“I love you so much,” she said softly. “Remember that. Always.”
He thought this an unchancy thing to say; almost as if she had spoken bad luck words. He felt chilled and so he made a jest of it.
“I am not likely to forget it,” he said. “For you will remind me of it daily.”
Aylaen smiled and closed her eyes.
The night was eerily quiet, or would have been but for Owl Mother’s snoring. Skylan was restless, uneasy. He tried to make sense of what had happened, but all he could hear, over and over, was:
Gods and men, the threads wrap around us, bind us tight.
CHAPTER
30
Skylan woke from a doze with a stiff neck and an aching back. Faint sunlight crept beneath the tapestry. The others were still asleep. He stretched and the wooden chair made a loud creaking sound, causing Aylaen to stir.
Fearing he would wake her, Skylan left the chair and crossed the floor, moving quietly. Going to the archway curtained off by the tapestry, he stepped into the room, letting the tapestry fall behind him.
Dim, soft light filtered through curtains as sheer as if they had been woven by spiders. Bunches of herbs hung from the ceiling and a basket stood on a low window seat. The herbs were dry to the point of crumbling to dust and their fragrance was faint, ghostly, giving him the impression that they had been hanging there a long time.
Skylan walked over to the window seat. The basket contained old, faded rose petals. He drew aside the curtains.
The window itself was a marvel to him, for it was made of myriad small panes of crystal cut in the shape of diamonds, bound together with lead. He looked out on what was presumably Tsa Kerestra, the Kingdom Above, and stared, amazed and confounded.
Dela Eden had claimed the kingdom’s beauty stole the breath. She had described lofty silver spires rising out of the storm clouds and he had pictured castles floating among the mist and fog.
What he saw was a forest of ancient trees spreading their boughs protectively over small dwellings with thatched roofs and the same lead-paned windows. Ivy covered the walls, roses climbed to the eaves. Lilies slept, their heads bowed, waiting for the sun. There were no streets, only rustic paths that led from house to house, worn by friends coming to visit.
“Dela Eden was right,” he said to himself. “This land is very beautiful. It reminds me of home, and I don’t know why.”
The forests and verdant grass and lush flowers of Tsa Kerestra did not in the least resemble the rugged shores of Vindraholm, where waves crashed among the rocks and crops struggled to survive in the stony ground. Perhaps it seemed familiar because he felt a sense of restful ease, as he always felt when he returned home after a long voyage.
Skylan let the curtains fall.
“Tsa Kerestra is beautiful, but it is wrong, all wrong,” he muttered.
Something poked him sharply in the back. He had not heard a sound and he whipped around to find Owl Mother standing behind him.
“Don’t sneak up on me like that!” Skylan said. He could feel his heart pounding.
Owl Mother chuckled. “Well, what do you two think of the place?” she asked, giving him a shrewd look.
“I was wondering how clouds grow flowers,” Skylan replied, meeting her gaze.
Owl Mother pursed her thin lips. “You’re not as stupid as you look.”
Shoving aside the basket of rose petals, she sat down in the window seat and made Skylan sit down. She snapped her fingers and a peach appeared in her wrinkled hand. Owl Mother split the peach in two and dug the pit out with her gnarled fingers.
“I’m not hungry,” said Skylan.
“I didn’t tell you to eat it, did I?” she snapped.
She handed one half of the peach to Skylan.
“Realm of Stone,” she said. “This half is the Realm of Fire.”
She balanced the pit on the palm of her hand. “The pit in the center is Tsa Kerestra.”
“A peach pit,” said Skylan.
“Think of it this way.” Owl Mother opened the curtains a crack, to let in more light, then conjured up a piece of charcoal and used it to draw a circle on the floor.
“This circle is the Realm of Fire.”
She drew another circle so that it overlapped with the first, then tapped the new circle. “This is the Realm of Stone.”
Using the charcoal, she colored in the area where the two circles overlapped to form an oval.
“This is Tsa Kerestra. Not the Kingdom Above so much as the Kingdom In Between.”
