Upon the Flight of the Queen

by Howard Andrew Jones

  “This was a brave battle,” Ortok mused behind her.

  “Kalandra?” Kyrkenall called as he drew close to the top of the slope. He scanned the shadows of the portico.

  There was no answer.

  Kyrkenall advanced into that portico, froze, then, very slowly, dropped to one knee, head bowed. Elenai didn’t see the form lying with its back against the pillar until she reached his side.

  The body had lain there for a long time. Yet there was no missing the Altenerai khalat, its colors little faded. The pant fabric had rotted away, but some boot leather still wrapped skeletal feet. And a sword lay across the breast, where it had once been clasped by the dying hand since desiccated. A ring circled one weathered fingerbone.

  “Hail, Commander,” Kyrkenall said softly.

  “Is that Renik?” Elenai asked quietly. She looked down at the eyeless, heat-mummified features. Wavy black hair flecked with gray still clung to the dried, skeletal head.

  “Aye.” Kyrkenall was silent for a long time.

  “I don’t understand,” Elenai said. “I thought they said a god dwelt here.” Unless, maybe, he’d left a recording of himself? He didn’t appear to have any other belongings.

  “Of course the kobalin would think him a god,” Kyrkenall said. “Look at him. He took on almost seventy-five kobalin, and almost half were lords—did you see the size of those bodies? Can you imagine? They must have come up in waves and somehow he took them all.”

  “But they left him here,” Elenai said. “Don’t the kobalin take the heads of their defeated enemies?”

  “They must not have defeated him,” Ortok said. He had crept up quietly behind them. “If no living warrior delivered his death blow, then no one had claim to him, and they would let him lie. And they would honor him. And who would not come to pay respects to such a warrior as this, and to ask for his blessing in war things? It is all clear to me now. He is the one even N’lahr reveres.”

  “He was the greatest of us,” Kyrkenall said, his voice ever so soft.

  Elenai had never met Renik, nor even seen him in the flesh, but her eyes welled with tears as she thought of this lone man standing off so many. And she knelt with Kyrkenall. “Hail, Commander.”

  Kyrkenall’s voice took on that reflective quality he often used while speaking verse, absent the usual playful note. This time he was deadly serious. “Here was flesh and blood, yet here there rests a grace divine. I would that he yet lived. We shall not see a one like him again, even should our lives stretch on and endless.” He faltered, then directly addressed the corpse. “You were the torch by which we sought the path. You lived the principal by word and deed. You were the model we all strove to meet.” His voice fell to a whisper. “When you were with us, it was easier, somehow, to rise above our own weakness.”

  Elenai wasn’t able to place the quote. “What’s that from?”

  “That’s me. Just now. Would that I had more.” His words came out in a snarl. “Would that the queen hadn’t wasted the life of this brave man. He didn’t need to die out here. Alone. Honored only by his enemies.” He continued to stare down at his old commanding officer as Elenai climbed to her feet.

  Reverently, Kyrkenall slipped the ring from the skeletal hand, then placed it with infinite care in one of his smallest belt pouches.

  Elenai gently touched the archer on the shoulder. “Let’s see what he was guarding.”

  The temple itself was a round room no more than twelve fair paces across. It had but a single opening. There was no light within, nor wall sconces to hang lanterns had they wished them, so she and Kyrkenall both willed their rings to light. There came an answering glitter from hundreds of mosaic floor and wall tiles inset with sparkling motes. At chest level all about the wall were empty recesses. Elenai counted thirty of them.

  “What do you think those are for?” Kyrkenall asked. “Busts of the gods?”

  “I think they were for hearthstones,” Elenai said. They were just about the ideal size. “Or maybe those stones that Kalandra was talking about. The remembrance stones.”

  “So where are they?”

  “A good question.”

  “Maybe they’re in some kind of protected spot,” Kyrkenall said, “and we have to find a trigger to release them.”

  “Or maybe Renik wasn’t protecting them, he just got caught here at the wrong moment. Maybe they were gone when he showed up.”

  “Or maybe the kobalin took them,” Kyrkenall suggested.

