Alborn stood beside Rastín. "You are my king. If you say Élvemere lives, who am I to question otherwise? By your stance, I take it you have remembered now a thing found and then forgotten. You have a decision to make, Rastín Dnyarr Túrring. A choice must be made."
Síari regarded Rastín, and Rastín in turn could not help but notice how wounds had bled through the bandages. Her face was pale and there were deepening circles under her eyes. But there was a light in her eyes and a smile on her lips. As he watched her, she took in a breath, exhaled; took in a breath, exhaled. Then she closed her eyes and was no more.
Death was no stranger to Rastín. In this place, Rastín had seen more death in the short cycles of his life than most elves see in the long millennia of their long lives, yet Síari's death moved him to tears, carried away words he meant to speak, and swept him to his knees.
Certainly, he had wept openly upon hearing of his father's death, but he had never before found tears such as these. In that moment, he could not have explained why Síari's death affected him so; indeed even later when he reflected on that moment he could not say with a certainty why he had broken down in great fits and sobs.
Perhaps it was a sudden understanding of the burden he carried or what his failures meant. Regardless of cause, Rastín Dnyarr Túrring rose from bended knee a king in his hearts of hearts--and not a king because others said he was a king, a king because he knew it through to his soul. From this day forward, no matter what was done to him, he promised himself he would never not be a king.
He touched a hand then to Alborn's shoulder. The old guard seemed to know what Rastín would do next even if Rastín himself did not know. Just before he turned and walked away, Rastín said, "I see without seeing. I know without knowing. You have done right by my family, and one day I hope to do right by you. Dierá and Eldri are yours now. They will keep you and serve you as they would me."
Chapter 9
Fire and lightning rained down from blood-red skies to mark the end of the midday reprieve. Rastín paid this no heed as he trudged across the mountainside, moving among the pits, searching.
It was a toll passed midday when he found it. Plain enough. A pit not unlike all the others before it. Ten spans deep and twenty spans across. He climbed in, called out to the heavens.
At first there was no answer, and so Rastín called out again and then again before there came a response. In a great pouring forth, his people came. They came not because he was their king, but because he had cried out to the heavens and because his words told of a discovery.
He worked then among countless thousands until the great gray stone was unearthed and revealed. As he stood there, looking up at the heavens, he knew blessed death would come. He was ready to receive this gift, as ready as he had ever been.
A hundred overlords descended from the heavens, walked down living stairs and living carpets to stand before him. Behind the overlords came ever more serpent magi. Soon there was no place Rastín could look to see the eyes of his kind.
Forced to his knees to accept the blessed gift, Rastín saw Holsteb and endless lines of those who had been blessed before him, their faces looming before his eyes as in life. As Síari had done at the last, he took in a breath, exhaled; took in a breath, exhaled. Then he closed his eyes and prepared to become no more.
As one, the overlords touched the tips of their staffs to his head and imparted the gift of the ageless. Behind the overlords, the magi chanted and exalted him. Lightning flashed from the heavens then, one hundred bolts, and every worker and every beast in every corner of the dark land paid tribute to the exaltation by crying out.
Rastín's own screams joined those wailing his praises as lightning rent flesh from bone. Pain became so excruciating that Rastín felt it was all he had ever known. Then there was blackness so deep, cold, and remote that he would never again think of the place between places as dark or cold or lonely.
He awoke from this blackness lost within himself, unsure of anything, void of everything, save the knowledge that he had been exalted when he had wished for nothing more than blessed parting. His sight was the first of his senses to return, though the world before him was blurred and obscured. Hearing followed, making him wish he had not ears. He heard only the sounds of the damned, issuing forth in wave after wave.
With those sounds, he knew he was within the great towers that breathed fire and vented smoke and ash. Indeed, as smell, taste, and touch returned, they seemed to bear him out. His last thought before slipping back into unconsciousness was that if he was exalted, he had not been given the choice of companion that all the others before him had been given.
