Nether Kingdom

by J. Edward Neill

  Better this way. Her last thoughts dwindled. Easier for me to find him alone.

  She left her friends behind. She saw Garrett watching, soundless and stoic, and she loved him more for not trying to stop her. She saw the others panic, screaming words she made no sense of.

  Away from them, she soared over the Thillrian camp.

  Like winter’s bitterest wind, she swept over clusters of war-weary men, sensing and feeling their presences. Lanterns dimmed and campfires choked in her wake. Men leapt to their feet and snared their weapons, but her passing left them reeling. She flew thrice across the entire camp, each time gaining momentum, but never once seeing the one she wanted.

  Saul was not in the encampment.

  He was closer to the Undergrave.

  In the deep of night, she tore northward faster than any bird, any arrow. The realm beyond the Thillrian camp looked as empty as a newly-dug grave. She sailed over slate-sided hillocks, glided over countless dead trees, and invaded every path carved by the Thillrian retreat. Treetops blackened in her wake, and the mists melted away before her.

  And still she flew.

  Far and north of the Thillrian camp she soared. The hours swept by, giving her nothing. She sensed no life in the Gluns, not a single living soul for her to descend upon. Here and there she sensed the bodies of dead soldiers, but none of them were Saul. They were Thillrians, pale and dead. They carried swords, not staves. Their beards were thin and black, not bushy and brown as the earth.

  She lost track of time.

  She spent more of herself than she knew.

  It happened when she flew too low to the earth. She burned a hole in the night, flying over dead men who lied in the scabby, snow-burned brush. Her Nightness failed moments later. Forced back to mortal form, she skidded across the brittle ground and crashed into a grove of thousand-thorned shrubs.

  She felt nothing. She remembered nothing. Drained and damaged, she tried to lift her head, but then fell far, far from consciousness.

  The sound of footfalls awoke her.

  Not dead, she thought. Not alive either.

  She arose in the shadow-realm of her dreaming mind. In the gloom her body was unscathed, but her vision blurred and hazy. Half conscious, she wandered through dark corridors and grey, colorless caverns. Such was the landscape of her soul, as cold and full of shadows as the Undergrave.

  She wandered out of the caverns and slunk into a bleak overworld. The clouds were low, the slow rain like falling ashes. Towers, trees, and massive cities floated in the background, ethereal and impossibly far away. I could walk forever and never reach them. This place…not real. Or is it?

  Somewhere in the lifeless realm, she heard someone call her name. It bounded through the shadows, arriving from all directions.

  “Hello?” Her voice echoed from cloud to ground. “Is someone there?”

  She rubbed her eyes. Everything blurred. She stared at a far off city, its towers curling in an otherworldly wind. Among the many shadows in the city’s foreground, one became sharper in her sights. It dripped like water from the sky, making no sound, gliding toward her over the course of eons. She tried to run to it, but gained no ground. She felt rooted to the earth, stuck in the center of nothing and nowhere.

  “Who’s there?” she shouted. “Is this a dream? Can you help me get out?”

  The shadow walked closer. It looked familiar somehow. She waited and waited, and felt her breath fail when she recognized it as the shape of a man.

  “Please.” The echoes swirled around her. “I am lost. Help me.”

  The shadow halted some thirty steps away. She sensed something familiar about the way it looked at her, the impression of a smile on its face.

  “I know you,” she said to it.

  “Yes you do,” it replied.

  She knew its voice. Closing her eyes, she forced herself to remember who it belonged to.

  “Rellen.”

  “Yes,” said the shadow.

  “I am dead?”

  “No. Not anymore. Wounded, but asleep beneath the Black Moon. It regenerates you. It makes you stronger.”

  “But where am I now?”

  “In the space between death and dreaming.”

  She struggled to believe it. The grey swirl of trees and cities felt almost tangible, too alike her dreams of a world fallen to the Ur. She blinked hard and shook her head, wanting to dislodge the dismal landscape from her mind. The shadows went nowhere.

  “I have to wake again? I have to go back?”

  “Yes,” said Rellen’s shadow. “And soon.”

