by T. A. Miles
The power of the dome held. For several moments while the giant grunted and strained, the energy only shimmered. And then, suddenly, it bowed outward.
Xu Liang gasped and lifted his other hand to support his grip on Pearl Moon, his soft features tense and straining.
The giant wouldn’t give up.
Tristus wanted to help, but he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know Dawnfire’s power, just that it was magic. He started to rise, his thoughts and his blood rushing. There had to be something he could do!
Suddenly, the giant lifted its foot. It bellowed something incoherent. Tristus only knew that it was loud, thunder magnified a hundred times. The giant struck the dome once more with its bone club, forcing a strangled noise from the mystic’s throat.
The dome shuddered, but it remained, and finally, grudgingly, the giant turned away and stomped toward the mountains south, resigned to loss and boredom.
Tristus hovered in mid-motion, unable to breathe at first as the terrible thrill of the moment passed. When he did manage to move, his gaze was drawn to the others, who were running toward the dome as it dissipated. Relieved, Tristus waved to let them know they were still alive, then turned to Xu Liang to congratulate an astounding effort.
He found the mystic on the ground, motionless.
Terror gripped him. Already on his knees, Tristus crawled to Xu Liang’s side and laid his hand on his back. When the mystic failed to respond, he edged closer and carefully turned him over, dreading what he might find out. “Please, no. Please...God...”
Tristus looked at the mystic with tears filling his eyes, spilling onto his cheeks before he realized he’d broken his vow never to cry again. His hand shook as he touched Xu Liang’s face, stroking blood away from the man’s mouth. And it was then that the awful reality struck him a blow harsher than any the giant could have delivered. He immediately took the mystic into his arms and held him close, shuddering with fear and denial as Xu Liang remained limp...lifeless.
PAIN WRACKED HER body for an instant almost too short to be felt. The hurt didn’t really exist in her body, it was deeper, separate but still connected. It was as if a piece of her soul had split apart from the rest, leaving a great, gaping void that slowly closed in on itself, making the world suddenly seem small and lonely, and dangerous.
She tried to hold her concentration, remembering everything he’d taught her and all that he had said concerning her importance not only to the Imperial City, but to all of Sheng Fan. She tried, but it did no good. Her eyes flitted open, a sharp breath caught in her throat, and suddenly, Song Da-Xiao began to weep.
“HEAL HIM!” FU RAN demanded. He was stomping and throwing his arms about, doing anything he could to keep from hurting someone and to keep attention away from the tears streaking his features. “Dammit! Don’t just sit there! Heal him!”
“I can’t!” Tristus shouted back. His arms were still locked around the mystic. No one dared unlock them, for fear that the fragile man they embraced was still alive and that the sudden movement would only hasten the fate they were hoping had not already befallen him. It hadn’t. Xu Liang’s shallow breath fluttered against Tristus’ neck, the life drawing out of the mystic one sigh at a time.
Taya was on her knees nearby, sobbing fearfully while Tarfan stood alone in the near distance. The guards sat still and somber around Tristus and Xu Liang, though one had shouted Fanese words at the sky when he arrived and realized his failure.
It wasn’t his failure. It wasn’t anyone’s failure, but still they each looked like they only waited for confirmation of the mystic’s last breath, which would then free them to commit ritual suicide at the scene of their master’s death. The elves had yet to return and were, for the moment, written off as being either dead themselves or too wrapped up in trying to kill each other to be of any use to anyone.
Tristus’ arms were beginning to ache, but he wouldn’t let go of Xu Liang. It would take an act of God.
“Why won’t you heal him?” Fu Ran growled, sounding more dangerous by the second.
“I would, but I can’t!” Tristus answered tearfully. “I don’t know how!” He allowed one gloved hand to stray from Xu Liang just long enough to show Fu Ran the blood he’d wiped from the mystic’s lips. “The wound is inside! I don’t know where! I can’t mend a wound like that!”
