The Quintessence Cycle- The Complete Series

by Terry C. Simpson

  The decree made by the king as part of the celebration allowed any Kasinian the chance to train at the Grey Fist to become a Blade. While that was an honor in itself, many were drawn to the coin they could earn as apprentices. Such an opportunity brought in its share of undesirables and those who had no skill, but it also revealed enough people strong in soul who could become part of the king’s army. Such an undertaking made Ainslen’s intentions seem benevolent. They were anything but.

  Leroi scowled at the thought of Ainslen’s transgressions as he strode across the Havershan Bridge, his booted footsteps crunching through gravel. Antelen ruled the night sky in full silver, her court of stars twinkling in homage. Behind him was a group of men and women, talking and laughing good-naturedly. Another dozen approached from the opposite direction, forms highlighted by oil lanterns atop tall posts.

  To his left, one of the many canals carved its way through the heart of the Burrows, the River Quarter’s disreputable lower district. On the right stretched the wrinkled silver sheet of the River Ost, the citadel’s structures curving on either side to match the harbor. Balmy winds carried the harbor’s malodorous breath as well as the music emanating from the taverns near the piers. Singing raucous songs, drunken revelers stumbled from one establishment to another. Folk traversed the other bridges, bodies little more than silhouettes.

  Farlander ships occupied all the piers, the cloaked guards on their decks illuminated by flickering torchlight. Another two ships were anchored a little farther out, no space available for them to berth. Much of the crews had disembarked either singly or in small groups so as not to draw attention. Days spent poring over reports from spies revealed the crew members eventually worked their way into the sewers. From there, they would capture those they deemed worthy and return to the ships, the captives imprisoned by kerin chains, a metal able to suppress soul.

  Leroi hadn’t believed such a material existed until he held kerin. Placing a kerin manacle around his wrist isolated that portion of his body from the rest of his soul. It was as if the area was empty, dead. He cringed as he considered the metal and the possibilities it provided.

  After the recent uprising by the counts and the battle at the Golden Spires, a story had spread, claiming the king had captured and imprisoned a Dracodar. He had dismissed them as nonsense. The Blighted Brothers and this metal made him a believer.

  Thinking of the Blighted Brothers, he glanced toward the darkness beneath one of the bridges. Some of the massive grey-scaled Dracodar would be there, hidden in the shadows. In all the auctions, he’d not encountered remains to match theirs. The only mention of grey scales he could recall resided within Etien’s Compendium and a few other obscure books. But he’d often doubted the old deranged explorer’s accounts. Some of it seemed so far-fetched, like his tales of winged Dracodar. Yet, the Brothers lent truth to the rumors of the things responsible for the attack on Ainslen during the night of Terestere’s delivery to the Golden Spires.

  Full Dracodar. Alive.

  He’d gotten a taste of their power with the remains now fused to his body, but for years he’d dreamed of what they must have been like in life. He’d imagined their clawed hands and feet, bodies rippling with muscle, scales glinting in the sun. He’d envisioned the fount of soul they could wield, touched it, saw them build cities and lay waste with it, stood in awe as their nimbuses flared with each meld. When Envald brought him among the Brothers in the Undertow the reality had made a mockery of those dreams.

  There, Envald had revealed the secret behind these strange Dracodar. They were remnants, ancient survivors from before the Thousand Year War, bodies altered by the Blight. Worse yet was the knowledge that the Farlanders possessed similar monsters: the Soulbreakers. And then Envald had them demonstrate their prowess.

  Seeing them in action was the difference between a painting of a panorama atop the highest peak in the Whetstone Mountains, and standing on that very spot in the flesh. Both were breathtaking, incredible. But the art lacked the ability to evoke reality’s stomach-clenching fear.

  The Blighted Brothers made Leroi feel inadequate in every capacity, even more so with their skill to hide their nimbuses. He knew a similar effect could be gained by employing koren , but such an application of the second cycle didn’t work on a person with his strength. This had to be something else, something more. He wished he knew the secret. Outside of their appearances they seemed utterly normal, incapable of wielding soul magic. But when they melded, the power was thick, woven seamlessly, intricate, and often combined many different abilities. The seemingly impossible complexity of their accomplishments at times made him swear his eyes deceived him.