  She wanted to go to him. To see if it really is Rellen. To touch him. The memory of her fallen love felt hazy in her mind. She wished she had not tried so hard to forget him.

  “I am sorry, Rellen.”

  “Do not be.” His tone was gentle. “I should be sorry, not you. If I were alive, I’d go with you. We could destroy Grimwain together. An adventure, it’d be. Father Sun would love us. He’s got the most to lose, after all.”

  Even in death, he made her smile. Tears, half-joyful, trickled down her cheeks.

  “I mean I am sorry about Garrett,” she sniffled. “It was you I loved first, but Grim took you. I was so lonely. I—”

  “Garrett loves you,” said Rellen’s shadow. “And so do I. But the world is made for the living, and that’s why you must return. You’ve work to do. Only the children of Archithrope can defeat Grimwain. I wouldn’t be much use. I remember how it ended the first time.”

  It was hard to hear him say such a thing. She flinched as lightning cracked above her. The dream-sky opened and rain began to fall, silent and cold as knives.

  “I have a feeling I will not see you again,” she said. “Is it true?”

  His shadow, already fading in the mist, smiled at her once last time. “Goodbye, Ande. I’ll wait for you here. Long as it takes.”

  “Wait! Rellen!”

  Too suddenly, the dream collapsed.

  She gasped for air and awoke in the real world, a place far more painful. No shades lived here, only thorns and twisted scrub. She wanted to cry out Rellen’s name, but with a glance at the grey sky and at the bruises darkening her forearms and knees, she knew he would never hear her.

  I fell. But I lived. I have work to do.

  Diary, Messengers

  Thillrian war-camp. Three days before solstice. Well beyond midnight

  Saul is alive. Alive, alive, alive.

  He sleeps one tent over. Twice shot by Wolde quarrels. Arm broken. No matter. With three other wounded men, he walked from Sallow’s heart all the way back to the Thillrian camp. Marid and the rest were right. I should have waited.

  By rights Saul should be dead. But no. Not today. Not tomorrow either. Hard as the Selhaunt, he is. I hugged him half to death when I staggered back to camp. Not a single flinch, no matter his hurts. I sometimes think if the Ur come and burn everything to rubble, only three things will remain: ashes, dust, and Saul.

  A few hours before dawn, and I am the only one awake. Marid snores inside his tent, same as he always does. Bellies full of broth, Perci, Imyr, and Evram doze quiet as the dead. Even Garrett and Saul are drowsing, having slipped to sleep beside the fire.

  We seven are all that remain in this dark, dreary valley. The last of the Thillrians left yesterday morn. It is deathly quiet in their absence. I hear no crickets, no owls, no mourning birds. Even mouthing the words off this page, I swear my breath sounds louder than anything else in the world.

  I am not inside my tent, not tonight. I lurk just outside of Marid’s camp, invisible. Three dead trees surround me, a triangle of tomblike towers. I am alone and glad for it. It is three days until the solstice. I am comfortable with what is to come.

  A messenger came to our camp today. He had nowhere else to go. The poor man looked as pale and gaunt as any tree in Sallow. The light in his eyes burned as feebly as candlelight, ready to be snuffed should a strong wind blow. I felt terrible for him, but worse when I heard his n
ews:

  ‘The Wolde, they released me,’ the messenger said. ‘They bade me tell you these things. In punishment for the Thillrian attack, the Dukes of Muthemnal and Dray have been executed. Their eyes have been gouged out, their tongues burned, and their heads set upon stakes so that they’ll forever watch over Sallow. Should another Thillrian approach Undergrave Hill, the Dukes’ sons’ lives shall be forfeit as well, as well as the lives of their households.’

  This and much more the poor man told us before he fled. We believed him. We fell silent in the aftermath. I hurt in my heart to hear Duke Ghurlain is dead. I parted on poor terms with him, but I never, ever wished suffering on him. I remember the others, their faces clear as day: Ghurk, Aera, and all the happy keepers of Castle Maewir. I love them all. I miss them terribly.

