Dead Stars - Part One (The Emaneska Series)

by Ben Galley

  ‘Ugh,’ sighed the mage, and for the third time that hour, Farden tried to make sense of it all, splayed out in front of him like the crumpled landscape.

  For years he had been living in self-induced shadow, crouched and hidden in a fog of his own making. The road he had taken there had been swallowed up and forgotten. He had enjoyed the numbness of it. It had been dark and cold of course, but it was his. Now he could feel the fog lifting and the sunlight barging its way in. He feared it. Despised it. It was a big beaming ray of change, and what had already been burnt away could never be found again. His fog had been permanently cleared. He had cursed it, fought it, and clawed at it, but to no avail. Something had changed. The Duke was gone. The nevermar had abandoned him. Krauslung had climbed back into his thoughts. He sighed again. Like it or not, his little world had crumbled.

  Farden rubbed his grizzled chin. The mage looked up at the frayed rope dangling above him, and he remembered what he had told himself, standing knife-drawn and ready over Kint and Forluss: alive was something.

  ‘Well,’ he said, beating the wilderness to an answer. ‘Alive is something. But am I living?’ No. He was merely existing. He thought of the leper of Wodehallow, and the wise words he had spoken on the way to the keep. Of life and how a man could squander it. How the very gift of living deserved better. Gods, what was his name? Farden scrabbled to remember it, but it evaded him. He scrunched up his eyes.

  Elessi was getting married, and according to Loki, she had invited him despite everything. She deserved better than another stab of disappointment on her wedding day, he thought. They all deserved better. Traffyd and Seria. Durnus. Tyrfing. All of them. The thought of that almost made him laugh. It would have been a laugh without a trace of pleasure. He had spent countless evenings vowing exile and solitude, all the while obliterating his old life with blood and drugs. They had sent countless messengers, innumerable scouts, they had even sent a god to fetch him! But after everything, Elessi was the one who could finally do it. Farden had always harboured the secret fear that a certain female would one day haul him back to his old life. He had never expected it to be Elessi. Somebody else. He clenched a fist and shivered at the thought of her.

  Farden let another memory drift down onto his tongue. He spoke it aloud. ‘We could have buried ourselves at the bottom of the ocean and fate would still have dragged us ashore by the scruff of our necks,’ he muttered. Durnus had said that. Farden closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. Was this it? He would have nowhere to hide. Questions would be asked. Painful subjects would be raised. He would be naked, strung out on a rack under a desert sun. Was it finally time?

  ‘Shit,’ he said to the wilderness. He looked up at the rope again.

  This life had nearly killed him. It was time to find another.

  Farden put the seed in his pocket and got to his feet. He looked at the little flint cottage in the distance. He could just about make out the sandy furrows of Traffyd’s little fields. If he squinted, he could imagine a little cloud of pipe-smoke hovering over the back porch. Farden shook his head. That was not for him. He looked down at his wrists and metal hands. Farmers had no need for armour.

  With feet that moved more eagerly than he would like, Farden went down the hill and kicked open the door to his shack. He looked around at its discoloured, pilfered walls and its rusty iron nails bent into hooks. He looked at the splintered floor and the scattered mouldy straw. He looked down at the bed where Jeasin wore a face like thunder.

  ‘We’re leaving,’ he announced, in a low voice.

  ‘We?’ Jeasin echoed.

  ‘Yes, we. Us. Plural.’

  Her icy expression didn’t change. Farden didn’t blame her. ‘Where?’

  ‘We’re going to a wedding.’

  Jeasin couldn’t have looked more contemptuous. ‘A wedding? Who would dare invite you to a weddin’?’

  Farden stopped in his tracks, halfway to the back door. ‘An old friend that I once hurt very much,’ he said.

  ‘And what made you change your mind, jus’ like that?’ Jeasin snapped her fingers.

  ‘A rope and an ash tree,’ he replied with a shrug. Jeasin looked confused, but Farden couldn’t elaborate even if he’d wanted to. It was hard to put it into words. Voicing his thoughts had never been his strong point. ‘That, and she deserves better from me, after all these years. She always did. They all do,’ he said, as he dug what belongings he deemed necessary from under the mess. He almost forgot to grab his notebook.

  ‘Who’s she?’

  ‘You’ll see,’ Farden answered.

  ‘You promise? This ain’t no trick?’

