by C. M. Hayden
The Shahl couldn’t muster the strength to push her away, and his voice grew slightly frantic. “How dare you…”
Vexis stroked what little hair he had left. “Shush. Just now fathers are dying left and right.”
“How dare you threaten me.” The Shahl turned to his chamber door. “Guards! Guards!” He waited for a long moment, but none appeared.
“You poor thing,” Vexis chided. “You’ve been alive so long, you’ve forgotten what life really means.” She rubbed the Netherlight in her pocket. “I don’t think you deserve this anymore.”
“You want immortality for yourself, do you?” The Shahl gave a toothy grin, but his voice betrayed his true anxiety. “I knew you were ambitious. Come now, we’ll work something out together. With you by my side.”
Vexis laughed to herself, regarding her father as she might regard a small child. “I don’t need immortality. The fear of death keeps a girl sharp. It helps us remember that what we do here, now, matters. What good is immortality if you’re just a dirty little despot in some shitty corner of the world?”
The Shahl looked at his daughter with a mote of fear behind his eyes, as if he was just seeing her for the first time. “Vexis, I’m your father. Do as I say.”
“No, you haven’t earned the right to call yourself that.” She stood from the bed and leaned one hand on the back post. “There’s only one true immortality. It’s the only one that matters, at any rate. It’s the immortality that comes from being feared. Nobody fears you, Valros.”
“I know plenty of people who would disagree with that.”
Vexis waved his comment aside. “Not that kind of fear. That’s the ordinary kind, like people fear getting stabbed or fear being boiled alive. They’re not things people actively worry about until it’s actually happening to them.”
“And what kind of fear should they have, precisely?”
Vexis smirked. “Good strategy, keep the conversation going until a guard notices the bodies outside the door. Maybe burst in to save you. Not a bad idea. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on killing you. Not for a while, anyway. If only you could lift your hands, maybe you could deal with me yourself. That’s the price of being old, I suppose.”
“You have no power,” the Shahl said, pointing to her magistry cuffs.
Vexis lulled her head, then casually picked the cuffs off her wrists and dropped them onto the blankets. “Because of these?”
The Shahl leaned back onto the bedpost, knowing he was powerless to stop her. “How?” he rasped.
“Your sixth Inquisitor was nice enough to remove them for me. My good friend, Nima. Wonderful girl. She’s a bit broken right now, but I think she’ll work through it. She’s stronger than even her brother knows.” Without warning, Vexis snapped the cuffs around her father’s wrists. She flashed a cat-like grin. “Just to keep you out of trouble. These are vicious little creations, aren’t they? Courtesy of your old friend, Amelia Ross. She called them Class S enchantments; said they were completely unbreakable, which I can attest to.”
The Shahl looked at his wrists and shot his daughter a pained glare.
Vexis placed a single finger on his mouth and shushed him. “That feeling right now in the pit of your stomach, that’s true fear. It comes from helplessness and inevitability.
“I owe you a lot, Valros. You helped show me the way forward. See, I have big plans, big visions. A vision of dragons. A vision of conquest. A vision of chaos and blood. A vision of light.” Again she smiled, more terrible than ever before. “Don’t worry, I’ll show you.”
Chapter Forty-three
A Vision of Light
Praxis didn’t remember how he’d gotten in the back of the wagon. He didn’t remember how his hands had been bound with magistry cuffs, or who the unmoving body beside him belonged to. All he knew was that he was in a horse-drawn wagon and could see the stars overhead. The coachman was familiar to him, a minor noble in his service. Praxis tried to get his attention, but the man pointedly ignored him. Praxis forced his head up over the edges of the wagon so he could see.
There were men on horses following the wagon, and Vexis was at the lead. They were very far from Helia Edûn. Around them were enormous bones stuck into the hard ground, and Praxis realized they were in the Dragon Wastelands. They came to a halt beside a valley thick with broken spears, ancient armor, and frayed banners sticking up from the dry, cracked earth.
Vexis hopped off her horse and looked into the wagon with a smile. “Oh, good. You’re awake.” She snapped her fingers at one of the men. “Prop him up, I want him to see this.”
Praxis practically snarled at the men. “A thousand shekels to the man who strikes her down.”
Vexis looked around to the others. “Anyone want to take him up on that? It’s a lot of money,” she asked glibly. The Endran girl, Nima, was standing beside several others. Her cheeks were red with tears, but she looked at Praxis with indifference. Nobody moved or said a word.
“You think the Netherlight will protect you from Father?” Praxis spat, turning his attention back to his little sister.
“Oh, I have more than that.” Vexis beat against her chest and coughed a few times. She looked as though she’d throw up. She hit her chest, one more time, and coughed up a small, rounded crystal into her palm. She held it up to the night sky. It glowed white with its own inner light and shined like a star.
“I’ve been saving this for a long time.” She held it to Praxis’ face, and he felt his entire body begin to heal. His pain disappeared, and his bruises faded.
“Is that…”
“A fragment of the Arclight.” Vexis nodded. “Wonderful, isn’t it?” She held the Arclight fragment and the Netherlight side-by-side and licked her lips.