“That’s absurd! How can the wound be inside of him! How can he be wounded at all? He wasn’t even struck!”
Tristus blurted the first possibility that came to mind. “Pressure! It was the awful pressure the giant was putting on that dome. It had to be! You saw how weak he was. He tried too hard to hold the magic...and the pressure...that has to be it!” It didn’t have to be it, but it was all Tristus could think of.
Fu Ran dropped to his knees wearily, brokenly. Tristus took genuine pity on the large man when his shoulders slumped, and he began to weep.
Look at us, Tristus thought. We are all lost without you, Xu Liang. Where will we go from here if you leave us?
The reality of that thought, that the mystic would indeed die here, inspired fresh tears. In the glaring daylight they burned and blurred his vision. Tristus squeezed his eyes closed and buried his face in the mystic’s soft hair. In the darkness Xu Liang’s closeness wrapped around him. He became acutely aware of each fragile breath. He could hear them as well as feel them. He could hear the fading heartbeat also, and he knew that when he opened his eyes the mystic would not simply be gone as the angel was. A body would remain in his arms, cold and dead, its resplendence lost forever.
Tristus buried his face deeper, wishing that he could fall into the mystic and die with him. There’d been so little time, and now there was none. He’d spent all of that time in awe, too fascinated to speak, too afraid to even think what his heart was feeling. He didn’t realize where his thoughts were carrying him as they bled out of his aching soul, until his lips touched Xu Liang’s neck. The warmth that still existed beneath the soft skin stirred his blood, and broke his heart. How could such grace be allowed to pass from this world? Why did Heaven bestow such grace upon mortals, only to take it away?
Forgetting himself, knowing only the will of his soaring, shattering heart, Tristus kissed the warm skin again, deliberately, and whispered words none of the others could have heard. He scarcely heard them himself. They were for Xu Liang and for no one else.
Tristus had just begun to cry again, softly, when a hand touched his shoulder. He lifted his face to look at Shirisae, whose features painted a portrait of serene compassion. Tristus resented that expression at first, ready to reject her suggestion that he let go, that Xu Liang had passed or that he should be allowed to do so.
However, the flame-haired lady elf said something else entirely, something that filled Tristus with hope. She said, “You must bring him to Vilciel.”
THE LANDSCAPE WAS rising as the sun set. A pall of red light fell over the Flatlands, casting long shadows. Alere could almost hear them creeping over the snow in the dreary silence. The company moved like a procession for the dead, and perhaps they were. The mystic had less color to him than before, and he had been pale to start, a tone that Alere had not come to identify with one of health among humans. He’d coughed just once when Fu Ran lifted him up to Tristus, who once again sat in Blue Crane’s saddle. The sound startled everyone into thinking that he was coming around, but he remained unconscious, and the blood on the knight’s arm told the tale all too well to any who wanted to hear it. Of course they wouldn’t listen. Humans were creatures of control and denial, denying what they could not control. Dwarves had always been far too stubborn. It made Alere despise the Phoenix Elves worse that they would charm these people with hope only to lead them to belated mourning for what was already lost.
Xu Liang could not be saved. Not only was he physically depleted and getting worse by the hour, his spirit, too, was fading. He’d expended himself to the very last of his strength in any form and there was no foundation for recovery. His heart would beat unti
l it was finished—if it wasn’t already done—and that would be the end of it.
That wasn’t what Alere wanted. He would beg Ysis for a chance to take back the harsh words he’d delivered the night before, if he thought it would be granted to him. He knew better, though. He knew far better than to expect anything from the gods. They had reasons for everything they did and rarely found it necessary to explain their reasoning to mortals, if ever.
