“You were already a king.”
“And weren’t you already a hero before you took up Aram—the sword that won’t accept the grasp of a coward?” Haruuc’s ears flicked. “If the sword pushes you to be like the Dhakaani heroes, you know what I feel. Maabet, Geth, think of it. These were Taruuzh’s gifts to Dhakaan, a sword that makes heroes great and a rod that makes kings greater.” He turned the rod so that the light of the torches in the throne room flashed on the dark purple surface. “The emperors of Dhakaan understood the importance of putting storytellers in the streets. They understood the bloodthirst of the people when an enemy is defeated. They understood the power of war, of the mere threat of war. Even when the empire stretched across half the continent, the emperors sought conquest! What do the heroes of the name of Kuun tell you?”
Geth could feel Wrath throbbing in his grip, could almost see its memories of the distant heroes flickering at the edge of his vision. “They tell me to be fearless,” he said. “To protect my friends. To let my deeds inspire the people.”
“No more? I feel a power in Guulen, Geth. I know that the emperors found more than just guidance in the rod.” Haruuc smiled, as if at a secret. “I can sense it, just out of reach. I think sometimes that all I need to do is find a way to impose my will on Guulen and no command I give will ever be refused.”
Geth’s belly clenched. The true power of the rod was waiting to be uncovered. “Haruuc, this isn’t right,” he said. “You wanted the rod as a symbol of rulership.”
“The ultimate symbol for something is the thing itself,” said Haruuc. “I’ll lead Darguun to greatness as the emperors led Dhakaan!”
“Darguun isn’t Dhakaan!” Geth said. “There are no more emperors. Eberron isn’t the same as it was five thousand years ago! There were no other nations to challenge Dhakaan. Its only enemies were the elves. Now the elves are only one of many nations ready to fight you. Munta said it—if you move against one, all of the others will come back against you. Look at the Valenar. They know the same thing. Darguun and Valenar might have signed the Treaty of Thronehold at the end of the Last War, but you know that every other nation is watching both of you very closely.” He drew a breath through his teeth. “Dhakaan was already great when Taruuzh forged Guulen and Aram, Haruuc. The emperors who held the rod never had to fight the kind of war Darguun would.”
“I haven’t declared war. I don’t need to declare war.” Haruuc stood up straight, savagely majestic in his armor, the spiked crown flashing on his head. “You see how just the threat of war brings my warlords together?”
“You barely have a grip on some of them, Haruuc. How long will it be before one decides to make a strike in your name? Or before one of the other nations takes your threats seriously and finds a way to strike first? Breland and Zilargo are just across the mountains. And what will happen if the warlords realize your threats are just posturing? They want a war. The only thing that has kept Darguun at peace has been your vision of a homeland for your people.”
“The warlords will obey me!”
“Keraal didn’t. Look where his rebellion led.” Geth lowered Wrath. “You’re on the edge of destroying Darguun. What the rod is telling you might have been true in the time of Dhakaan, but it’s not true now. You need to stop listening to it.”
Haruuc’s lips peeled back from his teeth. “Don’t you think I’ve tried?” he shouted. “At first it frightened me, and I tried to block it out, then I stopped when I saw what it was trying to do for me and Darguun. But from the moment I’ve held it, Guulen has been in my head and I can’t shut it out.” He slammed the rod down onto the seat of the throne, then pointed at it. “There! I still know what the emperors knew. I still hear the call to war. I still want Keraal’s blood.”
Geth stared at him in shock. He could push Wrath’s memories away if he wanted to—it was easy. But before he claimed it, Wrath had lain silent in the ghost fortress of Jhegesh Dol for five thousand years. The rod had remained in the grasp of Dabrak Riis, trapped in the timelessness of the Uura Odaarii. Geth swallowed. “I took the rod from Dabrak Riis. I carried it. Why didn’t it speak to me?”
“Because you’ve already been claimed by Aram. Because the Sword of Heroes can’t be held by a coward and the Rod of Kings answers only to someone with the will to rule,” Haruuc said. His mouth twisted and he looked down at the rod. “The emperors knew that.” His hands squeezed hard on the back of the throne. “Help me, shava,” he said. “Help me save Darguun again.”
