Trail of Pyres

by L. James Rice

  In the hall of statues stood a table seated for two, and two women (both taller than Solineus) carried golden trays to the table and a man bore a crystal flagon that looked to hold enough wine to make a dozen men rise with hangovers the next day.

  Rinold’s slap to his back rocked Solineus. “I don’t care what Solineus says, I like you, Touched.”

  “Ha ha! You entertain me, Squirrel. Feast, sleep, we will have talk with the Edan when he arrives.”

  Rinold jumped into a chair, sitting as a child whose feet didn’t reach the floor, but he didn’t give a whistle. Solineus wasn’t so eager. “Inslok won’t be pleased with his treatment.”

  “Pah!” The Touched leaned over him, and Solineus found it impossible to stare into just one eye, so his gaze flicked from blue to brown and back. “What’s time to an Edan?”

  Solineus watched as the Touched strode down the hall toward the coffin’s chamber, and only when the being disappeared did he take a seat.

  “The food’s good?”

  “I wasn’t gonna gripe none about the Edan’s cured venison, the way the meal warmed the bones, but… This sings on the tongue.” The Squirrel licked his lips. “What d’you make of that shit out there? What he did to Inslok, not even the Daevu… What the hells are we dealing with?”

  All Solineus managed was a shrug as he stared at the man’s twitching face. The Touched claimed to be a mortal man, or so Solineus interpreted, but he’d become something more. But what? Could a mortal become a god? Did a god steal his mortal form? He shrugged a second time. “He’s something we haven’t conceived of yet.”

  “Aye, two shits for sure of that. And now, burn me to the Forges, man, I figured on this tomb being the most peculiar place I’d ever see the first time around. Living people? The tomb intact? The pillars and lights?”

  “Lelishen said time didn’t flow straight here, that’s about all we can make of anything. We’ll just have to see what time tomorrow brings.” He forked a slice of what he figured fowl of one breed or another, dipped it in glaze and popped it in his mouth. Sweet orange and ginger brought a smile. “But until then, I reckon we deserve food and a night’s sleep. But watch the wine.”

  The Squirrel tipped his goblet. “Three cups no more, maybe four.” He paused. “Shits, I’m startin’ to talk like the bastard.”

  32

  Star Walk

  The Swallow’s tail swallowed,

  the tailless Tiger’s belly burps fed,

  his missing tail the Gorilla’s belt,

  from the Monkey’s tail dangles man dead,

  swing song sing song from a furry noose.

  –Tomes of the Touched

  Eliles spent several candles a day for the next several weeks testing several theories in Skywatch with several failures. Which meant Artus spent the same number of candles with her, grousing most times. They’d walked the perimeter of the invisible dome a dozen times, walked every square finger of open space hoping to run into something, figuratively or literally, then walked it all again waving staves above their heads. They chucked the staves as high as they could and never struck a thing.

  Nothing.

  She’d call it a waste of time, but pursuing Skywatch’s mystery kept her mind off the boy’s body, and the fact they might share an island with a murderer. That, and the pesky fact that plants weren’t growing. If nothing else, Skywatch was a spectacular distraction from her woes, but something in her gut told her this place could help solve her problems.

  All their circling, pacing, knocking, and throwing things led up to today: Artus brought a recurve bow and a quiver of arrows after launching a shaft into the outdoor sky and letting Eliles count how long until it hit the ground. She made it to twenty-two, and now they stood staring at the night sky with an arrow nocked in his bow.

  “You ready, girl?”

  Eliles stretched her neck and leaned back. “Loose.”

  The bow twanged with a peculiar reverberating thrum beneath this mystic sky, and both waited with eyes heavenward.

  Eliles fidgeted. “Seven, eight. This better not get one of us killed.”

  “Don’t worry none, I put her up there with a little angle.”

  “And if it ricochets off the ceiling?” His feet shuffled a muffled tune, but he stood his ground in silence.

  When she hit eighteen, his fingers drummed his hip, and she wasn’t so sure she should’ve trusted the man’s aim. Her heart beat faster, faster. “Twenty-two.”

