Queen of Fire

by Anthony Ryan

  “We were found by a Varitai scouting party the next morning, lying senseless amidst a herd of riderless horses. They took us back to camp where the slave-healer was able to wake Father with some kind of herbal mixture, but he was not the same, looking at me with eyes that saw a stranger, his lips spouting gibberish only he could understand. Loon though he now was, General Tokrev still deemed him an incompetent and a coward. As sole heir I was obliged to watch as he was beheaded, the general decreeing his line unworthy of freedom and condemning me to slavery. Naturally, as the wronged party, all my family’s wealth was now his.

  “A slave’s life is rarely an easy one, but to be a slave in army service is a particular form of torment. My comrades were mostly cowards and deserters, subjected to routine beatings to crush any defiance, the slightest sign of disobedience punishable by prolonged torture and death, a fate suffered by three of my companions during the march north. We were employed as beasts of burden, laden with packs that would have tried the strongest man, fed barely enough to sustain life, our numbers dwindled from two hundred to less than fifty by the time we reached the ice.

  “The general’s glorious campaign began with the destruction of a small settlement on the shore of the frozen ocean. Perhaps five hundred people, small in stature and clad in furs. It should have been an easy victory but these people were far from defenceless, for they somehow had command of bears. Great white bears unlike any seen before, bears that seemed to feel nothing as arrows or spears pierced their hides, bears that tore whole companies to pieces before being hacked down. The general was compelled to commit a full brigade to the fight, and what was expected to be an easy victory turned into a prolonged slaughter. The settlement was his, though many of its inhabitants had fled onto the ice. The few captives, mostly wounded men and women who had fought a rear-guard action to buy time for their people to flee, sat down and refused to move regardless of what torments were visited upon them by the overseers. They were dragged into cages but refused to eat, perishing shortly after, none speaking a single word.

  “Although Tokrev was quick to send an inflated account of his victory to Volar, his troops didn’t share his exultation. The cold was already claiming lives and winter had not yet fully fallen, and the Free Swords looked upon the vast expanse of ice before them with great unease. However, none had the courage to gainsay the general when he ordered the advance and I soon found myself hauling a sled across the ice alongside a dozen other unfortunates. Every morning we would wake to find our numbers diminished until soon only I and three others were left. The overseers cursed and beat us but had little option but to lighten the load, vital provisions being left behind because there were insufficient slaves to haul them. Bellies began to rumble and tempers shorten, the Free Swords’ fear growing with every step on the ice, fears that proved well justified.

  “The Bear People bided their time, letting us spend lives and food with each passing mile, until the days grew so short the army could cover no more than a few miles at a time. Strangely I found myself better fed than before, the chief overseer had contrived to plunge to his death at the bottom of a hidden crevasse and his surviving subordinates were too wearied by the cold to prevent me helping myself to my fellow slaves’ rations. They had all perished by now, some due to the beatings, but most taken by the cold.

  “I remember the day I last saw the general, standing alone at the head of the column. He paced about on the ice, stamping with impatience and it seemed to me he was waiting for something. Thanks to my increased strength I had begun to harbour insane notions of revenge. The ever-more-neglectful overseers, themselves reduced in number to only two, had failed to notice when I procured a key from one of their fallen comrades, a drunkard who had foolishly passed out after forgetting to properly secure his furs. It would be a simple matter to unfasten my shackles from the sled, sprint towards the general, and hook the chains over his head, strangling him before his Kuritai could respond. It was a hopeless scheme, of course. The man was twice my size and his Kuritai would have been on me before I covered half the distance. But I was young, and hope is ever bright in the young. And the sight of my father’s headless corpse had never faded, fool though he was.

  “So, as the general paced back and forth I slipped the key into the lock and made ready to execute my plan. I often wonder what would have transpired then had not the eyeless man appeared, most likely there would have been one more dead slave littering the course of this madman’s army across the ice. But still, in my less reflective moments, I often think how it would have felt to have that man at my mercy, just for an instant, to know his fear as the chain tightened around his throat.

