by Luke Scull
An oppressive silence fell over the room. Saverian’s jaw was clenched, his face unreadable. Melissan held Isaac close, whispering something in his ear. The other fehd looked anxious or afraid.
The Halfmage focused on the ghostly panorama of the Demonfire Hills. The world seemed to hold its breath, every second bursting with unspeakable tension. Melissan let go of Isaac and he turned away from her, a single tear rolling down his cheek.
The image of the Demonfire Hills suddenly flickered and died. From somewhere far, far away, there came the sound of an unimaginably large explosion. The room shook as the Obelisk swayed alarmingly.
Then the heat hit them.
Promises
✥
He shifted slightly in the cage, the accumulated sores of a year of imprisonment sending waves of agony through his body. He hardly felt the pain. Hardly felt anything at all except numbness.
He’d just watched his wife burned alive on a pyre. All he wanted now was death. An end to it all. His body was wasting away and every breath was a struggle, but the emptiness in his heart hurt worse than anything he had ever known.
He heard footsteps outside the cage. Maybe it was Borun, come to apologize again. His closest friend had turned his back on Kayne when he needed him most. Said he had a wife and daughters to think about.
Could be it was Orgrim. But he was a chieftain now, and though he’d expressed regret at what had happened the big Easterman wouldn’t sacrifice his duty to his people for his duty to a friend.
Or perhaps it was Magnar. His son had watched his own mother die in the flames. The boy he had raised to be a man.
He wanted to die. Prayed for it. But the Shaman wouldn’t grant him his wish until he was good and ready. Chances were he would burn just as Mhaira had burned. Even the rage inside him had turned to ash. He had nothing left. Not strength enough even to lift his head.
‘Kayne,’ rasped a voice. A voice he knew from years gone by.
‘Jerek?’ Kayne tried to say, but only a hoarse choking sound emerged.
‘I’m getting you out of there. The Shaman wants to get to you, he’ll have to go through me first.’
‘I’m done,’ he managed to say. ‘Go. Don’t worry about me.’
‘I made you a promise, Kayne.’ There was the sound of steel striking wicker. ‘After you pulled me from the fire.’
‘Go,’ Kayne said again. ‘Or you’ll burn too.’
‘Burned once already. Didn’t finish me, did it?’
Kayne said nothing. He had no more energy with which to speak. He heard the cage splintering just to his left. Heard the snap as the grim warrior they called the Wolf grabbed hold of his prison and began wrenching it open.
‘Go,’ he managed to gasp, one last time. He didn’t want another death on his hands. Another life lost because of his actions.
For a moment there was nothing but grunting and the snapping of wicker. Then a strong hand grabbed hold of him and pulled. Agony exploded as his broken body was dragged from the ruined prison.
‘I gave you my word,’ Jerek said. ‘Got myself exiled from the Forsaken when I heard what the Shaman done to you. Only way to leave the Icespire, short of death. But a man says a thing, a man does a thing.’ Kayne grunted as he was lifted and tossed over a burly shoulder like a sack of potatoes. ‘I’ll be there when you need me,’ Jerek rasped. ‘And that’s a fucking promise.’
*
He slid slowly from his horse. His boots crunched on the snow and his breath misted in the chill morning air but inside he burned, feverish with excitement. He took a breath and tried to calm his beating heart. He didn’t want to drop dead before he made it to the door.
He was home. He was home, and Mhaira was waiting for him.
Everything was just as he remembered it. The house looked like it had in his dreams, a place that held some of the best memories of his life. Some of the worst too, but those also had to be embraced because without them you never really understood what was important. Not until you almost lost it.
Kayne made his way to the door, noting the tidy fields, the neatly trimmed trees that lined the path. Proof that his wife was here, living under the same roof she’d lived under for the last twenty years. He had thought her dead. Horribly murdered, burned to ashes on the Shaman’s pyre three years ago.
But she was alive, and she was waiting for him.
He ran a hand down his face, suddenly conscious of the scars, the month’s growth of beard, the filth that caked him from neck to toe. Mhaira had always complained that his stubble tickled her, though she’d always had a twinkle in her eyes when she said it.