  Melds cast at them died before touching flesh. Manifested weapons failed to harm them. At first he thought them to be invulnerable, but simple steel and iron could cleave them as surely as winter was cold. If the attacker could find a way past their nimbuses. On offense, they were a force. Their massive Dracodarian-forged swords sheared through soul.

  Another burst of lights snapped Leroi from his reverie. This particular display bloomed in the air along the piers, a flower opening its metals, pollen cascading to the ground in a colored spray.

  The signal.

  Leroi turned toward the waist-high wall along the bridge’s perimeter. The other people had done the same, all seemingly enthralled by the spectacle. Leroi’s focus was on the Farlander ships. At any moment he expected the Blighted Brothers to ease from beneath the dark water and scale the sides of the vessels.

  A small burst of flame, like a torch sparking to life, lit the shadowy form of a man on one of the ships. A low rolling pop followed. Chaos swallowed the night.

  Several feet from Leroi a man cried out and crumpled to the ground. Half of his face was missing.

  “Attack, now!” yelled the Lord Marshal, recognizing the cause of the man’s death to be a kerin ball. “We’ve been discovered. Aim for anything wearing an ereskar cloak.”

  People flew into action around him, pretense discarded. Power surged. Nimbuses flared. Blades magnified their bodies, ripped chunks of the wall away, and flung them toward the ships. Casters ignited their souls, making the humid night even warmer. Massive balls of flame shot away from them and down across the water, sending up hisses of spray. Alchemists worked in tandem with some Magnifiers, coating debris with a replication of oil, then setting it alight. These projectiles spun end over end toward their targets. Similar assaults began all along the other bridges. Manifestors summoned forth bows. Arrows of pure soul sliced the night in misty trails.

  The first Blighted Brothers leaped from beneath the water’s surface, great splashes in their wake. They landed among the Farlanders who were gathering on the decks and waded into them with fists, feet, and massive swords. More swarmed from the underpasses and tunnels, legs churning at a blistering pace, yet their feet appeared to glide, not once kicking up dirt or water of any sort. Some sped atop the river’s surface.

  “Keep up the attacks,” Leroi yelled. “Don’t give their Blazers a chance to target the Brothers.”

  He created a dozen oily globes, set them aflame, and picked out any Blazers with firesticks, using the white ereskars on their cloaks to confirm his targets. He launched his strikes in quick succession. If his attacks struck true he would be happy, but all he needed were distractions.

  “The two ships in the harbor,” one of his Blades shouted over the din of melds, “don’t forget them.”

  “I won’t,” said Leroi, “but no one has appeared on their decks. Right now they’re not a threat.” The ships in question were dark, silent, and unmoving.

  Full-throated bellows announced the watch’s arrival as well as the other able-bodied men and women Leroi had managed to gather over the time spent scouting out the Farlander activities. With two Blades leading a dozen different groups, they charged up the gangplanks and onto the ships to lend assistance to the Blighted Brothers.

  Leroi smiled. He’d not expected the battle to come this easy. Envald
’s strategy had been impeccable. A skeleton crew guarded the ships, and with the majority of the Farlanders trapped in the sewers and the Undertow, by now locked in combat with Blighted Brothers, there would be no reinforcements.

  A roar filled the night. As Leroi turned his head toward the noise, there was a droning hum. Something smashed into the bridge. The impact lifted him off his feet, flung him aside. He slammed into the far wall, the wind knocked from his chest. Dirt and pebbles rained down on him. A hammer was pounding his head, its clang incessant; his vision blurred; blood’s earthy taste was thick in his mouth.

  Groaning, he staggered to his feet, wiping at the sticky wetness trickling down his face. Dust choked the air, made him squint and rub his eyes. Blinking rapidly, he tried to peer through the grit and gloom. Moans and cries reached him. Sounds he knew too well. Sounds of the dying.

