But I have faith. Mrithyn is with me even now. Maybe her God is too.
“You see that tree?” I point to a tree engulfed in blue flames.
She looks.
“Ivaia is there. We have to go. She will help us.”
“She won’t,” Liriene says, a frown crossing her face.
“Yes!” I pull her again.
We walk through the waves of blood, and I clear a path with my scythe. We forge into the heart of the campgrounds. What if Ivaia isn’t there? What if it’s a human mage?
I kick doubt from my mind.
Keep going. If the Gods march tonight into the realm of men, I’m marching too.
Liriene trips and starts sobbing, her tears watering the bloodied earth.
“Stop crying, Liri. You won’t be able to see.”
“I can see all.”
“Then watch where you’re going, alright?” My vision heightens. The color of fire against the night sky dances in my eyes. I see more humans than Elves now.
And they see me:
The real me, the executioner with the abysmal darkness of death in her eyes.
Blue fire glows beneath my skin and divine power charges through my veins.
Finally, we break through the crowd into the center of a fray. The horseman of death has a clear path to Ivaia. Blue, fiery light glows beneath her skin as well. He wild hair flutters in a violent wind as she calls storms. The horseman counters her magic. I now realize he wields a staff in one hand and a great sword in the other.
I stop short, watching their magic in a cataclysmic confrontation.
Men howl and roar at them, cheering on the Night Mare Rider.
She raises her hands above her head, calling forth all manner of magic. Her voice is multi-tonal and her words are not of the common tongue. Spells.
She hisses a hex and fumes rise from the ground. Putrid yellow steam swirls around the horseman’s field of protective magic, which I now notice originates from an intricate glyph on the ground. The steam coils and undulates against his barrier and the friction sparks blue lightning. His shield sizzles and splinters. He throws up his hands and enhances the shield. It vibrates, shrinking and expanding, pulsing with heightened energy. With a mind-numbing burst, it evaporates the smoke that threatened to disable it. Without hesitation, he places another glyph, another shield goes up between them.
Ivaia’s lightning bolt refracts off his protective field of magic and ricochets back into her. She wasn’t fast enough. She falls.
“Ivaia!” I scream. I struggle with the decision to leave Liriene and go help Iv. I can’t lose another mother-figure. Compelled by this desperation, I let go of Liri’s hand but I’m too late.
But I can’t move fast enough. Like trying to run through a dream. Like running with heavy legs through quicksand. I feel time crawling like an ant on my skin.
Someone in the wild crowd throws a lance.
A body crosses in front of Ivaia, shielding her from the blow.
Two sets of golden-haired heads fall to the ground.
I try to scream but nothing comes out.
My voice fails.
My body locks into place.
My mind warps.
My world shatters
The beast within me howls.
The Night Mare paws the earth and stands up on its hind legs, victorious. The horse man cackles, not at all deterred by the fact that someone else made the winning strike.
I run toward their bodies.
“Rio!” I find a scratch of my voice. “Iv!” I stumble through the crowds. I listen for their heartbeats, but my own is so loud. I push my senses farther, like the tendril of a vine, reaching along the ground toward them.
One steady heart beat meets me at their bodies. Only one.
Tears blur my eyes.
“No!” I push a human aside.
Both their bodies move.
Ivaia’s underneath Riordan, his full weight resting on her. He’s not moving. But she is.
I choke on a sob, still pushing through the crowd. My muscles trembling wildly, making me weaker. I stumble over my faulty legs.
Ivaia pushes Riordan’s body up. The spear has impaled him through the chest. Drawing closer, I hear his faint heartbeat now too. He’s still alive. He won’t last much longer. I must get there.
I push myself onto my toes, struggling to see as I forge through bands of Men. Ivaia’s face goes white. His blood splatters it. He’s choking. Blood oozes from his wound and pulses from his mouth.
Her fists are locked around the lance that connects them: It went through him into her.
