We’d kill – or die – for one another.
Like a jealous step-brother, the Raithin Mawrn connived unceasingly to overthrow or undermine our nation’s roots. They raided across our common border stealing horses, cattle, women and a pig or ten. Their suicidal raids constantly blew up villages, roadways, civilians, or the passing patrol. They died while believing in their country’s superiority, yet they simply died. Would they didn’t take ours with them.
Patriots, they called themselves. Terrorists, we called them. We Atani ferreted them out, killed or executed them, comforted the victims of their plots. Until now, no member of the royal family ever came in contact with these rats. Our spilled blood ensured it.
As I stalked forward at Malik’s right shoulder, I stiffened my spine into severe military precision, and pondered what it meant to be Atani. Loyal to none save the King and the order. Willing to kill or be killed for the same. Finding no wife or mate fit enough to withstand the rigors of life with an Atan. Never regretting the offspring we’d never see.
As a child, I ever challenged my Shifting talents, and grew high in my Clan’s estimation. I practiced my art, studying the anatomy of all creatures, and used my imagination when I had no other recourse. Most Shifters needed time to focus on the object or creature they wished to change into, and the change emerged over a period of several seconds. Unlike my Clan, I changed forms in an instant and constantly learned how to mold my body into anything at all. Many tried to imitate me, and their attempts never failed to make me laugh.
At the ripe old age of ten, I killed my first Raithin Mawrn. A wild fanatic with a hand-held bomb threatened to blow up the five children he’d roped to himself. He’d lit the fuse and it grew shorter by the second. The parents of the children screamed in panic as army soldiers and Atani sought to convince him that his demands would be met should he merely pinch the tiny flame.
I don’t recall his ultimatum, only his leering, fish-belly white face and drooling, gaping mouth. I changed myself into a black adder and slithered, unseen, behind him. My fangs in his foot surprised him into dropping his bomb. It fell from his fingers amid the legs of the crying, frightened children. Before it struck the ground and exploded, I changed, instantaneously, into a falcon. Catching the bomb on the fly, I lifted it, winging hard, wheeling, over the heads of the soldiers and watching crowd, the spark hissing balefully as the flame burned the fuse. I had perhaps ten, maybe twelve seconds. If I was lucky.
Fortunately, I knew the vicinity. I beat hard for a nearby lake, banking over it just as the flame sputtered toward the explosives inside the box. Flinging it as hard as I could toward the water, I folded my wings. Dropping like a stone, I banked hard left and swooped into a nearby thicket of oak trees. With a stout trunk between me and the shattering explosion and cascade of lake water climbing high, I weathered the bomb with only ringing ears and a ruffling of my feathers.
The Raithin Mawrn died under my venom, his skin turning blacker than his soul before his final convulsions killed him. He collapsed in his ropes with the furious parents kicking his corpse and the soldiers cutting free the frightened children. The King, hale and healthy then, rewarded me with a pouch of gold and a pat on the head. The children grew up and are, to this day, my friends.
At the elderly age of fifteen, I passed all the tests and won my right to wear the Death’s Head ring, the Atani symbol. All Atani wore them on their left hands: the toothily grinning human skull with its huge empty eye sockets. The Atani loved symbols: the Death’s Head signified both death for our enemies and life for those we loved.
Even in exile, mine never left my finger.
The years passed as they tended to do. I rose high under Malik’s new command, killed or imprisoned the enemy. I proved my worth and stepped up in rank and his friendship. Worthy of both, the King himself praised my skills. My talents killed or captured the Raithin Mawrn berserkers at a rate unheard of before. I listened to the right gossip and uncovered the feral plots. Many times I changed myself into the most innocuous creatures and disclosed the vicious spies who sought to gain information for their nefarious masters back home.
Ever the exception to the rule, I rose swifter than most and fell harder than anyone. No one in the Atan ever screwed up. Such incompetency was forbidden. In my turn, I cost a dozen Atani their lives through sheer stupidity and my own arrogance. I killed the soldiers under my command and succeeded in turning every Atani brother against me in one swift act. One day I’ll be memorialized in a statue somewhere, I thought. The inscription should read: Do as you are told and absolutely do not do as he did.