  “Would they disturb the temple of a god?” Elenai asked.

  He nodded shortly and then threw up a hand to stop her before she walked any farther. “I’m an idiot,” he whispered, and bent low to the ground, ring shining. She could tell he searched at random until he halted for a brief moment and bent even lower, before pressing on in a straight line for one of the empty recesses.

  “What is it?”

  “Tracks in the dust. They’re dusty themselves,” he said, “but they’re more recent.”

  “Renik’s tracks?” Maybe he’d taken the hearthstones out and someone had stolen them from him.

  “No. Boots, though. Smaller. I think a woman was here, looking around.”

  “Kalandra?” Elenai asked.

  “I don’t think some random woman could make it here, do you? We’ve walked over some of the tracks,” Kyrkenall said as he moved on. “It seems pretty clear that whoever this was went to each alcove. So she was collecting the stones.”

  Elenai fought down a surge of excitement. “So she was here, and got away.”

  “It seems so.”

  “Friends,” Ortok called from outside, “I have bad news.”

  It was only then Elenai noticed he hadn’t entered the space with them. He lingered in the open air just beyond the portico, not daring to set foot within the temple.

  Elenai was first through, and there was little need for Ortok’s arm to point downslope, for she saw figures charging toward them across the plains as a great green lightning bolt split the whitened sky behind. She’d seen enough large groups of warriors now to guess troop strengths. At least four hundred were closing on them.

  “Mount up.” There was a curiously cold calm to Kyrkenall’s voice.

  Elenai needed no urging and was soon in the saddle. Kyrkenall was about to start down slope, then caught sight of Ortok, still looking into the distance.

  “As weary as our horses are, we’re going to have a hard time staying ahead of them,” Kyrkenall said.

  “You go,” the kobalin said. “I will stay.”

  “They’ll kill you,” Elenai objected.

  He turned and met her eyes. “I hear the fear in your voice and know that it is for me. But you need not worry. Kobalin are not forbidden from this place. And they will stop to speak with me. It will give you some space. Go. Take Steadyfoot with you.”

  “Don’t make this sacrifice, Ortok,” Kyrkenall said. “There’s no need.”

  Ortok showed his teeth. “I make no sacrifice. N’lahr wanted me to find an army. Well. There one is. I will challenge its leader, and then I will take them to fight Naor. It is a simple thing.”

  Maybe it seemed simple to Ortok, but Elenai shot a nervous glance to the lithe archer. How could the kobalin even know who led the oncoming horde? It could be a greater warrior than he. Might well be, given how many kobalin followed him.

  “Then we’ll stay,” she said.

  He quickly shook his furry head. “No. You are not welcome here.”

  “But we have every right to pay respects to a fallen alten.”

  “He died on our lands, and has been honored by us. Not you. Maybe later this can be done. Not now. Go, friends. If I live, I will fight again at your side. Think well of me, and share my name with those you meet.”

  Elenai could only stare in astonishment and sorrow. She had seen Ortok challenge and win before, but it had never occurred to her he would leave so soon.

  Kyrkenall put hand to chest in salute and addressed him solemnly. “Hail, Ort
ok. Win glory. I hope to see you again.”

  Elenai, wordless, repeated the gesture. As Ortok returned it Kyrkenall was already headed down slope, guiding Steadyfoot by a line. She followed, leading the pack horses, surprised at how much closer the kobalin were already.

  Kyrkenall pushed Lyria into a weary canter and circled around the hill before riding off in a straight line. Elenai followed.

  She glanced over her shoulder. The hill blotted out sight of their pursuers and the temple blocked sight of Ortok.

  She knew she should have been more worried about the kobalin pursuit, but it was the sudden absence of Ortok that disturbed her most. She realized that she never should have supposed he would permanently be in their life, and reminded herself that in the end he was pledged to kill N’lahr or die trying. It was inevitable that he leave them, eventually.

