by Aaron Hodges
Devon’s hand tightened on kanker’s haft. He stared silently into her stone-grey eyes, seeing the tears shining there. Gone was the hardness, the anger of the woman he’d seen in the citadel. Looking at her now, he could almost, almost bring himself to believe this was the Alana he knew, the Alana he loved.
“Who are you?” he whispered.
She shook her head. “I don’t know.” Her voice cracked. Sinking to her knees, she wrapped her arms around herself. “Why did she sacrifice herself for me?” she asked, looking up at him. “She hated me, and she saved me. Why?”
Before Devon could think about what he was doing, he was on his knees beside her. Kanker lying discarded beside them, he pulled Alana into his arms, hugging her to his chest. “Because that’s who she was,” he mumbled. “That was Enala. She dedicated her entire life to others.”
“I don’t deserve it,” Alana sobbed.
“Maybe none of us do,” he replied, drawing back from her.
Hiccupping, Alana nodded. She seemed to regain some control over herself then, and wiping the tears from her eyes, she stood. Devon rose with her.
“Devon, I’m so, so sorry.” The words came in a rush. “For Kellian, for betraying you, for everything.”
Devon nodded, the hope withering in his chest. “So…you are still that Alana?”
“No…” She trailed off, her gaze distant. “Yes. I’m her, but also…the other girl as well. Both at once, and neither.”
“Not like your brother then,” Devon sighed. Wandering past her, he recovered the poker from where he’d discarded it earlier. He added another log to the fire and stirred the coals. “He loves you, you know. Thinks you’re a good person, whichever version of yourself you are.”
“I—”
Devon slammed the door to the camp stove shut, cutting her off, and then strode across the tent to where she stood. Alana did not shrink away as he towered over her, though her eyes betrayed her doubt.
“He’s a good man, your brother,” he murmured. “I trust him.”
“Then…”
Taking a deep breath, Devon offered his hand. “Why don’t we start over?” he said. “The name’s Devon. It’s nice to meet you…Alana.”
There was a moment’s pause as Alana stared at his outstretched hand. Then, with a hesitant smile, she reached out and took it.
Chapter 25
“Form rank, shields to the front! Archers, nock arrows!”
Merydith’s cry carried down the line as her lieutenants passed along her orders. The rattle of metal echoed from the cliffs as her men shifted into position. The horses had already been taken further up the pass with the bulk of the army, but Merydith had remained with the rearguard. After the loss of Damyn and his cohort, she couldn’t bring herself to entrust the task to anyone else.
Not for the first time in the past few days, the weight of grief pressed down on Merydith’s shoulders. She swallowed it back, unwilling to give in, to admit to her own weakness. The loss of her childhood friend had hit her hard, but worse still was the effect on morale. For a few brief, golden hours, the Northland army had celebrated their triumph on the Gods Road, but their elation had turned to ash when word reached them of the disaster that had befallen Damyn’s cohort.
Astride his monstrous Red Dragon, the Tsar had come, and slaughtered them all. Without the northern Magickers to protect them, Damyn’s forces had never stood a chance. Her scouts reported his cohort had been slaughtered to a man—though not before the Tsar had had his fun.
A fresh wave of grief swept through Merydith. Clenching her sword hilt, she drew the blade and lifted it above her head.
“For Northland!” Her cry carried down the line, echoing loudly from the cliffs that rose towering above them.
Striding to the front of the line, Merydith looked down on the forces arrayed before them. In their plated armour and cloaks of scarlet and emerald, the army below looked for all the world like their ancestors before them—champions of freedom, defenders of the weak, defiant in the face of evil. She couldn’t begin to understand how the once noble lands of the south had become so corrupted.
Yet even as her own nation grew from infancy to adulthood, the Tsar had led the Three Nations into darkness. Now he led them against Northland, and it rested on her to champion the cause of freedom.
“We hold them here!” she shouted.
