by Brian Fuller
“Fenna, enough!” the Chalaine said, trying to insert a friendly tone into a plea that proceeded from frustration.
Lady Blackshire finally did relent, though at breakfast, she cornered a grumpy Dason, and the two spoke at length. By the time they finished, Dason was beaming again and the Chalaine had lost her appetite. He resumed his duties as Gerand took the opportunity to get a few hours of sleep before they departed. Lord Kildan left with his Tolnorian soldiers first, the Duke bidding his sons farewell and promising to return to Mikmir as soon as he could to join in council.
The Chalaine pulled Maewen, Ethris, and General Harband aside after their departure and relayed Fenna’s intelligence about the Church soldiers marching on Mikmir.
“I feared as much,” Ethris said. “If Athan is looking for you, he knows you will make for Mikmir and will use every means to prevent you from getting inside. The Church is likely placing members of the Council of Padras in leadership positions, and Mikmir is key to controlling the nations. This may get very difficult, Chalaine. It may be up to you to rally your countrymen to take back Mikmir if the Church won’t quit the city.”
She said, “My mother would be better equipped. . .”
Ethris took her by the shoulders. “Your mother is a prisoner now, to save you. It falls to you now to fill her place.”
“But the people rejoice! They won’t believe me!”
“They will believe you. They worship you and will come to your aid if you can speak with conviction. You must wake them from this dream and bring them into the nightmare before Mikkik accomplishes his purpose.”
“Where do I start?” she asked.
“You start here with Lord and Lady Blackshire. Their levy of soldiers is small, but with the Tolnorians marching for their own country, we need to reinforce. The Church armies were never very big alone, and if the armies of the nations are returning home or scouring the wilderness to fight the Uyumaak, then we may be able to muster a force big enough to put the Eldephaere to flight.”
The Chalaine looked sideways at the jovial Geoff with his expectant wife, her longtime friend. Fenna placed a hand on the top of her protruding baby, waiting to feel a kick. Their happiness and celebration was a lie, or, as Ethris said, a dream. The Chalaine’s stomach clenched. No one knew better than she that a warm, comfortable dream was often much preferable to the cold, hard truth.
“Will you stand with me?” she asked Ethris. “My word alone won’t be sufficient.”
“I will, child. You may find you have more iron in you than you think.”
Heart heavy and hands clammy, the Chalaine walked to the head of the table where Lord Geoff of Blackshire waited.
Be like mother, she told herself.
“Lord Blackshire,” she said. “Ethris and I need to have a word with you and your wife.”
“But are you sure, Lady Alumira?” Geoff said, face stunned. So far, he was the only one that had remembered to use her new name. They sat in his study, which was dusty from disuse. “I can scarce believe it! It is the most awful thing in the world!”
“It is true,” she replied, finding that telling the tale out loud actually calmed her nerves. “What his purpose is now, I cannot say, but he has deceived the entire world. He played on the prophecy and turned it to his own ends. We are in grave danger, and I must get control of Mikmir to spread the word to a world that will not want to hear it.”
“So Gen was the Ilch as the stories said,” Fenna said, “but he turned away from his foreordained path out of love for you! And then to be killed! How he must have suffered.”
“Yes,” the Chalaine said. “But I do not tell you this merely for your information. I need provision for the men we have and what soldiers you can spare.”
Geoff stood. “But of course you shall have what you need. I . . . I just can’t fathom it. It did all sound a bit too easily done, and this kind of nefarious trickery does fit with all the tales told of Mikkik during the Wars. Thank you, Lady Alumira, for enlightening us. And I sorrow for your loss. Gen was every inch a man to be admired.”
“Yes, he is,” the Chalaine said before she realized her mistake. “Was,” she corrected hastily. “I thank you for your support. We will travel and try to gather men from the Regents as we go, though I fear that when the Church finds out we are coming, they may send soldiers for us directly.”
“More likely they will stay fortified within Mikmir’s walls,” Ethris opined.
