The Guardian Stone (The Gods and Kings Chronicles Book 3)

by Lee H. Haywood

  Beside him lay Captain Bently with a blade thrust through his back. He was haughtily garbed in the cloak of a commander. It now served as his death shroud. His whole body was crimson, the fabric sodden with his life blood.

  Evelyn was certain Bently was somehow involved in Waymire’s plot. She had never trusted the captain, and she felt oddly pleased to see that he had received what he deserved. She spit on his body as she passed by.

  She stood over Disias for a moment, weighing whether it was worth it to save the man. Disias had served both her and her uncle well, but in truth he had never worked for anyone other than himself. Still, he had not betrayed her like Waymire did.

  I will make you a queen, he had promised during their flight from Manherm. Evelyn never wanted to be queen. She wanted the Orb. That is why she had existed from the start. That is why King Johan had arranged a marriage between his nephew and a Kari princess. That is why her mother had trained her from the earliest days she could remember. She was raised to be a weapon, but fate had made her little more than a blade with a blunted edge. A lesson, perhaps. I must become as dangerous as the men about me or I will always fail.

  A clattering of hooves resounded at the crest of the hill. There she spied a man atop a gray stallion. His skin was a shade darker than her own, and he wore a long yellow cape and blue steel armor. He held his helmet in the crux of his arm. The helm was wreathed with long blue feathers speckled with green and black.

  He regarded her with eyes that were inky black, just like her own. “I am your uncle, Gurwan Kelig,” said the man, holding his hand to his left breast. “My brother, King Hann, has bid that I bring you home.”

  “Home,” said Evelyn, mouthing the word as if it was a foreign concept. Home was Stone Keep, where the bones of her mother lay interred. Home was Manherm, where she was born and raised. Home was...

  “Go with the Kari prince, Your Grace.”

  Evelyn looked down at her feet and found that Disias’s eyes had opened. He glanced at his stomach, lifting his hand long enough to reveal the bulge of intestine. He grimaced woefully, his fate painted plainly on his face.

  She knelt next to the dying man.

  “You said that I was to sit atop the Throne of Caper.”

  “I have said many foolish things, and have had many foolish dreams,” said Disias. It clearly pained him to speak, yet he did so anyway. “I always imagined a more glamorous death than this. Dying before the walls of Luthuania so that my carcass might be picked over by birds doesn’t sound very fitting, does it?” He smirked in a disarming manner, and for a moment he was once again the kindly and dynamic man who had seen her through the terrors of their flight from Manherm. That seemed so long ago now. She was no longer that person.

  “You never truly believed I would be queen, did you?”

  Ever the sycophant, Disias wove flattery with the harsh truth. “You are beautiful, you are young, you are revered, but you are no queen, Your Grace. The people of Capernicus needed a banner to rally around. So I gave them you.”

  “And what does Capernicus need now?”

  “Someone who can lead.”

  “I am not that person,” said Evelyn, feeling a sudden relief to finally speak aloud the truth she had known all along. “I never wanted the Throne of Caper, Disias. I never wished to lord over men.” She held out her hands, sweeping over the surrounding valley. “This is what men do. And for what?”

  “Freedom, Your Grace.”

  Evelyn scowled. “Then they are fools, all of them. They would trade one despot for another and call themselves free? The necromancer would have been a foul lord, but in truth, how much worse than King Johan? Men die, kings rise and fall, and the world goes on as it ever has.”

  “You are ever so enlightened, Your Grace,” said Disias, without the slightest tinge of sarcasm in his voice.

  “Don’t patronize me,” snapped Evelyn, thoroughly tired of being coddled like a child. “Speak the truth of it, or don’t speak at all.”

  Disias’s face tightened. “Certainty is freedom enough for most men. These conscripts are here because their fief lords demand it. These fief lords are here because their titles are granted by the king. A house of cards, built upon a two-legged table. But one shake, one kink in the Weaver’s web, and it will all come down. Peasants made thralls by a new despot who would call himself king. Fief lords killed in their sleep by the very people they are tasked with lording over.”

