Bones of the Empire

by Jim Galford

  Walking up to him, Mairlee touched his forehead gently. “Do you want to remember? It is a part of you. Even pain gives strength.”

  Estin wanted to pull away, to slap her hand aside. Instead, he found himself mumbling, “I do.”

  Mairlee closed her eyes, and a warmth spread through her touch. Almost immediately, Estin found himself lost in what felt to be a daydream that would not end, no matter how he tried to force himself to look away. It was as real as living it, despite the feeling that it was a long-lost memory.

  He lay huddled in his blankets, hiding in the small side room where his parents had tried to get him to sleep for the day. His father was gone, to where Estin could not be certain. He had been too young to know what his father did to provide for them. All he knew was that his father was away.

  A crash of a door opening set the tone of the memory, and Estin instinctively tried to get out of the dream. Unable to hide from the thoughts, he instead hunkered down in his blankets, trembling as one of the first humans he had ever seen rushed into the room. Balding with age and wearing bloodied, torn leather armor, the man went straight for Estin’s mother, who had been napping in a chair and reacted too slowly.

  The man struck his mother, Oalna, across the side of her muzzle with a club, even as Estin buried himself in the blankets, too afraid to watch, yet even more afraid of what might come if he closed his eyes. For years he had thought he had missed the initial exchange, but this time he watched as the man struck his mother over and over with the weapon until she stopped fighting and curled into a ball, trying to hide from the violence.

  She was still alive. That had been the first memory Estin had suppressed. He had always hoped she had died then. He had hoped it even more when he had found out what Liris had done with his parents after leaving the hut.

  The human immediately turned his attention to the rest of the hut, rummaging through the pottery and their few shelves, trying to find anything of value. When Oalna attempted to crawl toward the door—likely to call for help—the man casually struck her again. He hesitated briefly before putting a chain around her neck like a leash, and then he returned to his searching of the small building. More than once, he looked toward Estin, somehow not seeing the tiny wildling in the blankets.

  Screams came to Estin from outside the hut, and now, without the years of having put them aside, he could clearly make out the cries of people he knew, though not by name. There were sounds of a fire nearby, though the shouts and clashes of weapons were far closer. Just outside the wall behind him, he heard a man start to shout something, only to be cut off by a gurgling choke. As an adult, he knew the sound of a man having a sword plunged into his stomach all too well.

  For several more minutes, Estin watched helplessly as his mother was dragged by her neck around the room at the man’s whims. He pocketed trinkets here and there, though the only prize of value he had taken was his mother, who was groaning as he tugged the chain. Estin already knew she would not wake again. That much of the dream was clear.

  It was then that Estin’s father burst into the hut. In Estin’s memories, Theldis was unarmed and helpless as the man beat him to death with the club. This story was entirely different, and yet Estin knew it was truth, untainted by a child’s interpretations and years of trying to forget.

  Theldis was armed, wielding two battered swords the same way Estin did these days. The weapons were bloodied, and Estin realized his father had been fighting outside, trying to get into the hut. The dying choke outside had likely been someone Theldis had killed on his way in. He closed the door of the hut with his long striped tail, locking his eyes onto the human who was dragging his mate around by a chain.

  In Estin’s previous memories, the fight had been over as soon as it started. Now he watched with pride as his father dashed across the room and attacked with speed and skill that Estin had never seen outside of Raeln, his swords dancing and slashing as the human struggled to keep his club up and use the table for cover. Once, twice, the swords cut into the man, forcing him to the wall and making him drop the chain around Oalna’s neck. With the human pinned and a sword tip to his throat, Theldis finally turned to search for Estin, smiling sadly as their gazes met.

  A flicker through the air was the only warning as magic slammed into Theldis, bouncing him off the wall and knocking the swords from his hands. The human reacted immediately, hitting Theldis with his club until he stopped trying to get up.