My thoughts jangled to a halt as Malik stalked toward the head of the table. As though roped like that long ago fanatic to the children, I strode at his shoulder in perfect lock-step. The inhabitants of his command center instantly snapped to attention. Faces front as though they stared straight ahead, I felt their eyes slide sideways toward me. I heard their thoughts, their surprise, and their condemnation: What the bloody hell is he doing here?
At the head of Malik’s huge conference table, Padraig’al’amar’dar bowed his head over his clenched fist thumped against his bare chest. Malik’s First Lieutenant, and my replacement as second-in-command, Padraig saluted his Lord Captain Commander. A Centaur of Malik’s high bloodline, Padraig’s equine body was the color of rich mahogany, his legs, tail and shaggy hair as black as midnight. Four perfect white stockings rose halfway to his knees. He stepped into my boots the instant I departed with my Atan brother’s enmity like hot breath on my neck. Of all, Padraig stood the most to lose upon my return. He’d dare not kill me, not openly at least. His dark eyes followed me as he withdrew from the reports he’d been perusing.
“My Lord Captain,” he said, his hooves echoing hollowly against the tile despite the crowded room. His fingers flicked parchment toward Malik. “These reports are the latest intel from our watchers. Something has happened.”
Malik arrived at the head of the table, with me still held tight to him by that invisible rope. He frowned down at the reports Padraig indicated. “Indeed,” he murmured.
He picked up a parchment and read, his dark eyes flicking back and forth. He chose to read for himself the latest news rather than be informed by his subordinates. He dropped that particular report, only to pick up another. The skin over his tight cheeks darkened, telling me the news was anything but good. Malik kept his emotions in check, yet I read his face as easily as he read the reports. Malik wasn’t happy. And when Malik wasn’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.
I waited, patient, my arms behind my back, at ease, waiting for him to finish. I surveyed the room without appearing to, my eyes slightly lowered. Most present watched me rather than their supreme commander, lips tightened. Those with beaks rather than lips parted them as watchful eyes regarded me with curiosity or resentment or a weird combination of both. I felt no welcome, no gratitude, yet I also felt little hostility.
I concentrated. Expanding what little magic talent I owned, I touched the room’s occupants. Most regarded me with a neutral curiosity, much as one might expect from visitors viewing a zoo exhibit. Many soldiers present I didn’t know, nor did they know me. They’d only heard of my exploits. And regarded me much as they might that selfsame zoo critter. Those who did know me – I felt much condemnation, yet no open animosity, no desire to flay me alive.
Before I could probe further, Padraig eyed me sidelong and scowled, as though he knew I tested the room. Before I could lift my lip in a sneer, informing him of what I thought of his knowledge, Malik stirred. He sighed, and looked up, his dark face bland and devoid of expression.
“How inappropriate,” he murmured. I knew he didn’t speak of the reports.
Padraig stiffened and looked anywhere but at me. The condemning eyes studied boots, the table and each other. For myself, I breathed deep and released my magic. I resumed my military bearing and stared straight ahead, pretending Padraig and his animosity didn’t exist.
Malik’s command cente
r was just that. Half the size of Caer Bannog’s parade grounds, his oblong-shaped, high-walled audience chamber could easily fit twenty-plus Centaurs. High-pillared perches provided room for almost thirty Griffins, and yet could also comfortably accommodate a troop of Minotaurs and humans. A special chair at the head of the grand conference table allowed the King to attend these meetings in comfort.
Two Minotaur guards flanked the huge doors onto the great central garden where serving girls laughed and filled their pitchers from the fundamental fountain. Hemmed in by high walls and guarded by all the kingdom’s myriad species on its ramparts, the courtyard’s jungle garden hosted lush and towering plant-life, singing birds, and an escaped monkey or three. These defenses provided plenty of privacy for the commander who wished for the spying eavesdropper’s hearing and the lip-reader’s eyes to fail utterly.
