Apostate's Pilgrimage: An Epic Fantasy Saga (Empire of Resonance Book 3)

by L. W. Jacobs

  “Ella,” he said. “I’m going to need to waft for this one.”

  She blanched. Ella hated heights. “They’re not actually our problem. You know that, right?”

  Tai rolled his shoulders. “They might not be fighting if we hadn’t convinced them all to try flying past the whitecoats.”

  She glared at him. “If you come back to me with any wounds. I mean any at all—”

  Feynrick cleared his throat. “He’s, ah, got the god spear now. I think he’ll be good.”

  “I’ll come back,” Tai said. “I promise. You still haven’t answered my question.”

  Marea looked confused at this.

  “You were serious?” Ella asked.

  “Dead serious,” Tai said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a battle to stop.”

  She took her foot off the spear. He grabbed it in his good hand and struck a resonance that felt as deep as the ocean, shooting up into the air.

  It didn’t take long to see the battle, a roiling mass of whitecoats bleeding into motley pilgrims, pressing in on all four walls of the old city. But how to stop it?

  Tai took a breath. Power and belief. Avery had said it just took power and belief, and it seemed like he’d told the truth about that, at least. Probably thought he had to, because he needed them to survive long enough to get the spear, so he could steal it.

  The people, Tai. Remember? They’re dying?

  Right. Well he had power. Start with that.

  Tai flew toward the nearest wall, a wispy crack of blue lightning rising from the old city, not strong enough to even hit him. At least the shamans wouldn’t be a problem, now that he had their power.

  The scene was awful closer up, whitecoats thrusting and slashing with a mad intensity, the pilgrims falling on them in sheer numbers. The battle lines swirled in every direction, bodies and blood littering the cobblestones.

  Tai struck his higher resonance and started slamming down blankets of air, separating soldiers and pilgrims, swaddling them so they couldn’t hit each other, his uai endless but not enough, only a small portion of one section of the wall stilled after minutes of intense work.

  Power and belief. He needed both. Tai stopped, and imagined the entire battle below him swaddled in that kind of blanket, an impenetrable wall of air working its way in between whitecoat and pilgrim. Then believed it, feeling the power roaring inside of him, knowing what it was capable of.

  He waved the spear and a howl of wind like a midwinter blizzard rushed down the wall, parting soldier and pilgrim, driving an invisible wedge between the lines. Amazing, but he had no time for awe. Tai flew on, dropping another blanket over the north wall of the old city, then the east, then the south.

  But this was no solution either—it was a temporary fix at best. How did you stop two sides from fighting?

  Maybe you start by talking instead of using force.

  Tai imagined himself talking to everyone in the square below, like mindseyes could send out their thoughts, then waved the spear and believed.

  “I am Tai Kulga,” he said, and a wave of gasps replaced the cries of surprise and pain below.

  “I have taken the power of the stone,” he went on, “and I am claiming this city in the name of the Ascending God. There can be no more bloodshed here. The old city and the waystone are open to any who wish to see it, soldier or pilgrim. I will strike down any who attempt violence in these walls.”

  As he said it he imagined it so, having no idea how it worked, but believing that it would.

  There. That was enforcing peace. But they needed something more if this was going to work long term.

  “You are not enemies,” Tai said, sending his mindsight out into the crowd, seeing glimpses of the people down there, soldier and pilgrim alike. “You are citizens of the same nation and people of the same world. If you die here, your spirit will live on, unfulfilled. If you kill here, you will create those unfulfilled spirits, and maybe damn yourself to sleepless nights. I should know.”

  He pushed his mindsight further, seeing the hidden pains and hopes of the men in white coats and the people come seeking answers from a stone. “Your situation is not your enemy’s fault, and it is not your god’s to fix. It is yours. There is a lesson hidden in the voices you hear, whispering that you are not good enough, that no one loves you, that you don’t belong. You’ll have to talk to that voice to find it. But when you do, when you grow from it, no one can take that from you, not a political system that made you fight or an army of whitecoats or a man in the sky who speaks in your mind. It is yours.”

  Tai took a deep breath, coming back from the sea of pain and wonder that mindsight revealed in the crowd below. Something was shifting inside him, letting go. Ydilwen.

  Thank you, Ydilwen said.

  “I didn’t do this for you,” Tai answered, lifting the blanket of air and watching the crowd. Fights broke out in a few patches, but as he’d imagined, the aggressors fell over dead on the spot. More revenants on his head, but that was the price of power.

  I know. But you have given me what I wanted. A little piece of it, at least. And I am tired. So tired.

  Tai nodded. Below them the whitecoats and pilgrims began mingling, not fighting but flowing into the old city, like a stream of two waters.

  “It’s traditional for us to thank our spirit guides as they depart,” Tai said, remembering Marrem’s lessons on the old ways. “I do not think all revenants are guides, but I learned much from you, Ydilwen. Thank you.”