  And so you see, dearest journal, I have returned to my darkest state of mind. Reuniting with Marid and Saul uplifted me, but now reality sets in. My blood runs cold. The sky over Sallow seems fearful. Father Sun knows what will come. Even now in the dead of night, I see the tortured clouds. They twist, tear, and devour each other whole. Some are shaped like funnels, threatening a thousand dire storms, but others are as dead as the bone-dirt of Cornerstone, moving only when consumed by another.

  And in the center of the sky, lower than ever before, the Black Moon hangs. Directly above the Undergrave, I believe. I know why. The tower at the bottom of the ‘Grave is a conduit. My father’s spells will crawl up its walls and crack the Black Moon open. The Moon is so close now. My Nightness regenerates at twice its normal rate. My blood moves like a cold river through my veins, and my skin sizzles with fever.

  It is hard to sit still like this. My mind screams at me. The Nightness wants me to hurtle into heaven and lance the ocean of clouds. Afterward, it wants me to fall back to earth. It wants me to die.

  No.

  I should be dead. I already fell once. Rellen. I talked to him. A ghost. A day, maybe longer, of sleep in the dirt. Another of walking. An hour of flying. No food. No water. But here I am. Alive. The Nightness wants me dead, yet it sustains me. Hard to kill, we Anderae.

  The breeze picks up as I write. The climate is tortured. Snowflakes, tiny and silver, gather on the page, then melt when a gust of warm wind cooks them away. I see a hole in the clouds and stars twinkling beyond, but then the clouds swarm in and swallow everything. It is warm in one breath, cold in the next. The sky goes clear, but is soon smothered to each horizon with darkness. This is no natural season, nor any climate made by me. This is the world gasping for life. I wonder if every land sees it the same.

  Tomorrow will soon be today. My little friends: Perci, Imyr, and Evram, will leave at first light. Ah, boys. They want to stay because they know no better. Saul will take them as far west as he can. They will not have to face Grimwain.

  Saul, poor Saul. I will miss him more than anyone. I have decided, after two days and too many tears, I cannot bear to say another goodbye to him. I told him what to expect. Here at the end I think he finally understands how it must happen. He would come with me if I asked. He would crack his broken battle-staff over the heads of as many Wolde as he could. But he is too injured. He must seek sanctuary far from the Undergrave. I told him he never should have come to see me. He rejected the idea. I only wish he could see his wife and child one last time. Unlikely. Goodbye, my fondest friend. I will think of you until I close my eyes forever.

  And now, Marid. Marid is a different matter. I told him a thousand times it will only be Garrett and I who go to the Undergrave. He will not listen. We repeated our plan to him in grim detail. He said the same thing again and again, ‘You can’t tell me to walk away. If you fly off, I’ll follow you just as before.’ Marid, Marid, Marid. I still see the glimmer in your eyes. Maybe I should have stayed in Muthem and loved you. Maybe things would have been different. My temptation is to leave you and spare you a gruesome end. I have not yet decided.

  My inkwell is nearly dry. I am running out of pages. I stare into the night, at the sky, at the wisps of smoke twirling up from our failing campfire. I am lost in an ocean of regret and never-fulfilled hopes. I feel like a child hurled overboard into the abyss. Hope as I might to wake up and find this was all just a dream, it never happens. It never will. Tomorrow night I will go to the Undergrave. I will work all the wicked magicks the Pages Black taught me, and I will see if the sun rises the morning after.

  Goodbye Saul. Goodbye Daedelar. Goodbye Graehelm, Thillria, and everything in-between. If, many eons from now, after the Ur use up the earth and abandon it, I hope some creature finds you, dear diary. I hope they read you and know how much I loved, and lost.

  Descent

  At twilight, the Eye of the Ur began its final descent.

  The shadow it cast was unthinkably huge, the lands beneath it darkened by premature night. The blighted sphere was blacker than starless pitch, an abyss against which no light dared shine. It bulged beneath the strata of twilit clouds, settling so low in the heavens that the lines of magic on its surface were visible to the naked eye.

  All gazes were drawn to it, from Sallow to Shivershore, from Yrul to Graehelm, all filled with dread. Few recognized the horror it portended, but all lands near and far knew an evil time was at hand.

