Isabelle closed her eyes. “You brought down the tower.”
“And then he burned Aurous’s brains out,” Aisling said. “It wasn’t pretty, but it did the job.”
“I appreciated not having to climb all the stairs that the tower must have contained,” Calene said. “It’s been a tiring couple days, you know?”
“Five minutes,” Cyrus said, calling back over his little force. “Then we’re off to the Realm of Storms.” He looked at Isabelle. “Will you be coming with us?”
Isabelle let out an exasperated sigh. “I suppose. Why not?”
“Because you value your life?” Terian asked.
“I assured you that you would die in the Realm of Winter,” Isabelle said, looking directly at the Sovereign. “Since you didn’t … I assume you’ll come through this as well, and probably with a story about how you sunk Tempestus’s ship to the bottom of his stormy seas.”
“I probably won’t do that,” Cyrus said, and when she cocked her head at him, he went on. “I assume Tempestus can either swim or, failing that, cast the Falcon’s Essence spell.”
“Wouldn’t it be hilarious if he couldn’t swim?” Terian mused. “To watch the God of Storms floundering about in the water, casting around for something to grab on to? And it’d make our task that much easier …”
“I wouldn’t bet my hoard of gold on it,” Cyrus said, “but yeah … that’d be a laugh.” If I felt like laughing, he thought.
Zarnn brushed against Cyrus with the back of his palm, rustling Cyrus’s vambraces and tinkling the metal against the chain mail beneath. “Lord Davidon?” the troll rumbled.
Cyrus looked back to see Zarnn with the reins to his savanna cat in hand, stroking its whiskered face as he stared down. “Yes, Zarnn?”
“Should we bring rest of the Brotherhood with us? Lord Fortin left them to defend Emerald Fields.”
“No, I think not,” Cyrus said. “The last remainder of Sanctuary is there as well, aren’t they?”
“Aye,” Zarnn said. “And the portal closed.”
Cyrus frowned. “How would we even get to …? Oh.” Then he remembered the precautions they’d taken, setting up a regular check-in ring with wizards and druids to several major portals, while keeping their souls bound at Emerald Fields. “The chain.”
Zarnn nodded. “Would work. Could bring more army with us.”
“I want them where they are,” Cyrus said. “For the same purpose I left that army at Pharesia—the world of mortals is not safe, and Emerald Fields is especially unsafe should the portal open or they be left undefended. We’ll leave the rest of the Brotherhood in place.”
“Aye,” Zarnn said, and padded off, leading his cat away, stroking its fur. Cyrus watched with mild amazement. They really did tame those things somehow … He looked down and caught a glimpse of black liquid being left behind with each step, incomplete pawprints made in godly blood.
“Hello,” Cora’s soft voice came from Cyrus’s elbow, and he turned to see the enchanter standing there, her blue cloak wrapped tightly around her as against the subterranean chill. “How are you faring, Cyrus?”
Cyrus stared back at her for a long moment. “Oh, are we going to do this now?”
A hint of uncertainty flashed across the elf’s face. “Are we going to do what now?”
“This,” Cyrus said, pointing back and forth between the two of them. “This expression of concern from you, the inevitable reply that, ‘Oh, I’m fine,’ from me. That whole thing.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, surveying him carefully. “You’re not fine, are you?”
“I’m leading sixteen people into battle against the gods,” Cyrus said. “Why would I not be fine?”
“You are joking, aren’t you?”
“Less of a joke, more of a sarcastic understatement,” Cyrus said. “Whatever is happening within me pales in comparison to the events happening around me, so I’m going to ignore my own feelings for a little longer.”
“That’s not healthy,” she said, standing very still.
“You know what’s not healthy?” Cyrus asked. “Being lied to.” His gaze flitted to Quinneria, lurking a little ways back next to Mendicant, conversing with the goblin but her eyes firmly upon Cyrus. “You knew my mother was alive.”
