Aoleyn felt the same elation as she had on her first such journey, and this flight would be longer and better, she thought, for she intended to go right over the edge of the chasm and soar all the way down to the floor of Otontotomi, where Tuolonatl and Ataquixt waited.
She found them near the ruins of the great temple, Tuolonatl in deep and heated conversation with a handful of augurs.
Ataquixt walked over to join Aoleyn.
“It goes well?” Aoleyn asked.
Ataquixt shrugged. “Who can know? The augurs are not pleased. I do not think they have come to accept the changes. They argue now about where to bury High Priest Pixquicauh—or the small bit of what is left of him.”
“But they are letting the people leave?”
“You have seen it, and look now to the stair, as more depart. Tuolonatl has many friends here, including Sovereign Disu Suzu Ixil, who arrived in Otontotomi only a few weeks before the fall of Scathmizzane. She was a revered sovereign in the west, and the people here gladly gave her the set of power for now. Thus, she controls the mundunugu and macana warriors here—unquestionably so, with the fall of Pixquicauh, who was high priest. The augurs are in disarray; They do not even know how to choose their next high priest!
“From the beginning, the planning in Tonoloya, Sovereign Disu Suzu Ixil had no heart for this war and only agreed to come this far east and oversee the transformation of this place in exchange for Scathmizzane’s agreement that her garrison would serve as the city guard of Otontotomi.” He winked at Aoleyn and whispered, “I believe that she thought we would lose in the east and she would then be in position to take her warriors home and command all of Tonoloya.
“She is no friend to the augurs, and she holds great respect for Tuolonatl. She will abide by the agreement forged on the mountain. Indeed, I believe she is glad of it.”
Tuolonatl approached then, managing a smile at the sight of Aoleyn. “Truly, they exhaust me,” she said. “They care more for the rituals of their religion than the ethics that guide it, to a one.”
“Are we ready to leave?” Aoleyn asked.
The xoconai pair nodded, but Tuolonatl walked past Aoleyn, turning her gaze up the mountain, her expression wistful. “How fast the world has changed,” she said. “A year ago, I thought Scathmizzane a legend, a name, an idea more than a being. And then he came to us, in flesh, and promised to us the world.”
She gave a helpless little laugh.
“And now Scathmizzane is dead, and by my inaction, I helped kill my god.”
“The demon fossa, Cizinfozza, is dead,” Aoleyn said, coming up beside her. “I killed him.”
Tuolonatl smiled as she considered Aoleyn.
“Maybe we don’t need gods,” she told the young witch, who nodded in agreement.
The three set off immediately, out from the city to a waiting boat, which ferried them across the lake to the next pyramid in line, the first magical step to Palmaris, where Tuolonatl would claim sovereignty, perhaps that very day, they thought.
But no, for the trio found an unexpected consequence of the changes, of the fall of Scathmizzane and the release of the trapped souls: the mirrors used for flash-stepping were not so easily accessed anymore. They could not be used at all by the xoconai gathered at the pyramid outside of the city, in fact, and only Aoleyn’s powerful exercise of a diamond got her and her two companions across the miles to the next pyramid in line.
A second great step left the witch magically and physically exhausted. Her companions, too, felt as if they had finished a hard day’s march.
“Perhaps this is a good thing,” Tuolonatl said, as the three settled in at that last landing camp for a much-needed rest.
Aoleyn looked at her skeptically but noticed that Ataquixt was nodding in agreement.
“The individual cities and regions will find their balance more quickly if armies cannot be readily moved to join the fighting,” Tuolonatl explained.
“If it holds true that only those powerful in the use of the gemstones can manage the pyramids, the situation in the human lands is greatly changed, and perhaps greatly advantageous to the human monks, who outnumber the augurs in the region,” Ataquixt added.
“The changes are more an advantage to whomever holds the ground about the pyramids,” Tuolonatl said. “Look how tired Aoleyn was after a mere two steps. Few will be coming uninvited to do harm.” She nodded, and Aoleyn thought she seemed quite pleased by that.
