A death of silence …
The moment lengthened, threatening to consume them utterly, when shattering the silence came a triumphant cry: “I am I!” The resounding blare leapt from Braethen’s lips, erupting into the pall like the dawn, and sending shivers of hope down Tahn’s back. The spell broken, Mira yanked him forward, and up they raced. He realized, with a sudden sense of dread, that she was taking him toward Tillinghast.
As they sped over star shadows and stone, Tahn looked back over his shoulder at the scene unfolding at the rim of the pass. Wendra’s head bobbed as she retreated and tried to force audible tones from her injured throat. He wondered if this would be the last time he would ever see her, and wished he had tried to speak to her again. Grant and Braethen danced in close to Zephora, attempting to use their dual attack to confuse and cripple the Quietgiven. With a casual pass of his hand, Zephora sent them both skidding across the rough ground like scarecrows ravaged in an autumn gale.
Vendanj spared a look up the mountain at Tahn before calmly lowering one palm earthward and splaying his other fingers over his breast. In the next moment, the rock itself seemed to come to life and lick at Zephora with shard tongues and clutch toward him with indifferent fists. One lashed the Given’s chest before Zephora went to one knee and drove a bony hand into the hard soil. With frightening speed, the earth took on a deathly pallor that began to spread around them.
Tahn and Mira swept over the rise and found level ground as behind them the world lit in an explosion of darkness as searing and painful as live coals. The concussion thrust them forward, driving Tahn to the ground. The blast echoed past them in long, diminishing waves, leaving in its wake an emptiness that he thought might have claimed the shrieks and suffering of friends. Tahn heard only his own labored breathing, and the sound of his boots grinding against Saeculorum gravel as he followed the Far toward Restoration.
The sky above shone darkly, revealing every star Tahn had ever looked at long enough to fix in his memory. He’d hoped to have time to consider Vendanj’s words, consider everything that led him to this moment. All his thoughts clouded in his mind, and were finally pierced by the sound of footsteps, far down the mountain, climbing in pursuit with a steady, purposeful rhythm. Perhaps Vendanj … perhaps not. Tahn fought to climb faster, pushing the Far to quicken the pace.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT
Rudierd Tillinghast
Sweat drenched Tahn, stinging his eyes. The higher they crept, the tighter his chest felt, the pressure causing him to gasp. Deep breaths sent piercing pains through his body.
But up they climbed.
Twice Tahn looked back and saw nothing. But, holding his breath for a moment, he could hear the continued steps down the rocky way.
With renewed determination, he attacked the path, sliding in behind Mira as they forged through dense mountain brambles. At times, the steep pitch of the mountain made it seem like they ran up walls; the Far’s sure steps showed Tahn where to place his feet. The sound of his own heart pulsed in his head, behind his eyes, and in his wrists. He did not ever remember being so aware of the flow of his own life’s blood, and yet feeling so close to his own final earth.
Rushing after Mira up a steep leftward jag, he thought of his Hollows friends, Sutter, Braethen, and Wendra, and felt a pang of mourning. Surely the dark explosion had seared them utterly, claiming the lives of them all. In that instant, his concentration lapsed and he missed a step, crashing down and slipping toward the edge on loosened dirt and flat stones. He clutched at dry grass and sharp, buried rocks that ripped at his hands, tearing rough wounds in them.
His legs and chest slid over the edge of the path, dangling in the emptiness that cut away a hundred feet to a spray of jagged rock. Hanging by his hands, he stared up past the mountain at the sky, flooded with bright stars that blurred in his vision. He hadn’t the breath even to scream, and could feel his hands weakening.
He smiled, finding irony in failing this way after coming so far, after all the expectations he was supposed to meet at Tillinghast. He slipped closer to disaster. Mustering the reserves of his strength, he fought the momentum and tried to pull himself back up. He’d almost gotten his legs up over the edge when he dropped back again, hanging again by his hands … and he was losing his strength. Then one hand slipped. A weak moan escaped his lips.
Where is the tragedy in this? he thought, turning his gaze downward toward his imminent fall. My family is gone, as are my friends. And I cannot endure another day. I am not who they hope I am. Could I not simply have lived out my life in the Hollows? I would have been content.
As he began to slip farther, he was not sure that his fall was entirely due to weak hands.
From above, a hand flashed down and took hold of his arm before his fingers could give out. His head lolling back, he saw the furrowed brow of the Far. Her hair hung down around her face, but Tahn thought he saw something new in her eyes. She took Tahn’s wrist with her other hand and hauled him up in one powerful effort. He sat a moment, the wind stirring his hair, and tried to gather enough breath to thank her. Before he could say anything, she put his bow in his hand and helped him to his feet. As she nodded and resumed their climb, the resolve in her features rivaled the Sheason’s.
He cast a look backward over several tight switchbacks, and caught a flash of a dark figure gaining ground. His mind shouted a warning and he raced after Mira.
As the slope began to level off, the air began to thicken with mist, streaming as though with the onset of a storm. Moving forward through it, Tahn suddenly became aware of his skin. As he and Mira ran, the mists parted, coursing smoothly over his forehead, cheeks, and the backs of his hands. Unsure how, Tahn thought it felt as though these clouds were sentient. His skin came alive at their touch, communing with the ethereal element independent of his own thoughts. The mists thickened, reducing visibility and slowing their pace.