“What are you going to do?” Praxis asked, as Vexis approached the dragon bones sticking out from the ground. “Kill me out here where nobody will know?”
Vexis ran her hand along the immense dragon ribcage. “Why would I kill you? A dead man can’t learn any new lessons. A dead man can’t be made to regret his past. A dead man can’t fear anything. And a dead man can’t bear witness to the birth of a god.”
Vexis held the Arclight and Netherlight together in one hand, and the two chunks of crystals crackled and sparked. She pressed her other palm against the dragon bones. “What would you do with the power of life and death in the palm of your hand? Something small, no doubt. Think bigger. Dream bigger.” The crystals glowed in her hand, and shadows intermixed with the white glow of the Arclight. “Rise, Craetos.”
The shadows and light expanded rapidly from her hand like wildfire. They touched every bone before her, and the ground rumbled and cracked underfoot. All at once, bits of dry flesh pulled toward the bones and, piece by piece, a dragon skeleton became whole again. The muscle and meat grew back and the dragon, once dead for a millennium, stirred in the sand. Its eyes glowed like yellow embers, and it shook the earth with each step. Its wings flapped hard, kicking up a hurricane of dust and knocking Praxis onto his back.
The final bits of gnarled sinew and cracked scales came together in a cobweb of mismatched flesh, and the dragon snarled. Vexis ran her hands along its massive frame and exposed leg muscle.
With the undead dragon looming nearby, Vexis approached Praxis and held her hand lovingly to his cheek. “Shall we begin?”
Epilogue
The Third Light
Arangathras looked as intimidating as ever. He stood beside the door to the Conservatorium, glancing around at the foliage dispassionately. He was in his human-like form and had healed well from his time as the Shahl’s prisoner. He’d shed most of his cracked scales, and the Arclight had taken care of the shallow flesh damage.
Arangathras motioned one of his enormous claws toward Taro. Realizing he was meant to shake it, Taro did so.
“I’m in your debt,” Arangathras said. His enormous hand felt like it could encompass Taro’s entire fist.
“It was nothing,” Taro said, slightly taken aback
.
“I disagree. I never dreamed my midsight could be so wrong.”
“Midsight?”
Arangathras looked uneasy as he explained. “Your proximity to the Arclight has given your kind powers over creation and animation. And the Helians’ proximity to the Netherlight has given them power over shadow and death.”
Taro cocked his head. “You’re telling me there’s another?”
Arangathras nodded. “There is. The Overlight allows Seers, such as myself, to view possible futures. Sometimes many thousands at a time, but usually the most likely ones boil to the surface. When first I saw you, all paths showed you to be wicked. You proved me wrong.”
Taro didn’t know what to say to that.
“I’ve let my brothers and sisters know what took place in Helia,” Arangathras said. “It’s been agreed that there will be no conflict between our people.”
Taro blinked. “So, I just stopped a war?”
“It would seem so. Your actions did what Sivion herself could not. But there’s more to it.” Arangathras gritted his sharp teeth. “A terrible darkness has entered this world. We’d known Vexis was dangerous; but until today, we didn’t know precisely how dangerous. There are rumors…whispers of my long-dead father returning as a necrotic abomination under her control.”
“Necrotic? As in undead?” Taro asked.
Arangathras nodded grimly. “The future grows more obscure by the day, but all timelines point to a conflict with Vexis and her ilk. I have not told Sivion or Godrin yet, but I’m sure they must feel it coming.”
Taro asked the most obvious question first, “Then why tell me?”
Taro got the distinct impression that Arangathras was not supposed to be talking to him about these things, and the dragon was quiet for a long moment before he answered. “I tell you this because…because when I look into the future I don’t see the Sun King. I don’t see Sivion.” His burning amber eyes met Taro’s. “When I look into the future, I see you.”
“There is only one thing that can transcend life and death: our name. By the time you read this, I will be long dead. And in the thousands of years to come, the dust from my body will be long gone. But someone will remember my name. Perhaps as a prophet, perhaps as a teacher, perhaps as a madman. But someone will remember.
Here, then, is my final truth: Do something that will make people remember you.”