She roars as she pushes his impaled body off hers, and the spear exits her body.
“No!” She was hit too.
Her magic, like gold and silver rays of light, lifts Rio into the air, pulls the spear from his body, and lays him on the ground. His sacrifice earned the silence of the crowd, and nobody moves as she shifts to lean over his body. Blood sputters out of her mouth as her lips tremble. Her voice breaks through her mouth, “Rio.”
Her bloody hands shake, lingering over his wound. I can sense his soul departing. As if she can feel it too, she digs her fingers into his tunic, knotting it in her fists. Trying to hold him in this world. Not letting him leave.
Ivaia looks into her beloved knight’s diamond eyes as they dim forever. I hear his last heartbeat. She clenches her hands into fists, lifting them to her face, and I remember the tattoo on her palm. Her heart rate quickens but it’s thready.
She struggles to stand. Wiping the tears from her eyes with the palms of her hands, smearing her face with his blood. Like war paint.
A Man steps in front of me, and I can’t see her now. I cut his throat and push him aside.
I look and see the horseman, his black eyes trained on her failing body. Her shoulders hunch forward but she raises her arms at her side with characteristic grace, and stares him down. Her crystalline blue eyes shrouded in crimson blood.
She shoves a fist into the wound in her abdomen. It’s not good enough.
With her free hand she calls fire into her palm. Blue fire billows into the air, a torch against the night. A beacon of her resolution. With a final battle cry, she drops to her knees, and punches her flaming fist into the ground. Magic violet flames explode, blasting back the soldiers around them, and consume Ivaia and Riordan’s bodies.
My eyes widen to take in the height of the fire’s reach. A tower of tumultuous flames rises into the night sky and burns into my memory.
Another barbaric Man turns on me when I try to shove him. He grabs me by the hair.
“Look!” He taps his comrade on the shoulder with his gigantic free hand.
“Let her go!” Liriene’s voice bleats behind me.
“Grab that one too— they’re both of the right age.”
I hear her scream as someone grabs her behind me.
“No!” I kick at his legs. He grips my throat.
I steal a look back to Ivaia and Riordan. The fire dies, no longer fueld by her magic. Their bodies are entangled with one another in a final embrace. Charred and crumbling to ash.
My blood boils, my magic erupts within me. An inferno ravages my bones, breaks through the surface of my skin, and scorches the Man’s hands.
He drops me. I swing my scythe at his legs, removing them from his body. He falls to the ground. I grab his face in my hand and push my pain and magic into him. His face combusts, his head explodes.
I push myself up with a roar and see the Horseman’s smile.
A scream— a voice from the realm of Gods, rends the air like thunder.
All attention is on me in the next second.
The horseman looks through the crowd straight to me.
I raise my shaking hands and clasp them together around the hilt of my scythe. Lightning charges through me and runs courses all over my body. I breathe a spell onto my blade. The hilt lengthens the way Emisandre’s stick grew into a Pophis. My scythe transforms into a fully-grown staff
with a massive arced blade. I pulse the staff into the ground and the earth moans in response; quaking as if in terror at my wrath.
Soldiers fall into the chasm yawning open in the ground at my will.
I’ll bury them all.
For the first time in my life, I hear myself: The divine tongue, the voice that sucks air from lungs.
“Hasha’f thaar Mrithyn. In duin la namas.” Your souls belong to Mrithyn. Your blood belongs to me.
I sweep my scythe across the battlefield. Dalis Men yelp as the ground beneath them gives way.
I watch them fall.
The Horseman’s black eyes narrow on me.
“Ma v’lane nithura has rena ath Carenar!”
I claim your life in the name of Death!
Magic pulses from somewhere deep inside me. The energetic power blasts from me like an icy wind, freezing everything in my path.
Except him.
My power stops at his feet.
The shield of magic surrounds him still, unbroken.
Savage power seizes my bones. But it’s not my power.
My blood curdles in my veins, I go completely stiff.
What?
