Broken Earth

by C M Blackwood

  Indeed, in all past experiences which concerned their work for the Sorceress, the Southern men believed that they were in full control of their actions, and that they strove for evil on their own behalf; but they knew not that they acted only under the influence of Power which belonged to Férglag himself. They, of course, knew nothing of him; just as neither did anyone at all, save for Dain Aerca and Zana. Perhaps, with even deeper understanding than these two, had Queen Abella known him – but her knowledge faded with her death, and was left behind only in her own little journal, whose contents her daughter (who was indeed most in need of it) had not yet even begun to comprehend.

  Therefore, while Captain Henry and Commander Fala did as they could to gather loyalty amongst their men, and thought indeed that they were doing a decent job of it, it proved that their labour was nowhere near sufficient; and that, while they still worked together in the making of rudimentary plans, the Sorceress’ army was very near complete.

  Dain Aerca lived still in fear of her Master’s ire; but began to be more sure of herself, as the limbs of the body of her forces fell neatly into place, and proved that they functioned as well as ever.

  Yet there came a night when her fears were finally realised; and she was come upon very unexpectedly by her Master. He came to her room as in nights of old, suddenly and without warning. She had finally begun to sleep more easily, for the belief that he would come no longer to her in the dead of night; and so was perhaps even more frightened by this visit, and suffered very nearly the instant death of her own beating heart.

  She heard him speak out above her, and started to attention from a thick sleep.

  “Master!” she cried, leaping in an instant to her feet, so as to stand before him.

  “Hello, Sorceress.”

  Without thinking, Dain took a step backwards. She looked upon the Master, who wore tonight no mask, with perhaps more fear in her eyes than was wise; but with quite as little, at that, as she could manage.

  “Do not tell me,” said he, “that you are afraid of me?”

  “Certainly not,” said Dain, with a shake of the head; though her voice came as no more than a whisper, and was even to herself hardly convincing.

  Across the room strode the giant, with red scales of skin, horns upon his head, and a tail protruding down behind his legs. He settled himself into a chair at Dain’s table.

  “You may wonder,” said he, with a glittering of his large black eyes, “why I have kept away from you for so long.”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “I am not angry with you, child. I wanted only to see whether you would continue your work in a satisfactory manner, without my own hand to guide you.” He sat back in his chair, and looked upon Dain in an inscrutable manner. But finally he said, “I must say that you have done very well.”

  Dain’s breath came as the breaking of a dam, and the torrent of flood behind. She fell down herself in the seat opposite her Master, and looked upon him with a little more ease.

  Yet the beast sat silent for a while, scratching his great claws beneath the table, and appearing deep in thought. Finally he asked:

  “Do you know my true name, child?”

  “You – you are the Master,” said Dain.

  “That I am. I am Master of all – but do you know my true name?”

  “I do not.”

  He looked down to his claws, and began to sharpen them upon one another. Now, even after so much time, Dain could never tell whether such gestures were meant to be threatening; or whether they simply demonstrated a depth of thought, and meant absolutely nothing at all.

  “Should you like to know it?” he asked.

  “If you should like to tell me, Master.”

  His eyes pierced through her skin. “To tell you that,” he said, “I should have to tell you an entire story. Are you in the mood for a story, Sorceress?”

  “Of course, Master.”

  He continued with the sharpening of his claws, but began his story nevertheless, with his eyes cast down and his face full of the easy serenity of a reposing cat.

  “I once had a brother, you know,” said he. “Or rather, I should say that I still do have a brother – but he is nothing so much to me anymore. I had a sister, as well; but we were always very different, they and I. Namely, there was the issue of my strength. They envied what they could not have, and they grew to hate me. I should only say that I once lived much . . . higher than I presently do. A fair place it was, I can only admit. Yet there was, and there is, a certain King in that place; and I might say, that he and I never did manage to agree. Upon anything. He was loath to admit it, of course – but I was stronger than him, as well. It was only sensible that I become King. What fault was it of mine, that my strength outmatched his? The strongest should rule – and that is how it always has been! But he would not concede; and I grew tired of his ego. I did try to gather some to myself, and use them to attempt the throne by force. Yet there was always that brother, and that sister, of mine – thwarting me at every turn! In the last battle, they managed for a moment to catch me unawares; and I was thrown down from what had been my home; and what should have been my Kingdom.

  But that was no matter. I found that the going is much easier, here on earth – and that the servants are much more, shall we say, pliable?”

  He paused, and gave a hearty laugh. “Though of course, dear Sorceress, I do not refer to you in this way. You are my great lieutenant! With you, I shall gather to myself what is rightfully mine – and that King who once challenged me, shall be thrown down by my own hand, just as I was by his.”