-The Forty Truths of Ishal Valharis
BOOK 3: ALL THE GODS BELOW
Prologue
A Broken Family
Chapter One
A Vision of Light
Chapter Two
Consequences
Chapter Three
The Last Mercy of Vexis Andurin
Chapter Four
The Laws of Men
Chapter Five
A Call to Arms
Chapter Six
The Gray Wolf
Chapter Seven
Oathbreakers
Chapter Eight
A New Order
Chapter Nine
The Prisoner
Chapter Ten
The Deeplight Shard
Chapter Eleven
A Storm of Wings
Chapter Twelve
Survivors
Chapter Thirteen
The Search
Chapter Fourteen
The Northmen
Chapter Fifteen
Aruseldr, The Red Hall
Chapter Sixteen
King of the Ashes
Chapter Seventeen
Choices
Chapter Eighteen
Shieldmaidens
Chapter Nineteen
Mjolir, The Red King
Chapter Twenty
An Echo of Shadow
Chapter Twenty-one
Cowards and Kings
Chapter Twenty-two
A Matter of Honor
Chapter Twenty-three
The Bórhiemdr
Chapter Twenty-four
City of Dragons
Chapter Twenty-five
The Triumphs of Craetos
Chapter Twenty-six
The Chamber of the Seers
Chapter Twenty-seven
The Princess and the Dragon
Chapter Twenty-eight
Relics of the Past
Chapter Twenty-nine
Abandoned
Chapter Thirty
The Stranger
Chapter Thirty-one
Rieu, The Red Demon
Chapter Thirty-two
Dragonfire
Chapter Thirty-three
The Free Port of Aleth
Chapter Thirty-four
The Way Things Were
Chapter Thirty-five
Parting Ways
Chapter Thirty-six
An Unworthy Plan
Chapter Thirty-seven
Friends in Low Places
Chapter Thirty-eight
The Golden Throne
Chapter Thirty-nine
Fight & Flight
Chapter Forty
The Hidden Army
Chapter Forty-one
Where the Mountains Meet the Sea
Chapter Forty-two
The Gate Below
Chapter Forty-three
The Archivist
Chapter Forty-four
King of Dragons
Chapter Forty-five
Eyes of the Mad God
Chapter Forty-six
Escape From Nir Daras
Chapter Forty-seven
The Bright Dawn Ahead
Appendices
I - SUN KINGS
CONCURRENT TITLES
THE LINE OF SUN KINGS
II - THE OLD GODS
III - THE ARKOS
IV - DATING
V - THE RED KINGS OF NURENGARD
THE LINE OF RED KINGS
VI - NUREN CULTURE
HONORIFICS
NAMING CONVENTIONS
VII - PRONUNCIATIONS
PEOPLE
PLACES
OTHER
“All know of the gods that adorn the sky, giving light to darkness and hope to despair. But there are other gods, beings of pure malice that dwell not in the heavens, but in the hearts of men.
They live below, lurking in everyday places.
In the eyes of our brothers and sisters.
In the minds of our friends and family.
They watch us from the reach between worlds.
And beneath Nir Daras, one waits, his eyes wide open, ready to consume all the world.”
-Sethetrion the Truth-Seer
Prologue
A Broken Family
Era didn’t know how to be a widow. It was not the sort of thing you planned for. Not the sort of thing you dwelled on. In fact, when she’d first married Talthis, she made a point to not think about it. Being a warder was dangerous, after all.
Now it was a reality, and as Era sat clenching the hem of her black dress, she wished she’d given it more thought. She’d arrived at the Warder Central Encampment less than half a mile from the Magisterium.
The one-handed warder inside introduced himself as Sir Treytin Deridane. Despite his knighthood and title, his injury had left him as little more than a glorified file clerk. He sat on the other side of a wide birch desk surrounded by walls with crosshatched alcoves, each stuffed with parchments and scrolls.
Sir Deridane’s eyes were fixed on a scroll he’d pulled from the fourth row, and he spoke to Era with profound disinterest. “What was your husband’s rank?”
Era’s opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.
“Ma’am?” the warder repeated, glancing up at her.
Her second oldest son, Decker, was seated to her right. He held his younger brother, Enam, on his lap, and was trying to keep the boy’s sobs low. Decker wasn’t much past thirteen, but in all the unpleasantness that the last few weeks had b
rought, he’d risen to the occasion.
Decker answered for her, ever respectful. “He was a captain, my lord.”
The warder grumbled to himself and scratched his eyebrow. “What was his name again? Tathos?”
Under different circumstances, the comment would’ve merited a polite correction. In this case, Era glared daggers into the man. Very calmly, she removed her black veil and peeled off her gloves, setting both on the desk separating them.
“Talthis,” she said, as if she were ready to spit venom. “His name was Talthis.”
Oblivious to her anger, Sir Deridane looked at the scroll again and humphed. “Nope, no ‘Talthis’ here. You might want to try the western barracks down on Seventh Street. Speak with Lord Commander Linos—”
“I’ve already been to the western barracks today. Linos sent me here,” Era said, the edge in her voice ready to burst.
Deridane took out a strip of torn paper and quill, dipped the nib in an ink well, and scratched out an address. “Here’s the eastern barracks, then. Down by the docks, it’s a big gray fortress-like building with—”
“—with a falcon statue over the door,” Era finished. “Yes, I know. I’ve already been there. And I’ve already talked to Sir Ranneth. And to the palace guard’s office. And to the field commandant. And to the ramparts commander, twice.” Her voice grew increasingly manic as she spoke, and when she glanced down at her bare hands, she noticed her fingers were shaking. She pressed them against the desk in front of her and stood.
Decker touched her on the arm. “Mom, it’s okay.”
Era briefly cupped her hand over his. There was no malice in the action, but her unspoken words were clear: be quiet.
“Do you understand?” Era continued, almost shouting. “I’ve already seen those men, and now I’m here.” She made a flittering motion with her hand toward the scrolls on the wall. “So, do whatever you have to do, but I want my husband’s remains returned to me.”
The warder laced his thick fingers together. “Look, madam, you have my sympathy. Truly. But I can’t help you. I simply don’t have a Captain Talthis in my books.”