Even as she spoke, Merydith tasted the bitter tang of despair. The men and women around her knew this wasn’t the plan. After their attack on the advanced guard, they were meant to lead the Tsar and his forces on a merry chase through northern Lonia. Damyn was to have rejoined them, and if his attack on the wagons had been successful, they were to retreat to Northland. Without his supplies, the Tsar could not have followed, not while winter still gripped the lands of the north.
But the Tsar had saved his wagons, and sent a cohort of his own north to cut them off from their homeland. With the bulk of his forces to the east and south of them, Merydith had been left with no other options but to forge a path into the Sandstone Mountains.
Now, far from home and with only a week’s supplies remaining, their sole hope was to find a pass through to Trola and their allies there. Yet the Sandstone Mountains were a maze, made up of a thousand gullies and hillsides so steep that not even the mountain goats could scale some of them. Without a map, it would take days for her scouts to find a path through.
Until then, all Merydith could do was pray they did not encounter a dead end. Her rear guard could not hold back the Tsar’s forces long, only slow his advance. And while Helen and her Magickers had joined their powers to keep the Tsar from attacking them directly, they had nothing left to use against the thousands who marched against them.
Movement came from the men at the bottom of the canyon as their lines shifted, parting to make way for a single man. Merydith watched in astonishment as the distant figure staggered forward, half-tripping on the uneven ground. He wore little more than a loincloth, and his limbs were so emaciated she wondered how he could stand. Bruises marked his chest, where his ribcage stood out starkly against his pale skin.
Only as he neared did Merydith finally recognise him. A cry tore from her throat as Damyn dropped to a knee, his face stretched with exhaustion. His moans carried up the valley to the watching army, and stumbling back to his feet, he continued towards them, eyes wide, mouth gasping.
Merydith stood frozen in place, unable to believe the change that had been wrought on her friend in just a matter of days. There was little left of the man she’d sent to raid the Trolan supplies. Only a shadow remained of him.
As he neared the Northland army, his cry came again. Tearing herself from her shock, Merydith ran to him. He started to fall, but she caught him and lifted him into her arms. Shocked by how little he weighed, she turned and strode back towards her soldiers. Men and women parted wordlessly as she staggered past, then closed together in silence behind her.
Reaching the final ranks of the rear guard, Merydith caught herself. Taking a breath, she looked back. Her people needed her; she could not abandon them to tend to Damyn, not now, with the enemy so close.
Stones crunched as Mokyre appeared alongside her. She closed her eyes, unable to summon the strength to face the man just then. His position amongst the clans had demanded she name him captain, but she’d had little patience for him since the meeting with the other clan leaders.
“Take him,” he murmured. Merydith looked at him sharply as Mokyre went on. “He needs you. Don’t worry, I’ll handle the bastards down there.”
Merydith stared at the man, seeing the rage in his eyes as he looked at Damyn. Whatever their differences might be, Mokyre was a Northlander. What the Tsar had done to their people, what he had done to Damyn, was an affront to everything they believed in. Mokyre might not have wanted to go to war against the Tsar, but now that he had joined the battle, he would fight to the end for his nation.
Letting out a long breath, Merydith nodded. “Make them pay.”
With that, she turned and started up the valley. From behind her she heard the rhythmic thump of marching boots as the Tsar’s army advanced. Mokrye’s voice rang out in answer, ordering the archers to draw. The twang of bowstrings was followed by the whistling of arrows, then the screams of dying men rose from the valley below.
The first clashes of steel sounded as Merydith reached her tent and carried Damyn inside. Her stretcher was unmade but she laid him down over the twisted sheets, ignoring the stains his wounds left on her bedding.
“Your Majesty, is everything okay?” a voice called from the entrance to the tent.
Merydith turned, recognising the speaker. “Helen, what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be with the others, holding off the Tsar?”