  There was no response, just that same sense of lightening Tai had felt with Hake and Naveinya. But where they had been painful, like scabs tearing off, Ydilwen felt like shedding clothes in the heat of the day, a lightening, a freeing.

  Was this the better way to get rid of revenants? Were his people not totally wrong about the spirits being guides?

  He didn’t know. That was a question for Ella, or someone a lot smarter than him. And in the meantime, she had another one to answer.

  66

  People were already streaming into the gardens when Ella’s lover dropped down from the sky. Some pointed and exclaimed when they spotted him and Ella saw Tai grimace. Was this how religion was born?

  Power radiated from him like it had from the stone, but the smile he gave her was pure Tai. “You guys had enough sightseeing for one day?”

  Marea tore her gaze away from Harides’s body on the flagstones. “Yes,” she said. “Let’s go.”

  Tai waved the spear. A solid block of air rose under them, and suddenly the ground started getting farther away. Ella grabbed Tai and squeezed her eyes shut. She would not lose her stomach now, in front of all these people.

  “Where to?” Feynrick yelled over the rushing wind. Just a nice breeze, she told herself. Solid ground under her feet.

  “Anywhere else,” Tai yelled back, “before these people start worshipping me too.”

  “Somewhere with a good lay-in of dreamleaf might be nice,” Feynrick said. “Less you feel like flying us back to Ayugen tonight. I wouldn’t mind seeing my Marrey.”

  Gods, with the power of the spear Tai could probably do it. It sounded exhausting—Ella wasn’t as old as she’d been, but she still didn’t feel up for an all-night wafting. “Maybe someplace a little closer!” she called over the not-from-wafting wind.

  Marea raised her voice. “I know a place!”

  The wind blew far too long. Ella kept her eyes squeezed shut. It stopped after an impossible downward lurch, and Ella opened her eyes to find the abandoned shaman’s cottage, sun’s rays lighting the rolling hills to either side. It felt surreal, after the crowds and grandeur and chaos of Aran. But peaceful too, crickets singing and the scent of fresh grass on the breeze.

  She sighed, feeling a tightness leave her stomach. “Hard to believe we were just here this morning.”

  “Probably still coals in the hearth,” Feynrick said. “And as I recall those shamans laid in a good stock of leaf. Who’s up for tea?”

  “Maybe later,” Ta
i said, eyes on the patch of fresh dirt where they’d buried Eyadin. He looked somber, and Ella took his arm. Knowing Tai, he was probably feeling responsible for it somehow.

  Marea walked to the dirt and knelt in it, her back slumped. She’d told Ella what she’d done, while Tai was away. Gods. She was too young to have to deal with this.

  “Hey,” Ella said, laying a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Harides was a twisted man. Whatever you did here, it was his fault.”

  “No,” Marea said, sounding much older than her sixteen rains. “I chose it. He even said he was surprised I did it. Because I thought I loved him.” She gave a humorless laugh. “What a pile of shit.”

  “We’ve all done things we’re not proud of,” Ella said. “You know my past. And Eyadin was already involved in this, in whatever shaman sent him from Worldsmouth. If you hadn’t stopped him, the battle in Aran would have been much worse.”

  “He had a family,” Marea said. “Children.” Her fists clenched and her shoulders shook with silent sobs.

  There was no need to say the rest: Marea had been that child once, not so long ago. Karhail had killed her father in the attack on Newgen. And now she’d done the same thing to Eyadin’s family. What did you say to that?

  “I know their names,” Tai said. “I know where they live in the city. I promised him we would take care of them.”

  “I can do that,” Marea said, head snapping up, eyes suddenly sharp. “I will do that. Tell me where they are.”

  Ella cleared her throat. “In good time. We’ve all been through a lot. Probably better to sleep on it tonight.”

  “Tell me,” Marea insisted.

  Tai nodded. “Edena Mettek is his wife’s name. His daughter is Rena. They live in the West Cove district.”

  Marea stood. “Edena and Rena Mettek. West Cove. Okay.”

  She started walking.

  “Marea!” Ella called out, running after her. “Wait! It isn’t safe out there, even with your resonance. Stay with us. We can—”

  Marea whirled on her, face contorted. “Don’t tell me what I can’t do. You don’t—look, thank you, okay? You’ve been good to me, too good to me, but I have to do this. I have to go.”

  Ella started to say something, then Tai was there, good hand on her arm. “Let her go.” He nodded to Marea. “You’re welcome with us anytime. Ancestors guide you till then.”

  Marea’s eyes flitted between then, mouth working, then she nodded and kept walking.

  They stood watching her go, Ella’s stomach a tangle of concern and worry and knowledge Tai was right. Marea had to go, just like Ella had had to go years ago. She hadn’t even been as old as Marea when she’d run away.

  “She’ll be okay,” Tai said, as if reading her thoughts. Maybe he was. He held a hand out to her. “Want to walk? I hear there’s a lovely patch of grass around here somewhere.”

  She took a deep breath, then found a wicked smile. “And you have a considerably younger lady to lie with than you did last night.”

  He grinned. “Lucky me.”