The press of warm flesh close to his own should have been enough to tell him otherwise. Consciously or not, he had chosen Dierá. He awoke many tolls later to the young shieldmaiden tending to him with attentive care and an affection he had not known she was capable of.
Clearly she was pleased to see him rouse, and even more pleased when he was able to sit. She fed him then, scraps of bread, watery soup, as had been pushed under the door some tolls before.
"You do not know this," she said quietly, "but our fathers chose us for each other long before either of us were born. In Élvemere, I was to have been a queen, your wife, your beloved. I was bred to this as you were bred to be a king.
"In this place, it is us who must breed. It is what the magi have told me; the reason for you to choose me."
Rastín pushed away, putting his back to the cool, damp wall of the cell. "Are we in the great towers that breathe fire?"
"I think so, though what lies beyond this door you do not wish to see."
"How did you come to be in this place?"
Dierá hung her head. "When you were taken to stand before the magi, you chose me, though you may not remember. Some time has passed since your great find."
"M-m-my great find?" Rastín started to remember. Somewhere far off he thought he heard music. It seemed an age since he had heard music.
"You found the missing cornerstone, the last cornerstone. The magi were greatly pleased and yet displeased, because they were certain the find was kept from them. It is good that you do not know this time."
Rastín gripped Dierá's shoulders. "How much time has passed?"
"Truly I do not know. I've lost track of time since."
"Before you were taken to the towers?" Rastín asked, squeezing her shoulders with more force than he intended.
Dierá's expression told him that his grip pained her, though she said not a word of this. "Some tendays passed…" Her voice trailed off, then she added, "It is better that you do not know this time."
As his vision cleared and his other senses returned fully, he saw she was covered with welts and bruises. He released her and sat back, but she pushed herself up against him.
A voice from the darkness said, "A slave is nothing if not another's play thing." Rastín recognized his favorite language, Jurin. He loved its harshness on the tongue, and in particular the harshness of its curses.
Fire lit behind Rastín's eyes at the hearing, and he suddenly was alert and lunging into the darkness, certain that the one behind this voice had hurt Dierá. He barely managed a ten-stride however, before he collapsed. Dierá helped him back to their corner of the dark cell.
"Your fire is why the masters have kept you," said the voice, "My fire, my curse." As the other said this, the darkness was cleared, lit by living fires.
Rastín rarely saw the mammoth ones in the dark land or the immortal city, but he knew who and what they were. "You are…"
"We are Empyrjurin, as you are Élvemere."
"Your fire, I thought you bore it always."
Crouching, because he could not stand, the gargant moved toward Rastín. "As I'm sure you are certain, Styrjurin bore wind and Fhurjurin bore earth and stone. However, do you think we eat with fire ever burning in the oils of our flesh?"
Remembering the harshness of the Jurin curses, which spoke of grinding bone, tearing flesh, spill
ing entrails, and much more, Rastín was certain he and Dierá were in danger. "I am exalted," he said, his voice booming. "You will keep your distance."
The gargant's laughter boomed from the ceiling. Rastín did not understand what was so funny and so he hurled the foulest of his foul curses at the gargant. The gargant's response was laughter that shook the floor.
In Elvish, Dierá said, "They are friends."
"They?" questioned Rastín even as he finally discerned faces among the many fires spread throughout the enormous cell.
"Without G'rkyr, I would not be here. Nor would you."
"G'rkyr?"
"I am G'rkyr," the gargant said, half crouching, half crawling closer. "And switching to Elvish is very impolite. I told you that I can still understand you, as can Zanük; but the others, they cannot."
Looking up at the gargant with his great bold eyes, his knuckles dragging across the floor, and his neck bent against the ceiling, Rastín felt as if the walls of the cell were closing in on them. Surely it was only a matter of moments before they were all crushed to death. As the gargant reached out to him, he felt a heart-sized lump well up in his throat. This feeling of walls closing in only worsened when the others of G'rkyr's kind crawled closer.
"The little one peeping out behind G'rkyr is Zanük," Dierá said. "They are inseparable except when it comes to their curiosity of us little folk, and then Zanük cowers behind G'rkyr. Isn't that right, Zanük?"