He grinned, imagining the look on her face when she saw him. That had been the only thing that kept him going at times: the memory of her smile when he woke in the morning. And the lingering image of her putting Magnar to sleep. Not grand events like the day of their joining, though those were precious in their own way. It was the simple things, the everyday moments that were no different from what any other man and woman shared the length and breadth of the High Fangs, except Mhaira had chosen to share those moments with him.
He slowed as he approached the door. The wedding wreath that had always hung there was missing. Mhaira sometimes brought it inside when the weather got too cold, even though the blessing of the spirits had meant it had endured the passing of seasons and years intact. So long as their love remained true.
He hesitated, then knocked twice on the door, his body shivering with anticipation, tears threatening his eyes. He shook his head ruefully. There’d been too many tears recently. He didn’t want Mhaira to think he was going soft.
He waited, and then waited some more. There was no answer. Brow creasing in confusion, he knocked one more time. There was still no answer. He tried the handle and found the door unlocked. Maybe Mhaira was sleeping. The truth was she wasn’t getting any younger, though to his eyes she never seemed to change despite the passing of the years. She was always just as beautiful as the day he’d married her.
He entered the house, seeing the hole on the wall he’d repaired years ago, noting how clean and tidy everything was. He tiptoed over to their bedroom door and pushed it quietly open, expecting to find her sound asleep. The bed was empty, though her clothes were still there. He saw the scarf he had bought for her as a naming day gift and raised it to his nose. It still smelled of her.
He wandered the house, searching for any sign of his wife. The rooms looked recently lived in, though there was no food in the larder. He popped his head outside, certain he would find Mhaira tending the garden, but that too was empty. Though it was covered in snow, the garden wasn’t overgrown. Someone had been here not long ago.
‘May?’ he called out, beginning to grow worried. He left the house and crossed the field to the other house, where Mhaira’s cousin, Natalya, and her husband had lived before Gared’s passing. When he was only a few feet from the door, it thudded open. An elderly woman hobbled out, supported by a walking stick. She squinted up at Kayne. ‘You here to help me south along with the rest of our folk? I was expecting someone younger.’
Kayne stopped and stared at the wizened old crone. ‘Who are you?’
The grandmother tapped her stick against the snow. ‘My name’s Gabs. Young king Magnar sent me here some months back.’
‘He did?’ Kayne asked, confused. ‘Why?’
Gabs shook her head. ‘The lady of the house weren’t well. The young king sent me to make sure her needs were being seen to. Poor thing could hardly get out of bed come the end.’
Come the end.
‘Where is she?’ Kayne asked, his voice suddenly trembling so badly he could hardly force the words out. ‘Where’s Mhaira?’
The old woman shook her head sadly and finally Kayne understood, and all colour seemed to fade from the world.
‘She passed last week. It was the illness in her lungs. I buried her by the bench in the garden, like she asked. You knew her?’
Kayne barely heard. He turned away, the gr
ound seeming to lurch beneath him, his heart a lead weight in his chest. He walked back towards the house in a daze, legs feeling as though they belonged to a different man.
‘Here now, what are you doing?’ came Gabs’ voice behind him. He ignored her, crossed the field and entered the house. Walked down the hallway and out into the garden. He saw the shallow mound beside the bench, then. It was covered in snow.
‘May,’ he whispered brokenly, collapsing to his knees and scooping away snow with his bare hands, not feeling the cold, not feeling anything except an emptiness so deep he might sink into it and never find his way back out.
His hands closed around something. It was their wedding wreath. He shook it softly with trembling hands, and as the snow that clung to it fell away he saw that the leaves were as green as the day he and Mhaira had wed, the interweaving branches that symbolized their joining as strong as ever.
He knelt there, staring up at the grey sky. Snowflakes began to drift down to settle on his face, another storm gathering overhead. He looked down at the wreath. A moment later a sob escaped his lips and hot tears rolled down his cheeks. All the pain surged up, began to burst from him.