Maewen, who had insisted on coming, walked out of the corner. “I will go find Falael, who is no doubt enjoying the living trees near here. I will send him north to scout. I will remain with the Chalaine.”
“Very good,” Ethris said. “Let’s get General Harband and get the men moving. We should stop in Embriss to speak with Regent Feldebrinne and then on to Kitmere to visit Regent Torunne. Having his nephew Volney with us should help.”
They left the study, and the Chalaine breathed a sigh of relief.
Ethris beamed at her, eyes soft. “Well done, Lady Alumira. It will be hard for me to get used to calling you that.”
“Call me whatever you like,” she said. “You’ve earned it. Do you think the others will be as easy to convince?”
Ethris shook his head. “No. They have more at stake in angering the Church, but do not fear! You can actually be quite persuasive when you wish. And if we fail, we will move on to the next and the next until we have enough men behind us to make Athan think twice about facing us.”
In order to allow Geoff time to muster his men and gather provisions, they delayed a day. During the night, Fenna at last had her baby. The Chalaine saw her through the difficult moments of labor and rejoiced with her when a baby girl howled her first cries into the night. Geoff already had a song at the ready—he had previously prepared one for a boy and one for a girl—and father and mother both laughed and wept at the wonder of it all. By the time the Chalaine sought her room and her bed, it was late.
“I will have a son as my first child,” Dason said as they walked the hall.
“How do you know?” the Chalaine asked.
“I just know. Don’t you feel the same?” he asked, words pregnant with meaning.
“Good night, Dason,” she said as she opened the door to her room and shut it more loudly than she intended.
None of the candles in her room were lit, and the fire smoldered, extinguished in the hearth. Something about the room felt wrong, a smell or a change in the way she felt. She turned back to the door to open it, but her body would no longer move at her command. She opened her mouth to scream for help, but nothing would come. Something passed in front of the shuttered window, a dark shadow growing larger as it approached her, and then blackness enveloped her like a dark wing.
“Lady Alumira!”
The Chalaine opened her eyes and rolled over. It was still night, and she was surprised to find herself in her bed fully clothed and facedown as if she had been dropped there. She remembered coming into the room, but nothing after.
“What happened, Gerand?”
“You were gone! Taken somewhere, as far as we know. We all rode away to find you, but Ethris held us back, saying that what waited was too powerful for us to deal with. He wanted to go on alone, but Dason refused to stay behind. They disappeared over a hill, and we all sensed that you had returned here a short while later. I’ve just ridden in. What happened to you?”
“I . . . I can’t remember. I came into the room and then I woke up here.”
The Chalaine worked at her mind to try to unlock the memory, but she couldn’t tease out what had happened in the missing interval. Long minutes passed, the night deepening as they waited for Dason and Ethris. She went to visit Fenna, who was feeding her baby. Her worn, sleepy face was troubled, and after she finished nursing, the Chalaine left to let her sleep. Pacing about the house—Gerand following behind her—was all the Chalaine could think to do.
A few hours before dawn, the front door swung open hard and everything turned to commotion
. Men dressed in the livery of Blackshire hauled a body through the door. It was an unconscious Dason, his face pale and eyes closed. Charred holes were blasted in his uniform, the skin black and cracked underneath. A burned gash ran aslant down his face.
“He’s barely alive, Lady Alumira,” one of the soldiers said as Geoff burst into the room followed by Fenna. “We fished two bodies out of the water. Both of them were boiled alive by the looks of it. I think one of them is the Mage.”
“Ethris?” Geoff exclaimed.
“We think so, Milord,” the soldier replied as they placed Dason on the couch. “The clothes were his, anyway. Never seen the other one.”
The Chalaine’s heart sank. What had happened? She crossed to Dason as more people crowded into the room only to be dismissed by Geoff. Grabbing his hand, she crouched beside her injured Protector and concentrated. Charred wounds gaped all over his torso and arms. With her skill in healing, it took little to repair them, knitting the skin back together and restoring his handsome face so that nothing marred his visage. She broke contact and he stirred, sitting upright slowly as his mind cleared.