  He ceased to work upon his nails, and looked up at Dain with a wicked grin. “But that only brings me to the point with which I began. I offered you my name – and I have yet to give it to you! I should begin with the point, that I have had many names over the years, all given to me by different peoples who have served me. But my true name – given to me by my mother, whom I slew – is Férglag. In the tongue of my birthplace, this name means ‘of the fire.’ It is rather strange, you must consider, that my own dear mother chose this name for her third child. My brother she named Aurelus – ‘of the clouds.’ And my sister she named Arolah – ‘of the firmament.’ Now, however do you think she could have known enough, all those years in advance – that I should be so great as I am, and that my Power should lie in the strength of fire? Some called her a visionary, but I myself never could come to a decision for it.”

  Dain knew not what her response should be; and so she only nodded.

  “I tell you all this,” said the beast, “for one reason only. I do expect very much, dear Sorceress, that you shall meet those siblings of mine, before all has been said and done. They shall appear very powerful, to the likes of you; but I should like to expect that I can depend upon you to be true to me.”

  “Of course, Master,” said Dain.

  He looked upon her for a while longer; simply staring, as if wanting to assure himself of her sincerity. But finally he rose up, and placed his hand upon Dain’s head, in the manner of old – and she had to fight particularly hard, to suppress the shiver that started up at its presence.

  But finally he smiled down upon her, and disappeared from the chamber.

  ~

  And so, as has already been said, the armies of Férglag (though certainly none of them knew that they were any such thing) were very early prepared for war. None knew when the call might come; and even Dain Aerca waited upon her Master’s order, for the release of those dark soldiers of the Dúnanen.

  In the meantime, Dain put Zana to the task of contracting her own people for the march. She had little hope of triumph in that area; but she knew that it must be attempted. Now, Zana knew better, of course, than to go to Lokin; but went instead to several Lumaria who had always proved especially loyal to her. First and foremost of these was called Edrich, and kept close by himself a large band which was loyal only to him.

  She spoke to them privately, at a predetermined meeting that took p
lace in the very halls of Death Rock. She informed them of the impending battle; and assured them that, if they chose to take part in such a noble cause, they would be rewarded greatly; and would perhaps even be restored their Mountain from the villainous Lokin, whom all of them shared the purpose of despising.

  “And how will this be done?” asked Edrich. “How will we be delivered from Lokin?”

  “Have I ever spoken you an untruth, Edrich?” asked Zana. “Have I ever proved faithless to you?”

  “I suppose not,” admitted Edrich. “But I still am not inclined to think that this war will prove beneficial for any of us – even in light of Lokin’s removal.”

  “And who do you have to fear,” said Zana, “besides the Sorceress? Who in this land do you wish to conquer? Should the forces of Eredor be thrown down – with especial thought to that dratted Princess – what at all would you have to fear? I assure you that, if you join in this fight, you shall never have another care of the Sorceress. She shall govern you no more. Lokin thinks not that she is, still, your governor – but you know better, Edrich, do you not? Do you not wish for your freedom? If Eredor was no more, you should have no rules to live by! Nothing should be forbidden you! How long has it been, my brother, since we could roam the land free? How long has it been, since we hunted without pursuit?”

  Many faces in her audience began to take on a look of wonder.

  “We should be the greatest force in the land,” continued Zana. “We should go wherever we liked! Someday, there should be no more Mountain – and we should take control of everything!”

  It was here that she became certain of her success. One look into the glittering eyes of the crowd – and she knew that she had won.

  “We shall consider it,” said Edrich. “I shall gather to me everyone I can, who is in any favour at all of this thing – and I will come to you with our answer.”

  “Let it be soon, Edrich,” said Zana. “Only let it be soon.”

  ~

  By the time of Zana’s negotiations with the Lumaria, Thomas Henry and Harn Fala had gathered betwixt themselves hardly enough men to fill a single regiment. The rest merely scoffed at them, and began, indeed, to think that their two highest officers had become just as mad as their Princess.

  Yet Lila took to herself these loyal men, and spoke long to them concerning the dangers that they faced. Some seemed, still, very skeptical, but fortunately enough did not let their doubts dictate their decision. They seemed to think that it was better to prepare themselves for something that might never happen – rather than somehow come unprepared at that thing which they thought would not happen, but which had happened anyway.

  It had been Lila’s hope to ride forth with the full force of her men, mere days after she learnt the location to which they would ride. She had wished to make the very best use she could of the shock that she knew the Sorceress would experience, upon understanding that Lila had accomplished what none ever had.

  Yet none of her plans had come to fruition. The great majority of her men were convinced that she was mad, and would do nothing in the least to assist her in her endeavour. Lila thought that she might have had a good deal more success with them, had it not been for the treacherous Jonathan Payton – who had, on the report of Captain Henry himself, been moving amongst the men with great vigour. There were several of the Elders who were just as active as he in such causes (namely Raymond Archer and Damien Locke), though they of course worked always under the hand and order of Payton; and in Lila’s opinion, understood very little at all of the reasons for which they did what they did. This did not mean, of course, that she did not despise them – but only that there was a very special, dark and close space in her heart for Jonathan Payton.