He’s controlling my body.
My magic is no match. I can’t force him out, I can’t repel his power.
No.
“Got you.” A thought that doesn’t belong to me sails into my head like an arrow.
Stop.
I’m choking now. I drop my scythe and my hands fly to my throat, clawing for air.
“Stop fighting,” I hear in my head.
Never!
“Have it your way.”
The world goes black.
29. THE MAWS OF MEN
Regaining consciousness feels like pounding on the surface of a frozen lake from beneath it in its frigid blackened waters.
The ice thuds against my pounding fists, stinging my flesh.
Then it cracks.
Each crack splinters.
Until the ice shatters.
I lay here now, lost in my new reality.
Where am I?
I push up on my elbows. Every inch of my body hurts.
“You’re up,” Liriene says in a hoarse voice from behind me.
I roll over to face her. It’s dark and I can barely make out her form in the shadows. The smell of wet earth and stagnant air confuses me.
“Are we in a cave?” I make no movement.
“Yes.”
I rise into a crouching position. Her hands grope in the darkness. We lock on to each other’s forearms.
Her skin is cold. I finally realize I’m shivering. We huddle together for warmth.
Hours pass before our sleepless eyes in a stretching and recoiling shadow. Silent hours. My mind runs through the battlefield into the clearing where I watched Ivaia and Riordan die. The Night Mare’s whinnying and snorting chase me into the recesses of my thoughts. Silas’ body slams into the dark place of my mind and leads me into the tent where I found my sister and Attica hiding. I wander behind the visions, watching them replay. Ivaia and Riordan’s love goes up in flames. I chase down the horseman. I slam into his wall of magic. My mind beats its fists on the shield between him and me.
His pitchblack eyes watch me through the crowds of thoughts.
“Memories will destroy you,” Liriene whispers. She sighs. Whether I open or close my eyes, darkness shrouds us. A perfect backdrop for the memories to play against. I can’t ignore them here.
“Do you remember having visions?”
She stills beside me. Her bones shudder and I know it’s not from the chilly, dank air.
The voice that escapes her next is ethereal— it glows in this dark, but her words are deeper than the shadows:
“Violence. Terror. Chaos. These events come from the twisted side of my wildest dreams. What am I becoming?”
I turn toward her and feel for her shoulders. They’re fallen forward and her head is bowed. I lift her chin and push her back upright. “Liriene,” I breathe. “You are not becoming anything. I won’t let the Gods—”
“How can you stop Him? I saw Him!” She begins to cry. “He sees me even here beneath the earth. He is showing me ruination. War. Death.”
I dig my fingernails into her shoulders, trying to steady her, trying to prevent what’s taking hold of her.
“He has revealed to me my own demise.”
“No,” I grit my teeth. “No, the Gods cannot have you too. You are not going to die.” I shake her. “Ignore Him. Block out His voice, close your eyes.”
“I can’t.” She wraps her hands around my forearms and bows her head against my chest. I take her in my arms.
“Everyone thinks Oran is a child-like God. That he is giddy and bright.” She picks her head up.
“It’s not true. He’s terrible. He sees all, knows all. These visions are blinding!” Her whispers are frantic. “He is not a sun God. He is revelation, and He shows me such darkness. Adreana does not hide Him from us— she hides us from His Truth.”
Her words chill me.
“What does He want? Why claim you now?”
“I don’t know!”
I shake her again. “The darkness was meant for me. Not you, Liriene.”
Her shaking stops, her shoulders roll back under my fingertips, and she places her hands on my face. I can feel her breath when she says, “We all have both light and darkness within.”
Approaching footsteps bring us to our feet. We cling to each other. Firelight blazes through the shadows, casting them back into the depths of the cave as the torchbearer nears us. Heavy, armored footsteps ring out as what sounds like a multitude approaches. The light burns my eyes and Liriene shields her face as they come into view. First, I see torches wrapped in fire, then the hands carrying them.