“How—?” Geth started to ask, but the answer burst over him before he could even finish. “Ashi! Her dragonmark may be able to block the rod’s influence on you.”
“For how long?”
“Long enough,” Geth said. He sheathed Wrath—just as three slow knocks sounded against the great wooden door of the throne room.
Haruuc started. “Razu,” he said. “It’s time to end Keraal’s rebellion.” He let go of the throne’s back and walked around it. His hand hovered over the rod, then he took it and seated himself. Geth hissed, but Haruuc shook his head. “This can’t be delayed. It must be done. Nothing can save Keraal now. I would only look weak if I let him live. I know this without the rod. But hurry.” The lhesh raised his voice in a powerful shout and said in Goblin, “Enter! Enter to mourn! Enter to witness judgment!”
Down at the end of the throne room, the great wooden door began to rise.
Geth jumped down from the dais and raced up the aisle. Ashi would be with the court. He could catch her as she entered and take her around to the side of the dais. She only needed to touch Haruuc and they could put an end to this—
And why do you care so much? he found himself wondering. Not so long ago, you were ready to leave and put Darguun behind you.
He ground his teeth together. Call it the influence of the sword, he thought. But Haruuc’s words came back to him.
Weren’t you already a hero before you took up the sword?
“Rat,” he muttered as he slid to a stop beside the rising door. Shins were visible on the other side. Knees. Thighs. Waists. Geth threw a final look back at Haruuc, sitting like a statue on his throne, then ducked under the moving door.
Ekhaas watched Razu lift a massive staff from her shoulder and swing it three times against the great carved door of the throne room, then step back. There was a short pause, then Haruuc’s deep voice echoed through the wood. “Enter! Enter to mourn! Enter to witness judgment!”
Razu gave a nod to some hidden assistant and the door began its slow rise up into the ceiling. Ekhaas took a breath and made herself calm. There were rumors about what judgment waited for Keraal on the other side of the door. After all that Haruuc had done already, it was hard to guess what he might do next.
Standing beside her, Senen Dhakaan spoke under her breath. “You saw Dagii. What did he say about Haruuc’s announcement on the bridge?”
“Nothing,” said Ekhaas. She kept her voice level and calm. It was the truth. She’d found Dagii after the procession had returned to Khaar Mbar’ost and gotten close to him under the guise of offering healing for his torn hands. As she had sung away his wounds, they’d exchanged quick words. Haruuc’s announcement, to her shame, had not been what they’d discussed.
“You bound all of the Gan’duur into the grieving trees yourself?” she’d asked.
“Cho,” he had whispered back—then he’d caught her gaze, haunted gray eyes to amber, and whispered what amounted to treason. “They didn’t suffer long, Ashi. I opened a vein for each of them. They died on the trees, but quickly. Haruuc was wrong to order them killed that way. What happened to him?”
She shook the memory—and the image of her hands around Dagii’s—from her head and looked back toward the throne room.
Just in time to see Geth duck under the partly open door. The shifter’s appearance caused a small ripple among the elder warlords who stood at the front of the antechamber. Tariic and Munta both tried to speak to him, but Geth shook them off and pushed himself i
nto the open. He stood on the edge of the steps for a moment, surveying the crowd below. His face twisted in frustration, then his eyes found her and widened. He jumped over the rail of the stairs and came across the floor of the chamber, using his great gauntlet like a shield to shove warlords and clan chiefs out of the way.
“Ekhaas!” he said as soon as he was close. “I need Ashi! Have you seen her or Vounn? Have they gone to the gallery?”
He started to turn to the passage that led up to the gallery overlooking the throne room, but Ekhaas grabbed him and spun him around. “The gallery is closed,” she said. “But I saw them heading up the stairs to their chambers. They haven’t come back down?”
“I couldn’t see them.” Geth pulled away, but she hung onto him a moment longer.
“What’s happening?” she whispered in his ear.
He hesitated for a moment, then murmured back, “The rod.”
She felt her ears rise and panic filled her. “Haruuc has discovered its powers?”
“Not yet. It’s trying to make him a king the way Wrath makes me a hero.”
