Child of the Sword, Book 1 of The Gods Within (53 page)

“Dead, eh?”

It took some effort to admit the truth.
“Probably. But we have to be sure one way or another.”

Brandon looked slowly about before
continuing his search. He was certain it was somewhere near here
that he’d seen Morgin go down. He’d only caught a glimpse of him,
fleetingly captured in the midst of battle. One moment Morgin had
stood out among them all, he and his horse a massive shadow of
awesome power reeking death and havoc among his enemy. The next
moment he had disappeared in a sea of bodies, and though the tide
had turned, the bloodletting had continued without him.

“Who was it you said you were looking
for?”

“My cousin. His name was AethonLaw, but he
liked to be called Morgin.”

“Ah!” the young boy said knowingly. “The
ShadowLord, was he not?”

“Yes,” Brandon said. “They call him that. Do
you know of him?”

“Aye. Everyone knows of the ShadowLord. I
thought he was my king, but then he died. Dead kings don’t rule
much, do they?” The young boy laughed bitterly at some private
joke. “Dead kings can’t even rule their own souls, eh?”

“He is dead then?” Brandon asked. “You’ve
seen his body?”

The young boy rolled his eyes as if dealing
with an ignorant and foolish child. “He’s not dead, at least not
anymore.”

This young boy had a strange way of
speaking. “I . . . I don’t follow you. Not
dead . . . anymore?”

“Aye. Now you’re catching on.”

Brandon grabbed the collar of the boy’s
tunic, though he did so more violently than he intended. “Where is
he?”

“Right here,” the boy said, patting the rump
of the dead horse.

Brandon looked carefully at the carcass.
Only its rump and hind legs were visible, the rest of it buried
beneath a pile of dead warriors.

“That’s just a dead horse, not my
cousin.”

“Ah! But it’s his horse. And he’s still
seated in his saddle.”

Brandon let go of the boy’s robe and climbed
frantically onto the pile of bodies. Both Decouix and Elhiyne had
died here. He pulled at a set of shoulders, but the dead had
stiffened during the night so it was difficult work. He’d just
managed to pull the first dead warrior loose when he realized that
the young boy couldn’t have seen Morgin, not buried under this pile
of dead. He spun toward the horse’s rump to accuse the boy of
lying, but now he stood alone in a field of dead.