Mira paused, appearing to get her bearings. Standing together in the dense mist with the rasp of leaves stirring around them, Mira grabbed Tahn’s shoulder and thrust him forward, falling in a half-stride behind.
Then, out of the mists, a low ridge appeared. They headed directly toward it, angling for a break to their right. They passed through the rim of black rock which let out abruptly on a few strides of soft loam before a sheer cliff fell away to nothingness.
Mira stopped. “Tillinghast.”
The mist roiled in slow patterns, turning back on itself and folding endlessly together. Looking skyward, Tahn could see more of the same, though thinner. Beyond the ledge, the mist thickened to obscurity. He took a tentative step, and his foot sank into the rich-smelling soil. He looked at his sunken boot, then peered right along the cliff to where he could see the vague silhouette of one cloudwood rising at the edge of the land. Its roots grew partially into the abyss, twisting down into the clouds like bony, scrabbling fingers. The tree disappeared up into the mist, its top lost completely to view. At its base, a single branch lay fallen as though broken away in a storm.
He looked once at Mira, whose eyes shone with confidence.
Then Tahn crept toward the ledge, desiring to look down, his boots tracking deep in the loam. Halfway to the edge, he heard Mira draw her swords, and turned to see Zephora ease from the rim of rock. The mists parted around his black cloak as though in aversion.
The Quiet disregarded Mira, looking past her to Tahn. “Quillescent.”
Mira did not wait. With blinding speed, she set upon the Draethmorte, her blades slicing through the fog so quickly that it did not stir at their passing. Several blows appeared to land directly on the creature, but Zephora did not flinch, the insult of a blade apparently of no consequence to his flesh. Mira sprang back, landing in a defensive posture.
Tahn could not see clearly, but whatever rents or marks Mira’s attack had made seemed to have healed themselves.
“Your destiny is larger than the race of men allows, Quillescent.” The Draethmorte’s words rang darkly. “You are more
than they know. Their arrogance and greed have opened a way to put right the abominations of the First Ones. You can be the deliverer, and erase ages of neglect and cruelty.”
“His words are all lies, Tahn,” Mira shouted. “Absurdities meant to confuse you. Give no heed to words that make darkness light and light dark. The trick of the Artificer is to lead you gently first, before tightening shackles that unmind you forever.”
With a slight gesture, Zephora shoved a burst of dark light that took Mira full in the chest and hurled her to the very edge of Tillinghast.
“She can be yours, too, Tahn,” Zephora said in a silken tone. “In the protective hollow of the Quiet’s hand, you’ll have restored to you only what you wish, and you’ll be endowed in all the ways you could desire: memory, power, security. You may, Quillescent, even undo things you have done. Does there remain any act you wish you could take back? This is true power, the offering I make to you. It is not villainy, Tahn.”
Zephora’s use of his name unnerved him.
He relaxed his grip on his bow. “Why does the order fear you, then? What have they to lose?” he asked the Draethmorte.
Mira groaned, struggling to get up, but Tahn focused on the cloaked form.
“Their own power, their own control.” Zephora took a casual step toward Tahn. “It has always been so. Your histories are incomplete, and they tell a flawed version of accounts which demonize all those trapped within the Bourne.”
“Bar’dyn have sought my life, forced me to leave my home … they claimed the life of my sister’s child! And you speak as though you are the casualties! Mira is right, you merely seek to deceive me!”
With more ire Zephora explained, “We have not sought your life, Quillescent. Though it were better that you die than have you give your gifts to those who would use them to confirm and sustain our abandonment.”
Better that you die … They were words Tahn had heard now from both sides of this hateful conflict.
“In ignorance, you are filled with hatred and fear. Do not let it be so. I can supply you with answers, and open all the world to you.” Zephora’s voice deepened, resounding in the very loam beneath Tahn’s feet. He drew back his cowl to reveal a skeletal face. The skin might have parted with a smile. “Or I can end at Tillinghast forever the life that never belonged to you.”
Uncontrollable shivers wracked Tahn. Through them he struggled to ask, “Why do you call me Quillescent?”
The Draethmorte laughed. “It is who you really are, Tahn. The secret the Sheason isn’t ready to share with you. You were—”
Just then, a loud clanging interrupted the creature. Tahn looked to see Mira holding one broken sword over a rock. In her other hand she held the stone with which she had just snapped her blade in two. Fury raged in her eyes as she stood and pointed the broken sword toward Zephora. “In the name of the Far, I rebuke you. By the covenant of those given special age, I call you out.”
Tahn had no idea what Mira had just said or done, but Zephora’s face registered a brief glimmer of concern. Just as quickly, the expression passed, and he turned to face the Far, lifting his robed arms in preparation.
“Oathbreaker,” the creature hissed at Mira, a kind of awful delight sounding in its voice as it spoke the word.