For just a moment, when he’d heard the retelling of the events following the giant’s failed interest in three mounted elves riding faster than it cared to chase—considering none of them had the spear it truly wanted—Alere almost believed the mystic had again gone out of his way only to recover one of the weapons he sought for his cause. When he listened again, and saw what Tristus believed and the moving devotion in the knight’s eyes, he realized the error of his thinking. Xu Liang was the same selfless man he’d come upon in the Hollowen Forest. Alere’s own shortcomings had gradually rejected his original perception of the mystic, his elven heritage refusing to accept that a human could possess such qualities. He wanted to believe he was following Aerkiren’s will. From the start he’d been following Xu Liang, a gifted human indeed, to have won an elf lord’s trust and respect so quickly.
I would count you a friend, Xu Liang, Alere thought. And I would take back my words that were spoken in haste and perhaps with some jealousy. I will play for you tonight, mystic of Sheng Fan, when your heart has drummed its last.
FU RAN HAD never known a brother besides Xu Liang. He’d been raised with the person he would one day be expected to protect with his own life. Unlike his father, who’d managed to always separate duty from family, Fu Ran developed a close bond with the pampered student. So close that when the class separation started becoming more apparent between scholar and bodyguard—master and servant—he became angry and hurt.
The Emperor and Prince both considered Fu Ran insolent, and even rebellious, and Xu Liang constantly sided with them. Of course, what else could a fledgling official have done? Fu Ran eventually swallowed his pride—that Xu Liang had actually told him was misplaced in one well-remembered instance—and accepted his humiliating lot for the sake of his friend. He would have taken almost any abuse, except Song Lu. The overbearing prince had taken to calling Xu Liang his friend as well, but unlike Fu Ran, who had no other choice, Song Lu was not willing to share. He made life miserable for Fu Ran, and Xu Liang—blinded by his budding career and ‘the glory of Sheng Fan’—did little to amend the rapidly devolving situation. Fu Ran left and, as fate continually brought them together, he knew, in spite of Xu Liang’s evolved wisdom and maturity, that the mystic had never forgiven him. To explore outside of Sheng Fan was one thing. To leave it altogether was unthinkable.
“Lord Xu Liang is like a son to me,” Gai Ping said to Guang Ci. Both men walked close to Fu Ran, speaking softly in the only tongue they knew. “If he dies, I will carry his body to the Empress myself.”
“I will accompany you,” Guang Ci promised. “I would sooner die myself than to see his body left here among these detestable barbarians and their strange, filthy lands!”
“You would disgrace his memory with such words!” the elder scolded. “At the late Emperor’s command, he explored the outer realms and came to cherish them.”
“Careful,” Fu Ran said. “He’s not finished yet.”
After he issued the words, Fu Ran looked to the one person among them who genuinely believed that; Tristus Edainien.
Excluding the fire elves, the knight was the stranger among them. Yet somehow he’d managed to win everyone over. Fu Ran couldn’t say if it was pity come to affection or just phenomenal tolerance among the group, but even after his berserker side showed itself, the knight managed to fit himself in. And now, with Dawnfire in his possession, glowing against the eventide along with its sibling Blades, it was indisputable. He was one of them.
The thought carried Fu Ran’s gaze to Xu Liang, unconscious, getting some well-deserved sleep after his victory. If only he were asleep...if only he were aware of just how close he’d come to bringing all of the Swords together. With four of them present and the Spear of Heaven safely with the Empress, he had only to find one more. And then he could have returned to Sheng Fan.
“He’s going to make it, Fu Ran,” Tristus said softly.
Fu Ran looked up to see the knight staring directly ahead, a peculiar surety having banished his tears. It was as if he knew something that no one else did. Fu Ran couldn’t say if he felt comforted by that, or more depressed. At the moment he felt numb, as devoid of thought or expression as Xu Liang. If the mystic did somehow make it, he was not going to be happy.
THE LAND LIFTED around them, gaining dimension and texture. No more was the terrain flat and cast with an endless sheet of snow. Steep, slender shadows loomed all around the travelers. They moved through the mountain pass feeling as if they were being passed along by many dark hands. They were in the clutches and the care of the Phoenix Elves.