  Her shoulders scrunched, eyes pinched tight. Nothing hit.

  “Where’s yer count at, girl?”

  “Twenty-eight.”

  He turned. “I don’t think the damned thing’s comin’ down, stuck it in the ceiling, a beam or something.”

  The arrow struck four steps from his feet with a high-pitched musical clatter and they both ducked, banging their heads. They stood straight, both laughing.

  Her hysterical guffaw trailed into a chuckle, then died with the revelation. “No ceiling. It hit nothing and was up there longer than outside.”

  Artus wiped a tear from his eye as his humor faded. “Well, that ain’t no joke. How the hell’s is that possible? I mean, it looks that way… but I never godsdamn figured on it.”

  She nodded. “If it’s open high, there’s no reason it couldn’t be open wide.”

  “Exceptin’ we can walk over and play a knuckle symphony on the wall.”

  “Put that arrow up about fifteen feet above the ground, see what happens.”

  He snagged the arrow from the floor and held it up. The steel tip was a degree of crooked. “That’s some hard floor, right there.” He nocked and let fly, and in a flicker it struck a gong before rattling to finish its song.

  They strolled to the wall, their feet playing complimentary tunes, and grabbed the arrow. “So, we got walls but no ceilin’. Fascinating, but don’t do us no whisper of good.”

  She shook her head. “No, something’s out there, we just need to find it.”

  “If’n you say so, I’ll stick with your instincts, but it’s got me stumped if you’re right.” His brow scrunched; he must’ve recognized the look on her face. “Mind if I go read on grapes while you sit here and ponder?”

  She grinned. “You hid that book from Jinbin, didn’t you?”

  “Bet yer lovely eyes, I did. Once you get them plants to growin’, I’m the one making wine, not that watered-down-piss-sippin’—”

  “Tut tut! Go on, read, just leave me the bow and arrows.”

  He held the recurve out. “That’s there’s a strong draw girl, think you can handle it?” She stared at him. “Right. Don’t mind me, the whiskey’s done my wits in over the years.” He grinned as he unclipped the quiver from his hip and handed it to her.

  “I’ll fetch you from the library when I leave.”

  He hit the stairs and spiraled in descent. “Aye! Don’t forget me down there.”

  Eliles sighed, sat, and later lay on her back with the quiver beneath her head. Boiled leather was more comfortable than bare Latcu.

  She battered her brain for further references to the Gate of Shooting Stars, but couldn’t dredge up a one that seemed to matter. What she recalled from the Book of Iote was more vague in her memory than she’d like. King Priest Esreriun walked the starry road, entering through the shower of stars, falling stars? He followed his path true, avoiding the Twelve Hells, until he found his way to the Conqueror Heaven, where Sol resurrected him as a chosen warrior and prophet.

  The details had seeped out of her mind soon after learning the tale; book study wasn’t something she ever enjoyed.

  She laid there for half a candle before the moon rose. “Time passes here, but it’s an illusion… maybe. Rumor spoke of…” So many things she’d heard and assumed exaggerative banter turned out to be true, maybe this too was more literal than she’d ever dreamed. She tapped the Latchu floor, and as its ring faded a suspicion jumped into her mind. One of the books in the library was entitled: Elinwe Show me the Way, but it
s pages bore no relation to the title, from what she’d read. “Rumor spoke of the oracles studying the stars of the past, visions of the past.”

  She jumped to her feet, pinning her stare on the Fire Lion. She should pray, but she feared her words and sentiment would ring hollow. But hells, it wasn’t as if the gods had ever listened before. She bowed her head. “Elinwe, I beseech your guidance.” A warmth slid down the nape of her neck, down her spine, slow and thick like blood rather than water, and she blinked. “Elinwe?” She’d never felt the power of prayer, and couldn’t be certain this sensation was it. Whatever it was, it was power. “Elinwe, show me the way to this year’s Eve of Snows.” Nothing happened, and her inner voice berated her foolishness, but she shut its yap with a thought. In the holy tongue. She repeated the words in Old Silone.