  And yet she couldn’t help thinking of a moment from Selana’s play, The Fall of Myralon. She’d often thought Selana stiff and old-fashioned, but that moment in the third act—when the aging queen discovered her young grandson dead upon the stairs—it had remarkable power. She thought of it now, of the woman separated suddenly from the person in whom she had invested hope and love and time, killed not by assassins but by a tumble down steps. Elenai could no longer remember the full lines, but recalled how the queen had cradled the child, complaining that the Gods might at least have warned her his fair days were almost through.

  It wasn’t that she equated the queen’s love for her grandson with her affection for Ortok, but her sudden understanding that time with Ortok was finite paralleled the queen’s lament.

  Now they rode toward dark hills in a dark land under benighted skies.

  It was easy enough to guess Kyrkenall’s plan—ride for the hills, lose their pursuers there, find a way to double back.

  She glanced again over her shoulder and this time saw warriors to either side of the hill. The sky, splashed again by lightning, limned them so that she glimpsed their strange hulking outlines and mismatched horns. Those weren’t Naor helms, but the horns of kobalin. And she couldn’t be sure but … she looked back once more to confirm.

  “I don’t think they’re following,” she shouted up to Kyrkenall.

  He called back to her, his voice shaking as Lyria’s tired hooves pounded over the black soil. “Ortok’s challenge will hold them in place.”

  She knew that she would see nothing that might tell her their friend’s fate as she looked back, but she couldn’t help doing so. Ortok might even now be fighting for his life. Or standing victorious. He might be dead.

  Less than a mile separated them but he might as well be realms away, or a hundred years apart. What was the difference, she thought darkly, between a memory from a few moments ago, or yesterday, or from decades past? None of them were real, anymore. They were equally gone, every single one, no matter when they’d transpired.

  Kyrkenall and Elenai slowed their horses, lest they run them to ruin, but they moved on, and the hills resolved themselves into dark, ruddy shapes. Kyrkenall guided them into a low pass.

  Just beyond it, horsemen were waiting.

  There were six in all, bareheaded, each a fine figure of a man in their late twenties, their musculature obvious even under loose blue shirts. They wore a uniform of sorts—matching short-sleeved tunics, dark kilts over which a sword belt hung, and strap sandals.

  Though imposing, there wasn’t anything immediately challenging in their presentation. The foremost bowed his head respectfully, then pressed a closed fist over his heart. He addressed them in a warm alto. “We bring you greeting. Our lady extends her invitation and welcome to you. You are to accompany us to meet her.”

  “Who are you?” Kyrkenall asked. “Where do you want us to go? And who’s your lady?”

  “I am Sorak, speaker with the Shift Dwellers. I am here to take you to the lands of our lady, the Alten Cerai, Goddess of the Shifts. Come. She is eager to speak with you.”

  21

  Last Words

  Someone sat on the bed. Vannek awoke in darkness, and on the moment his hand was under the pillow and around the knife hilt. He smelled horses, and sweat, and beer, and knew it was someone heavy from the impact of him sitting on the mattress. And then Vannek had twisted on the lantern, and he saw the craggy, scarred face of graying Rolk. The older man was half-turned and looking toward the knife Vannek leveled.

  Rolk looked away from the knife tip and met Vannek’s eyes, then spoke as though they were already in the midst of a conversation. “The problem with your father wasn’t that he lacked bravery, or smarts. It was that he was too busy fighting to make enough children. And when he did, it was always with the wrong women. So we got Chargan, spawn of a Dendressi doxy. We got Koregan, spoiled son of a pampered mother. And we got you.”

  Vannek sat up, but didn’t put the knife away. He wasn’t yet sure how he would play this. It had already been a long day, and a bleak one, and he’d only managed to fall asleep in the last hour. It had required all of his cunning to keep the kings in line after they learned that not just the whole of the Snowbird clan but two of their three dragons were lost. Only the recovering one was left them. He’d spun the failed attack as emblematic of the problems of impulsive leadership under Tarjezhan and perhaps placing too much faith in magic, and he thought it had worked. He’d thought, too, that Rolk was convinced. Yet here he was. Was this a challenge?