The circles and the oval made about as much sense to Skylan as Acronis’s squiggly-lined maps.
“The city is on the ground,” he said, frowning at the drawing.
“On the ground in our realm, which floats in the clouds in your realm,” said Owl Mother.
Skylan looked out at the clear, peaceful sky, just beginning to brighten. “But where is the storm? The silver spires? I saw them.”
“You saw what you wanted to see,” said Owl Mother. She paused, then said quietly, “The clouds are like a wall around the city, a moat to keep out our foes.”
“But why do you hide?” Skylan asked. “With all this magical power…”
“You were in our world,” said Owl Mother. “You saw the ruins of what was once a beautiful city. But our world was ruled by cruel men who delighted in killing. Our ancestors had to escape or they feared we would perish. Some of the daring followed the dragons through the portal to the Realm of Stone. Our people could have lived there, but it was already populated by savage beings: humans, ogres, and Cyclopes. We foresaw endless trouble, wars and more killing. With the help of the Great Dragon Ilyrion, our people formed their own realm—between the other two. We could live in peace with no one the wiser.
“Then came Torval and his rampaging gods. He killed Ilyrion and claimed the world, and discovered our realm. We made a pact with Vindrash. She promised to keep our secret and we promised to leave the world in peace. She gave us the spiritbone as a show of good faith. Then came the stranger gods and with that an end to our so-called peaceful way of life.”
“Life seems peaceful enough here,” said Skylan with a glance through the curtains.
“The life of a sparrow in a cage seems peaceful enough! But would you want it?” Owl Mother asked with a snort of disgust. “We are humans, like you, but because we can boil an egg with our minds we think we are better. We knew Torval and the other gods were neglecting the world, keeping careless watch. That wasn’t our concern.”
Owl Mother shrugged. “Vindrash hid the power of creation out of fear. The world was dying for the lack, yet still we did nothing.”
“Is that why you came to live with us?” Skylan asked.
“There were some of us who wanted to live in the world, not above it,” said Owl Mother. “We moved out to form a new kingdom, Tsa Terestra. The Kingdom Below. And some of us traveled farther than that.”
“Why?” asked Skylan.
“The arrival of Aelon and the Gods of Raj. Torval dropped the hammer on that one. Poor blighter. He never thought some god would do to him what he did to Ilyrion. I needed to speak to Vindrash and to the dragons. The Gods of Raj were not a threat. They had their hands full trying to keep the ogres and the Cyclopes from cutting each other’s throats. But Aelon, the Faceless God, was a different kettle of fish. He came poking and prying and snooping about and it wasn’t long before he discovered the truth about Tsa Kerestra. He was sweet as honey dripping from the comb when he came to us, asking for ‘tribute,’ saying it would be a shame if he was forced to destroy our peaceful way of life.
“Aelon was powerful. The so-called wise agreed to pay him. Anything to be left alone. Of course, Aelon lied and sent his spies to discover the secret of the stormholds.”
“What are the secrets to the stormholds?” Skylan asked. “What do they do?”
“They are the gates that allow us to travel between realms. Those of us who live in the Kingdom Below come to visit friends and family. A
ll of us must periodically return to our place of origin, the Realm of Fire, to replenish our magic.”
“I saw the great stone globe hanging in midair,” said Skylan. “How does it work?”
“The seneschal lowers the globe and the gate opens,” said Owl Mother. “Oh, it’s much more complicated than that, having to do with all manner of magic hoopla and folderol. But that’s what it boils down to.”
Skylan frowned. “And so Aelon’s spies discovered the secret and now Raegar knows how to lower the globe and open the gate.”
Owl Mother snorted and began to rub out the drawing of the realms with the toe of her shoe. “Even if he knows the secret, he isn’t a wizard. He can’t work the magic.”
“So what is the problem? If Raegar doesn’t know the secret, then the stormhold won’t allow him to pass though the gate, and Tsa Kerestra will be safe in the clouds,” Skylan said. “Give us the spiritbone and we will leave.”
“The damage has been done,” said Owl Mother gravely. “The moment the traitor told Aelon that he would hand over the spiritbone, Tsa Kerestra fell.”