And why wouldn’t she be? If Tuolonatl seized control of Palmaris, as she intended, in order to change the very structure of the city to include the humans and the xoconai side by side, she wouldn’t have to fear a sudden and fierce reprisal from the xoconai augurs and those who would follow them in a continued war of conquest.
* * *
It took them nearly a month before they could step before the golden mirror in the pyramid constructed on the remains of St. Precious in Palmaris. There, as with all of the previous dozens of steps, the xoconai guards snapped to attention, eyes cast downward in proper respect to the great cochcal Tuolonatl.
All of that gave Aoleyn hope. Ataquixt hadn’t been exaggerating when he had introduced the woman up on the sacred lea. With every flash-step, they had found the same reception, and the deference shown to Tuolonatl was as great as anything Aoleyn had witnessed in Ursal with King Midalis, or in St.-Mere-Abelle with Father Abbot Braumin.
But it was slightly different with Tuolonatl, she thought, for it seemed to Aoleyn that the woman was greatly loved as well as greatly respected. That had been true with the other two comparisons, as well, of course, but not like this. The xoconai warriors guarding the pyramids had been so happy to simply glimpse this legendary woman. She was, to them, a great and true hero, Aoleyn thought.
Again, that gave her hope, for she was coming to believe that Tuolonatl was worthy of that respect.
“Are you sure that you will not remain with us in these important first days in the city?” Tuolonatl asked Aoleyn, as they neared the docks, soon after arriving in Palmaris. “These early moments may prove critical.”
“I have seen the way they look at you,” Aoleyn replied. “All of them.”
“All except the augurs,” Ataquixt interjected. “And I suspect that whoever has claimed the mantle of city sovereign here will not be so pleased by Tuolonatl’s intentions.”
“That is your fight, and one I would only complicate,” Aoleyn replied. “I will go to the father abbot at Saint-Mere-Abelle with all the news from the west. They must be told. I will tell them, too, of Tuolonatl and your plans. Perhaps you will find very powerful allies in your quest to forge alliance between human and xoconai.”
“I trust that you will prove a worthy emissary,” Tuolonatl replied. “Your actions on the mountain showed me your heart, Aoleyn. You could have conquered the world, perhaps, with the power of the God Crystal.”
“That would have been the worst outcome for all, especially me,” Aoleyn answered with a grin.
Tuolonatl and Ataquixt shared that smile. “Come,” Tuolonatl said, “let us find you a boat to sail you to Saint-Mere-Abelle. Know that you are ever welcome here if I am successful and claim the city as my own.”
“May you reign long,” Aoleyn said.
“Two years,” Ataquixt unexpectedly replied to that. “And then she will face challengers, and the people of the city will decide if she should remain.”
“The xoconai and the humans of Palmaris, if I am successful,” Tuolonatl added.
Aoleyn had never heard such talk. It seemed too simple a concept.
* * *
The young witch stood at the taffrail of a great ship soon after, watching Palmaris recede as they made great speed along the Masur Delaval. For all that had happened, all the death and blood, all the horrors of the God Crystal and the great destruction wrought by Scathmizzane, and for all that she missed her friends, particularly Bahdlahn, Aoleyn felt strangely light and hopeful.
Perhaps some good would come from the darkness of
the last few months.
But still, the epiphany of Scathmizzane lingered, mocking her optimism.
* * *
“They are all around us,” the scout reported with obvious distress, gasping with every word.
Julian of the Evergreen looked to his commanders, Allheart Knights all, now that King Midalis had knighted Bahdlahn of Loch Beag. “We knew this day would come,” he said to somber nods, and he asked the scout, “How many?”
“Thousands,” the woman answered. “Five thousand at least. It is as if they emptied the city.”
“They knew where we were and knew when to strike,” Julian reasoned, for most of his forces were together here on a hill in the forest west of the city, gathered to discuss their plans for the next round of their resistance, since winter was coming fast. They had already seen the first snowfall, though it didn’t amount to much and had already melted. But that wouldn’t hold, and the nights were growing noticeably colder.
