then caught herself and stood up straight.

  “Hrem, I must help Chayii. If she collapses, her hold on Jir will, too, and he’ll attack. Keep the others together.”

  Hrem nodded and slid over to steady the trio while Visyna matched her pace with Chayii and casually slipped her arm around her waist. The elf was shaking.

  “You must keep your hands free to weave, my child,” Chayii said, turning to look at her. Chayii’s face was gray and her lips were turning blue.

  “You’re turning to ice,” Visyna said, gripping the elf more tightly and hoping to get some warmth int
o her.

  “Jir is becoming increasingly difficult to hold, and the weather is not helping. I don’t think I can make it to the fort.”

  No. Visyna looked around to make sure no elves were close. “I think I felt Konowa up there. I’m certain I sensed him. We just have to make it inside and we’ll be fine. Everything will be fine.”

  “My son is there?”

  Visyna squeezed her waist. “You just have to hold on a bit longer.”

  At these words Chayii stood up a little straighter. Jir looked up at them and purred, his ears pointing straight up and his muzzle to the wind, sniffing the air. Could he sense Konowa, too, she wondered? A moment later the bengar’s purr turned into a snarl.

  Visyna took her hand from Chayii’s waist and sought out the threads again. There were more, hundreds more.

  “Rakkes!”

  “Where?” Chayii asked, coming to a halt. The elves around them heard her shout and stopped, too. Kritton was there in a flash, eyes boring in on her.

  “I warned you, witch,” he said, raising the butt of his musket in preparation to strike her.

  Before it could fall, the shrieking cry of a rakke sounded off in the distance. It was answered at once by dozens more. The sound grew to a fury far outstripping the storm. Kritton lowered his musket.

  “Back to the tunnel. We need to go back there, now!”

  “It’s too late for that,” Hrem said, walking up to place himself between the elf and Visyna. “Didn’t you hear those things? They’re behind us, too. Our only chance now is to make it to the fort. The rakkes will never get us in there.”

  Mention of the fort snapped Kritton’s head around to look at the rocky hill. Visyna noticed the elves were watching the storm now and paying no attention to the rest of them.

  One of the elves said something to Kritton in elvish and pointed toward the fort, but Kritton shook his head. “The plan was to meet at the foot of the path leading up to the main gate. The dwarf Griz Jahrfel will be there.”

  “Kritton, if Griz Jahrfel is anywhere around here, he and the rest of his band of thieves are probably rakke meat by now,” Hrem said. “Listen to them. We have to get to the fort.”

  Kritton raised his musket as if to fire. “You forget who’s in charge here! We will not go back in that fort!” Kritton shouted.

  By now all the elves had formed a small square facing outward. This was exactly the chance Visyna had been looking for, but now that there were rakkes nearby she wasn’t certain if she should take it. She believed in her heart that Konowa was in that fort, and wanted nothing more than for him to charge out with the regiment to save them, but she already knew that was impossible. A regiment can’t move that fast, and it would be suicide to bring them out of the security of the fort.

  She made up her mind.

  While Hrem and Kritton continued to argue she moved over to stand in front of Zwitty, Scolly, and Inkermon. She turned to them as if offering them aid.

  “Tell me if Kritton comes this way,” she said.

  “What are you up to?” Zwitty asked, his weaselly face a scowl of suspicion.

  “Saving your lives,” she said.

  Ignoring the threads of life around her, Visyna focused instead on the weather. She closed her eyes and focused her attention skyward, picking out a single snowflake fluttering in the air several hundred feet up. Using it as her focal point, she began to draw more flakes to it, hoping to create a microstorm that would blind Kritton and the elves long enough to cover their escape.

  Instead of massing together into a billowing pile, however, the flakes melted and froze together, forming a spinning chunk of ice. She grimaced, feeling the sting of the Shadow Monarch’s taint in the storm. Her dexterity was hampered by the pain. The more she wove the larger the ice grew. It was already man-sized and growing faster as it fell. The horror of what she had set in motion dawned on her. This wasn’t going to be a blinding storm, it was a single chunk of solid metallic ice.

  She saw Kritton’s life force clearly in the storm. It was bound in the Shadow Monarch’s oath and pulsing with a black energy. It troubled her that it was so similar to that of Konowa’s, but unlike Konowa, she knew Kritton wasn’t going to change. There was more than just the oath staining Kritton’s energy. His rage and his need for revenge was consuming him, making him as toxic as the rakkes around them.

  Visyna turned and opened her eyes. Kritton was still yelling at Hrem, but he paused in mid-sentence and looked at her. He saw her hands and his eyes grew wide.

  He knows.