“Khaavolaar! What can I do?”
“Watch him!”
Geth tore out of her grasp and charged through the crowded chamber like a bull. She stared after him until Senen asked in her ear, “What was that about?”
She twitched and turned back. “It’s a private matter.”
Senen’s ears flicked. “Haruuc’s shava comes rushing out of a sealed throne room looking for the bearer of a Siberys dragonmark, and it’s a private matter?”
Ekhaas’s teeth ground together. “Yes,” she said tightly and was saved from further interrogation by a collective gasp of amazement that rose from the front ranks of the crowd. The great door was all the way up, and the way into the throne room was open. There was a moment of confusion, as if some of those in the front ranks had drawn back before entering, but then Haruuc’s court was moving inexorably forward. Ekhaas was carried up the stairs—and saw the grieving tree.
“Khaavolaar!” she said again, but her expression of surprise was lost in the rolling wave of astonishment that gripped each new rank of spectators to mount the stairs. Every goblin knew what a true grieving tree was supposed to look like. Very few of them had ever seen one before. Ekhaas had, and she still found herself struck dumb by the curved and cruel branches of white stone.
The interior of the throne room was as silent as Haruuc on his throne. The only noises were the rustle of fabric and the clatter of armor as warlords and clan chiefs, ambassadors, envoys, and councilors took their places. The room was packed tight. Ekhaas was fortunate enough to find herself with a good view of Haruuc. When the court had assembled, he spoke.
“Enter the dead.”
A drum beat started, and Ekhaas couldn’t help but think of the drum that had followed their steps into the throne room when they’d presented Haruuc with the rod. She studied the lhesh, trying to see if she could find any clue to the truth of what Geth had said. Haruuc’s fingers were white around the rod, and his face was drawn into a tightly controlled mask, but that could have been anger or grief.
There was movement in the doorway. With another rustle of cloth and metal, heads turned as Vanii’s body was carried into the throne room by the same six bugbears who had carried the casket through Rhukaan Draal. It had been removed from the casket, though, and placed on a silk-draped plank. There was some preserving magic at work—Haruuc’s shava had been dead for nearly a week, but he might have been struck down only hours before. Humans, Ekhaas knew, might have tried to make it look like he was only sleeping. Such denial was a shame. Goblin tradition honored a warrior’s death. The wound that had killed Vanii was visible for all to see: a deep red rent in his chest surrounded by shattered mail and broken ribs.
At the end of the aisle, the bugbears paused before Haruuc. He rose from his throne and came down from the dais to stand over Vanii. His hand came up. He touched the open wound, then Vanii’s forehead.
“Paatcha, shava,” he said, then nodded to the bugbears. They took the corpse to a stone bier set beneath the grieving tree, left him there, and retired to the side of the room. Haruuc returned to the throne and looked up the aisle. Heads turned again in anticipation.
Chains clanked on the stairs in counterpoint to the slow beat of the drum, then Dagii and Keraal appeared. The warlord of the Mur Talaan had washed and donned his armor with the three tribex horns that stood tall over his head and shoulders. Ekhaas saw his ears flick at the sight of the grieving tree, but his face otherwise betrayed nothing.
Keraal’s ears, however, went back flat against his head, and his eyes opened so wide the whites of them made a shocking pale ring. He had been stripped of clothes except for a loincloth. Chains bound his ankles and his wrists. Bruises and half-healed wounds showed on his body. He tried to pull back, but Dagii pushed him forward. Keraal stumbled down the aisle, his eyes fixed on the grieving tree. Dagii dragged him to a stop before the throne. Haruuc looked down on the defeated warlord. Keraal tried to stand straight, but the shackles wouldn’t allow it—a length of chain between hands and feet forced him to hunch. The chains rattled as he began to shake.
Haruuc said nothing, but only gestured with the rod toward the tree. Dagii took Keraal’s arm and guided him over to stand beneath the stone branches, beside Vanii’s bier, then took several quick steps back. Keraal was left alone, staring up at the tree.
Haruuc whispered a word.