  “But the arrival of the eyeless man forced all such thoughts from my head. He seemed little different from the people slaughtered on the shore, clad in furs, small and broad of face, but instead of bears, he brought cats, very large cats that appeared out of the mist on either side of him, making the few surviving horses rear in alarm, along with more than a few Free Swords. Many began to draw swords but stopped at a command from the general. To my great surprise he then began to converse with the eyeless man, not in some alien tribal tongue, but in Volarian. Even more shocking was his demeanour, his shoulders hunched and head slightly bowed, the posture of a subservient man. Their words were faint but I heard a few snatches of conversation above the constant wind, ‘You were told to wait,’ the eyeless man told the general. Tokrev appeared to bluster, speaking the kind of military jargon my father rejoiced in but barely understood, talk of seized initiative and bold thrusts. The eyeless man told him he was a fool. ‘Come back next summer,’ he said before turning away. ‘If they leave you anything to return with.’ Then he was gone, and his cats with him.

  “We remained encamped as night came on, every soul no doubt now silently beseeching Tokrev to order a retreat come the morning. In the event, the Bear People left him no decision in the matter. The spear-hawks attacked first, streaking out of the night sky by the hundred to rip eyes from sockets, tear away faces and fingers so that it seemed a red rain was falling all around. Panic seized the Free Swords and only the Varitai and Kuritai responded to the bugle blasts, forming a defensive cordon around the camp. For a moment all was quiet, the night beyond the torchlight nothing but a silent void, but then the sound came, filling the night, the roar of a thousand bears stirred to fury.

  “They came at us from two sides, a solid wedge of charging muscle and claw, smashing through the Varitai as if they were made of straw, then rampaging through the camp. Everywhere men fell shrieking, slashed open or decapitated by sweeping claws, the bears rising and falling as they pounded men to bloody ruin. My last view of the general was the sight of him amidst a cluster of Kuritai, fighting with all their expertise to keep the bears at bay as he fled, a dense knot of fear-maddened Free Swords following close behind.

  “As for me, I still crouched next to the sled, now liberally adorned with the remnants of my overseers. Everything had happened with such speed I could scarcely believe it. The bears seemed content to continue dismembering corpses, but then I saw men running from the shadows, many men with spears, more bears running alongside them and the air above alive with the thunder of wings. I knew in an instant to linger here another moment meant death.

  “I unlocked myself and fled into the darkness, not thinking to seize some supplies, my only thought of escape. I ran until my lungs burned with the frozen air, collapsing only when my legs gave way. I lay still for a time, trying to recover some strength, but I was so tired, and it was so cold. I thought it might be best to sleep for a while, and might have fallen to an endless slumber had I not heard the steady crunch of a bear’s claws on the ice behind me. I forced myself to my feet, staggering on, fuelled only by terror, but even that was not enough to maintain my flight and I fell again.

  “Knowing my cause to be hopeless I forced myself to turn and confront my pursuer, a lumbering shape looming ever closer through the darkness, eyes bright, claws and snout red from recent fee
ding. Volarians have no death songs, believing there are no gods or ascended souls to hear them, but in those final moments I found myself thinking once again of my father’s foolish dreams and how I wished I had found the courage to ask him about my mother.”

  Astorek fell silent, his gaze distant now, a puzzled frown on his brow as if he recalled something not fully understood. Vaelin knew the expression well, having worn it many times himself. “The wolf,” he said.

  “Yes.” Astorek gave a slight smile. “The bear stopped a few feet from me, growling, eyes bright with a malice that I had only ever seen in the eyes of men before. It seemed to be savouring the moment, creeping closer until its bloody snout was only inches away, its breath, hot and stinking on my face … Then it stopped.

  “I had closed my eyes, refusing to look into its hate-filled gaze, but when I felt its breath recede I opened them again. The bear had shrunk to its haunches, head lowered, eyes now lit with another human trait—fear. Not, of course, of me, but something beyond me. So I turned and saw a wolf.