“Of course,” Cora said. “But that wasn’t my secret to tell, and she had very good reasons for not divulging it.” The elven enchantress gestured around them. “As you can see.”
“As I can see what?” Cyrus snapped.
“She feared this,” Cora said. “The full anger of the gods awakened against mortal life.”
Cyrus fixed on Quinneria, who was still looking at him. “She knew this might happen?”
“She knows more about the pantheon and its workings than anyone other than Curatio or Alaric,” Cora said. “She studied them once she pierced the veil of heresy—after all, once you’ve crossed the line of heresy, why not go all out?”
“I knew she was aware of things that others weren’t,” Cyrus said, beckoning to Quinneria, “but I didn’t realize she knew that much about these … creatures.”
Quinneria detached herself from her conversation with Mendicant and made her way over with no haste. When she reached them, she said, “The look on your face suggests that I’m about to feel the wrath of the Lord of Perdamun.”
Cyrus grimaced in irritation and looked away, fixing his eyes on a point in the distance where the ceiling curved in a circle that ringed the room. “Well, Mother, you would know.”
“I would,” she said. “So. What is on your mind?” She did not smile, but she looked to Cora and received a supportive stroke on the arm in return.
“How much do you know about what the gods are doing right now?” Cyrus asked.
“About their specific plan for the moment and how it will unfold over the next hours? Very little. About their general plan, as relates to their history?” She shook her head. “All too much, but you’ve already heard the gist of it from the lips of Aurous.”
Cyrus stayed the desire to lash out with cutting words. “What can you tell me?”
“If history holds, they mean to reduce the population of Arkaria to near zero,” Quinneria said. “To start over again with the land in a purer state. I imagine they won’t stop there, either; they’ll likely carry that wrath at least as far as Amti. They’ll want to make sure that the next time a people rise up, they have a better chance of ensuring that it happens without … extraneous influence, such as Alaric, Curatio, or the book that taught me what I learned about all things heretical. They will wipe out every sign of our passage the way that the ancients were wiped out.” She looked rather resigned. “But again, you already knew that, didn’t you?”
“Aurous said that they were watching us,” Cyrus said, feeling a twist of emotion in his chest. “As though we provoked them somehow into this action by our mere strength.”
“I imagine there was a triggering point, yes,” Quinneria said. “They were content to allow us to live under their graces until such time as we became a threat.” She looked sideways, and Cyrus followed her gaze to where Mendicant stood, red spell energies dancing between his fingers as his glassy eyes watched the light dance. “And we are clearly a threat to them now.”
“Clearly,” Cyrus said, “since we keep killing them.” He thought back to the first moments after they’d killed Mortus. “Was that why Alaric nearly took my head off after the Realm of Death?”
“Yes,” she said. “It’s also why he tried to keep you from killing any of the other gods. You see, he took the punishment for Mortus upon himself—”
“The punishment?” Cyrus wheeled round on her.
“Oh, another secret revealed,” Cora said under her breath.
“Yes,” Quinneria said after a moment’s hesitation. “He surrendered to them under the Endless Bridge, I imagine, and they carried him away from there.”
“Where is he now?” Cyrus asked, his eyes afire, leaning forward.
; “I don’t know where they imprisoned him,” she said, shaking her head. “If I knew, I would have told you, especially since there’s no reason now not to free him, if we could. He is most likely in the realm of some god—though which, I have no idea.”
“If you had to guess—” Cyrus began.
“I couldn’t,” she said. “Terrgenden or Vidara might know, but I don’t. I had meant to ask them, but events rather spun out of control quickly …”
“Indeed,” Cora said quietly. “It is hard to believe that only a day has passed since the fall of Sanctuary and the death of …” Her voice trailed off. “Well, so many, I suppose.”
Cyrus ran a hand over his face. “Yes. So many.” He dug the tips of his gauntlet into his brow, scratching even though there was no itch. His forehead was tight, as though his face had become a mask carved of stone.
Vara dead. More missing … I don’t even know how many aren’t accounted for.