  Vannek wavered for a moment and decided that threatening would only sound weak. So would retreat. He kept his knife still as his voice, and pretended to be part of the same conversation. “That means there’s a problem with me?”

  Rolk gestured to Vannek’s breasts, unbound and visible through his night shirt. “The obvious ones.”

  The mattress creaked as Rolk shifted heavy thighs. “Your father was your grandfather’s favorite. And mine. The best of his whole brood.” Rolk had assumed an easy familiarity, as though they were old friends around the campfire, or he some kindly uncle. “We hoped the line might breed true, through him.” His scarred face twisted. “Maybe we could have whipped Koregan into shape. He had mettle. Chargan’s too clever for his own good, and he’s a mage. No one will take a half-breed for a king.” Suddenly Rolk’s eyes were sharp, and seemed to suck in the light, as though they were the only thing in the room giving it off, except for teeth, now bared. “That leaves you. And right now, you’re hanging by a thread.”

  “That sounds like a threat.”

  “Learn to hear truth. Your grandfather sent me with Koregan to be his voice. He’s gone now, and so’s Koregan. So who should I serve? Ostensibly you’re next in line.”

  “I am next in line. I’ve already taken command.”

  “You’ve told people you’re in command. That doesn’t mean you are. Since you’re a woman.”

  “I’m a man now.”

  “Are you? If I tore your clothes off I’d find what I’d see under any woman’s garments.” His smile wasn’t at all warm. “I could take you and make you squeal.”

  Vannek fought down the anger, and indignation, and strove to sound coldly competent. “You’d die first.”

  Rolk leaned infinitesimally closer. “I’m stronger than you.” He frowned, suddenly uncaring, and dismissed Vannek with a twist of his lip. “But I want a woman who smells like sweet things, like a tasty dessert. And you do your best to smell like a man. I also want a woman who knows how to bed a man, and I don’t guess you ever have. Or at least not enough to count. Have you been bedding Syrik?”

  Vannek felt a flush rise on his cheeks, and involuntarily his hand tightened on his knife hilt. He then lost control and voiced a threat. “I can have you killed.”

  Rolk’s response was instantaneous. “It’s the other way round.”

  He hated that Rolk had angered him into sounding foolish, and glared as the old warrior continued. “I see the way he follows you. I see the way your back stiffens when he does, and by the Three it is bloody priceless. You haven’t had him, have you?”

/>   He’s trying to bait you, he told himself, and forced calm

  “In a way,” Rolk said, “I feel sorry for you. If you’d been my daughter I’d have married you to one of the Red Feather chieftains. They take care of their women, and they raise strong sons. You could have been happy. Instead—pfft. Your grandfather’s had you playing this foolish game for the last four years.”

  “I’m not your daughter. And the past is gone. I’m in charge now. I assume you have some reason for this intrusion. Although I don’t appreciate your approach, I note your candor. Truth is good.”

  Rolk said nothing.

  “So let’s start over,” Vannek said slowly. “You tell me your point, and I’ll decide what I wish to do with it. You think I’m hanging by a thread.”

  Rolk’s voice had been faintly mocking before. Now he was in dead earnest. “I know you’re hanging by a thread because the kings already plot who’ll run the city then you’re disposed of. When will Chargan be here?”

  Amongst other talents, Vannek had become a gifted liar. “Within five days.”

  “Still so long? Here are the things in your favor. Koregan looked weak because after he won the city, the rebels kept giving him trouble, and then they killed him. Now people say the only reason he won the city is because of Chargan’s dragons and his father’s army. They’re probably right. And here you are in contrast, the personal slayer of his assassin within a quarter hour.”

  Vannek didn’t correct him. It had been Syrik’s idea to spread word that the Dendressi Vannek had slain was the one who’d fired Koregan’s death arrow.

  “You’re still a woman. Now normally that would make you pointless, but the rank and file are more loyal to you than their own kings. They saw you were the first one through when the wall went down. They love that you avenged your brother. And they’re superstitious about the magic they were told made you a man, and the fact the god-king’s blood fills your veins. Their strutting little kings can’t compare with that if you sing it right.”