Dawn of Swords (5 page)

Just as dusk began to settle over the world of Dezrel, Jacob and his charges finally entered Safeway, the growing community surrounding the Sanctuary. The land shifted—where once there had been reddish, cracked earth, now there were green, cultivated fields. Much of Safeway looked just like this—miles upon miles of flatland, two days across by foot, bordered by the river to the east and the Kerrian desert to the west, the clay cliffs to the north and the shores of the Thulon Ocean to the south. The whole area was peppered with small tent- and hut-dwelling communities for as far as the eye could see. Near ten thousand men, women, and children
called it home, just as they all in turn called Ashhur their kind and loving god.

Bareatus—one of the Wardens Ashhur and Celestia had brought over from some different reality—stood off to the side of the dirt road, hand raised in greeting. Just like the rest of the Wardens, he was tall, almost seven feet, and sublimely graceful. Jacob always thought the Wardens looked eerily similar to elves, only with rounded ears and hair like spun silk. Though all were male, their smooth ivory features held certain feminine qualities, which made them seem approachable despite their size. Bareatus glanced at the trailing donkey and the wrapped lump atop it, and his smile of greeting wavered. His hand fell to his side, and he stood still as a stone, his eyes narrowed to mere slits framed by a mane of straight, golden locks.

“Are Ahaesarus and Judarius about?” asked Jacob.

Bareatus shook his head, his gaze still trained on Martin’s covered body.

“They are in Ang, holding court with Bessus and Damaspia.”

Of course, thought Jacob. The masters of House Gorgoros were always requesting spiritual guidance.

“And our Lord? Is he here?”

Bareatus nodded.

“He is.”

“Good. I will meet with him at once. Please send word to my fellow mentors that their presence is required back at the Sanctuary.”

“Very well, Jacob. I will send a crow bearing that message. In regards to our Lord, please be forewarned that Ashhur is spending time with the children. ‘At once’ may not be as quick as you wish.”

Jacob gestured for the youths to follow him and kicked his mare, leaving Bareatus alone on the road. He heard the massive Warden’s long strides as he loped away, heading for the tents that were just visible at the tip of a distant rise.

The road rose and fell, rose and fell, and as the sun slowly descended, casting the sky with a deep burgundy pallor, people
came into view all around him. There was a group of men in the meadow to his right, dressed in dirty rags and hacking away at the soil, seemingly vacant smiles plastered on their faces. To his left were seven children, running and laughing through a field of short corn, ducking below the stalks and daring others to find them. Beyond the children was a mixed group of men and women, twenty of them at least, on their knees facing the setting sun, their eyes closed and chins held high. Farther ahead, a group of women sat around a small fire. A young mother, no older than fourteen, held a babe in her arms, and she put it to her breast as they passed. One of the other women, much older and more wizened looking, tended the small garden before her. She sprinkled dust onto the carpet of dirt, chanted a few choice words, and from the ground sprouted three buds. The buds grew and grew, and in a matter of moments the three sprouts joined to became a full strawberry bush. The woman plucked a ripe fruit from the vine and fed it to the young mother, whose child continued to suckle at her breast.

That was life in Safeway: praying, farming, breeding, and playing, all under the watchful eye of Ashhur, their god made flesh.

“They’re back!” shouted the voice of a young boy. “Jacob and the kinglings!”

A crowd gathered, running alongside their mounts as they made their way down the uneven road. The people called out to them, cheering for each of the kinglings in turn. Jacob glanced at them, taking in the hope on their faces. Geris waved, and even Ben’s spirits seemed to lift, if only a little. Someone shouted out Martin Harrow’s name, but none of those who gathered let their gaze linger on the sack draped over the rear donkey.

“Where is he?” asked a woman’s voice. “Where is Kingling Harrow?”

Jacob peered over his shoulder to see that there was still a smile on the querying woman’s face. She did not understand. None of them did. Around here, with Ashhur, the Wardens, and the healers
tending to the wounds and ailments of the populace, unnatural death was unheard of. In western Dezrel, over the span of ninety-three years, no one had perished before his or her time.

Jacob had a feeling that was about to change.