Footsteps crunched on the snow behind. He didn’t turn, didn’t want Gabs to see him in this state. Didn’t want to hear the old woman’s awkward questions.
He just wanted to be left alone with his wife and his memories.
‘Kayne.’
The grating voice cut through the air like an edge of steel. Kayne turned, staring numbly through eyes blurred with tears. A scarred face met his gaze. A face he’d been sure he would never see again.
Jerek took a step forward, his twin axes clutched tightly in his hands. The Wolf’s expression was stone. There was a darkness in his eyes that was terrible to behold, as if he had walked through hell itself.
If I ever see you again I’ll kill you. That’s a promise.
Kayne met his old friend’s stare. For a moment, neither man moved. Then Kayne nodded once, slowly. He turned back to Mhaira’s grave and placed the wreath carefully down. The Wolf always paid his debts. Always kept his promises.
He knelt there, listening to Jerek approach. He wasn’t going to fight. Not now. He just wished he could have seen Mhaira one last time. He thought of her smile and fresh tears glistened in his eyes.
The Wolf shifted behind him. ‘Kayne,’ he rasped again.
‘Aye,’ Kayne replied calmly. It was time.
For a long moment nothing happened. And then an axe fell to the ground either side of him, and a strong hand squeezed his shoulder.
SPRING
✥
The Fade Prince
✥
THE WAREHOUSE SHOOK as though it were being battered by a giant’s club. Dust and ash rained down through the cracks in the wooden roof and Eremul the Halfmage came awake choking and spluttering. Monique, beside him on the floor, did much the same, except somehow she managed it with a lot more grace. As often happened, he tried to climb to his feet only for his brain to catch up with the fact that he no longer had feet, or indeed ankles or knees.
Thirteen years and still instinct overwhelms memory. Overwhelms rational thought. Then again, I am but a human. Not an immortal fehd.
‘Let me help you,’ said Monique, gently lifting him from the floor and assisting him into his chair. He blinked dirt from his eyes and squinted through the cloud of dust. Mard was sitting cross-legged amidst the detritus and staring at Monique suspiciously, possibly with some kind of cock-rot-related anxiety in mind. Ricker was passed out, so drunk that a direct kick to the face wouldn’t have woken him.
So, exactly the same as always. What then is that racket outside? The building began to shake again and now there was a loud roaring noise, as though a hurricane were tearing through the city. Eremul wheeled himself over to the door and peeped out. He wasn’t the only one. Dorminia’s many homeless glanced fearfully from the cramped doorways of the Refuge to see what latest terror threatened the city. Everything was coated in ash and dust – the fallout from the colossal cloud that had mushroomed into the sky the day the Breaker of Worlds was deployed to destroy the gholam. Even within the Obelisk, the heat had been near unbearable for a minute or two.
The Halfmage had been relieved to learn that none in the city had perished – at least not as a direct result of the weapon’s deployment. The coming days would doubtless bring complications, with the city’s water supply becoming polluted. Also, the trembling in the earth caused by the blast had weakened Dorminia’s structures, and several had since collapsed, burying their unfortunate inhabitants within.
The Halfmage shook his head. In the last year the city had endured war, a sustained bombardment from the First Fleet’s artillery, and now the unleashing of the deadliest weapon ever created.
The Grey City. An apt name for possibly the grimmest conurbation this side of a metaphorical hell. It was hard to conceive of a time when he might fondly reminisce about Salazar’s rule, but the Halfmage could feel the moment edging slightly closer.
Monique placed a hand on his arm and poked her head out of the doorway for a look. ‘Shall we see what the fuss is about?’ she asked. He glanced at her in surprise. Monique had seemed largely content to remain in the Refuge since seeking him out. Indeed, she was worryingly quiet most of the time. He imagined the stress and uncertainty of the times – not to mention their decidedly charmless room-mates – would have that effect on a woman.
When it comes to women, my imagination is all I have by way of experience.