The Magicker nodded. “I wanted to check on things when I heard the battle begin. Then I saw you with…Damyn…” She trailed off as her eyes were drawn to the broken body of her friend. “Gods, what did they do to him?”
“I don’t know,” Merydith whispered. Away from the eyes of her people, she felt the beginnings of tears. She sucked in a deep breath. “Can you help me?” she asked in a rush.
Helen closed her eyes for the count of ten, and then nodded. “They can cope without my strength, for the moment.” She moved to stand beside the bed. “But he may be beyond even my powers to help.”
“Just do what you can,” Merydith replied. It had been so long since Enala had departed, she had already given the woman up for dead. But she couldn’t cope with losing Damyn as well, not now, not like this.
Crouching beside the camp-stretcher, Helen held her hands out towards the captain. Green light spread from her fingers. Where it touched Damyn’s emaciated body, he groaned, his face scrunching tight, though he did not wake. Merydith sat alongside the woman and stroked her friend’s forehead, whispering quiet reassurances.
Behold the fate of your people, Queen.
Merydith flinched as the words whispered in her ear, the voice as clear as if it had been spoken out loud. She spun, her sword slashing the air behind her, but there was nothing there. Laughter taunted her, seeming to come from all around her. Fear wrapped around Merydith’s gut as the voice continued.
Every man, every woman, every child who stands against me will suffer thus. Your Magickers will not keep me from them. Even now they falter. I will crush them and burn your army from my land. I will take you and any who survive and make you my prisoners, to suffer like the good captain has suffered. And I will march into your lands and put an end to your rebellion. Northland will be returned to wasteland, as it was always destined to be.
“What do you want?” Merydith groaned.
Bow, Queen, the voice whispered. Bow to your Tsar. Hand over your renegade Magickers, and you and your people may live.
Merydith’s eyes were drawn to the hunched form of Helen. Light still seeped from her hands, and she did not seem to have heard the voice whispering through the tent. A knife twisted in Merydith’s gut at the thought of betraying the kindly woman, and yet…
Images entered her mind, of her people entombed in the tunnels of Erachill, of the northern steeps burning, and the screams of a million voices ringing out across her land. The clash of steel came again from beyond the walls of her tent, the cries of the dying. Her head bowed beneath the weight of her responsibility.
Then Enala’s face flickered into her mind, and she remembered how the old woman had stood against the darkness of Archon, even when all hope seemed lost. No matter how dark things became, she and her brother and the man, Gabriel, had never backed down.
Opening her eyes, Merydith saw a dark fog coalescing before her. Slowly the shape of a man took form, vague and indistinct, and yet unmistakable. The Tsar watched her with ghostly eyes for a long time before he spoke again. This time, his voice rang loudly though the tent, instead of within her own mind.
“What is your decision, Queen?”
Merydith drew herself up and faced the phantom. “I will defy you to my dying breath,” she spat.
“So be it.” The phantom raised his hands.
Merydith flinched, but beside her Helen staggered to her feet. Terror showed on her face, but her eyes glowed with power. Raising her arms, she cried out.
“Brothers, sisters, on me!”
Light flashed across the tent, and a spiralling vortex of multicoloured magic descended on the woman. It gathered around Helen for half a second, and then rushed from her at the spectre. The air crackled as it sliced through the tent and a cry rang out, followed by a dull boom. Darkness swallowed the room as all the lanterns flickered out, followed by absolute silence.
Staggering sideways, Merydith squinted through the gloom. The dark canvas blacked out the daylight, but as her eyes adjusted she saw the Tsar had vanished, and Helen on her knees. Heart in her throat, she stepped toward the Magicker. Groaning, the Magicker rose slowly back to her feet. A frown touched the woman’s face as she looked away, but a smile replaced it as her eyes alighted on Merydith.
“You’re okay. Thank the Gods.”
Merydith nodded. Suddenly weary, she sat on the stretcher beside Damyn. “I thought you said the others could cope without you.”