  Estin had always lost this part of the memories after he had seen his father mouth, “Hide.” It was all a dark blur of waiting as screams continued outside. Now he watched from the blankets as a woman walked into the room to survey the damage.

  Dressed head to toe in black robes, boots, gloves, and a deep hood, she could have been anyone. Estin wanted to believe she was a stranger, someone long gone, though he knew better after his discoveries recently. Odds were that she was someone he knew all too well. The lack of scent was all the confirmation he needed. When she turned his way, Estin was not surprised to see Liris’s face briefly.

  “Is that all of the black-and-white ones?” she asked softly, and the armored man nodded vigorously, tugging the chain. “Drag them both outside and splash water on them until they wake. I want them to look me in the eyes as they die.”

  The human man quickly looped the other end of the chain around Theldis’s neck and dragged the two unconscious wildlings from the hut like so much dead weight. Once he was gone, Liris’s hood turned slowly as she searched the place one last time before following the man outside.

  Estin lay there, trembling, his eyes filled with tears. The dream should end. He always woke at that point. Rarely had he seen more, aside from the sense of having grabbed everything and run. The seconds passed relentlessly as the daylight grew and faded at the open door. Eventually, he could wait no longer, his fear and rumbling belly urging him to get away from his hiding spot.

  Scurrying across the room, Estin had pulled himself up the side of the fireplace to the loose stone where his father had told him things had been left “just in case.” Estin yanked that stone free without thinking, his mind racing with this being exactly the kind of situation his father had warned him about.

  Behind the stone, a tiny bag of money and a rolled-up piece of paper lay. Estin had ignored the paper, but his adult mind knew what it had been. It was a map. Theldis had given him a map that led straight to where Estin’s older sister, Yalla, had gone to live with her mate. It was their escape plan if the village was found, but Estin was too young to understand that. He had ignored the paper and moved on to grab dry bread, some fruit, and other supplies from the hut. Without another thought, he ran, his instincts driving him to move until he either was caught or he found a safe place.

  Estin raced from the hut, expecting pursuit. Instead, the silence gradually worked its way through his fear, slowing him before he reached the edge of the village. Stopping near the broken wood fence that ringed the homes, he looked around, his heart racing as he took in things no child was meant to see.

  Bodies were everywhere. Most were orcs, having died in large groups, clearly fighting as a group to hold their ground. Near them, many humans in armor like the one who had invaded Estin’s home lay in broken heaps. There were wildling corpses every twenty feet or so, of breeds so varied that Estin could not help but think of Lihuan’s village.

  Estin could not make his legs work. He stood there, staring at one body after another. His attention instinctively went to children he had played with. Most of them looked to have been beaten to death with clubs, a slow and brutal death. Some appeared as though they had been ripped apart by animals—something he attributed to Liris immediately.

  Raising his head slightly, Estin saw the rest of the villagers. Every single white-and-black-furred wilding that had inhabited the village was swinging from nooses at the edge of the woods. Many were already dead, their limbs still as they swayed, but a few continued to thrash, trying to free themselves.

  Sittin
g near the long line of hanging wildlings, the black-robed woman was calmly seated on a blanket, watching them die. Around her, the humans she had used as her soldiers lay in bloodied piles. No one was safe from her.

  Estin ran again, this time heading south to get away from Liris and the sight of his parents’ remains swinging in the breeze. He did not make it far before he slid to a stop, voices nearby making him think he had been found. Estin flattened out in the brush, trying to make himself invisible to the people ahead of him.

  “The dark one is following the threads of this world, trying to destroy any of value to you.” A woman’s voice, though Estin could not see her through the trees. “We were too late again. I have lost the breed we thought the prophecies referred to. I doubt I will find another raccoon wildling for a hundred miles in any direction and I am still not convinced that was correct. The wolves are scattered. What do we have left? Perhaps a bovine? I can see the pattern has not been destroyed, but we are losing ground, my friend.”

  A deep growl from the same direction made Estin’s skin prickle and set off a desire to run blindly anywhere he could go. Somehow he managed to keep himself on the ground.