Skylan didn’t understand, but he supposed it had something to do with magic.
“Stop this traitor! Chain him up. Kill him.”
“I’d feed him to a chimera, if I could!” Owl Mother said with a vicious snap. “But I can’t prove my suspicions. If I accuse Baldev, he will simply deny it. He is well respected in Tsa Kerestra and I am a cranky, rebellious old crone who told my people to go to hell and walked out.”
“Then I will steal the spiritbone,” said Skylan, jumping to his feet. “We will go now, while everyone is asleep.”
Owl Mother eyed him. “And will you be the one to unravel the magical spells that guard it, Skylan Ivorson?”
“You could do that,” said Skylan.
“The spells are known only to the three Lords of the Storm, the governing body of the Kingdoms Above and Below. Baldev is one of those lords. He wants to be the sole ruler. I would guess that is the deal he made with Raegar.”
“Then my warriors and I will fight Raegar’s army and take the spiritbone from him,” said Skylan.
“How many warriors do you have?” Owl Mother asked.
“Many hundred,” Skylan replied proudly. “Ogres and my friends and Cyclopes. And we have the Dragon Kahg.”
Owl Mother rose to her feet. “Come with me.”
“Where?” Skylan asked.
“Where I tell you,” Owl Mother returned.
She rose to her feet and led him to the door, which opened onto a small garden, now overgrown with weeds and brambles. Apples lay rotting on the ground beneath their trees. Beans had withered on the vine. A ragged hedge, grown to the height of a man, surrounded the garden like a leafy green wall on three sides. The fourth side was guarded by a stone wall like the one that surrounded the ill-fated city in the Realm of Fire.
Owl Mother led Skylan through the withered garden to the wall. She squinted at it intently, almost touching the stone with her nose, and ran her hands over it, poking and prodding.
One of the stones wiggled and, after some work, Owl Mother managed to pry it loose and pull it out of the wall. Sunlight shone through the hole. Owl Mother stood back, indicating with a gesture that Skylan was to look through the gap.
“What will I see?” Skylan asked, hesitating.
“Look and find out,” Owl Mother growled.
The gap in the wall was about two hand-spans in length, located at Owl Mother’s eye level, which meant Skylan had to stoop to see through it. He gasped and stepped back.
“The ground … The ground is far below us! And yet”—he eyed the ground beneath his feet—“we are standing on solid ground.”
Owl Mother flourished the peach pit. “What the eye sees is not always what the eye sees. But never mind about the ground and whether it’s above or below. You have bigger problems. Look to the west.”
Skylan put his eye to the hole again, trying not to think about the ground. Beyond this solid wall of gray stone another wall of gray, this one more insubstantial, the storm clouds that wrapped protectively about Tsa Kerestra. At Owl Mother’s words, the clouds parted and he saw the sun shining down on the plateau, sparkling on the sea and gleaming on twin hulls of an immense galley.
The ship bristled with oars like quills on a porcupine as the galley rode at anchor. Soldiers, small as bugs from this distance, jumped from the decks and began wading ashore, carrying their equipment over their heads. Smaller boats ferried even more soldiers and supplies to the beach, where men were busy unloading supplies, assembling siege engines, and pitching row after row of tents.
Skylan stared in blank dismay. He had figured Raegar had about four thousand troops. He could not guess at the number of soldiers, but there had to be twice that number in one galley, and another twin-hulled galley, as big as the first and crowded with even more men, sailed toward the shoreline. Triremes and other ships packed with soldiers and supplies traveled in their wake. All were flying the serpent flag of Oran, Empire of the New Dawn.
To complete his ruin, three dragons flew in lazy, sweeping circles overhead. One was the Dragon Fala, whom Kahg had said had chosen to serve Aelon. The other two Skylan recognized, for they had been among those who had sailed his dragonships to this place from Joabis’s isle. These two had apparently liked Raegar’s odds of recovering the spiritbone better than his, and decided to switch sides.