“Dason?” the Chalaine said, trying to focus his attention.
“Your Ladyship,” he said reverently, standing and pulling her into an awkward hug in front of everyone. “I had thought you lost. You were just lying there in the grass as if you were dead! Thank Eldaloth you are alive! I have proved myself to you now and atoned for my failure in Rhugoth. I can stand as a man before you. You are my love and my life, and I will never part from you!”
She pulled away gently but was unable to escape his adoring gaze or the amused smiles of those in the room. “What happened, Dason? I have no memory of what happened to me this night. Is Ethris dead?”
Dason reached for her hand. “I do not know. We all felt that you were moving away from Blackshire at great speed and gave chase. Ethris came with us, fearing that some sorcery was involved. We felt you stop your forward progress as we rode west into the hills. But Ethris felt something, something he said was powerful enough that swords would be of no use. He ordered us to stay behind, but I didn’t. I could not be detained, though the others of the Dark Guard were more than happy to obey orders.” He cast a meaningful glance at Gerand.
“So, abandoned by my brothers in arms, Ethris and I rode alone through the hills at great hazard to recover you. We crested a hill where a pond was nestled in a depression, and there we saw you lying in the grass next to an old woman. Ethris warned me that this was the Ash Witch and that I should return, but my heart wouldn’t let me. That love which I have always had for you, Chalaine, prodded me onward. I could not let the hope of all my future prospects remain in the power of that evil woman.
“We rode forward to confront her. She simply waited, and Ethris was incanting, probably some protection. But my horse suddenly slowed and then fell over. Ethris rode on without me, but undeterred I drew my sword and charged forward, though the distance was great. Ethris stopped before the Ash Witch and they appeared to bandy words, but a tentacle of water rose from the pond, encircled him, and pulled him down into the depths. A great show of light and disruption flared in the water as if Ethris struggled against some unseen foe in its depths.
“The Ash Witch stood and watched until Ethris rose to the top of the water. From my position, I could not tell who it was, but when a bald head emerged, I knew Ethris had won the contest. My heart soared for joy, but the Ash Witch called down a mighty column of fire that set the pond to boiling. And . . . and I think Ethris succumbed.
“I understood, then, the Witch’s terrible power, but my Chalaine waited, unconscious and unprotected on the grass, and I would not stop even if death were the price. Alone and friendless I charged forward, raising my sword to strike down the Witch, but a great blast of lightning lanced through me and I fell, not ten feet from where the Chalaine lay. I stretched my hand toward her at the last, but my deep wounds overcame my strength. But as I faded, I knew that the love in my heart would keep my body alive until my Lady could heal me, and it was as I knew it would be. All I ask now is a small locket of your hair as a token to mark my deeds, though I soon hope it will be within my power to ask much more.”
“I shall fetch a knife!” Fenna said with a wink to the Chalaine.
“There is no need,” Dason said, pulling one from his boot.
“Dason,” the Chalaine said, “this is not the time! Ethris is dead, and we are in grave peril.”
“It will just take a moment, Chalaine,” he said, reaching out and grasping a strand of her hair that curled beneath the veil. The Chalaine gritted her teeth as he performed the act.
“I am Lady Alumira, now, Dason,” she said firmly. “And I must see the bodies. I must know. You take your rest. I will have Gerand with me on this errand.”
She didn’t bother to turn around to see if her coldness had stung him, asking the soldiers that had carried him in earlier to show her and Gerand where they had placed the bodies. The soldiers led them to the small Chapel where she and Gen had enjoyed their first open expressions of love for one another. Those memories seemed ages behind her, and she wanted their renewal. The lamps of the Chapel were lit, and a Pureman stood as they entered.
“I’ve been preparing the bodies, Milady,” he said. “I am sorry for your loss. Ethris was a powerful man. I would advise you against seeing them. It is unpleasant.”
“I will see them,” she said, feeling numb.