  Evelyn envisioned the mob that had descended upon Stone Keep during the plague. She cringed at the thought of what they would have done to her had they been able to wrest her from the safety of her high walls.

  “Uncertainty. That is the terror that haunts the minds of men. A good king does not grant true freedom, a good king guarantees that tomorrow will be much like today. The lord will remain the lord, and the peasants will remain the peasants, and so on and so forth until their end of days. That is the certainty that a good king brings.”

  “And the Royal Guardsmen?” pressed Evelyn, directing Disias’s gaze to Bently’s stiff body. “What certainty do they fight for?”

  “Some men are just honorable,” said Disias. There was a hint of a crack to his voice, and for a moment Evelyn thought she beheld the semblance of genuine emotion. “Few and far between they are, these honorable men, but when you find one, beware. They will die for an ideal. That was our late captain’s error. In some ways Captain Bently was a better man than I, yet it would seem that we are both destined for the same fate.” Disias lowered his head to the ground. He had turned several shades paler in the few minutes they were talking. He gazed askance at his wound, sighing warily at the sight.

  “Let me have a look,” said Evelyn, finding the man pitiable. She took a knee and pulled aside his quivering hand, checking the wound in his stomach. The laceration ran laterally from his bellybutton to his side. A mixture of excrement and blood foamed about the opening. All men die, she thought to herself, yet might this one still serve me? Is it worth it to save his life? Can he ever be trusted?

  She studied his face, trying to discern his true intent.

  Disias looked back undaunted. Perhaps he truly was ready to die. “You were not going to use the Orb to destroy the necromancer, were you?” pressed Disias with sudden pertness.

  Evelyn furrowed her brow. Her desire to possess the Orb had been her secret. None knew it save Waymire and Rancor. She had certainly never told Disias, yet somehow he had figured it out on his own. This didn’t surprise her.

  Disias would often hear news with feigned shock, but the glint in his eyes told of a different truth. The gears of his mind were ever-turning. Her mother had always insisted that a wise man was as dangerous as a stupid one. Wise men do not follow, Calycia Manherm would say. Wise men steer you like the rudder of a ship. Wise men will never truly serve.

  She looked to Disias coolly, having made up her mind. “You are correct, I would not have used the Orb to slay the necromancer,” said Evelyn, unashamed by the stark truth. “I would have let the necromancer enslave all before I purged its energies to destroy him. The necromancer’s dominion would have been a flicker in time. I intended to use the Orb to destroy an evil that counts its damnable existence in eons, not decades.”

  Disias smiled from ear to ear, once again arriving to the correct conclusion. “So we are done with our childish games, I see. Your Grace wishes to be a god killer.”

  “I only exist for one reason. I was to end that which the Guardians started. I have trained day and night so that I can channel the Sundered Soul. I was put upon this earth so that I might one day destroy the evil that lurks. I was put upon this earth to destroy the Shadow. For now I have failed, but just because I do not have the Orb, it does not mean that there isn’t another way.” With each word, Evelyn’s voice rose with growing certainty. “I am the Witch of Stone Keep. I shall kill any man who tries to thwart me. I shall take that which I need. And I shall set the fate of this world. I will become the Weaver embodied.”

&nb
sp; “The Weaver be praised,” said Disias. He raised his hand up toward the heavens, only to recoil as she shoved his entrails back into his body. She sealed his flesh with her frigid touch.

  “You shall praise me,” said Evelyn sternly, her face only inches from Disias’s own.

  Disias nodded dumbly, his mouth hung agape in an almost lustful manner.

  Satisfied, she stood upright, feeling as if she suddenly towered over Disias’s supine body. She turned to the Kari prince who had already collected a pair of horses to bear them away. Evelyn spoke of her fate. “We will accompany you to Karu. There is much that my uncle can provide to serve my need.”