“Five thousand,” he muttered, along with several others, all of them glancing around. Julian’s fighters numbered less than three hundred here, and most of those were hardly veteran fighters, just Palmaris citizens—farmers and dockhands, fishermen and craftsmen—training with the knights in the hope of someday reclaiming their beloved city.
“What do we do?” a man in the back asked.
“We die well,” Bahdlahn replied. He adjusted his breastplate, still uncomfortable in the thing, which only recently had been awarded to him by Julian, after the death of another Allheart.
“How much time?” Julian asked the scout, but even as he did so he saw the torches flaring, one after another in a line. The knight commander moved about the hilltop, following the sight, to see the whole of the hill encircled by a ring of torches.
“Riders,” Bahdlahn said, from the eastern edge of the hilltop.
Julian moved beside his friend. Down at the base of the hill, he spotted two figures riding slowly across the moonlit field. They were xoconai, so he and his band believed, but they were riding horses, not the lizards they called cuetzpali.
One of the riders unfurled a flag then and began waving it about.
“Julian of the Evergreen,” the other called, a woman’s voice, “your soldiers within the city have all been arrested. We have captured, too, the people who housed your resistance and ferried your supplies.”
Julian looked to Bahdlahn, and then around. All of his fighters were shaking their heads, frustrated and helpless.
The woman began calling out the names of the captured—names Julian knew well.
“Julian of the Evergreen,” she finished, “there is no need of further bloodshed. Things have changed, across the world. Come down now and speak with us. Let us see if there is a better way.”
“It’s a trap,” someone to the side of Julian insisted.
“Don’t go,” said another, and a third added, “We’ll all go, and kill as many of the devils as we can!”
Julian looked to Bahdlahn.
“They have those who helped us and those we tried to help,” Bahdlahn reminded.
Julian looked to his nearby knights, to the woman who served as his second-in-command, who stood scowling and shaking her head.
“Come with me,” Julian said to Bahdlahn, instead. To his surprised second-in-command, he added, “If they take us or kill us, I trust that you will make them pay dearly.”
“Count on it,” the grim-faced woman assured him.
The xoconai riders dismounted when Julian and Bahdlahn walked down onto the field, Bahdlahn carrying a torch.
“I am Tuolonatl, city sovereign of Palmaris,” the woman introduced herself.
“I have heard that name many times, though not with that title,” Julian replied.
“Much has changed, in the city and across the world,” she replied. She motioned to the ground. “Let us sit and I will tell you.”
“You have my people,” Julian said, not moving.
“They are well. They will not be harmed.” She looked Julian in the eye, nodded, and added, “Whatever may happen here.”
Julian and Bahdlahn exchanged curious looks, then did sit across from the two xoconai. Even after the woman started talking, Bahdlahn found himself staring at the man—staring at him in response, for the lithe xoconai warrior, who seemed not much older than Bahdlahn, had locked an unrelenting gaze on him.
“The fate of the world is uncertain,” Tuolonatl began. “There will be no one leader, human or xoconai, at least not for a long while—generations, likely. Of this, I am sure.”
“Curious words,” Julian replied. “I suspect that you have lost a great battle.”
“The xoconai have marched all the way to the sea, to the place you call the Mantis Arm,” Tuolonatl said. “Even now, a great xoconai army remains encamped outside of the city you call Entel.”
“You invite me to sit with you so that you can tell me of your glory?”
The woman shook her head. “Everything has changed.” She looked to Bahdlahn. “You look familiar to me. Should I know you?”
“He looks like those from the west,” the man beside her said. “He is from the lake, from the mountain, Tzatzini.” His stare remained fixed on Bahdlahn, and he smiled, and Bahdlahn got the uncomfortable feeling that this one knew more than he was saying and that his words about Bahdlahn’s origin were no guess.
“We recently came from there,” Tuolonatl told Bahdlahn, “from the place the Usgar call the winter plateau, and the God Crystal. There was the greatest battle of the war fought, as summer turned to fall.”