  “Two things struck me at once. First, it was large, larger in fact than the bear that now cringed from it. Secondly, its eyes. They looked into mine and I knew … It saw me, all of me, skin, bone, heart and soul. It saw me, and felt no malice at all.

  “I heard a scraping sound and turned to see the bear fleeing into the night with all haste, the white shape soon swallowed by darkness. The wolf circled me for a short while, its gaze still fixed on me. For all the strangeness and the terror I still felt the great cold enfolding me, the sweat on my skin now frozen, leeching away what strength I had left. My vision began to dim and I knew death would soon claim me … Then the wolf growled.

  “It was not a voice that came to my head then, more a certainty, an implacable conviction that I couldn’t die here. From somewhere I found the strength to stand and the wolf trotted away towards the north, stopping after a time to ensure I was following. I shuffled along in its wake for uncounted hours, or possibly days, for all sense of time seemed to fade. If I faltered, or felt the welling surge of despair that would tempt me to sink onto the ice where at least I could rest, the wolf would growl, and I would keep moving.

  “We stopped when a green fire began to flicker in the sky. Not knowing what it was, I finally fell to my knees, thinking this a vision of death, or madness. Perhaps I had already died and my tutors had all been wrong; there is something awaiting us beyond the arc of life. All fear had left me by then, along with all but the most faint sensation, numbed as I was. Now there was only acceptance, a sense of a journey complete.

  “And the wolf howled.”

  Astorek closed his eyes and Vaelin felt Dahrena’s hand slide into his, knowing she too was recalling the wolf’s howl, that night in the forest when the Seordah heeded its call to war. He knew Astorek couldn’t describe how it felt, the sound that seemed to strip away everything but the core of those privileged, or cursed to hear it.

  “I would have wept,” the young shaman said, reopening his eyes to regard his audience with a sombre smile. “Had not my tears been frozen in my eyes. The wolf’s howl faded and it looked at me, one last time, then was gone, bounding across the ice. I stared up at the fire in the sky for a time then lay down to sleep. Whale Killer must have found me only minutes later, for I was still alive to greet the next dawn.”

  “And you have remained here ever since?” Vaelin asked. “Never tempted to return home?”

  “What home would I return to? Everything I had is gone. Besides, when they returned the next summer, I learned full well the vileness of my former people. We knew of the Bear People’s great battle with the Cat People, that they had fled to the west in search of easier prey. The Wolf People were not sorry to see them gone from the ice, for they had fallen to unwise ways. But, though the Bear People had won a victory, their losses meant they couldn’t withstand another Volarian expedition, especially since the Volarians had learned their lessons well and came better equipped and in much greater numbers. When they were done with the Bear People they came for us.

  “Many Wings had taught me much, and I was a very keen student. She had hoped to shield me from the struggle but I wanted to repay their kindness. We killed many Volarians together, my wolves and her hawks, striking where they were weakest, fleeing before they could strike back. For months we harried them until their line of march became a red smear across the ice. But there were always more, and, though I searched for him, I never caught Tokrev’s scent again. Two winters ago they stopped coming. We thought we had finally convinced them to leave us be, but it seems they went across the great water to torment your people instead, for which we are sorry.”

  Vaelin’s gaze went to Kiral who gave a short nod. She hears no lie … as I heard no lie from Barkus.

  “They will come again,” Astorek went on, eyes intent on Vaelin. “In greater numbers still. But now we have you, Raven’s Shadow.”

  The hut where Alturk had chosen to seclude himself was a mean thing, little more than a slanting shack in a small clearing away from the main settlement. The door gave way easily under Vaelin’s boot, releasing the fetid odour of an unwashed man mired in overindulgence. Alturk’s substantial form lay on a bed of furs, snoring loudly, surrounded by the walrus-tooth flasks their hosts used to store pine ale, all empty. The slumbering Alturk gave no indication of having noticed the intrusion, something that changed abruptly when Vaelin emptied a bowlful of ice water over his shaggy head.