The crowd gradually thinned as the land sloped downward, and Jacob and the kinglings entered the Cavern of Solitude, a tapered passage cut through the middle of a foreboding hillock. Jagged spires of stone protruded from the sides of the cliff, narrowing the road. Jacob was grateful that it was still daylight, as the passage could prove treacherous when traversed in the dark. The cavern was guarded by the great statue of Ashhur, a twenty-foot behemoth carved into the side of the red clay cliff. The deity’s statue stared down at them as they passed beneath it, his left hand holding an olive branch to the heavens, his right hand crossed over his immortal heart. Jacob heard Ben whistle a quiet lullaby as the statue disappeared behind them—the very same lullaby the god himself had sung to the kinglings on the night they were anointed.

When they exited the Cavern of Solitude, the horizon stretched out before them. Clay huts and lean-tos constructed of desiccated animal hides peppered the land. From these abodes more people emerged, forming an assembly in front of the colossal building at the center of it all—the Sanctuary itself, forty feet high and circular, built with smoothed stone from the northwest coast. It was the only building in Safeway, and the tallest in all of western Dezrel. On its sloped crest, above the solarium, was etched the Golden Mountain of legend, the final, peaceful resting spot of the spirits of the dead in Afram. Below that were etched Ashhur’s two guiding principles, both of them concepts to revere and commands to obey:
Love
and
Forgive
.

Jacob saw the Marylls and Felhorns emerge from their crude domiciles, making their way toward the passageway that was cut into the short wall bordering the Sanctuary. He searched for the unmistakable bald pate of Stoke Harrow, Martin’s father, and
eventually found the burly man in the crowd. He was wearing a burlap robe and pulling his wife Tori along. Soon the families of all three kinglings stood front and center, waiting with wringing hands and expressions overwrought with excitement.

At the edge of the gathering, Jacob veered his mare off to the side and dismounted. He tapped the horse’s flank, and it began to saunter away obediently. He then helped Ben and Geris down from their donkeys. The two boys immediately found their families, who were waiting with open arms, and ran to them.

The Harrows stood confused, their gazes shifting from the other two kinglings to Jacob and then to the wrapped carcass atop the third donkey. Hesitantly, Jacob approached it, gesturing for Stoke Harrow to come forward. The large man did as he was bidden, that perplexed expression still smeared across his face. Tori followed meekly, hands clenched over her mouth. Jacob lifted one end of the bulk, untied the rope, and pulled back a flap of fabric. The pale face of Martin Harrow emerged, mouth slightly agape, eyes sewn shut. His cheeks were sunken, and his red hair had lost its luster. The scent of rot wafted off the dead child, the result of three days riding in the sweltering southern heat. Jacob cringed and pinched his nose shut while Stoke’s face twisted into a manifestation of stupefaction.

Tori shoved past her husband, and Jacob backed away, letting her grab hold of the dead boy’s shoulders.

“Martin?” she whispered, lifting the child’s head. She shook him, hard, and his body flopped like a dead fish on the saddle. Her eyes brimmed with tears as she took in the reality of the situation. Her husband was behind her the next instant, his strong hands on her back, holding her up. Tori spun around and buried her face in his chest. Stoke wailed in disbelief as his wife’s tears saturated his burlap robe. The cry she released was shrill in its anguish, threatening to shatter the hearts of all who heard it.

The Marylls and Felhorns gathered around the weeping parents, embracing them, consoling them in the only way they knew how,
while the rest of the throng stood in shocked silence. Suddenly, Stoke Harrow’s head shot upward, and he fixed Jacob with a murderous stare. The anguished father stepped away from the other grievers, his meaty hands balled into fists. The tears that ran from his eyes created ravines on his muddy cheeks.

“You were supposed to protect him!”

Jacob stood his ground as the larger man stormed across the narrow space between them. He never flinched, not even when Stoke’s arm cocked back, the rage in his eyes burning as hot as the sun.

“Stop!”
said a voice like booming thunder.