  CHAPTER

  XXIV

  A FATHER’S LEGACY

  The dead were remembered. Each of the peoples of Laveria did so in their own way. The dwarves of Halgath held festivals and competitions in memory of those who had fallen. The elves of Luthuania partook in solemn services, secluded and cloaked in tradition. The lords and captains of Capernicus were laid to rest in great funerary pyres that set the fields before Luthuania aglow in shimmering light. Never again would they seal their dead beneath the ground or in charnel vaults. The bodies of the enemy were set in great heaps and burned until nothing remained, and for a while the land was stained with their soot.

  Desperous watched it all with a certain irreverence. The dead are to be envied, not mourned, thought Desperous. He had tasted a flicker of the afterlife, and now the memory lingered mockingly. He would never possess what these blessed souls were granted in death. He wondered how many of the departed would trade places with him if given the choice. Each night he walked the fields before Luthuania and watched forlornly as the pyres burned. And each night he had to quell the temptation to throw himself into the purifying bath of flames. Bliss does not await me on the other side, he reminded himself. Only the abyssal dark. Only the numbing chill.

  After three days of ceremonies and remembrance, the rains came. As if fated and set with the task of cleansing the land of all its sorrows, the rain fell in a torrent. The plains before Luthuania became awash, and when the clouds finally parted and the sun once again shone brightly in the sky, the filth of war had been swept away. The land was reborn. Desperous’s thirst to join the dead was satiated for now. He had more pressing matters to deal with.

  Throughout these many days, Desperous and Rancor spent most of their time at Nochman’s bedside. Their father was dying, of this everyone was sure. Evelyn Manherm had healed his wounds before she fled, yet something else was drawing Nochman into the afterlife. Perhaps it was the loss of the orb, or a resignation that his purpose had been fulfilled. Either way, he slipped nearer to the end with each passing day. Nochman fought the slow and steady crawl to oblivion, steadfast that he still had knowledge to share with his sons. For six days and nights they sat at his bedside and he told them of his life, his role in the War of Sundering, and his vision of duty and honor that would live on in them.

  As they sat and listened to their father, Desperous watched Rancor, sensing that his brother was waiting. Rancor would not act while Nochman was still alive, but in time he would be ruthless. Desperous had heard rumors that Rancor personally ordered Tulea’s assassination. He had little doubt this was true. Desperous feared the other councilors would hold similar fates if his brother stood unchecked.

  The deaths of Tulea Farsidian and Steflan Vis had thrown all matters of the state into uncertainty. Tulea’s heirs squabbled like vultures over who should succeed her. Riggin Vis had returned to the Teeth to take up the lordship of his father. The few councilors that remained hid themselves from view and met in secret, plotting to retain what meager power they still possessed.

  The Council’s order to imprison Rancor still stood, but there were few remaining who could enforce the edict save Desperous. Desperous ensured that no man acted against Rancor while their father still lived. He would save Nochman that final indignity; let him believe that his legacy will live on in his son. When Nochman finally passed, Desperous would have a difficult decision to make.

  As Nochman’s final hour drew near, he spoke to each of his sons in turn, commanding the other to wait outside his apartment.

  Nochman waited until Rancor shut the door before he spoke. “What fate did the Guardian tell you was in your future?”

  Desperous examined his father’s withered visage trying to decide how much he already knew. Nochman appeared to have aged a hundred years since the day Desperous had set out on his quest to awaken the Guardian. His skin had become pale and wrinkled, as if creased for every joy and sorrow he had ever known. Yet his eyes gleamed keenly; seeing all, knowing all. There was still wisdom within the kingdom of that mind. Desperous shifted his eyes askance, unable to bear his father’s gaze. “Yansarian told me he would not overcome these evils,” he muttered quietly.

  “And did this task fall to you?”

  “I don’t know,” responded Desperous with an ounce of hesitation. He found it difficult to recall anything with certainty from the nightmarish conversation he had held with the Guardian within the recesses of his mind. “It did, or at least I thought it did, but I was not the one who defeated the necromancer, nor did I kill the Wyrm.”

  “If the Wyrm was truly killed at all,” proposed Nochman.

  “The dragoons were scattered, leaderless and without direction,” said Desperous. “The Wyrm is dead.”

  “For the fortune of this land I pray this is true,” said Nochman. He sighed wearily. Every word for him was a struggle. “Without evidence we will never know for certain. What if the Guardian failed? Who will stand against the Wyrm then?”