Shirisae lit their way with Firestorm. At the wide base of one of the sheer, ominous rock formations, the lady elf stopped them. She bade them wait while she and her brother rode ahead into the darkness. Firestorm illuminated a third rider when the siblings drew to a halt several yards away.
The companions huddled in the soft, golden glow of Dawnfire, watching...and waiting.
Tristus had not relinquished his hold on either the spear or Xu Liang for the duration of their journey into this last stand of mountains. He held Dawnfire in one hand, Blue Crane’s reins in the other, with Xu Liang slumped over his arm. In the stillness of the wait, he gently and almost unconsciously drew the mystic closer. He felt ten years younger, verging upon discovery, one of the first of many discoveries that would dictate the course of his entire life. In his twenty-six years, he’d only gravitated toward two people this strongly. One had pushed him away, the other had been dead for two years now. While still with the Order, he’d given himself to duty and then, recently, to despair and to desperately trying to recover some sense of purpose after his banishment. He’d forgotten what it was like to be out of all possibility of mortal danger and to still be afraid.
“I’m leaving,” Alere announced, and in the suddenness of his words, Tristus looked at him quickly, drawing the white elf’s gaze. He didn’t have to ask why. The elf saw the question in Tristus’ eyes, and answered. “I will go no further. These elves are neither my kin nor my allies.”
That wasn’t good enough for Tristus. “Alere, you can’t.” He kept his voice low, but his words were urgent, pleading. “What about the quest? What about the Swords? Though I didn’t understand it at first, I know now that the Blades are drawn together for some purpose. We must stay together.”
Alere simply looked at him, waiting for him to finish. And then, unexpectedly, he smiled. He shook his head gently. “No. I will not stay here among my enemies. However, do not despair, Tristus Edainien. We will meet again. The mystic believes in fate, that to all things, regarding all ends, there is a purpose. Pearl Moon will not cease to shine this night, though the light of its bearer should wane and be gone from this world. The Swords will find each other again. And so I bid you farewell, Knight of Andaria. For now.”
Tristus watched the elf, knowing that no force in this realm was going to stop him, since he’d made up his mind. He searched for words anyway and as the white elf turned Breigh around and departed, Tristus said only, “Alere...”
“There’s the loyalty of an elf for you,” Tarfan grumbled. “Takes the frying pan himself and dumps us into the fire.”
“I don’t think he would have left if he believed we were in any danger, Tarfan,” Tristus said quietly, still watching Alere’s departing form.
“So what now?” Fu Ran asked, and it was several moments before Tristus realized the large man was asking him. Perhaps it was only because he sat so near their fallen leader.
With his attention once again fully on the matter at hand, Tristus answe
red in as calm a voice as he could muster. “We go with the fire elves. We’ve come this far, and if there’s any chance at all that they can aid Xu Liang, we must take it.”
Fu Ran nodded, then began speaking to the bodyguards in Fanese, presumably explaining things to them. All five of the brilliantly armored warriors looked at Tristus when the large man was finished, their expressions unreadable.
Shirisae and D’mitri returned within the following moments. “Our passage has been granted. Be warned that the way to Vilciel from here is long and treacherous. Do not stray from the path. I will be your guide and my brother shall follow to be certain no one is lost.”
“It looks as if we’ve lost one already,” D’mitri commented, his tone sounding satisfied as well as derisive.
Tristus ignored the chill that climbed up his back, and said to Shirisae, “How long is this path? I fear our friend is quickly fading.”
Shirisae regarded Xu Liang with a brief glance. Her golden eyes looked long at Tristus. “For him the journey will be easy. For the rest of you, it will be a test of your worth before our god.”
“What in the blasted hells is that supposed to mean?” Tarfan demanded.
“I can give you only this information; The Phoenix is not a force for preservation, but of renewal. Use the knowledge I have given you wisely.”
Shirisae started off, and the companions lingered under the cold, burning gaze of her sibling.
“Does anyone else have a bad feeling about this?” Taya asked nervously.