  Farden looked her right in the very centre of her blue eyes. ‘I promise.’

  Jeasin crossed her arms. ‘Why should I trust you, after what you said to me?’

  ‘You don’t have to trust me. I’ll send the gryphon back for you as soon as I arrive,’ Farden called as he hopped out of the back door.

  ‘Wait!’ Jeasin felt her way out of the shack. Farden was already on the beach, saying something about Whiskers. Ilios and Loki watched with blank expressions. Jeasin stamped her foot, almost driving her heel through the wood of the doorstep. ‘You’re coming back for us? No, no! I don’t think so. Not after your little speech! This is a trick!’

  ‘I made a promise, Jeasin. This one, for bloody once, I’ll keep.’

  ‘Gods curse you if you’re lyin’, Farden. Gods curse you.’

  ‘We’ll see to that,’ Loki called from the fireside.

  A finger jabbed in his direction. ‘I’m holdin’ you responsible if he don’t, stranger. And that creature too, whatever it is.’

  ‘Gryphon,’ Farden muttered.

  Loki stood up, not bothering to hide his contented smile as he dusted off his hands. He went to stand by Ilios and watched the beast preen his feathers, ready to fly. Farden was scrambling about in the doorway, busy packing a haversack. ‘So what changed your mind?’ called the god.

  Farden glanced at him over his shoulder. The god’s face hadn’t even bruised. That nettled him. ‘You know perfectly well what did, Loki. Now shut up and climb on that gryphon,’ Farden ordered. Loki buttoned his leather coat and did as the mage had so politely instructed. He didn’t care; he had won. The smile loitering on his face said so.

  ‘You not saying goodbye to Traffyd? Seria?’ he asked.

  Farden spared a moment to bite his lip. ‘I’ll send a hawk.’

  Loki shrugged, and clambered on to the gryphon. Before Farden did the same, he knelt down and reached under a certain floorboard, feeling around for a little wooden box. His fingers soon found it, and he prised it open in the mouldy darkness. There it was. Forgotten, but not lost. Something hard and rough, wrapped in a skinny metal chain. Farden lifted the little thing from the darkness and fastened it around his neck. It was a little dragon’s scale on a necklace, an old gift from a one-eyed Siren. It glittered briefly in the sunlight before he tucked it under the collar of his dirty shirt. ‘I’m going to need all the luck I can get,’ he whispered to himself, marching back onto the beach. It was the first time he had worn it in a decade. Up until now, he hadn’t felt worthy of luck.

  Grunting and heaving, he pulled himself onto the gryphon’s back and sat down behind Loki. He looked back at his little shack. Jeasin was leaning against the wall. She was pouting, her arms firmly crossed. He shook his head. She would eat her bitter words. This was one promise he wasn’t going to break.

  Just before he turned away, a small black object emerged from the door and scurried over the pebbles and sand towards them, a little blur of feet and fur. Farden couldn’t help but cheer quietly to himself, and chide himself too, for almost forgetting. Holding tightly to a clump of Ilios’ feathers, Farden leant down and Whiskers jumped into his open gauntlet. He quickly stashed him inside his haversack and yanked hard on the straps around his shoulders.

  I’m going back, he realised, in a flash-flood of unease. I’m going back.

  Farden took a
very deep breath indeed.

  ‘Krauslung, Ilios,’ the mage called to the gryphon, biting down on his fear. He gripped Ilios’ sides with his legs, and held on tight to the ridge of feathers and fur running along his spine. The words felt very odd on his lips. He couldn’t quite figure out if he was returning home or leaving it. It would all depend on what awaited him.

  After trotting around in a circle, obviously pleased with the calibre of his passengers, Ilios spread his wings high. The breeze rustled in his pinions. He hunkered down briefly before exploding into the air like a bolt from a bow, leaving a cloud of sand in his wake. Soon they were flapping high into the blue sky, heading east to a wedding, and gods know what else.

  Chapter 19

  “Admissions Notes - Summer 852. Written Class.

  Applicant - Male. 18 years. Existing skill - High. Potential - High. Family - Everwit’s son, mage of some repute. Notes: Blacksmith’s boy. Old, for an applicant. Master Rufellish believes him to be too old, but I believe he demonstrates the exact qualities young Vice is looking for. Tenacious. Fast-learner. Not a leader, but a fighter. He will have to be tamed, however. I will put his name before the others - Tyrfing.”