  Kritton began to bring his musket up to his shoulder again. He was going to fire. Time stood still. Visyna knew what she had to do, but unlike the beetle in the tunnel, this would be no accident. She lowered her hands, removing the last of her hold on the falling ice. It occurred to her then she had the power in her to divert the ice so that it wouldn’t fall directly on Kritton, but she didn’t. A part of her was screaming that this was wrong, and that there would truly be no turning back, but her survival and that of the group meant more.

  She made a choice.

  There was a rush of air, a blur, and then a spray of red mist as the ice slammed into Kritton’s skull. The ice didn’t shatter then, but carried on to pulverize Kritton’s body into a four-foot-deep crater in the frozen desert floor.

  Visyna cried out. The violence of Kritton’s death shocked her. Blood, snow, and ice exploded in every direction. A chunk of ice struck Visyna in the stomach, knocking her backward into the three soldiers, sending all four of them tumbling to the snow.

  Visyna gasped for breath, her arms and legs twitching as she tried to regain control of her senses. A hand appeared out of the dark. She reached for it, yelping as the frost fire singed her bare flesh. Hrem hauled her upright then quickly let go. Scolly, Zwitty, and Inkermon staggered to their feet. Jir padded into view with Chayii still gripping his mane.

  “That was one hell of an ace you had tucked up your sleeve,” Hrem said. There was a fierce grin of satisfaction on his face that Visyna couldn’t share. He held up his other hand. Yimt’s drukar was clenched in his fist. Did he want to give it to her as a war prize? She’d just murdered another living being. She knew she had done it for all the right reasons, but it still didn’t change the fact of what she had done. She shook her head and turned away.

  A musket fired. Everyone ducked, but the shot had been aimed away from them. Rakkes yowled. A rock sailed overhead. The elves were all turned to face outward. More muskets fired.

  “The rakkes are closing in,” Hrem shouted. “We have to try for the fort. Can you do more of that weather stuff?”

  Visyna was still reeling. It wasn’t remorse, but more shock that she had deliberately taken another life. She tried to probe her feelings further, wanting to feel something beyond disbelief, but her mind was too full of images of blood-splattered ice and the horrible sound of crunching bone. She knew it would stay with her the rest of her life.

  “Not like that, but I should be able to keep us partially hidden in the storm.” She suddenly felt the need to explain herself. “I can’t kill them all, Hrem. I did what I had to do to stop Kritton, but I can’t take the lives of all these elves. Even if I had the power I don’t think I could do it.”

  “You won’t have to,” Hrem said, looking away.

  Visyna followed his gaze. The elves were disappearing into the snow, firing their muskets as they went.

  “Are they running away?” she asked.

  “Don’t know and don’t care,” Hrem said. “After what you did to Kritton, they probably figure they’re safer with the rakkes. If anything, they should prove a nice distraction for us. We’re a lot smaller group. We have a better chance of remaining undetected.”

  A volley of musket fire made further conversation impossible. Visyna ducked again. Rakkes screamed in pain from somewhere close.

  “You’re risking our lives,” Zwitty said, pointing a finger at Hrem. “You really think one of these elves won’t put a musket ball in our
back as a parting gift? They were ready to end every last one of us down in that tunnel. We set out toward the fort on our own and they might just fire a volley at us.”

  “Would you rather stay here and wait for the rakkes?” Hrem asked.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Scolly said, looking at Zwitty. “Those rakkes are terrible.”

  Zwitty looked at Scolly, opened his mouth and then closed it in a frown. He lowered his hand. “No one wants to meet up with those damn rakkes, I’m just saying it’s our lives if you’re wrong, Hrem.”

  “It’s our lives regardless,” Visyna added, marshaling her energy. “We have to get to the fort, it’s the only chance we have. I should be able to weave a small storm within the storm that will keep us hidden.”

  “Can you control it?” Zwitty asked. The concern in his voice was obvious. They had all seen Kritton’s death. Cannon balls weren’t that destructive.

  Visyna knew her cheeks were burning. She hadn’t meant to create a massive chunk of ice, but in the end it saved them. She saved them. “I won’t be focusing my energy above us, only around us. You’ll all be fine, just don’t touch me, and don’t stray outside the area I protect.”

  “And if we did?” Zwitty asked.

  Visyna said nothing, simply looking over at the crater where Kritton had been standing.

  The musket fire lessened. Visyna could still see a few of the elves through the snow, but it was as if her group no longer existed. Now that Kritton was dead, maybe his toxic concepts of honor and revenge would no longer sway the elves. She wanted to believe that was true, but she had already made up her mind she wasn’t going to stay here to find out.

  She noticed Chayii still holding on to Jir and walked over to them. “Konowa must know we’re here. We just have to make it to the walls and we’ll be safe.”

  “You have a lot of faith in my son,” Chayii said. It was a statement. Visyna detected no sarcasm.

  “I do, but I also have a lot of faith in myself, and in you and Jir and the rest of the squad, even Zwitty.”