‘Eager for some clean spring air?’ he asked wryly, gesturing at the sheets of dust blowing through the streets. It seemed as though the disturbance was coming from the Hook: the large plaza in which the city’s criminals were once executed and where Eremul himself had come within moments of doing the hanged man’s dance, or whatever the humorous equivalent for a man with no legs could be termed. ‘I suppose it is at least fresher than what comes out of Ricker’s arse on a morning.’
Monique gave him a scandalized look that quickly became a smile and Eremul felt the unfamiliar warm sensation spreading through him. To hell with your hashka. Forget magic. Love is the most powerful addiction of all. Or at least it was for those who had gone thirty-five years utterly starved of it.
‘Follow me,’ he said, wheeling his chair out through the door. ‘I can probably work a little something to help with the dust.’ He muttered a few words and summoned the meagre reserves of magic within him, shaping it into a warding spell that kept the airborne detritus away from him and Monique. Dirty faces watched them from half-open doors. Many revealed malice or anger, but the Halfmage was beyond giving a shit about the opinions of his neighbours.
Eremul and Monique made their way between crowded warehouses, skirted around heaps of rubbish, dead animals and piles of rotting sewage. The Refuge might provide a roof over their heads and a bowl of foul-tasting soup on an evening, but it was otherwise a lawless, filthy place. A year ago Eremul might have termed it ‘hellish’. Not any more.
Hell is defined by the limits of imagination – and imagination is defined through the limits of experience. True hell cannot be known until it has been lived.
The orphans in the Warrens, they knew true hell. The Pioneers who had sailed to the Celestial Isles had known true hell, every man and woman, at least for the short time they had remained in possession of their heads. What the homeless were suffering in the Refuge was but a trifling inconvenience in comparison.
As they neared the Hook, the drifting clouds of dust and ash grew thicker, the roaring louder. Eremul had to put his hands to his ears to block out the noise. Dozens of fehd were gathered around the edge of the plaza. Dust and ash swirled around the Ancients as they formed a circle, Isaac among them beside his sister Melissan. The siblings wore stony expressions. There was an air of tragedy about the two Adjudicators that was almost palpable. The agony Eremul had witnessed on Isaac’s face following the death of his half-sister Nym had shaken him for days. It may
have been Isaac’s emotional projection that made him feel bad for the fehd officer – but Eremul had the oddest sensation that it could also have been simple empathy.
Isaac saw them approaching and gave a tiny nod of greeting. His obsidian gaze lingered on Monique for a second and he seemed to give a regretful sigh before returning his attention to the spectacle in the centre of the plaza. Melissan regarded the two humans as a woman might regard a fresh dog turd turning up on the bottom of her shoe. But she did not protest as they arrived at the Hook and both stared slack-jawed at the huge metallic bird hovering ten feet above the ground.
Or at least it resembled a metallic bird; on closer inspection Eremul concluded it was some kind of fehd relic. It was forty feet from nose to tail, with a wingspan at least twice that.
‘It flies,’ Monique said breathlessly. ‘It must be magic.’
‘Not magic,’ said the Halfmage with a frown. The roaring seemed to come from somewhere beneath the wings. ‘It’s a machine.’
‘The oldest of machines,’ said Isaac behind them. The Adjudicator had quietly joined the couple. ‘It is one of the last surviving relics of the Time Before – a smaller brother to the great ship that brought us to these lands. Prince Obrahim has arrived.’
The flying machine was slowly lowered to the ground. The roaring died and the billowing clouds of ash and dust slowly settled back to the earth. A small portal on the side slid open and a short flight of steps was lowered. A moment later a fehd who could only be their mythical prince stepped out.
He was of equal height to General Saverian, and in fact looked similar enough that none could mistake them for anything but brothers. The prince wore a golden cloak and carried a great metal sceptre topped by the largest diamond the Halfmage had ever seen. Unlike the white-haired general, Obrahim had hair as golden as the dawn. It was topped by a silver coronet.
Saverian stepped from the circle of fehd and lowered himself to one knee, the point of his crystal sword resting on the ground. The rest of his kind immediately followed suit. Isaac nodded at Monique to kneel and she quickly obeyed.