"I do not," Zanük protested, his voice deep and loud.
Rastín's eyes grew wide as Zanük moved from behind G'rkyr. Zanük was anything but little, nearly a third bigger than G'rkyr; and G'rkyr was huge.
"They are Three Hammers clan," Dierá murmured to Rastín. "The ageless have declared war on their people. It is their reckoning day, and may the Great Mother watch over theirs."
G'rkyr said, "I hear you, little one, even when you whisper."
"Ha!" Dierá said, "I'm not whispering. Sometimes we little folk like to talk quietly among ourselves. We do not need our voices to boom and rumble to prove ourselves."
Rastín saw there was something unsaid between Dierá and G'rkyr, perhaps an old argument to which he was not privy. He did not, however, have the energy or focus to follow fully their banter, and he could not help himself when his eyelids drooped and closed.
He heard Dierá shoo the curious giantfolk back. "When we did not breed, we were put here among the Empyrjurin."
"Put here?" Rastín asked.
"As food," the gargant said.
"Not as food," Dierá countered as she scolded the gargant. "G'rkyr's belly is the focus of his thoughts--all too often. I'm surprised little Zanük still has arms, and that G'rkyr has not eaten them while his brother slept." Switching to Elvish, she added, "The masters meant us as gifts."
"Elf kind are gifts to giantfolk?"
"Tasty gifts," G'rkyr said; and for this Dierá swatted the gargant's nose, but she had to jump up in the air to do so.
"G'rkyr is the one who figured out how to bring you to consciousness. You'll have to forgive his petulance, for he is ever jealous of my regard for you."
"But I am exalted," Rastín said, his voice booming again.
"Lies," Dierá said, "All lies. The blessed are brought here. They are not cleansed or raised to the blessed land. Here, they are as the masters wish it…"
"Food or entertainment. Sometimes both," added G'rkyr with a knowing relish that made Rastín shrink back. Dierá chased G'rkyr away by swatting his nose a few more times.
"What of the exalted? Surely there must be reward," Rastín asked.
"Of a certainty," Dierá said, and then she repeated it, but would say no more.
Chapter 10
Days passed before Rastín felt strong enough to do anything other than sit idly and talk with Dierá, G'rkyr, and the other Empyrjurin sharing the cavernous cell. At times Dierá, G'rkyr, and others would be summoned out of the cell. When Dierá returned, she would always go directly to one of the open cisterns along the southerly wall and bathe before joining Rastín. He never dared ask why.
While Dierá bathed, she sang. Her voice carried well. It was as beautiful and haunting as the songs she chose. Most were ballads that told of battles lost, the death of the great ones, and the final days of Élvemere. Rastín's second self was always keenly aware of the songs and their words, even if his other self in the waking world paid them little attention.
G'rkyr used these opportunities to batter Rastín with stinging banter or open mocking. The gargant had taken to calling Rastín "Exalted" or "His Empirical Majestic Exalted One." Rastín knew the gargant had no idea that Rastín was actually a prince among elf kind, but these and other quips only made Rastín increasingly resentful of G'rkyr and the other giantfolk.
As G'rkyr began this day's tirade, Rastín looked up at the gargant with indifferent eyes. His expression told the gargant his thoughts.
In response, G'rkyr took his huge finger and jabbed Rastín in the gut, making Rastín double over. As the gargant did this, he said, "Remember, Exalted, you are here only because she would not leave you and begged me to find a way to help you."
Hoping to avoid goading the gargant on, Rastín said, "I was told I have you to thank for this. On behalf of my people, the Élvemere, I thank you."
"Your people, your people. His Empirical Majestic Exalted One sure is fond of himself. You think I swept you from dream and shadow willingly? That one--" G'rkyr pointed to Dierá as she bathed "--has the ftokish tongue."
"I hear you," Dierá called out.