Flanking the table stood a trio of Centaur sergeants, two commanders of human cavalry, and three Griffin flight leaders. Clan Chieftain of the mighty Minotaur nation in his purple and white tunic, tan breeches, and twin swords belted to his broad hips, Ba’al’amawer stood at Padraig’s right hand. His emblem of the Eastern Sun rising in splendor marked each shoulder as cloak clasps, his dark scarlet mantle falling to his booted heels. He too, saluted formally as did the Minotaur guards at the huge teak doors inlaid with gold that led to the garden beyond.
I caught the eye of Lieutenant Cian, a member of my own Einion’nalad Clan, and raised a slight smile. We both stood close in blood to our own Clan Chief, and played together as children. A tall Shifter with reddish-blonde hair that fell well past his shoulders, his pale skin contrasted sharply with his dark brown eyes. Slender, almost to the point of emaciation, he owned strong broad shoulders. Wearing a black tunic with the Death’s Head symbol on each shoulder, and black breeches; his dark gold cloak fell to his spurs. He stood behind Ba’al’amawer and his Minotaur guard, his expression neutral, and his eyes dark and hooded. Alarm bells rang inside my head when he didn’t return my smile. He stared at me, his face in shadow, and his hands clasped behind his back as he stood at military ease. Only the clasp at his cloak, the Tiger’s Eye emblem of the Clan, gleamed under the light.
Malik’s attention shifted to a folded message, doubled upon itself as though held within a tight claw. Unrolling it, he read quickly, his shadowed eyes flicking back and forth. Malik’s frown turned into a dangerous scowl. He glanced up and gazed down the long table.
“They’ve stopped? Why?”
Padraig flipped yet another parchment though his fingers. “We believe, my Lord Captain, that our Princess Iyumi has fallen ill.”
Malik’s eyes narrowed. “Ill?”
“This is what our spies in place tell us,” Ba’al’amawer replied with the calm the Minotaurs were famous for. Despite their close relationship to bulls, Minotaurs seldom acted out of anger, passion or sheer joy. Slow to anger, slow to laugh, and also slow to act with haste or without thought, the Minotaur presence in the Atan prevented many impulsive acts against the Raithin scum. Had they not preached, and enforced, peace and logic, we Atani might well have killed ourselves in our haste to slaughter the hated beserkers.
“The Raithin Mawrn idiots dare not move for fear of harming her. She lies in a faint within caverns as they sought refuge within, and they’ve sent desperate messages home.”
“Home? How?”
“Birds, my Lord Captain. Messenger pigeons.”
“I see.”
“I have begged the services of Queen X’an’ada, asked that her Faeries kill these birds before they reach their destination.”
“Good luck with that,” Malik replied. “You know the Faeries hate killing things.”
“They also hold She Who Hears in high regard,” Ba’al’amawer said. “They wish her home as much as we do.”
“Uh, huh.” Malik’s gaze dropped to the table. He flicked through the parchments, one after the other, his hands and eyes never still.
“Why was she abducted in the first place?”
My question dropped among them like an Raithin Mawrn bomb. Silence descended with a thud as all eyes swiveled toward me. Shock reverberated throughout, as though I’d blasphemed rather than ask a question.
Malik raised his right hand. “I haven’t taken the time to explain to First Captain Vanyar the circumstances regarding the princess’s abduction. He hasn’t yet been briefed.”
Under the guarded silence, Malik picked up a quill and fiddled with it for a long moment. He made a notation on the parchment with a frown, and glanced up. “Lieutenant Padraig, I trust you’ve briefed the rest of the staff?”
“Indeed, my Lord Captain. All stand ready.”
“Good.” Malik made another notation on his report.
“What haven’t you told me?” I demanded.
“The child’s been born,” Malik said, returning his gaze to his table, his fingers fiddling with his quill. His pen scritched a brief notation, and the sound shrieked across my nerve endings.
“I see,” I replied, my tone neutral. Inwardly, I sagged. Oh, gods.