Helen smiled sheepishly. “I guess not.”
A voice called to them from beyond the walls of the tent, and then light spilled inside as someone lifted the flap. “Your Majesty!” One of her guards stood there, his face the picture of concern. “Is everything okay? We heard shouting.”
Merydith nodded. “Fetch some fresh lanterns, Marcus.” The guard nodded and darkness returned to the tent as he departed. Turning her attention to her friend, Merydith reached out and touched his throat. His pulse was erratic but strong. “Is he okay?” she asked the Magicker.
The smile fell from Helen’s face. “I’ve done what I can. Whether he lives is up to him now.”
“Thank you, Helen. For everything.” She hesitated. “What was that before, when the light appeared?”
“Something very dangerous,” the Magicker replied. “While none of us are powerful enough to threaten the Tsar alone, we have been able to combine our magics in a spell, one that keeps the Tsar from entering our camp. Mostly. But just then, when we forced him out, our power needed to be directed. For just a moment, I was its vessel.”
“And that’s dangerous?”
“If I’d held it a second longer, the force would have torn me to pieces.”
Merydith sighed. “So you’re saying you couldn’t send it against that army down there?”
“I might, though not in the form you just saw. But even if we could manage it, such a feat would cripple us all. It would leave every man and woman here exposed to the Tsar’s power.” She gestured at Damyn. “And we have seen what he is capable of.”
Ice slid down Merydith spine as she nodded. “Very well,” she murmured. “Thank you again, Helen, for everything you’ve done. You should return to the others now, before he tries anything else.”
“What about you?” the Magicker whispered, rising to her feet.
Merydith looked down at Damyn. “I will stay with him.”
Helen nodded. “May the Gods be with you, my Queen.”
Then she was gone, leaving Merydith alone with the man who had stood at her side since she was just a child. Looking at his withered body, she finally allowed her grief to show. Tears burned her eyes as she stroked his cheek.
“Come back to me, Damyn,” she said. “I forbid you to die.”
Outside, the sounds of battle finally faded away, and silence descended on the tent.
Chapter 26
Braidon sat in the darkness staring out over the valley, listening as soft voices carried up from the Baronians gathered below. Their campfires glistened in the moonlight, the flicker of movement betraying the chaos of the camp. Where he was sitting though, the world was at peace. He could almost forget the world was at war, that his father was even now leading an invasion of Northland, or that an elite group of soldiers were hunting him.<
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In his mind, Braidon pictured the warrior Queen Merydith, and wondered where she was now. The woman wasn’t one to sit idly by while her people were attacked, and he hoped she would be ready when his father came for her. She had put her trust in Enala and himself to finish the Tsar, but now that they had failed, Northlands fate was in her hands. Though how she could hope to succeed, he couldn’t begin to imagine. The Three Nations were too powerful, the Tsar unstoppable.
And now Enala was gone.
He scrunched his eyes closed and shivered as he saw again Enala fall, cut down by his father’s sword.
“Her own son,” Braidon whispered, still struggling to come to terms with it all.
While he had learned the truth in Ardath, he’d never had the chance to ask his grandmother about their past, about anything. He wondered now who his grandfather had been, and why Enala had kept herself away from them all this time.
His heart ached for the old woman, but while she had shown him kindness, had protected him and taught him to use his magic, he still could not picture her as his grandmother. There was a gap, a great canyon between the images in his mind, one he could not span. Not now that she was gone.
Sadness touched him as he thought of Merydith. It was the Northland Queen who had truly known the old woman. Enala had helped to raise her, had truly been a grandmother to the woman. Braidon swallowed at the thought of having to tell her the truth, that the old woman was gone. He feared it might break her, after their last conversation in Erachill.
You have outgrown me, girl.
He smiled as he recalled Enala’s last words to the Queen. However much the news hurt, Enala had had faith in the woman. Merydith would not break, not when the fate of her nation was at stake.