  Little did she understand, at that time, the true thoughts and intentions of Payton; but she would learn them in good time. With all that she had to concern herself about, in those dark days before the fall, it was really for the best that she had not that additional, particular thing to trouble over.

  Yet Lila was aware of the foremost cause of the replacement of those men’s trust, who finally agreed to return to her. There was a certain thing that continued to happen, each and every one of those days after Lila’s realisation of her own Power. As had first occurred in the time of her unconsciousness, when the medicine man sat by her side and coaxed certain displays of force from her, in the place of the words she would not give, so such a thing began to occur more frequently, and more acutely.

  When Lila’s thoughts became mired in the troubles of her heart (the foremost of which she would not admit even to herself; and for this reason only increased the strength of its effects), she fell into a sort of blackness what was much similar to that which she found, when her body inexplicably shifted from the place where she had left it. To speak of the latter event, she many times found herself in the grounds of the castle; or miles past the very gates of Eredor, with no recollection as to how she had come there. She managed somehow to keep herself from the Sorceress (though, with the percentage of her thoughts that were fixed upon the woman, it was a small miracle that she achieved this thing). But once, on diverting herself from that place of danger, she landed herself somewhere in the wild forest – many, many miles away from Onssgaard. With no horse, and no idea as to where she was, she wandered many days before she could find the strength to shift herself back to the castle. She returned starved nearly to death, and dehydrated almost to the point at which a grape is cured into a raisin; but was nursed well enough back to health by the medicine man, who seemed very ashamed of the fact that he was much more enamoured by Lila’s newfound abilities, than he was concerned for the state in which she had worked herself. Lila supposed, however, that he could not be blamed – for she was well aware of the fact that she was only the second creature ever to have attained the ability to shift, apart from the Lumaria. (And that first creature, of course, was Dain Aerca.) Even Lila was somewhat fascinated by it, and would have been much more pleased with it, if it were not for the fact that she kept landing herself at great distances from the castle.

  But, to return to that other thing which continued to happen – Lila found that, when she became unusually upset or angry, the very world around her would begin to tremble. The walls of the castle would shake; and just as had occurred in that first instance, while she dwelt in a months-long stupor, pieces of the roofs and towers themselves would break apart from the rest, and tumble down to the ground. Many men were nearly killed by these occurrences; and eventually, all took to moving their posts some distance away from the castle doors.

  This was the thing that frightened some of her men to returning to her; but all the rest were sated by the assurances of Jonathan Payton, who convinced them that the Princess possessed no Power to do such things; and that these things related merely to earthquakes, and could be neither predicted nor helped any more than the fall of the rain.

  Lila was left feeling very disappointed in her men – for, in order for them to believe in numerous earthquakes, in a part of the world what had perhaps never before experienced such a thing, they must have been even more exceedingly ignorant than she had suspected.

  Yet she tried to content herself with the men whom she had already collected. As they had been drawn to her, more out of fear than anything else, she was perhaps less kind to them than she had ever been before, and took to frequent displays of her Power in their presence. She wondered if it was cruel to do such a thing – but comforted herself with the fact that it seemed to be very effective.

  As to herself, the pain in her chest had only grown more terrible with the passing days. She felt, at times, that her very skin would break apart, for the great pressure that seemed to build up behind it.

  “Surely this is not normal?” she asked the medicine man.

  “Surely it is not,” answered he. “There is some confliction, it seems, betwixt what you do and what you wish. Should you like to share anything with me?”

  “Certainly not.”
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  “Then with your brother, perhaps?”

  “Certainly not!”

  Sometimes, it was like knives, piercing outwards from the inside; and sometimes, it was like great leaden mallets, being pounded down upon the bone. She slept very little; and when she did, she often woke screaming. She took to sleeping in the North-West tower, for the frequency with which this occurred. Only four men knew of her nightly location: and these three were Thomas Henry, Harn Fala, Tobias Redda and her own dear brother; the last of whom was perhaps the most supportive in those trying times. He often sat late with her, and would look with her through all of their mother’s papers, which each of them liked to hold for long whiles in their hands, and to recollect how their mother’s hands had once lingered so long upon them.

  On one particular night, however, Lila inhabited the tower quite alone. She looked long out of the window, before she retired to the little bed that she had made for herself, in a corner of the great wide space. She lay long awake, feeling just as fearful as ever she did about falling asleep (for all of those reasons above, which included the shifting of her person to random and remote locations; a thing which did in fact happen most while she was asleep).

  It was the night of a full moon, and the tower was filled with silver light. It flowed through the tall windows, which were fixed all the way about the circular space, and splashed upon all it touched like sparkling paint.

  Lila was quite transfixed by the beautiful sight, and lay long looking into the bright silver glow; and thus found some semblance of peace, which allowed her to go for a while to sleep.

  Yet, upon waking, she felt not a drop of what peace had lulled her to sleep; and she leapt in a single movement from her bed. She attempted to shift to the first floor, where she would seek Thomas Henry; but she found that she could not, and so was forced only to move physically through the great space that separated them, as fast as she was able.