  The dust and smoke dissipated, swept away by a stiff breeze. His vision cleared, allowing him to take in his Blades. Or what was left of them. They littered the ground, bodies twisted, mangled, some missing limbs, others clawing at their blood-streaked clothes, writhing in agony. Others did not move, eyes locked in death’s vacant stare.

  Some six feet in front of him was the remains of the bridge. The stonework was mangled. The retaining wall and the portion of the bridge itself where he’d stood was completely gone. Below him the canal’s dark waters glistened.

  Another booming roar echoed. He flinched by instinct, stumbling back. The resulting crash came from elsewhere, far to his left.

  “This way, my lord,” someone said and touched his arm.

  Leroi spun before recognizing the voice as that of the Blade who’d spoken earlier, a grizzled man with a thick beard and matted hair. Dirt marred his features. Leroi couldn’t recall when last he was this glad to see a familiar face. “Blade Farnier, wh-what happened?”

  “Those ships, sir, the ones I warned you of.” Farnier nodded toward the harbor.

  Leroi turned. Sails unfurled, making for the River Ost, were the two ships that hadn’t berthed. Twin eruptions of smoke and fire illuminated the starboard side of one and the port side of the other, somewhere just above the bloated bellies. Simultaneous blasts resounded. Moments later, bridges to the east and west exploded in a spray of stone, dust, and bodies. Along the docks several buildings burned.

  Mouth agape, Leroi scanned the other bridges. Of the twenty crossings in the River Quarter, nine remained. Sporadic melds flew from a few of the decimated areas down toward the docked ships where battle still raged. Even as he watched a Blighted Brother’s head exploded in a mushroom of blood and brains.

  “Blazers on the ships, my lord,” Farnier said to the question on Leroi’s lips. “And now, they’re out of our range.”

  Helpless, Leroi could only watch. The enemies on the docked ships were fighting for their lives, and eventually they would lose, but the cost to Envald’s forces and his own men would be great. “What a fool I’ve been,” he whispered. Turning to Farnier, he nodded toward the other capable survivors who were searching among the carnage. “Get another man to help you. Fetch any chirurgeons you can find and send them to the bridges.”

  “What about you, sir?”

  Leroi glanced down. Grime covered him. Blood stained his clothes. His blood. He raised a tentative hand to the wet gash under his hairline. “I’ll be fine. I must get to the docks, see what I can do to help.”

  Out on the water the fleeing ships fired once again. A shower of debris and smoke exploded from buildings beyond the docks. Fires kindled to life. Leroi hoped the people he’d assigned to evacuate the shops and homes in this part of the district had managed to do their jobs. He couldn’t begin to imagine the dead if they had failed. Nor did he wish to. It was his fault for not listening to Farnier.

  He was on the verge of leaping from the bridge when he noticed an eerie silence had fallen over the harbor. The occasional distant pops and low booms from the two ships were the sole disturbances. A closer inspection revealed most of the Farlanders were on their knees, heads bowed.

  “Seems it’s over, my lord,” said Farnier.

  Leroi opened his mouth to reply when flame and smoke belched from several of the captured ships. The blasts ripped through the night, echoing long and loud. He imagined the large kerin balls hurtling through the night sky.

  Pillars of water careened into the air near the fleeing ships. And then the attacks struck true. Masts cracked and fell like twigs. Wooden chunks flew from the hulls. Holes appeared in the sails. Men screamed.

  The barrage continued until one of the Farlander vessels exploded in a storm of wood and fire. The other leaned listlessly. Survivors leapt overboard. They thrashed in the water like insects.

  A cheer went up from the docks. It spread to the bridges. Leroi felt his lips curl up into a smile.

  “Victory,” Envald’s cultured voice said from behind him, “but at a steep cost, a cost that could have been avoided.”