  The explosion of rage was instantaneous, the Lonak surging upright, war club in hand, teeth bared in a snarl. He paused at the sight of Vaelin in the doorway, confusion flickering across his dripping face. “Do you choose death now, Merim Her?” he demanded in a hiss.

  “Sorbeh Khin,” Vaelin stated, the Lonak for a formal challenge. “You are no longer fit to lead the Sentar. They are mine now. If you wish to keep them, fight me.” He turned and walked into the clearing where the Sentar waited, looking on with shared expressions of grim understanding. Kiral had explained Vaelin’s reasoning and, to his surprise, none had raised an objection.

  “Faithless dogs,” Alturk growled at them as he emerged from the shack, going on to harangue them in Lonak in a short but vehement diatribe that appeared to leave all singularly unmoved.

  “You no longer hear the word from the Mountain,” Kiral told him. “You make yourself, varnish. This man gives you a chance to prove otherwise.”

  Alturk gave no reply, consenting only to sneer at her before fixing his unsteady gaze on Vaelin, grip tightening on his war club. “Where is your weapon?”

  Vaelin spread his hands, showing the absence of a dagger at his belt, his sword also gone from his back. “Why would I require a weapon? You offer no threat.”

  Alturk stared at him in fury for a moment longer, then began to laugh, throwing his head back and casting hearty peals of mirth into the trees as he tossed his war club aside. “I should thank you,” he said when his laughter finally subsided. “Not every man gets to make his dreams real.”

  He came at Vaelin in a crouching sprint. Their time among the Wolf People had done much to restore his frame and, for all the pine ale in his belly, his speed was impressive, leaving only the barest time for Vaelin to sidestep the charge and deliver a punch to his jaw. Alturk grunted in pain but didn’t falter, replying with a swift round-house blow. Vaelin blocked it with both forearms and drove his elbow into the Lonak’s exposed face, following up with a rapid series of punches to the face and belly, dodging Alturk’s counterblows as he drove him back, every punch landing with unerring precision … Until the Lonak caught one in his fist and hammered a blow into Vaelin’s temple.

  He reeled from the impact, the world suddenly a blur as he struggled to resume a fighting stance. Alturk didn’t afford him the opportunity, however, sweeping his legs away with a kick and driving another punch into his face. For a moment the world went away and Vaelin could see only a vague shadow, surrounded by glittering stars …

  “You,” Alturk grated, lo
oming closer, meaty fist drawn back for another blow. “You made my son varnish. I see him every night, I watch him die every night, because of you, Merim Her.”

  “I spared a boy,” Vaelin replied, spitting blood, feeling his left eye swelling shut. “You killed a man … A man who made his own choices.” He saw it then, a flicker of something in the Lonak’s eyes, a spasm of expression on his craggy face. “You knew,” Vaelin said in realisation. “You knew he had betrayed you long before you killed him.”

  Alturk snarled again, drawing his fist back farther. Vaelin hawked and spat blood into the Lonak’s eyes, buying enough time to twist and deliver a kick to the side of his head. He surged upright as Alturk staggered away, charging forward to drive his head into the Lonak’s midriff then jerking it up to connect with his jaw. He followed with more punches to the face, Alturk sagging more with each blow, arms flailing as he tried to ward off the assault. Finally Vaelin sent him to his knees with a right hook to the jaw.

  Vaelin paused, chest heaving, his fists leaking blood onto the forest floor. “Nishak told me,” Alturk said in a dull, weary voice, gazing up at him, blood streaming from numerous cuts. “I … didn’t listen.” He lowered his head, slumping in resignation, muttering, “I make no request for the knife.”

  Kiral appeared at Vaelin’s side with Alturk’s war club in hand. “Strike true, Tahlessa,” she said, offering the weapon to Vaelin. “He deserves a quick end at least…”

  She trailed off abruptly and straightened, her gaze going to the south. From the pained expression on her face he knew her song must be sounding a powerful note. However, this time he didn’t need to ask the meaning, for he could hear another warning, pealing across ice and forest, undeniable and implacable. The Sentar stirred in discomfort, exchanging fearful glances, for no wolf’s howl was ever so loud.