And, of course, Vaste left …
Now the gods are aiming to wipe out every living thing on the soils of Arkaria. “This is all so familiar,” Cyrus muttered, searching his memory. “Heh,” he said once the answer came to him.
“What was that?” Cora asked.
“A bitter laugh,” Quinneria said.
“It only serves to irritate me when you subtly remind me how well you know me,” Cyrus said, taking his hand from his forehead and catching a brief look of contrition from his mother. “I was recalling to mind the Dragonlord, and how he schemed to escape his prison so that he could scorch the lands of Arkaria into a new kingdom for him to rule.”
“Indeed,” Cora said cautiously. “It was good that you stopped him.” She seemed to be treading lightly, worried that perhaps he was going to lash out at her.
He took a breath. “I’ll be fine, Cora.” She looked quickly to Quinneria, whose face was a mask of its own. “Or perhaps I won’t, but it doesn’t matter at the moment.” He raised his voice, speaking now to the last sixteen people who followed him. “Time’s up. On your feet.” He pointed toward the portal. “It’s time to go into the storm.”
36.
Alaric
On the day after I was inducted, with little ceremony, into the House of Garaunt, I found myself in a considerably more trying position than I’d experienced since my early days in the Coliseum. Raised an ignorant, weakling prince, I had naturally found myself attracted to strength, at least as I conceived of it. Having that conception of strength ripped away in northern Syloreas, I had now redefined it, and was positioning myself as close to my new definition as I could.
But if I thought what I had done before was difficult, fighting my fellows and that butcher Curatio in the middle of an arena of cheering Protanians, the task that Chavoron had set before me this day was surely set to exceed those bounds, and not in a small measure.
“You will come with me to the cabinet meeting this morning,” Chavoron said, lounging on the dual padded chair in the corner of his expansive quarters at the top of the tower that would eventually become the Reikonos Citadel. He did not look up at me as he spoke, his attention on a book in his lap, his eyes scrolling over it carefully. “You will listen and learn.”
“Will the meeting be conducted in the human language?” I asked, wary.
“No,” Chavoron said, glancing up from his book with amusement. “This is where you start to make yourself useful. The first step will be learning our language so that you can communicate with the people you’re supposed to help me influence into believing your race is more than a spectacle on the level of a trained goat.”
I gritted my teeth a little, not so much for the insult to my race but the insult to me personally. “I’ve never learned another language before.”
“Then this is the perfect time to broaden your horizons,” he said, back to his book. “And you will have help.”
“Help?” I asked, and as if in answer, a knock sounded at the door.
“Come!” Chavoron called, and the door at the bottom of the stairs opened soundlessly to reveal Rin, wearing his full armor, but lacking his sword. When he turned after closing the door, I could see the look on his face was one of tight displeasure under a mask of failing neutrality.
“First Citizen,” Rin said, holding back his disdain with careful intonation. He looked at me and did not try so hard, clearly resentful of his new mission in life. “Alaric Garaunt.” He nodded to me with curt respect, and his irritation faded as I assumed he got himself under control.
“I am pleased you are here,” Chavoron said, thumping his book closed, a silk strand holding his place in the center. I had never seen anything quite like that before; most of the time, when I saw someone reading, they would simply leave their book open so as not to lose their place, though books were not a widespread thing in Luukessia. In Enrant Monge, the richest keep that ruled the entire land, we had perhaps twenty, though the numbers were gradually increasing. “Now, we can go.”
“The others are already arriving.” Rin nodded dutifully as he informed Chavoron of this. “The doors to the chambers were open and I could see them piling in around the table.”
“Very good,” Chavoron said with a thoughtful nod, his eyes fixed on the distance. “Come along, then.” And he was in motion, energetic and alive, down the stairs with his hands clasped behind his back once more.
Rin nodded to the stairs, indicating I should go first. I did, following a few steps behind Chavoron.