“A great battle with few combatants,” the xoconai man added, “but with consequence for all the world.”
“For there, Scathmizzane, the god of the xoconai, was destroyed,” Tuolonatl said. “There did Kithkukulikhan, the great serpent dragon, meet its end. There was the great temple of Otontotomi destroyed, the High Priest Pixquicauh of Tonoloya buried under its stones.”
Bahdlahn and Julian exchanged even more curious looks.
“You do not seem troubled by these events,” Bahdlahn said.
“It is the way of things,” Tuolonatl replied. “With the fall of Scathmizzane, the world’s future is more uncertain, but perhaps more hopeful than before.”
“You say this with the fall of your god?” Julian asked skeptically.
“I say this because my god was a lie,” the woman bluntly replied. “I say this because the future is ours to determine now, of our own hearts and minds, hopes and dreams. And so I come to you not as an enemy but with the hope of alliance, of an end to the fighting here in Palmaris, at least. I am the city sovereign, but by decree and not by the will of the people of Palmaris, and certainly not by the wishes of the augurs. It had to be, but only for a short time, until the new order of things can be established. Then, if I hope to remain, it will be by huzzah and not by decree.
“In this time of transition, I ask that you come into the city and serve beside me, as my equal, a voice for the humans as I will be the voice of the xoconai. Let us build together the shining city that will become the beacon of hope for the world.”
Neither man could formulate a reply for a long, long while.
“I understand your surprise,” Tuolonatl said finally.
“And your suspicion,” the man beside her added. “But understand that we could have easily burned you off that hill if we so chose. All of you would be dead or captured by now.”
“But to what good end?” Tuolonatl asked.
“You are willing to cede half the power?” Julian asked. “You have everything under your control, and I am to believe that you would surrender that advantage?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Scathmizzane is destroyed, and I am glad of it. Yes, I could kill you here, along with all of your warriors and all of those within the city who helped you. This very night could bring the end of your resistance. But to what gain? Would the remaining humans in Palmaris then accept us? Or would they hate u
s even more, giving rise to another resistance, and another after that?”
She shook her head and blew a long sigh. “I have seen too much war. I have heard too many cries of the dying on the cold fields. I do not think we are so different, xoconai and human, Julian of the Evergreen. In the human cities we have entered, I have seen the same things I knew in the xoconai cities of Tonoloya.” Her voice lowered. “I am not a young woman. I would have my legacy be that of one who brought our peoples together, not as one who slaughtered thousands.”
“He was a god,” Bahdlahn blurted. “What happened there in the west? How could he be killed by so few?”
“By one,” Tuolonatl answered. “Scathmizzane was destroyed by a young woman, fearless and mighty with magic, who became a leopard and tore him asunder.”
Bahdlahn sucked in his breath, his eyes going wide.
“A human woman?” Julian asked.
“What woman?” Bahdlahn asked at the same time.
“Her name is Aoleyn,” Tuolonatl declared. “Aoleyn of Fireach Speuer. She is my friend.”
* * *
Aoleyn stood along the wall of St.-Mere-Abelle, staring out to the southeast, to the wider waters beyond the sheltered inlet that held the monastery docks. She glanced back behind her to a small chapel. The Abellican leaders were in there, debating the future of the Church, of the kingdom, of the world.
Father Abbot Braumin Herde had listened to her attentively, and she had recounted the events of Fireach Speuer and of Palmaris as faithfully as she could manage. She had also advised the father abbot and those others about him to focus on Palmaris, on the great xoconai Tuolonatl, who hoped to change the world.
The young witch crossed her arms over her chest, bringing her cloak in closer against the cold autumn wind, and also as a shield against the fears within her. They had listened to her, yes, but Aoleyn wasn’t sure that they had heard her. She had barely finished telling them of her departure from Palmaris when one of the masters had posited that they could use the disarray there to their advantage. If they could just sneak into the city enough brothers armed with potent gemstones, might they take and secure the docks quickly enough for a fleet of soldiers to arrive and sweep the place clear of the invaders?
Song of the Risen God Page 45