  “I have found a child who will suffice for the other part of the plan,” said a deep voice that sounded as near to a bestial snarl as language could. “She is strong. If what you fear will happen, we will need her. As a precaution, I have a second already serving me by virtue of blood, lest the might of the woods be too much for one mortal to contain.”

  “That—”

  Estin swore he heard sniffing.

  “Do you smell that?”

  The air in front of Estin flickered and darkened, forming into a wolf nearly as large as the hut he had fled. Brilliant purple eyes flared as it looked down on him.

  Screaming, Estin dropped half of what he had been carrying and ran, no longer even sure where he was going. He changed directions often, looking back for any pursuit. The wolf had not come after him.

  With another shriek, Estin slammed into something and fell over backward. Looking up, he saw an old human woman with pointed ears. Estin’s adult mind told him it was an elf, though his child-self had no idea what that meant.

  The grey-haired woman bent down and watched him with a tender expression. “What have we here?” she asked, smiling as she knelt in front of Estin, catching him by the tail when he tried to run. “Calm yourself, child. Do you have a name?”

  Estin’s mouth worked, but no words would come out. He tugged at his tail, trying to get away as panic took over any ability to think clearly. His fear compounded as the wolf floated, rather than walked, into the part of the woods where the strange old woman held him.

  “He is not the one,” the wolf said without moving its jaw. “I may not see the fabric as you do, but he is nothing. He bears the weakness of all mortals. Saving him changes nothing.”

  The woman—Mairlee, Estin slowly realized as his adult thoughts intruded again—pulled Estin to her, despite his struggles. Eyeing him as one might study a fruit that might have gone bad, she smirked. “He is not what we are looking for, but his thread will change others. Some will become stronger and others weaker. He will be the only way your champion will live to see adulthood. It would be a mercy to break his neck right now, and I see much in him that makes me think twice about sparing him. He is not what was prophesied, but he is vital to it happening as we wish.”

  Estin whimpered and curled up as best he could. Trembling, he tried to hide in his own fur from the two creatures studying him.

  “The dark one will find him and crush him as she crushed the others,” the wolf said, snorting as it searched the woods. “She will come for us if we interfere. Our power and time is waning. If we do not find a way to set matters in motion soon, we never will. The time of the gods is nearing an end at this rate. Even if this one can alter the path of fate, I doubt that will be enough.”

  Mairlee picked Estin up despite his attempts to claw and bite at her fingers. He never left a mark. “Child,” she said, turning him so he was facing the wolf. “Tell me what you see.”

  The wolf’s features deepened angrily, but before Estin could scream, an image appeared between him and the creature. Another child, though a bit older than him, stood staring off into the distance, as though not really there with them. She was a fox wildling, her wide blue eyes studying something Estin could not see. The contrast of her white jaw and bright red fur seemed almost hypnotic to Estin.

  “She’s pretty,” Estin managed to eke out before the female vanished and he found himself facing the wolf again.

  The woman turned Estin around to face her, keeping his paws off the ground. “Her kind kill yours, child. Does that not scare you?”

  Estin stared into the woman’s eyes. “You scare me. She’s like me.”

  “You are an odd little creature,” she answered, smiling. “Keep ignoring what your instincts tell you, and you might live long enough to tell her what you thought when you saw her today.”

  Winds picked up around him, making Estin’s head spin, and he squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them, Mairlee was taking her hand away from his head, and the dream was gone.

  Rage came to Estin without him realizing it was there. He screamed, snarling like an animal, and punched the wall of the cave until his hands were numb and covered with blood. Covering his face with his shaking hands, he fought to control the anger.

  “You were not to end up like this,” Mairlee said from behind him. “You were to inspire Feanne to greatness and then die. That was your place. Insrin and Feanne would have struggled as long as they could…and they would have died, as well. Surviving this far was not something I or the Miharon foresaw. Now I find myself changing my plans to aid you.”