The grieving tree shivered—and moved. The curved segments of its branches ground together as they rotated. Haruuc whispered another word, and a thick stone limb bent down and curled around Keraal. The warlord screamed. Like a living tree caught in a storm or some weird undersea creature, the tree thrashed and whirled. Keraal was passed from branch to branch until he hung among the carved white stone. Then the ridges and thorns of the tree seemed to ripple, and Keraal shrieked again as they dug into his flesh.
The grooves cut into the branches from which he hung turned red as blood trickled through them. The grieving tree shivered again. Twitching and whimpering, Keraal hung in agony as the tree fed.
A strong person could linger on a grieving tree for days. Legends of Dhakaan told of arch-traitors and fallen heroes who had hung in a tree for a week or more.
Ekhaas saw some of the ambassadors of the other nations and some of the representatives of the dragonmarked houses—humans, elves, half-elves, a dwarf, a gnome—look away. No one of the goblin races did. Her gut twisted at Keraal’s agony and her ears went back. But saliva ran in her mouth and her tongue moved, touching the points of her teeth. Her heart beat faster, taking the place of the drum that had fallen silent.
One of the warlords moaned softly. Ekhaas didn’t look to see who.
Haruuc rose. He raised the Rod of Kings. “Let all witness,” he said, “the end of those who stand against Darguun! Haruuc Shaarat’kor fears no one. Darguun fears no one!”
“Haruuc!” shouted a voice. “Haruuc!” Other voices took up the chant. “Haruuc! Haruuc! Haruuc! Haruuc!” The throne room shook. Haruuc raised his hands in acknowledgment.
Then another voice called, “Give us war!”
Ekhaas saw Haruuc freeze. The chant that filled the room changed. “War! Haruuc! War! Haruuc! War! War! War!”
A smile spread across Haruuc’s face. “Darguuls!” he roared. “Was our nation not born in war? Were our people not born in war? From ancient days, have we not spread our power across the land?”
The knot in Ekhaas’s belly grew tighter. The ambassadors of the other nations of Khorvaire were looking at each other in a peculiar frenzy. All of them seemed to have moved a little bit away from the ambassador of Breland. Another groan drifted from Keraal on the grieving tree. Haruuc looked up at him—and it seemed to Ekhaas that his smile tightened once more. When he looked back to the warlords and clan chiefs, there was nothing easy in his manner. It was almost as if he fought to get the words out of his mouth. “Our strategy must be discussed! There must be a
n assembly!”
But enthusiasm got the better of the crowd. “Breland!” someone cried, and the Brelish ambassador twitched.
“Zilargo!”
“Northern Breland and then into Thrane!”
“Silence!” said Haruuc. He looked out over the court. “You think small! Are you hobgoblins or halflings? Breland, Thrane … what challenge would they be? Ancient blood demands an ancient enemy. As it was in the age of Dhakaan, goblins shall go into battle against elves!” He thrust the Rod of Kings out before him. “Let our blades fall on Valenar!”
For a moment, there was stunned silence in the throne room, then the court burst into a wave of cheers.
“Mothers of the dirge,” said Senen softly. “He’s going to do it. He’s going to start a war.”
Ekhaas’s ears rose high as she unraveled the lhesh’s scheme in her head. “No,” she said. “He’s going to stop one.”
Senen looked at her, but she just stared at Haruuc in amazement. It seemed that he glanced off to one side for an instant, off through the door that led from the dais, then smiled in triumph and raised his arms high above his head. The cheers of the crowd burst out anew.
CHAPTER
THIRTY
As soon as they were back in Khaar Mbar’ost, Vounn had taken Ashi’s arm, pulled her away from the crowd streaming into Haruuc’s throne room, and taken her up to her chambers. “Put a pack together,” she had said. “You’re going to the House Orien compound. Forget the games—I want you back to Sterngate with the first Orien coach on the road. If Haruuc is talking about war, I don’t want you here.”
A few weeks ago, she would have argued with the lady seneschal. No more. She could see the danger as clearly as Vounn. Running back to the safety of Karrlakton felt cowardly. Staying in Darguun felt stupid. “What about you?” she’d asked.
The Doom of Kings: Legacy of Dhakaan - Book 1 Page 38