  “Farnier,” Leroi said, “see to my earlier instructions.” The Blade bowed and ran off. Leroi faced Envald. Fire and accusation resided in the man’s eyes. Leroi fought the urge to avert his gaze. “Some would say a victory without cost is no victory at all.”

  “Some people are fools.”

  Leroi sighed. “I apologize for what happened. If it makes a difference, my men suffered also.” He nodded toward the wounded and the dead.

  “It does not. You could have prevented it if you had followed my instructions to the letter.”

  Knowing he was in the wrong, Leroi restrained the inclination for a retort. “All I can offer is my sympathy.”

  “It will have to do. However, our losses make the task assigned by our queen even more treacherous. Remember, this was but a small part. We must do whatever we can to stop the Farlander weapons and reinforcements from reaching the Swords of Humel.”

  “Well, you have your issues, and I have mine,” Leroi said. “Word of this will reach the king. And I also have to deal with the nobles he left to hinder me. Convincing them your Blighted Brothers are the lesser evil will be no easy task. If they even get a hint of the plan to cripple Ainslen’s forces, I might have an uprising on my hands.”

  “I hope your ability as a speaker far surpasses that of your leadership, for should they stand in the way, my instructions are very specific.” With those last words, Envald leaped off the bridge and floated down to the ground. He strode into the capering shadows toward the piers.

  Leroi took in the destruction, the folk rushing to put out fires, the pall drifting into the night sky. None of it was supposed to happen. He should’ve known better than to set expectations in a battle. Almost anything was possible. He had several ideas of how to present his decision before the council when it was called. For their sakes, he prayed they listened.

  A D ead P ast

  A ntelen was a ghostly smudge in a cloud-wreathed sky when Terestere’s ereskar made its way through a pass to the reaches of the Upper Treskelin Forest. Terestere climbed down from the animal, left the two remaining Blades and the Jophite, and entered the forest, close-knit trees hiding her from view. Her sight took a few moments to adjust to the darkness, but soon enough she was able to see as if it were day.

  A wind carried the forest’s unforgotten song, resonant like rustling rain. She inhaled, long and deep, reveling in the mélange of wet earth and humus, of leaves and tree gum, of hidden animals and night blooming flowers. This had been her home for too many years to count. She missed its feel. As the trees missed her, their souls pulling at her own. Her senses wandered, connected to life all around her, life soaked with the soul of her people, with her soul, siphoned and collected over centuries. In this moment she was Elin-Lahnim, the Queen of All.

  She considered transforming but decided to remain human. Assuming her Dracodar form would bring the Longing crashing down on her. Besides, she refused to appear as if she were appeasing the dissenters. She needed to be what she had ever been. Hard. They had to reconcile their thinking wi
th the conclusions she’d already drawn. As much as she hated the past and present actions of most humans, the changes they’d forced upon her people, the things they’d forced her to do, they were essential. The First-Born and any other true Pures might deny the truth, but theirs was a dying lineage. Their future resided in the human or half-breed couplings.

  A few minutes of walking brought her to a clearing cloaked in shadow. The First-Born waited at its center. They sat back on their haunches, scales limned by moonlight, lengthy arms hanging down, claws touching the ground. She took her place at their head, noting the disdainful expressions from two in particular. Tak-Larim and Ky-Sanim.

  “I’m glad you could be here on such short notice.” She dipped her head in respect to them.

  “The Mother calls and we come,” they intoned as one, heads bowed.

  “How fares my boy?” From a distance she’d watched Winslow all these years, heart torn over the inability to reveal her true self to him. Her feelings ran even deeper for Keedar, for the vision of her death she’d left with him. Although she’d birthed countless progeny over the centuries, the boys were her last. And would ever be.

  “He struggles, as to be expected,” said Lo-Janim, the other Ganhi , tall and sinuous, eyes a dark amber.

  “Soft-skins can only do so much,” snarled Tak-Larim, his height such that his body cast a longer shadow than the others. “You were too quick to declare him Ganhi when he does not possess all the cycles. To even claim such without the quintessence is shameful. To do so for a soft-skin is even worse.”