  Below the Eye, in the valley of the abandoned Thillrian war-camp, three souls watched closer than any other. If these three were captivated more than the rest of Thillria, it was because they knew best what awaited the world. They stared, and the shadows painted their faces black. They shivered, and their heartbeats slowed.

  First there was Marid, for whom the full significance of the moon only now gained clarity. He feels the same terror as the rest of Thillria, Andelusia knew. But not the same hopelessness. With a gaze not completely devoid of optimism, he stared at the dread thing in the sky. He wants to believe the Ur do not exist, or that the Moon is as empty as a cup long ago drained. He trusts. And that is something.

  Haunting the earth beside Marid was Garrett. For all his stoicism, he beheld the Eye with as much emotion as anyone else. He hates and fears it, thought Andelusia. The only thing on earth to compel him so. Had he a bow powerful enough or a spear whose tip could pierce the clouds, she believed he would assail the Eye. But no. All he can do is drive it back for another hundred years.

  Lastly there was Andelusia. Her ghostly countenance, storm-clouded eyes, and inky tresses betrayed her connection with the Black Moon. As the eve dragged its ebon brush across the sky, she watched the Eye serenely. She felt close to it, as attracted as any lover. In its presence, her body pulsed with Nightness more powerfully than ever before. She was attuned to its whims, and her slightest movements felt like sword-strokes carving through the cobwebs of a dream.

  Not afraid.

  Not anymore.

  “Almost time,” she said to Garrett and Marid. “Give me your swords.”

  Garrett tore his long Thillrian blade from his belt and laid it in her grasp. She held out her left hand to take Marid’s, but his did not come so willingly.

  “Marid, your sword.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  “Give it to me. I will show you.”

  He did as she demanded. With both swords in hand, she knelt to the dead Sallow soil and set the blades before her. Both men watched. Neither knows what I am about to do.

  “Look closely,” she told them. “When I am done, these will carve through anything Grim puts before us.”

  She wetted her lips with a flick of her tongue. The words of the Pages Black slid like oil into her throat, wanting to spill out far faster. She tensed her fingers and uttered phrases unheard on the earth for a thousand generations. The shadows answered her call. Smoking like funereal flames, two puddles of violet Ur broth boiled in her palms and spilled onto the cold steel before her. The metal hissed and popped. Touched by her horrid spell, the color of each changed from silver to black, from clean and polished to lusterless and dead.

  “There. Done.” She closed her fists, swallowing the Ur br
oth into nothingness.

  “They look worse than before!” Marid complained.

  “Trust me. Not worse. Much more dangerous,” she said. “Whatever you do, whomever you fight, never so much as nick yourselves. The poison is enough to kill a thousand men, and these swords are sharp enough to cut rocks into ribbons.”

  She rose with a sword in each hand. Garrett nodded at his with morbid approval. He took the still-smoldering blade, not even flinching at the heat.

  Marid was not nearly as comfortable. His eyes went wide at the sight of his smoking, black-bladed sword.

  “What did you do?” he asked.

  “Made them better.”

  “Ande…I…I don’t know…I expected you to make them…sunnier. Don’t we need light to cut the dark?”

  “Marid, love.” She set his blade delicately into his hands. “I wish you would reconsider. Find Saul’s tracks in the dust. You can be out of Sallow in a day or two.”

  “But you said nowhere’ll be safe,” he protested.

  “I know what I said. But there is always the chance I am wrong.”

  “You’ve been right about everything else,” he huffed.

  She looked to the Black Moon. With the Nightness, she saw the lines of wicked magic burning on its surface. “Not bravery to come with us. Suicide. The same for you, Garrett. You should both run.”

  She closed her eyes. Her heartbeat slowed to a crawl. The Nightness frosted her skin. After a deep breath, she looked at her companions again.

  Neither man had moved.

  “You insist?” she asked.

  “We do.” Marid nodded at Garrett.

  “You are sure?”

  “We are.”

  “Then go to that tree.” She directed Marid to a fallen willow some thirty paces away. “When I come for you, we will leave.”

  Like a pup ordered away from its master’s side, Marid shuffled toward the tree and sat on its rotting flank. Once he was far enough away, she looked to Garrett. Alone with him. If only one last time.