  The shift was subtle; if she hadn’t anticipated the move, she would’ve missed its blur. The Eye once again sat in the Fire Lion constellation, and a gasp escaped her lungs. “Elinwe, show me the way to now.” The stars realigned in a blink.

  If I knew the day Esreriun died I might find the Gate of Shooting Stars. Then something else occurred to her. “Elinwe, show me the way to Ivin Choerkin.” Nothing happened. “Elinwe, show me the way to Ivin Choerkin yesterday.”

  The universe spun, and she tumbled to her knees, striking hard, fighting the urge to vomit from the sudden shift. She panted, licked her lips, and raised her eyes. Distant and faint in the stars she saw a city larger than she’d ever known with massive towers and walls spanning horizons. It made sense only if it was a Tek city. “Are you there? Somewhere?”

  Who else? “Elinwe, show me Solineus Mikjehemlut yesterday.” The stars shifted and rolled, and this time she stayed on her knees to stay steady. She saw nothing but stars until she turned to face northeast. A frozen waste and a cloud resting in a bowl. “The Steaming Lakes?”

  Laughter erupted around her, pinpricks covering her body as it echoed. “I told you we’d speak again.”

  “Holy hells!” She leaped to her feet, the power in the voice reminiscent of Lord Priest Ulrikt, but when she spun, she gazed at a giant of a man with an eye of blue and an eye of brown. Gaunt and handsome, his smile was playful.

  “Oh! Dame of Fire, a name earned in turn and turn and turn of the stars until unlearned.”

  “Touched? How are you here?”

  He strode across the stars without a song sounding with his steps. “Do you hear? Or do you not hear? I am not here, not really, even if I can do this.” He stopped in front of her and jabbed her forehead.

  She rubbed her brow. “You sure feel here.”

  “I am more here than not here, but still not quite here. Confused yet?”

  “How could I not be?”

  “Indeed!”

  She walked around him, poked him the back.

  “I am ticklish if you must know… when I have flesh; death, bones, no one ever bothered try to tickle my bones. Maybe try that another time?”

  Her mind whirled with the implications. “I can come to these stars and talk to you any time?”

  “Good thought, bad thought, and I confess a sorrowful answer of no. To see me, you would need my name given, not earned. Maybe? Maybe not, but either way, no.”

  “But I could just speak of this day, Solineus—”

  “Not so, no, and no longer. Today he is still near, but I fear, tomorrow or day the next, or in flickers flicking in flickers, his reality will no longer linger, and I will no longer bear the flesh to speak, to walk with you in the stars.”

  “So he’s still close?”

  He sighed, exasperated. “It is what I said. But not in the time you are now. Or is he? These things are predictably uncertain. The skeins of time and space weave, and leave us speaking, guessing as to the why and how.”

  “Why did he return to the Steaming Lakes?”

  His eyes rolled, lips twisted. “Because I am irresistible! He has returned before and will return again, just as we will speak more, now and before.” He laughed, slapped her back in mirth so hard she stumbled. “Why did you seek him?”

  “I… It was the second name that came to me.”

  “As much time as we have to waste, I won’t. Ha ha! No. Only this will I say… He will pass your way, though not this day, or the last day? Or whichever day, but he will pass someday soon. Sooner if you call the yapping, tramping, howlers who drag the rails.”

  It took her a handful of flickers before she put it together. “Zjin? How?”

  “You are a clever girl in a whirl of stars, this is an answer you yourself may find. I traipse and pace awaiting questions more a challenge to face.” And yet he stood stone still.

  She grinned, feeling devilish. “Fine. How many years ago did Esreriun die?”

  “Ha ha! What use have you for a blowhard dead and struck low for lo so many years?”

  “The Gate of Shooting Stars.”

  He nodded and smiled, finger waggling. “You seek the secret of the Starry Road, the brilliant stepping stones to the Seven Heavens. Clever girl. You think and thought to test my wisdom, but I know precisely of his death as it was by hand mine.”

  “You killed the King Priest?”

  “Must I repeat myself so? But shhh! Don’t tell him, I don’t want him to see me coming the murderous time next.”