Faces
Men’s faces.
Tall, broad-bodied soldiers dressed in silver and black armor march in unison down the long corridor of the cave. When their light reaches us, they stop, drawing their blades.
I hear screams and cries of fear coming from somewhere deeper within the cave. Those in the darker depths must see the light coming. I guess they already know who’s behind it. Liriene pushes me behind her, earning a glare from me.
“State your names.” One deep timbre shakes the cavern walls.
Liriene squeezes my hand, halting me from replying.
The leader steps forward, sword drawn and aimed in our direction. We push back into the wall. We are completely unarmed.
“From what clan do you hail?” He questions us again. His eyes are sanguine, burning red in his long, lean face. His ash brown hair is tied neatly into a short braid. His skin is fair as a lily.
“Hishmal or Ro’Hale?” Another asks behind him. Less appetizing to the eye, this one has green-yellow skin and giant black eyes with no whites in them.
There are survivors of Hishmal here? As well as our own people? Liriene and I exchange a wary glance.
“Ro’Hale,” she replies. Her voice is stronger now, clear. All traces of despair are gone. I stare up at her placid face and mercury eyes. Her scarlet hair is a furious shade of red in the firelight. I sense newly awakened power undulating in her veins.
“Names,” he demands.
Her eyes are orbs of divine warning, and the Man visibly recoils when she speaks again, “You first.”
Her very presence is terrifying.
He laughs at her before his posture settles. “I am Lord Varic,” He says. “Master of Tecar.”
“Tecar?” I ask.
Liriene’s eyes widen with realization. She squeezes my hand once more. A signal that she knows where we are. I look to her for an explanation but she locks her eyes on Varic.
“Shepherd of the Lost,” She snarls at him.
“Ah! So, you have heard of me?”
“No!” She roars. “I have Seen you. I have Seen your death!” Her fiery hair floats about her face, but there is no wind. She grows in stature, her voice tears through the cave
like a thunderclap.
“We are no little lambs, Shepherd — We are wolves! And we will never be slaves of the Baore! You will let my people go!”
All humor deserts Varic’s expression. His jaw tightens and his brows set with determination.
I grin at my sister and straighten my back beside her. I wonder how dangerous we seem to these men: The contrast of our appearances must be startling. Snow white hair and flaming red. Fury and resolve to match. Sisters, one marked by death, the other by fire.
“Witches!” One spits on the ground. I come abreast with Liriene and glare at the one who spewed the insult.
“Try again,” I dare.
“I recognize her!” One points in my direction. “She was in the clearing when Magister Hadriel slew the Witch!”
“She’s a Mage!”
“Daughters of Despair!”
Magister Hadriel. Ivaia said he’s the one who magicked Herrona into loving Berlium.
“Then it seems we have who we were looking for.” The leader turns and walks away. “Take her and kill the other.”
“No! I go nowhere without my sister.” I lock arms with Liriene.
“We want the instrument of the Divine only.” The leader turns back to me. “But I‘m sure the King will find that very interesting.”
“We are both servants to the Gods,” I say.
“Which of you serves the God of Death?”
Liriene and I both hold our tongues.
“No answer?”
“She has white hair! She wielded the Scythe in Ro’Hale. She must be the White Reaper.”
“But she has hair the color of blood. I sense greater power in her.” The soldier with all-black eyes flourishes a staff. A mage or a monster?
“Take her then.” He points to Liriene.
“Touch her and I’ll kill you.” I sink into a ready stance, hands opened as magic charges and sparks at my fingertips. I’ll fight them for her. I’ll die on their blades for her.
Liriene mimics my stance and bares her teeth — Fangs! Her hands uncurl and the length of her nails have grown into small talons. I almost forget to look formidable in my surprise.
I tear my eyes from her and meet the those of the guards. Their armor displays the insignia of the Grizzly King. We are in the Baore. We are in King Berlium’s slave den.
The Sunderlands Page 35