Stoke’s arm fell mid-swing. The man’s shoulders hunched as he turned around. Jacob glanced up at the Sanctuary. The great door was open, and now children were streaming out of it, filing down the cobbled path and into the milling crowd. A giant figure ducked beneath the doorframe, stepping out of the darkness and into the light. He was as tall as two men standing atop each other. His broad shoulders looked capable of carrying the world upon them, and yet all they held up was a gown made of glimmering white silk. On the front of the gown was stenciled a mountain surrounded by a field of red roses. His beard was trimmed but pronounced, and his blond hair, cut shoulder length, swooped back from his skull like a wave receding into the ocean. His eyes, golden as sunlight, seemed to see everything at once.

Jacob stepped away from Stoke, bowed on one knee, and placed his right fist over his heart.

“My Lord Ashhur, I beg your pardon,” he said. The rest of those gathered, save the children who had exited the Sanctuary, fell to their knees.

The god-made-flesh offered Jacob a nod as he stepped with a single stride over the low wall surrounding the Sanctuary. The crowd parted before him, shuffling sideways on their knees, as their god approached the still-weeping couple. Ashhur placed his index finger gently on the forehead of their dead son, and then lowered
himself and wrapped both arms around the grieving parents. Stoke began sobbing anew, until his mood shifted back from sorrow to fury.

“Why did you let this happen?” he kept repeating, driving his fists into Ashhur’s enormous knee. The god touched the man’s chin with his palm—the sheer size of his hand swallowed Stoke’s entire skull—and the outburst ceased.

“Let us speak in the Sanctuary,” he said, his voice still booming across the countryside.

The god led the Harrows into the tall edifice, and the donkey carrying Martin’s body was ushered in after them. When they were gone, the crowd looked to Jacob for instruction. He waved them away as kindly as he could, and they dispersed. Geris Felhorn was the last to leave, staring at him for a while before relenting and finally joining his parents on the short walk back to their domicile.

Jacob breathed heavily out his mouth, making his way in the opposite direction. He followed the dirt path along the west side of the Sanctuary wall, where the path broke away from the structure and passed through a field of wildflowers. Unlike the roads into and out of Safeway, this path was smooth, flattened by the constant foot traffic. Not many people left, after all. The land—along with Ashhur himself—supplied them with all they needed. There was a reason that the west had been named Paradise by the people who lived there.

He trotted down a gulch, and the sound of crashing waves reached his ears. The sun dipped low on the horizon, and the sky lit up in a brilliant shade of purple. A cabin of rough-hewn stone came into view, the straw of its roof bristling with the gentle sea breeze. Jacob had purposefully built his home far away from the Sanctuary to allow himself respite from the prayers that rang out seemingly without end. He was rarely visited, and when he was, it was usually by the Sanctuary stewards coming to tell him that Ashhur required his presence.

As he approached, he noticed that a ladder was propped up against the side of the cabin. A figure was braced on the top rung, applying a layer of wet tar to the areas where the roof had grown thin. He was a handsome man of twenty years, stocky of build and good with his hands.

“Hello, Roland,” Jacob said to his steward.

“Hello, Master Jacob,” Roland replied. He never took his eyes off his work. “I wasn’t expecting you back until next week. How were things in Haven?”

Jacob stopped once he reached the side of the ladder. “They were…not well.”

Finally Roland gazed down.

“You wish to speak of it?” he asked, his piercing blue eyes glinting between strands of his sandy-brown hair.

“Not at the moment. How goes the labor?”

“Laboriously. I set out grain for the chickens, milked the cows, and helped Fela Felabosi construct a new shelter for his son Bronta. The boy is expecting a child soon and wanted to strike out on his own. I just started the household chores an hour ago.”

“It’s late, son. Your work is done for the day.”

Roland gave him a queer look.

“Are you sure? There are three more weak spots on the roof, and I haven’t begun mortaring the loose stone on the eastern wall.…”

Jacob chuckled. Roland didn’t like stopping before his work was complete, which was an honorable characteristic. Not many in the west shared the boy’s work ethic, perhaps not even Jacob himself.

“It’s fine. If it showers tonight, I will set out a bucket. Go home. Get some rest. I will see you on the morrow.”

Roland hopped off the ladder and then lowered it to the grass. Despite his nonchalant attitude, Jacob could tell he was intensely curious about his master’s trip to Haven.

“So, tomorrow we will speak of what happened, yes?”

“We will. I promise you.”

The boy smiled, and just like everything else about him, it was beautiful.