  “There is not one alive with the strength to do so.”

  “All are mortal, Son. Even the Wyrm, who were proven so in death. But you have something unique.”

  Desperous bowed his head in shame. One son had become a despot, the other an abomination. Desperous had hoped to hide the truth from his father.

  “You have become cold, Son.”

  “And you know why?”

  Nochman smiled. “I do. It is a unique fate. Life without death. To know that your days are not numbered in months or years; what would you do with such a gift?”

  “Is it a gift?” challenged Desperous. “Is this something other men would search for? I did not. Now that it is my own, I do not wish for it.”

  “But all the same, it is yours,” said Nochman. “The Guardian may have had foresight, but that does not mean he could envision how events would unfold. The Guardian might have one fate for you, but you can have your own. In the years to come, great men will rise and fall and you will remain. If it is true that the last of the gods have been destroyed, no others will outlast you. You might serve your own purpose and take up the throne, ruling this land for all eternity as you see fit. This would be your right, not because you are my son, but because you are most deserving of the task. But if our great enemy persists, you will have another fate. You will remember what has been lost to the ages, and you will uphold a standard from a time in which mortal men stood against insurmountable tyranny. You will be the last sentinel of the past, a bulwark against the evil that lurks.”

  Desperous did not respond, but instead sat in silence. He saw in his father’s words a purpose he had not seen for himself. After some time had passed, Nochman motioned toward the door. Desperous kissed his father’s forehead and departed, allowing Rancor to be counseled by their father in private. Desperous never learned what words passed between Nochman and Rancor, but they spoke at great length, and when Rancor departed from the room he looked sullen and weak.

  Nochman passed on to the lands of Elandria later that evening. He died with the hopeful belief that the empire he built was safe, and that the one true enemy was destroyed. As he passed on into the next life, a smile was perched upon his lips. Desperous looked at his father’s peaceful expression with envy and cried.

  In the coming days the armies of Capernicus and Halgath departed for their own lands. The Capernican war trains
moved westward warily, fearing what they might find when they arrived to their homeland to reclaim what was left. Desperous awaited the news with apprehension. With much of Capernicus still occupied by the remains of the dragoon clans, there was no guarantee that the war was through. But fair tidings soon arrived from the west. Most of the cities and towns of Capernicus were liberated. In city after city the same report was heard. A great host of black scurrying creatures had descended upon the city at night and by the coming dawn, there was naught left of the dark children save the butchered corpses of dragoons.

  Only the Nexus remained in the hands of the enemy. The Nexian Order would not willingly surrender that which they had fought a century to possess. The people of Capernicus, distraught and without a sole heir, had greater concerns than to siege a city so staunchly occupied. That task would fall to others.

  A great funerary procession was held for Nochman, father of Luthuania. The people wept en masse, reaching for the passing carriage which bore Nochman’s body through the streets. Nochman was truly loved, Desperous realized, as he walked in the wake of his father’s carriage. But so was Desperous. The people threw flowers before him, creating a carpet of yellow and pink petals for him to walk atop. Rancor received no such reverence from the people. This was not lost on the high lord; the twinges of frustration were broadcast plainly on his brother’s face.

  Rancor longed for acceptance, an acceptance he had fought his entire life to gain; from their father, from the Council, from the people. And how was he repaid? With judgment from their headstrong father, arrest by the Council, and scorn from the masses. Desperous could no longer avoid the conversation. Rancor’s staid veneer was bound to crack, and when it did, he would prove all the more dangerous.

  That evening he tracked Rancor down in his private study. He found his brother in a mercurial state, pacing before the high-backed throne of their household line. Clasped about his neck was the burgundy tri-rays cape that was Desperous’s by birthright. Rancor nervously wrung the fabric in his hands. “I must ask something of you,” began Rancor with a hint of a tremor to his voice. “The Council would have me imprisoned, unjustly so, but they will do nothing now that you have returned. They know you hold the will of the army. I need you to help me reclaim what was unjustly taken from our family.”