I saw indeed. The child prophesied centuries ago, and awaited with both fierce eagerness and terrible dread by both countries. The child blessed by the gods that would bring together the split countries, Bryn’Cairdhans and Raithin Mawr, as one nation again. Magic, non-magic, human, non-human – all bonded under one flag, one brotherhood, one king. I remembered the prophecy, having often read it in ancient manuscripts during my school days.
From the north the red will rise,
Under her wings grace shall fall.
Seek ye the child of innocence,
The holy defender, the chosen of the light,
Of purity born, of blood she seeks.
By north and by south,
Brothers not of blood, but of bond, bear the flame,
Under the dark and the light, the shadow will rise.
Three cycles shall pass
From the dark side of the moon.
By fire and steel, magic falters,
Kissed by fate, by fate answered
When the moon and the sun
Are joined as one,
From tears of strife, from the bitter ashes,
From sorrow and from rage
That what was once parted
Shall again be one.
The Raithin Mawrn feared, and hated, our powers of magic. Those of us who walked like men but shifted shape into anything at all both confused and terrified them. In a land of humans only, parents told their children tales of bloodshed and murder in the night by Minotaurs. Their belief that Griffins flew in search of unborn babes to devour, ripping them from their mothers’ wombs, answered all their superstitious questions. Our Centaurs and Shape-Shifters, and even the laughing Faeries, were evil, vomited from hell to plague their nation.
As a land that fostered magic and encouraged its growth, we accepted the half-bred as brothers. The Centaurs, the Minotaurs and the Griffins worked alongside humans as equals, intelligent beings with talents and magic powers alongside our own. Shape-Shifters, the Einion’nalad Clan, were granted the gods-given strength to control and shift our own shapes. The Faeries, the giggling children of the gods, brought light and laughter to our beloved country.
The Raithin Mawrn envisioned our destruction. We hoped and prayed for peace. They saw the prophetic child as the sign the end of Bryn’Cairdha drew nigh. We saw the child as our salvation and our truth. The Raithin Mawrn believed the child’s birth brought about the destruction of Bryn’Cairdha, the end to magic and permit the Raithin Mawrn to overrun our beloved lands. We saw it as an end to the neverending war and terror.
Stirring from my reverie, I glanced up. “That’s why they took her. She knows where the child is.”
Malik straightened slowly. His hooded eyes met mine as he nodded, his right hand still marking a spot on his map. “Of course, Princess Iyumi will refuse to divulge the child’s location. The Raithin Mawrn will do anything to get their hands upon it.”
&
nbsp; “Do we even know what species the child is?”
As the Atani council waited, a smile rose to Malik’s eyes and no further. “Her Highness knows, certainly.”
“But she didn’t tell anyone.”
Malik grimaced. “Unfortunately, Her Royal Highness rode out with only a pair of guards for protection.”
“Why?”
“She, um –”
“Malik.”
He straightened and took his hand from his map. “She thought to find the child through secrecy and stealth, bring it back here before anyone knew of its birth.”
“What happened?”
“Somehow, the Raithin Mawrn knew and sent a secret patrol of their own. They set their trap and she bumbled into it. They took her.”
“How in the name of all the gods could that happen?” I asked, my fury rising. “We’re supposed to protect her. We dropped the ball on our most sacred duty?”
“You’d know more about that than any of us.”
The anonymous voice filled the silence my words left behind. I clenched my fists, searching for the owner of the voice. Buttresses high and wide held up a vast ceiling, and encouraged a hall that echoed. Sounds bounced off clay tiles and discouraged eavesdroppers. Thus voices tended to resonate from everywhere and anywhere. As crowded as the room was, I couldn’t discern who spoke. I only determined that its source was human. Since Griffin voices had a singular pitch and nothing could imitate a Minotaur’s deep rumble, I knew a human voice when I heard it. However, many humans crowded Malik’s command center.
“Chill, bro,” Malik muttered, his eyes still lowered as though he perused report after report, his hands never still. “It’s all good.”
“It’s hardly –”
The Unforgiven Page 6