Rastín grinned. The word ftokish was a vulgarism particular to the southerly region of Jurin where G'rkyr's clan lived. The closest Rastín had ever come to understanding its meaning was through Dierá's reaction to it. He suspected he would understand all the Empyrjurin idioms and vulgarisms in time--or at least those used by the Three Hammers clan. Still, it irked him that Dierá and G'rkyr had such a strong connection.
Rather than stay and argue with the gargant, Rastín went to a place he knew the other would not dare to go. He went to the cisterns where Dierá bathed and sang the saddest song he had ever heard. The elf maiden did not shy away from him. Instead she finished her song and then asked, "You have decided, then?"
"I have decided nothing," Rastín replied as he sat.
"Do you find me unattractive or unsuitable in some way?"
He regarded her, taking in the deep bronze of her bare shoulders, the long line of her neck, the perfect oval of her face, the roundness of her gray eyes, and the silver of her hair in a single, lingering glance. "You are beautiful," he told her, and he meant it. "But I will not do this thing because they command it."
Dierá stood and walked from the cistern. Her naked form drew Rastín's eyes as was her intention. Her breasts were not as full as some, but they were pleasing. Both round and firm. Her slender waist accentuated the curve of her hips. Her backside was shapely, and she turned to ensure he saw this. "Then do this thing for me," she said as she leaned down to him.
At her touch and at the press of her lips against his, Rastín felt his desire rise. He could not help this, but he could not allow himself to continue. Dierá had twice been given to him--once by his own people and once by the ageless--though for different reasons. It was all the same, and all meant to sink him to a level of depravity where the ageless owned not only his life but his soul. Though his life might be forfeit, Rastín decided his soul was his own, and for this reason he gently pushed Dierá away. One day, if Dierá came to him of her own free will, things would be different, but that day was not today.
Across the cell, G'rkyr applauded and jeered, causing Rastín to charge with a ferocity that surprised the gargant. As G'rkyr landed on his backside, smashing his head against the low ceiling, Rastín's charge ended with a flying leap as he kicked out at the gargant's chest with both feet. The gargant fell flat on his back with Rastín straddled across his neck.
"Mock me now," Rastín said as he choked the gargant, squeezing w
ith his legs and hands. "I dare you."
G'rkyr, for all his size and might, had never suspected Rastín was capable of knocking him down, let alone trying to choke the wind out of him. G'rkyr flailed about, trying to knock Rastín off; but Rastín only tightened his grip.
Having slipped on her light shift, Dierá stalked across the cell until she was standing at G'rkyr's shoulder. "G'rkyr, Rastín does not understand that you mock him because of your fondness for me. He can be as thick-headed and single-minded as you!"
Pulling Rastín off the gargant, she said, "Rastín, I am as fond of G'rkyr as he is of me."
Rastín's expression spoke of the incredulity he was feeling. "You have feelings for a gargant?"
"I do indeed," Dierá said, kissing G'rkyr's cheek and helping him sit up.
G'rkyr smiled and gloated.
"Have your gargant, then!" Rastín shouted, throwing his hands up in the air and walking away. As he moved to the opposite side of the cell, the other Empyrjurin shied away from him. Preferring the company of Dierá and G'rkyr to his, they left him alone. Even Zanük, G'rkyr's closest rival, would not speak to Rastín.
Dierá sulked for the rest of the day. When the dinner cauldrons were brought in, Dierá served Rastín as ever. However, instead of handing him the bowl of stewed meat, she shoved it at him, causing much of it to spill. "Do eat what is on the floor," she told him as she stalked away. "Otherwise, you are likely to get hungry in the night."
"Dierá," he called after her. "It doesn't have to be like this. I'm sorry. Sit by me."
Obediently, Dierá sat where she stood, refusing to look at him.
Frustrated, Rastín walked over to her. "You do not have to sit if you do not want to sit."
"Oh, but I do," Dierá told him quietly, bitterly.
G'rkyr looked up from his bowl, started to grunt something. Rastín ignored the gargant as he knelt next to Dierá. "If this is how you will be, then I free you. You are free, I tell you. Go. From now on, I shall be as nothing to you and you shall be as nothing to me."
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