The closer she came, the more her stomach turned. Both men were wrapped in white linen, their faces bloated and burned almost beyond recognition. While one corpse she could not identify, the other was unmistakable. Ethris had been killed in a trap set by his own mother, not that Ethris had ever hinted that he regarded her with any affection.
“I will leave you with him for a moment,” the Pureman said.
“Wait outside,” the Chalaine ordered Geoff’s men. “Gerand, stay with me.”
She stared at the grotesque body in disbelief. It was as if she was looking out a window, and a mountain that had always been there had crumbled. Of all the people she had known in her life, Ethris had always seemed the most indestructible. Even when he had been missing after the caravan had been destroyed, she never doubted that they would find him again. With Ethris dead, her mother missing, and Gen gone, she felt utterly alone. The foundations of her life were falling, and she struggled to balance. She could rely on no one but herself. While her feelings should have focused on the loss she had suffered, she instead felt a weight pressing down upon her.
“The passing of a legend,” Gerand said reverently. “Dark times, indeed.”
“What am I to do, Gerand?”
“Your duty, Lady Alumira,” he said. “It is a very Tolnorian thing to say, I know, but he set you on a path before he died, and it seems wise to walk it.”
“But now I walk it alone without his wisdom. I wish my mother were here.”
Gerand nodded. “I wish Cadaen and his companion success. I pray for it daily.”
“There is something I wish to share with you, Gerand. I hope you do not consider it a burden,” she said. “But it is a secret, and a deep one at that. I have carried it nearly alone for some time, but I feel to tell you now. Will you hear it?”
“You have my word as your Protector and a Tolnorian,” he said, “though if your secret is that you do not love my brother as he hopes you do, I believe that I know it.”
“You can see that?” she said.
“Yes. My brother is a sword fighter to be feared, but he is also a romantic fool. I’m afraid he will likely persist in pursuing you even if you rebuff him,” Gerand answered. “You may actually have to marry someone else before he gives up.”
“That is not the secret, but it is related, in a way,” She exhaled. Telling someone else was a horrible risk, but she needed support. “Gen is alive.”
“Yes, he is,” Gerand said.
“But . . . when did you know? How?”
Gerand smiled. “I
had him treat a wound I had sustained. He might have thought the dark would aid him in concealing his identity, but it actually helped expose him. His voice, the way he moved, his profile, his mysterious appearance, all of it pointed to him. I was still hesitant to believe until I saw him and Maewen standing around chatting in Elvish like they always did. Unmistakable. You should take heart. If any man can get your mother free from Athan, it is Gen. It is him you love, is it not?”
“Yes,” she answered, stunned by Gerand’s perceptiveness.
“You always did seem to have a bond beyond Chalaine and Protector. How he returned to life must be quite a tale,” he added. “But why did you wish to tell me this?”
“First, so you would not think me unnecessarily cruel to your brother. Second, because—besides Maewen—I am the only one that knows. He is alone, and he needs the support of his former companions. He carries a great weight, as I do now. Can you support him? You don’t believe he was secretly a traitor for Mikkik, do you?”
“Mikkik is crafty, but not stupid. If he were clever enough to move one of his agents into such an intimate position within the inner circle of prophecy, I’m sure he would have struck before the wedding even took place. While Athan may be confused, Gen acting under Mikkik’s orders makes no sense. And of course, I will support Gen. I thought his return some plan or device of your mother’s or Ethris’s and didn’t wish to interfere.”
“No,” she said. “He came of his own accord. You can’t imagine my joy. Or perhaps you can. I’m sure your thoughts of Mena have given you a hope to cling to during these strange times.”
“Of course,” Gerand said, “although I am sorry to think that she is at home rejoicing in the false salvation of the world, deceived like everyone else. I dread having to break the news to her that the world is worse off than ever before.”
The Chalaine regarded the corspes before her. “I know. I have to go tell all of Ki’Hal the same. It’s going to be hard without Ethris. People feared and respected him. It will be easy for them to dismiss me as a silly girl who has been tricked by the Ilch.”