We descended in a spiral down two floors; the first, I had been informed, was living quarters for the cabinet members who lived here. When we reached the second floor down, I saw double doors opened wide, and a table within an expansive room. It was a long, stone table, with a head seat at the far end, its tall back stretching up higher than my head, and shadowed by the sunlight flooding in through the glass doors behind it.
No one stood as Chavoron entered the room. I frowned, trying to think of what would happen if my father had entered a council and someone had not stood in respect. I could not recall such a thing ever happening. The insult would have been unthinkable.
“I see we’re nearly assembled,” Chavoron said, halting at the head of the table. He looked toward the door, clearly anticipating my arrival, and I did not disappoint him by straggling. I joined him at the head of the table, and he pointed to a place at his shoulder. I stood there, just behind him. Rin took up position on the other side of him, just to the left of his shoulder. Chavoron looked at me and then made a gesture to encompass the filled table before him. “This is the cabinet.”
The table was long, seats pulled up on each side. Almost all of them were filled, and every face in the room was turned to look at us. They were, naturally, all blue. Some—predominantly on the right side of the table—were smiling. Others, mostly on the left, looked furiously angry, their scowls needing no translation.
“You see the divide,” Chavoron said under his breath. “There was a time when the seats were unallocated, when no one sat in a certain place. But as time has passed, this has happened, and now there is one side of the table against the other.” He looked away, toward the smiling and scowling faces in front of us. “I sometimes think a round table would be better.”
I saw a familiar face, down and a little to the left, amid the scowling faction, his gaze fixed upon me. It took me a moment to recognize him. His features were thin and filled with resentment. He was tapping his long fingers on the table irritably.
“Grenaday,” Chavoron said, looking right at him. “Perhaps you’d do the rest of us a favor and refrain.”
Grenaday glanced down at his fingers and stopped tapping. He did not, however, seem to take the instruction happily; his scowl got worse.
The woman to Chavoron’s immediate left, looking coldly furious, broke into a few sentences in Protanian. I listened, understanding nothing, but saw the chorus of nods on her side of the table as she drew her statement to a close.
The Protanian man to Chavoron’s immediate right stood up. He wa
s young and wore armor unlike any I’d seen thus far. To my surprise, he spoke in my language. “I, for one, see no problem with conducting our meeting in such a way as to make our guest feel welcome.” He turned and nodded to me with something like respect. “Blessings be unto you, Alaric of House Garaunt.”
“Thank you,” I said, meeting his gaze and finding it something just short of electric. He had a square jaw, and dark hair that flowed over his brow into a small whorl. He had classically handsome looks, and the way he stood told me a great deal about how he viewed the world—it was his challenge, but one he was ready to meet head-on. He looked to Chavoron’s right and found Rin, giving him a nod. “It is good to see you as well, kinsman.”
Rin’s lips puckered before he spoke. “And you as well, Timmas.”
A man down the table in emerald green robes stood and burst out angrily in Protanian, filling the air with words I did not understand. He did not stop after one statement, but instead seemed to be launching into a tirade in his own language, gesturing floridly, and then pounding the table before seeming to switch tacks.
“Step back,” Chavoron said under his breath, waving for Rin and I to move away. We did, and he seated himself, listening all the while to the yelling man. When he had finished tucking his chair under the table, Chavoron said quietly, “Mathurin, enlighten Alaric as to what is going on.”
Rin looked over at me, half our faces hidden from the table by Chavoron’s high-backed chair. Rin was now back to neutral, his apparent anger at the handsome young man under control. “The—” he pronounced a word that seemed rather lovely and flowing, but that I did not know, “—which is akin to the minister of farming, or cultivation, in your language, is on something of a tirade.”
“I noted that much,” I said.
The minister of farming came to a halt and sat to the applause of those on his side, the sound of their clapping echoing through the chamber. “Forgive me,” Rin said, clearly not asking for forgiveness, “if I assumed you knew less than you do. It seemed a reasonable conclusion to come to, with you being newly out of the slave camp.” He looked at me with icy regard in those red irises, and a slight smile curving one corner of his mouth.
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