  Estin trembled uncontrollably, leaning against the wall to keep from falling. His heart would not stop pounding, trying to escape from his chest. “You…you tricked me…you made me meet Feanne?” Estin managed to squeak out, dropping to the floor. He felt as though his whole world was crumbling. “None of this was real…”

  “All of it was real, Estin,” Mairlee answered, standing over him. “I did not put you two together. I was confirming my suspicions. This was all on the two of you. There is no trick. Your feelings and lives were as genuine as any. Even I cannot create love. As I said, I believed you would be her friend and aid her, but that she and Insrin would be here today.”

  “How can I even know that she loves—”

  Mairlee’s slap laid Estin out on the floor of the cave. “Stop being stupid, Estin. I cannot believe you still worry about such things. You have spent nearly half of your short life with this female, and she has borne your children. Would she had put up with you this long if she didn’t love you beyond any measure I can put to words?”

  “Could you have saved my parents?”

  “Yes. If I had, Feanne would have died before she was eight. You would never have met her.”

  “You know so much about us…the first two kits…”

  “I will not begin to lower myself to determining the bloodlines of mortals, Estin. My own brood have never bothered to ask who their father was. If I will not tell my own children, why would I waste my strength seeking out answers for yours? The patterns of fate are not so…detailed.”

  “If you help me…can I save Feanne?” He got up slowly to his feet.

  “I have no way of knowing. That is up to you. The fabric of this world has changed too much for me to claim any control anymore. I am as bound by it as you are. Promise me something, if we are to do this,” Mairlee said, stepping up to him. She cocked her head slightly, studying him for a moment, the same way she had in the vision. “Promise me that you will not explain what you see here to anyone for as long as you live. They may learn on their own, but I do not want it coming from your mouth first. My people are few, and we must remain hidden if we are to survive after we weaken ourselves aiding you. What I must do to help you will reveal me.”

  “I promise,” Estin said
, standing as tall as he could. With Mairlee’s slightly hunched back, she still was a few inches shorter than him.

  “This may hurt,” she said, placing a wrinkled hand on his chest. “A lot…”

  Before Estin could reply, Mairlee drove her hand through his ribs and into his chest, making his entire body burn. He could not move, his muscles frozen as he felt her fingers tugging not so much at his flesh and blood, but his life itself. As he stared at Mairlee, struggling to take a breath or pull away, a silhouette rose above her, enormous wings unfurling, filling the cave. The last sound Estin heard as his heart stopped was a bestial roar that dwarfed anything he had heard since fleeing Lantonne.

  Chapter Eight

  “Unity”

  “Flank them. Push them back against the valley,” Raeln ordered the Turessian beside him, who looked up at him nervously. “Full push. Give the order and get them moving. Confirm with Ceran before announcing, if the clans require.”

  “Our enemies said they will meet with us for negotiation in two hours,” the man, Lendin, reminded him, rubbing at his tattoos as he tended to when worried Raeln was overstepping his bounds. “This would be an act of war against their clan. It is a dishonorable act, battle leader.”

  Raeln grabbed Lendin—who shuddered at the touch—and turned him around to face a section of woods to the south of their position. Raeln had been watching that spot all afternoon. “What do you see?”

  “Trees,” the man replied, pulling his robe free of Raeln’s grip. “Why do you keep touching me?”

  “It gets your attention. What do you see over those trees?”

  He followed Raeln’s pointing. “Carrion birds.”

  “Carrion birds mean corpses. Watch where those birds go.”

  The man sighed and stared at the woods as the huge flock of birds dipped and circled. Slowly the flock drifted toward the back of the clan’s forces. Every few seconds, some from the flock would dive into the trees, as though swooping in on food. “They’re flanking us,” Lendin said finally, standing straight in surprise. “Rotting ancestors? Are they bringing forces around while we wait to have the meeting of clans? The use of ancestors in war is against all of our traditions.”