  “The Book of Iote doesn’t mention murder, but battle.”

  “Semantics, my dear, and no one ever knew the face of the blade nor the hand it wields, until you, now, here… where only you will hear, no audience, no tome, no tomb, no ink and quill. It is a thing only mentioned once and never again, except in the eternal and infinite repetition.”

  She struggled to accept that the man she was speaking to killed one of the most famous leaders of the Church in a time… “How many years ago, then? If it was your hand as you say.”

  “I know precisely when I killed him, but I don’t know precisely when I speak to you, now, understand? My hand, bloody, did kill, but the grave did his body never fill. He was a duck-witted fool and arrogant to a fault before he died, his soul returned was unbearable and no brighter. Ha ha! Oh, I miss my stenographer, that was beautiful!”

  “It’s been five hundred and two years since the Great Forgetting.”

  “And the First Forgetting, the Rending, before that but for how long? I killed him on the fifth of Kelevra by the Edan Calendar you know, in the year eighteen hundred and seventy-three, by Edan reckoning they’ve forgotten, four ninety-five by others, seven seventy-two by another. And in twenty-five ninety-four by time given by a peculiar and particular people as the Luxukoni, and their bastardized Edan calendar, using the count of the First Dragons. You see how I do not know? Time is not so simple for its reality to be kept in a thimble.”

  She rubbed her eyes. “A guess? Some scholars put the Age of Warlords at five hundred years.”

  “A millennium from then and then to now and now, give or take a century or two. Ha ha! Just to reach the First… I will guess thirteen to sixteen hundred years past, but it is a blind cast searching for an unhungry fish.”

  “Fine, fine. The Shower of Stars, was it visible in the living sky, or only by the dead?”

  “Now the clever girl gets cleverer… more clever… Hack and spit the line to sever. Sorry, my mind went elsewhere, no fair. I bloodied my hand, and the stars did fall, loosed from bows in the sky in a hurry, a flurry. Beautiful to behold and yet winter cold, they said the universe wept his passing but showers come and go centuries over, it was coincidence, I proclaim to you, oh Dame. The Fire Lion burned not so different as whatever now this is, and there, to the northwest, over the Heart of Januel, did rain the Shower of Stars. Find this, and you find your answer.”

  “I need more clues… I could sit her months—”

  “My time runs short amid my eternity, if you’ve a better question ask now. I feel your friend drawing too far away.”

  “I saw a great eye blanketing out the stars, what was it?”

  The Touched triangled his
hands at their fingertips and stared. Solemn. And his typical banter faded to the cadence of a normal man. “You’ve seen the eye?”

  “I have. Whose eye?”

  “She has returned. She has noticed you. Only she may say her name. Accept the honor with humility, my sister.”

  He disappeared in a blink as if never there.

  “What the Twelve Hells… he talks normal and makes less sense.” But the Touched left her more bones to chew than she started with, even if leaving her in the dark regarding the eye.

  She nocked an arrow and gave the bow’s string a tug. Artus didn’t lie about the bow’s power, but with a thought the Sliver of Star lent her strength and she sent it sailing over the Heart of Januel. The wall rang low, followed by the floor’s clattering chimes. She giggled at her own optimism; it would never be so easy.

  With bow in hand and the quiver at her hip, she meandered to the stair, defeated again by the speckles in the night. She tugged the stair’s step, and a door opened in the floor, less than a foot from her toes.

  She leaned over its opening. “Artus!” She waited a dozen flickers. “Artus!” But there wasn’t an answer. Lanterns burned below and she stepped on the stairs ducking to see. No one.

  She climbed back up the treads with hasty steps, she wasn’t in no mood to get trapped in a library today. Artus must not have gone to the library… but then, why were the lanterns lit?

  The door closed.

  33

  One World Twice

  Celebrate the sedate, immolate, one day, imitate.

  What folly your father brought upon your jolly,

  Dying as he did.

  He never meant to bring you tears,

  never meant to Unleash your Fears.

  There, there, child, patting your shoulder so you slept,