Brandon quickly scanned the horizon in all
directions. The glen was quite flat so he could see far, much
farther than the boy could have moved in the few seconds his back
had been turned, and yet there was no sign of him. Only then did
Brandon stop to listen to his soul. There was a taint on the air,
as if something old beyond imagining had recently passed nearby,
and he realized that the missing boy had been steeped in the arcane
of ancient lore. He nodded, turned unerringly back to his task of
digging among the dead.

~~~

JohnEngine looked out into the blackness of
the night beyond the walls of Castle Inetka, tried not to hear the
cries of the wounded that littered the landscape there. There were
so many wounded, of such abundance that not even the castle itself
could hold them all, and more arrived with each passing moment. The
moon had yet to rise, so those caring for them carried candles or
lanterns, and in the inky darkness that remained they appeared as
lonely sparks of life bobbing about on a field of pain and
death.

Morgin had loved the night, JohnEngine knew.
To him it had been an ally. But not this night, not a night filled
with the cries of dying men. Morgin had loved nights of peace and
solitude. The cloak of darkness had been his friend, the moonlight
his companion. Through Morgin’s eyes JohnEngine had learned to view
darkness in a new way.

JohnEngine began to cry again. He was seated
on the ground outside the castle with his back to the castle wall.
He sat in a dark shadow far to one side of the main gate, for he
wanted to be alone with his sorrow, and he understood now why
Morgin had always been drawn to the solitude of shadow.

He could remember waking in Castle Inetka,
confused and in great pain, his leg a swollen, throbbing reminder
of Bayellgae’s venom. With time and the healing powers of magic
both the confusion and pain had lessened, and like all the rest he
began to hunger for news from Sa’umbra. The castle had been filled
then mostly with women, caring for he and about twenty others of
Tulellcoe’s original troop. Wounded and unable to fight, they
learned that waiting was almost as difficult a task as
fighting.

Then one morning news had come down from the
pass that the battle had begun with preliminary skirmishes. With
information always a half day late because of the distance, each
day’s news was worse than the last. The Elhiynes were losing.
Everyone in the castle had known that would be the case, but they
had hoped nevertheless.

The day of the final battle had arrived
sooner than expected. News came that the Elhiyne forces were
withdrawing prematurely onto Csairne Glen, and in Inetka they all
held their breaths as a cold fear tightened in their guts. But late
afternoon the reports became confused. They spoke of Eglahan and
Wylow, and they spoke of the now legendary ShadowLord. They said he
had brought his vast power down upon them all and somehow managed
to snatch victory from inevitable defeat. By late evening
confirmation arrived. The Decouix army had been beaten by the
ShadowLord at Csairne Glen.

The celebration that followed was ecstatic
and boisterous, and short lived, for soon the wounded began to
arrive. AnnaRail had come with the first of them, and there was
much joy in her eyes when she found that JohnEngine was alive. “But
where is Morgin?” she had asked, and the joy was replaced by a
frown.

When JohnEngine could give her no answer
they began searching among the wounded, but to no avail. By morning
they understood the full extent of the slaughter at Csairne Glen,
and at noon that day Abileen came riding down hastily from the
pass. He refused to speak to anyone but AnnaRail herself, saying
only that he bore a message from Lord Brandon.

AnnaRail was summoned and came hurriedly to
the castle yard. “Speak, man,” she demanded sharply.

Abileen’s voice trembled.
“Milady . . .” A tear touched his eye. “I bear ill
news. Your son . . .” He faltered momentarily,
hesitated long enough to compose himself, then straightened. “Lord
Morgin is sorely wounded and very close to death. Lord Brandon says
he will not survive the journey here. You must come to Csairne
Glen.”

AnnaRail staggered as if that simple, flat
statement had been an arrow striking into her chest. “I don’t
believe it. If he was dying I would know, and he is not dying.”

She spun about, barking commands as she
hurried back into the castle proper. “Prepare a horse for me while
I gather my things.”

JohnEngine was still limping badly and could
not mount a horse, so he was forced to wait at Inetka. He watched
AnnaRail and Abileen depart with a small escort, had to sit
nervously through that day and into the next, waiting, questioning
anyone who came down from the mountain for word of his brother.

It was just before nightfall, as dusk
settled upon a gray and still day, that they brought his twisted
and mutilated body down from Sa’umbra. A hush fell over the throng
that waited at Inetka, and near death Morgin came, born on a litter
between two horses, accompanied by a long and winding procession
that stretched down the road.

AnnaRail hovered over Morgin, walked beside
his litter, hissed instructions at everyone. As they carried Morgin
into the castle JohnEngine stopped her and asked, “Will he
live?”

Her complexion had turned gray with fatigue
and worry. “I know not. Death is very close at hand.”

There was nothing JohnEngine could do but
get in the way, so he’d found this place outside the castle wall
where he could sit and worry and fret in private.

France’s voice interrupted his thoughts.
“JohnEngine, lad. Are you out here?”

France stood within the light that splashed