  They walked for a minute, boots swishing the long grass. “Think Nauro’s really gone?” she asked. His ashes were a weight in her pocket—she’d gathered them in a scrap of cloth before they left.

  “No,” Tai said. “He’s too smart for that. He’ll be back.”

  “Well, I won’t be such a sow to him next time,” Ella said.

  “You were just looking out for us,” Tai said. “Trust everyone and you end up traveling with a Harides.”

  “Hey, even I didn’t see that one coming,” Ella said. “And I used to—”

  A zip sounded in front of them, and suddenly a richly dressed woman was standing in the knee-deep grass ahead of them. The cut of her dress was strange, high on one side with a separate color beneath, the fabric looking thin as spider silk.

  “Tai of Ayugen,” she said. “And the spear of second sight.”

  Tai tensed and separated from her, holding the spear flat behind him. Ella felt inside for her resonance.

  “Who are you?” Tai called.

  “A peer, now,” the woman said. “Though an enemy, too, I suppose, because I was rather fond of Aymila.”

  Ella sucked in a breath. Aymila had been Semeca’s true name. “You’re an archrevenant.”

  The woman inclined her head. “That is one word for us, yes.”

  “If you’re here for the spear,” Tai said, “you won’t get it without a fight.”

  “Oh, I don’t want the spear, sweetness,” the woman said, jutting one hip out. Ella couldn’t help noticing the woman was curvy in all the right places. “What I want is for you to not bring hell and fire down on us because you don’t know what you’re doing.”

  Ella frowned, still ready to strike resonance at any second. She had life to burn again, now. “What danger could the spear pose to you?” Ella asked. “You have the same power.”

  The woman gave a lazy smile. “I have more power, actually. Aymila was lax in her tactics, but I find them sort of pleasant. A long-term game. No, I am not talking about the spear. I’m talking about your little trick around the stone.”

  “The harmony?” Tai asked.

  “The harmony,” she said. “I should have listened to Aymila when she said it was a threat. It’s why she attacked you, you know. The rest of us thought, well, it doesn’t matter what we thought. What matters is that you never do it again.”

  That set Ella’s mind spinning. Why would an archrevenant care what they did? Unless the full harmony posed some sort of danger to them. Or was it the stones—did the woman fear they’d open the other stones and steal her power? But that wasn’t how it worked.

  “And if we do?” Tai asked.

  “Do you think the fires in the moon burn on their own?” the woman hissed, suddenly angry. “Do you think the myths of the Descending God are just myths? You should be learning by now legends have their feet in fact. But never mind that. Let me tell you what will happen if you do. I will come for you, with Alenul and Teynsley and Hathrim and Gyelon, with all seven of the other archrevenants, and the spear you hold will be no protection against our combined might.”

  Ella stared at the woman, dread a cold weight in her stomach. She had no doubt the woman could do it. But what was so dangerous about a full harmony?

  “But, pardon me,” the woman said, voice sweet again. “I have been long off this continent, and am forgetting my manners. There’s no need for threats. I’ll give you some time to settle in, then come for a proper visit. But in the meantime, be a dear and don’t strike a full chord again? You seem like such nice people.”

  She disappeared in a bang and a rush of air.

  Ella stared at the waving grass where she’d stood, Yersh countryside once again surreal in the evening light. “Did I just see that?”

  Tai rubbed his eyes. “Did you see a woman appear out of nowhere claiming to be an archrevenant and making strange threats? Cause that’s what I saw.”

  “Well, good,” Ella said. “I guess we’re not crazy.”

  “No,” Tai said. “It’s the world that’s crazy.”

  “At least she didn’t try to kill us.”

  “Not yet anyway,” he said, then took a deep breath. “Walk with me?”

  She walked with him, sun slipping below the horizon in a show of scarlet and purple, lines of clouds illuminated in the sky. What did you do about an archrevenant suddenly appearing and threatening you? Especially at the end of a day in which you could have died many times?

  You did nothing. You walked in the sweet grass with your lover and appreciated that for now, at least, you were alive and together.

  “You never answered my question, you know,” Tai said.

  It actually took her a second to remember which one he meant. “Oh!” Ella said. “That one. Yes.”

  He stopped, a grin growing on his face. “Yes?”

  “Yes!” she cried. “What did you think I’d say?”

  “I wasn’t sure, after you said you’d
have to think about it.”

  “Well the answer is yes, Tai Kulga of Ayugen. Godslayer. Though you’ll probably have to meet my parents to do it.”

  The words slipped out before she even realized what she was saying. She hadn’t seen her parents since she’d killed her brother and ran out the front door. But maybe it was time.

  “I can do that,” he said.

  “Good,” she said. “Now throw me down in this grass and have your way with me.”

  He grinned. “I can do that too.”

  She liked a capable man.

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  ALSO IN SERIES

  BEGGAR’S REBELLION

  PAUPER’S EMPIRE

  APOSTATE’S PILGRAMAGE

  ACOLYTE’S UNDERWORLD

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