Skylan had seen more than enough and he sank back against the stone wall. The breath left his body in a sigh that was like the last breath of the dying. A bitter taste filled his mouth, and his stomach heaved. He had been so proud of his fleet of dragonships, his army of a few hundred ogres and Cyclopes and Vindrasi warriors.
In the past, when all had seemed lost, Skylan had known that his wits and his sword, his faith in Torval and in himself would win the day.
But not this day. Raegar would roll over their shield wall, grind their bones into the sand, and spill their blood into the sea.
Owl Mother’s rough, calloused hand rested on his arm.
“Go home, Skylan,” she said. “Take Aylaen and the spiritbones with you. You tried to defeat Aelon and you damn near succeeded. No one can fault you. Not even Torval.”
Skylan gave a faint smile. “That is because Torval will be dead and so will we. If we flee, we put off the inevitable. We will sail home and death and destruction will follow us. Raegar will destroy the Stormlords and then he will cross the ocean and destroy us.”
Owl Mother shook her head. Skylan glared at her.
“You Stormlords could stop Raegar and his army!” he said angrily. He gestured to the storm clouds, to the wall, to Tsa Kerestra, a world between worlds. “You could slay every one of those soldiers with as little effort as I could slay a hill of ants.”
“We could,” said Owl Mother. “We did. You remember that I told you that the Realm of Fire was occupied by cruel men who found it easy to kill, who took delight in the killing.”
“Yes,” said Skylan impatiently. “What of it?”
“Those men were us,” said Owl Mother.
She sat down beside him, putting her back against the wall.
“You have seen the tapestries. A reminder of what we once were. We have thrived here, and in all these centuries, we have never killed another human. But the hunger is still inside us. We know what would happen if once we started.”
She shrugged. “Oh, we would tell ourselves that we were only defending the innocent and that once the enemy was destroyed, the killing would stop. But it would never stop. For there is always another enemy. In the end, we would turn on you.”
Skylan regarded her, troubled.
“Don’t worry,” she said, resting her wrinkled hand on his shoulder. “We are not a threat to your people or any others in this world. We have made our plans. And if you decide to stay to fight, we will give you what help we can.”
She gave Skylan a pat on the shoulder and then stood up and headed back toward the small h
ouse.
He looked again at Raegar’s army. He sat there for a long time, watching as more and more men poured off the ships. Their officers were starting to form them into ranks and they seemed to stretch to the end of the world.
Skylan touched the amulet. “I will fight, Torval. I will fight until death takes me. But I will not win.”
“Skylan…”
He looked up to see Aylaen standing in front of him. He wondered how long she had been there, if she had heard him. The sorrowful look in her eyes told him she had.
“I am sorry, Aylaen,” said Skylan, rising to his feet. “My pride, my arrogance brought us here.”
“Love brought you here,” said Aylaen earnestly, clasping his hands. “Love for our gods, for our people. Whatever is done in love will always triumph.”
Skylan gave a rueful smile. “Someday I hope to be the man you think I am. Come back to the house. I don’t see how we can obtain the spiritbone, but we have to try. Our only chance is to summon the Great Dragon Ilyrion.”
“I have been talking things over with Owl Mother and we have a plan,” Aylaen said. “You’re not going to like it, for it means we must part, for a little while at least.”
She spoke with a catch in her voice and he noticed that she kept her eyes averted.
“You are right,” he said. “I don’t like it.”
She raised her eyes to meet his. “Hear the idea first. I will stay here with Owl Mother. She will take me to the spiritbone.”
Skylan shook his head. “Owl Mother told me the spiritbone is guarded by powerful magicks. Only the Lords of the Storm can remove them and one of those lords is the traitor.”
“So we will let him remove them,” said Aylaen. “Owl Mother says that when the magical gate opens, the Stormlords will surrender and Raegar will enter the city in triumph. Baldev will take him to the spiritbone. Once Baldev removes the spells, Owl Mother and I can steal the spiritbone.”
“Raegar will come after you,” said Skylan.
“Not if his fleet is in peril,” said Aylaen.
Doom of the Dragon Page 28