  Found in the desk of Master Wust, in 877, during the trial of the Written mage Tyrfing

  As the tired gryphon’s claws scraped against the smooth marble floor of the Nest, Tyrfing and Modren took a sharp intake of breath. They couldn’t help it. Call it shock, call it sadness, call it downright relief that he was even alive, Farden was a sore sight for sore eyes. Only the gods beside them remained emotionless and still.

  Farden looked like a dead man in a stolen body.

  It was probably a mercy for Durnus that he couldn’t see the gaunt mess of a mage that slid down from the gryphon’s back. He heard the sound of boots hitting marble, and an uneasy clearing of somebody’s throat.

  Farden wasn’t sure what to do with himself, a feeling he hated immediately. He stood there like a statue of embarrassment and just scratched his sandy scalp. Scanning the faces standing before him, he was unsure of whether they were happy to see him, or angry, or upset, or just being polite. His headache pounded mockingly.

  Durnus could sense the awkwardness in his old friend. He smiled and stepped forward, one hand outstretched, and waited. After several moments, a familiar yet weary voice spoke to him through the darkness. ‘I never thought I’d see you in an Arkmage’s robe.’ Farden sounded tired.

  ‘Well at least one of us can,’ he smiled, pointing to his eyes. He could hear Farden biting his lip. Footsteps approached, and a cold metal hand embraced his. Durnus used his other hand to trace the armour up his wrist and then to his arm. He followed the contours of his knotted shoulders to his grimy neck, and then to his face, where the sharpness of the mage’s cheekbones and the rough patches of dry skin and scratches almost made him wince. The years had beaten Farden into a scarred pulp. And yet, there was a strange element to his skin that softened the blow for Durnus. Feeling a little uncomfortable, Farden closed his eyes as Durnus’ fingers probed his forehead and the corners of his face. No matter where he touched, there were no lines nor creases of age to be found. Durnus smiled and patted the mage’s armoured wrist. ‘The years have been kind to you,’ he said, with a sigh.

  ‘Kind isn’t really a word I’d use,’ muttered Farden, staring back at his old friend. Old was truly the word. Although Durnus had barely aged since they had last parted, Farden had completely forgotten what he’d looked like. It slowly crept back to him as he took in Durnus’ wispy silver hair, his pale face and thin, yet clever lips. Only his eyes had changed; their once pale hue had been wrapped in grey mist and hidden away behind blindness. A lycan’s goodbye kiss.

  Farden turned to face the others. The first two he didn’t recognise. One was a very tall man with tawny eyes. The other was a willowy woman with strange sea-green hair. The last two he did recognise, but only just.

  Fifteen years was a long time for any man. For Tyrfing, already in the latter years of his life, it was a very long time indeed. Farden felt a twinge in his chest as his eyes roved over his uncle’s face. Tyrfing’s black hair was now streaked with grey, like veins of silver running through seams of coal. The same was true of his beard. His blue eyes were beset on all sides by lines and the bruises of tiredness. Webs of wrinkles had crept into his hands and neck. They looked intent on staying. He too wore a white and gold Arkmage’s robe. Farden didn’t know which was more surprising: a pale king on the marble thrones, or a once-banished Written.

  Farden didn’t smile, but instead walked forward with his arms wide. Tyrfing met his embrace eagerly. It was quicker than he’d liked. As Tyrfing stepped back, he looked down at the armour wrapped around his nephew’s limbs and then back to his face. He could see that despite the grime and scars of his exile, he hadn’t aged a day. Tyrfing chuckled drily. ‘So, the rumours of Scalussen are true. I didn’t quite believe them until now,’ he remarked.

  Farden nodded and shrugged. He felt a strange sort of guilt then, a guilt at having the blessing of the armour. Tyrfing had gone on ageing while Farden hadn’t. Farden tried to ignore it. ‘I told you,’ he said.

  ‘You’re making the rest of us look bad,’ stated Modren. Farden turned to him and weakly tried to match his smile. Modren looked good. The mage had grown out his white-blonde hair, and even sprouted a matching goatee. He positively glittered in his suit of silver armour. He had a black and green cape fastened to his shoulders. It wavered and crackled in the wind.

  Farden scratched his head again. ‘Looks like I have a lot to catch up on,’ he mumbled. ‘Undermage.’