Then a shriek arose from him, emanating from his mantle, his pores, his eyes. It touched the air with a sourness that coalesced into a palpable form that Tahn believed would tear skin from muscle. It flew at Mira, streaking through the mists. The Far leapt to the right out of the way, the shriek sailing like a great spear into the mists and abruptly losing its potency to silence. Mira danced to her feet, and trod lightly nearer Zephora with the jagged stump of her sword.
“You waste my time!” Zephora roared.
Before Tahn knew what he was doing, he had again drawn his weapon. He saw blood from his wounded hands seeping between fingers tightly clenched on his bow, but he aimed and drew back the string.
This time, with certainty, he used no arrow.
The bow was always just a way, when the time came, to focus. He knew, from years ago, standing with Grant in the Scar, that it was only the intention of his draw that mattered. And along his path from the Hollows, he’d learned something new about himself, some deeper ability when he drew an empty string.
In his mind he began to speak deliberately the words.
I draw with the strength …
“Don’t be a fool, Quillescent! You’ve no understanding of what you do!”
Mira circled closer to the Draethmorte.
A low hum began in Tahn’s head.
… of my arms …
“Do not cause me to destroy you! Choose now, or I will make the fall of the Cloudwood seem a rose’s death compared to the anguish your Ars and Arsa will forever know!”
Tahn drew deeper yet, his body still quivering, his flesh weak and cold. He remained uncertain even now, questions and grief plaguing him as the hum in his mind grew loud like the faster and faster turning of a potter’s wheel. Mira raised her truncated sword and began to say something in a low whisper. Tahn thought her body looked less substantial, perhaps a trick of the mist.
… And release as …
“Will you serve injustice, Quillescent? Will you honor and harbor those who hid from the face of the sun creations equal to themselves in glory and potential?” Zephora took a defiant step forward. With it, Tahn’s body shook, his mind filled with shapeless fears and doubts. “I defy you! I name you unforgiven! A doleful little archer come to Tillinghast without his own childhood. You raise your aim, and I mark you for all the brothers out of the Bourne as a deliverer become betrayer. The ravages of time I invoke upon you! Across ages the darkness speeds to find you, Quillescent. With the power of hatred and despair tempered in the farthest reaches of the Bourne they will fall upon you and yours! Now, enough of this! I will have my reward!”
Zephora loosed a wave of awful darkness from his outstretched hands. Tahn was knocked savagely to the loam at the ledge; his body felt as though he had fallen into the rough stones of a winter river. The silent pulse throbbed in his flesh. He could hear nothing, but images of all his dreams and visions raced through his mind: burning pages falling like cinders from the air; rivers of blood coursing from the Tabernacle of the Sky; men and women stumbling with their throats ripped from their necks as the last notes of the Song of Suffering ended; the veil falling and a great white mountain at the bitter end of all that is light quaking and thrumming with the hatred of ages.
As these terrible scenes flowed before his mind’s eye, his soul quailed, and he hoped for solace. But instead he saw himself seated in the dark of predawn awaiting the miracle that never came.
That was something he knew he could not bear.
He thought then of Sutter’s ramblings in the wilds: The spirit is not whole, Tahn. It’s not whole. It can be divided. Given out. Taken. Small portions separated from the whole …
And of the feeling in those moments when he’d drawn with no arrow, and what he intended to release.
Tahn again drew his bow, pulling hard and fast and releasing at the vileness escaped from the Bourne. An unseen arrow flew from his string and struck Zephora in the chest. The fiend wailed, a cry like a chorus of mourners both old and young at the deaths of their dear ones.
Tahn marveled at what had happened, but knew that he had used his bow, an instrument of this world, to fire his heart upon his adversary—a small portion of his spirit, unacquainted with the stains that might diminish him. The stains that in their fullness became the foulness that stood before him.
But Zephora was not done.
The enemy had a heart of its own, and in a moment of defiance to Tahn’s small act of bravery, it rent its garment and exposed its awful flesh. From the earth and abyss and heavens all at once came a thunderous boom that Tahn knew was only ever heard in his mind.
There came to him a taste of the Quiet.
Malice and hatred and the energy that might give them life coa
lesced into the splendor of the Whited One and filled Tahn’s mind. It stole his own voice and any power to fight or defend against the coming of the end of the world, stole any power yet left to choose, to hope.
Tahn fell, his body numb. He was still aware. He lay there unmoving after a horrible rain of dark applause, in a deafening silence. His will to act bled from him, as he felt the burden of unending grief and despair.
In that moment, he lost his name and all the history for good or ill that had been his own.
Accountability no longer even mattered.
And suddenly he watched himself fade into a canopy of white so immense and stark that he couldn’t be sure he wasn’t blind. The universe was as empty as new parchment, on which he was an indistinguishable speck.
At the far side of his defeat, when meaninglessness had all but taken him, came the ringing of another blade being broken in the air of Restoration.
Then came the soft words of a familiar voice uttered low in an ancient tongue. Perhaps a covenant tongue.
It somehow gave him enough mind to cry out for help to the one who’d helped him in the pit at Solath Mahnus: Rolen!
The scream filled up his mind, echoing out to silence, where he heard simply: Be still, Tahn. Be still. Remember standing in the dark, and in the glorious gentle light of a thousand sunrises.
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