outward from the open main gates of Inetka. He peered blindly into
the darkness and called softly, “JohnEngine?”

“I’m here, France. In the shadows at the
foot of the wall.”

France stepped out of the light and felt his
way along the wall slowly. When he found JohnEngine he sat down
beside him, and for a long time neither of them spoke. Then France
said, “Your grandmother is commissioning a bard to write a song
about the great battle of Csairne Glen, and about the mighty
warrior AethonLaw.”

“He didn’t want to be a hero,” JohnEngine
said. “Especially not the kind the old witch is going to make him
into.”

France made no answer, and again they sat
without speaking. The night was lonely and cold.

“John,” France said. “Your mother needs you.
She’s exhausted her magic on him and now sits there, refuses to
rest herself, refuses to admit he’s dying. She’s not thinkin’
clearly, not right in the head, John. She needs you.”

“All right. I’ll come in shortly,
after . . .” JohnEngine hesitated, for he could
suddenly sense magic in the air.

“Look,” France said, pointing up the
road.

There appeared in the distance a soft, white
glow set against the blackness of the moonless night. It was a
rider, mounted on a black horse walking slowly toward the castle.
Both rider and horse appeared to be encased in an aura of some
kind, and about them hovered a hot, brilliant spark that darted in
every direction at once.

As they approached JohnEngine saw that the
rider was a woman. She wore some filmy, gauzy thing more like a
nightgown than a dress, and yet the coldness of the night air
seemed not to touch her. Her feet bore neither sandals nor
slippers. Her long and golden hair hung past her shoulders, and she
was by far the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, though it was
a cold, inhuman beauty. About her hung an aura visible to the eye,
a soft, warm illumination that called happily to one’s soul. But
more powerful than the aura, a sense of goodness and kindness
beckoned to JohnEngine’s heart. Somehow she had enchanted him,
bewitched him. He stood, and limping on his still swollen leg he
walked toward her.

France gripped his arm painfully, spun him
about, slapped him hard across the face. “Keep yer wits, lad. Look
at her horse.”

The spell was broken. JohnEngine shook his
head to clear it, then turned to look back at the woman’s mount.
There could be no mistaking the coal-black mare, the horse Morgin
had ridden into the battle at Csairne Glen, a horse that was now
dead, by all reports. Suspicious now, JohnEngine tried to look at
the hot spark darting everywhere about the woman, but it moved too
quickly for him to discern any detail.

The horse stopped in the middle of the road
just in front of the castle’s main gate. JohnEngine and France
approached cautiously.

For what seemed an eternity the woman failed
to notice them. Then slowly she turned her face upon them, and it
was a face of beauty beyond imagining, marred only by the vacancy
of her expression and the inhuman look she cast upon them.

JohnEngine bowed deeply from the waist. “My
lady. May I ask to whom I have the honor of speaking?”

At his words her face softened and became a
little less alien. For the first time her eyes came to focus and
she said, “I am . . .” But she hesitated, confusion
and distress visible on her face. She put her fingertips to her
forehead as if to think carefully, then her eyes brightened and she
nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Yes. But it has been so long since I have
existed on this plane. It is so hard to remember.”

“Milady?” JohnEngine asked politely. “I
don’t understand?”

Her attention turned back to him. “Ah
mortal! Yes. Your question. I am the Archangel Ellowyn.” She nodded
again, as if she needed to confirm that statement by agreeing with
herself. “Yes. I am Ellowyn.”

“Lies,” France screamed. He stepped back
warily. “Nothing but lies. You’ve come to seek vengeance on
Morgin’s soul.”

JohnEngine tried to intervene. “No, France.
I think she’s telling the truth.”

France ignored him. “Well you’ll not have
him,” he screamed. “Not as long as I live to protect him.” He
stepped back another pace to stand blocking the castle gateway, and
drew his sword in a single fluid motion.

Suddenly the hot spark of light shot toward
his face, darted about him and dove at him again and again. He
raised an arm to protect his eyes and slashed his sword blindly
about.

“Laelith stop,” Ellowyn cried. Her voice
cracked through the night like a whip, and the spark obediently
retreated from France to hover over the archangel. “Swordsman,” she
said. “Put away your sword. You cannot harm us.”

France obeyed reluctantly, and when his
sword was sheathed Ellowyn slipped off the horse’s back. She turned
to the animal and smiled. Then she curtsied and said, “Thank you,
my lady.”

One moment the coal-black horse was there,
the next it was not.

Ellowyn turned to France and approached him.
He stood ready for battle, but JohnEngine could see that there was
only peace in her heart. She held up a finger and called to the
spark, “Come, little one. Alight.”

The spark descended, landed on the
outstretched finger, and for the first time it was still, a tiny
little girl no larger than the finger on which she stood, with
shimmering, translucent wings extending from her back. She seemed
unable to remain still for longer than a second or two, fluttering
her wings nervously and moving about.

“There, there, little one,” Ellowyn said.
She stroked the back of its neck. “The swordsman means no harm. He
feels great sorrow, and fears the loss of his friend, and he only
wishes to protect him.”