  ‘All in good time, Farden,’ said Modren, reaching for his gauntleted hand with his own. Farden hesitated, but Modren had already seized him in a tight, friendly grip. Underneath their armour, only one set of keys glowed. Modren could feel the lack of magick in his friend. His smile faded at the corners, but he held his tongue. ‘All in good time.’

  ‘Well!’ Durnus clapped his hands to shatter the mood. ‘This is all a bit too serious, isn’t it? Not to my liking. We should be celebrating your return, Farden. This feels more like a funeral.’

  ‘Well that would be fitting, considering,’ said a dry voice from behind the Arkmage. They turned around to see Loki leaning against one of the marble trees. His arms were crossed, and his face impassive. Farden glared at him. He had hoped that his punch had knocked some silence into the god, but his ability to annoy persisted.

  Farden held up his hands to his uncle and old friends. ‘No celebrations, please. I wouldn’t be able…’ he trailed off, his tongue dry. ‘I can’t explain… I don’t…’

  ‘We understand,’ said Tyrfing. Farden nodded. He was probably the only one who did.

  ‘What would you like?’ asked Modren.

  Farden rubbed his wind-numbed face. It took him a moment to decide. He looked down at his drab, ripped, and sandy clothing and shrugged. ‘A decent cloak. One with a hood,’ he muttered through cracked lips. ‘And a bath.’

  The others couldn’t help but chuckle. Farden, whatever little of him remained, had finally returned.

  The bath, it turned out, was too long in coming. Farden paced about the room like a caged sabre-cat, not sure whether to sit, stand, or slump. As he sauntered past the tall window, he stared out at the city for the hundredth time. He had insisted on a room in the lower level of the Arkathedral, away from the prying eyes of the magick council, away from the hustle, the bustle. His humble room stared right out into a forest of lofty chimney pots. Some shone in their virgin placements. Soot and moss slicked the rest.

  Farden looked out and scratched his beard. What was he waiting for, besides the bath? For it all to sink in? Or for the dream to subside and fall out from under him? He was waiting mainly for his headache to disappear, but he knew it would be pestering him for a while yet. The nevermar was still having its way with him. Was he waiting to feel better, or to feel worse? He was waiting to feel something, that was for sure. Something that n
udged the needle, to tell him whether he had made a mistake or not. Whatever it was, it was taking its sweet merry time about it.

  Farden had never been one for waiting.

  Looking out on his long-forgotten city, Farden decided he would wait no longer. The city’s innards were calling to him, and the urge to melt into them grew unbearable. The bath could wait.

  Farden turned on his heel and wrestled his way into the new clothes that had been draped over the corner of his borrowed bed. They felt soft, and that softness was a foreign quality that made him wary.

  ‘Little steps,’ Farden said aloud. He shimmied out of his armour and laid it aside, then shrugged off his torn crimson cloak and his road-ragged shirt. The trousers fell in a heap next to them. Moving quickly to ignore the bruises and scars, he put on the new clothes and made for the door.

  Half an hour later and he was standing on the cobbles of a city he barely recognised. The nevermar wasn’t to blame for that. Fifteen years was a lifetime for a city as well as a man, especially for one he had left in a state of corpsehood and destruction.

  Farden hoisted up his hood like a shield and struck out for Krauslung’s very centre. He took his steps slowly; partly to take it in, partly for the sake of his aching legs. The day was cool. The sun warm. The city was in the busy throes of a dying market day.

  Krauslung was a honeycombed madness. Its alleys and curving streets seemed narrower and deeper than he remembered. He felt as if he were an ant in a canyon of doors, gutters, awnings, and criss-cross windowpanes. Farden didn’t really mind. Here he could disappear in plain sight. He remembered liking this. It had been his first and favourite hobby in his younger days.

  As he stumbled into the first of the countless market squares, Farden also encountered his first preacher.

  At the corner of two alleyways, a man stood tall on a little wooden stage. He was all forehead and nose. A confident man, burly, with a sense of a brawler about him. His hair had been dyed a purple-red, like an angry bruise. There was a Siren tattoo on his cheek, and cheaply done at that. He was being heckled between sentences by passersby, sentences that he delivered in a deliberate drawl, as of speaking to an audience of morons. ‘Thron,’ he droned. ‘Is a god above gods!’