Dead Stars - Part One (The Emaneska Series) (42 page)

This is just temporary
, he told himself, over and over.
Just temporary
. That echoing thought stayed with him until he heard a door slam, shattering his clammy reverie. He wiped the sweat from his eyes and turned around to find that Loki had gone. He had left the notebook on the floor, open at a page now emblazoned with a perfect copy of his Book.

Trembling fingers reached out to close the notebook and slide it back under the seat. Farden crawled into his bed. Whiskers appeared from the shadows and curled into a ball on his chest, listening to the mage’s heart thundering behind his ribs. Slowly, painfully slowly, the storm subsided. His heart ceased its senseless battering. His mind let tiredness come, and Farden fell into another mercifully dreamless sleep.

The same could not be said of Loki.

The god awoke with a start, several hours later, just as the sun was reaching its lofty zenith in the faint blue sky. Loki sat bolt upright and looked around, wary and uncomfortable. Jeasin was still fast asleep. As was Ilios.

Loki tucked his legs into his chest and rested his chin on his knees. He stared out to sea and frowned at its calmness. He couldn’t pretend it hadn’t happened. How had he fallen asleep? He had been lying on his back, watching the bruised sky change from dawn to morning, when suddenly… No. It was impossible. Gods did not sleep, he asserted to the silence and the waves.

‘Gods do not sleep,’ he blurted the words, unbidden.

But the thing that had unsettled him the most was the fact that if gods didn’t sleep, they definitely didn’t dream. Loki narrowed his eyes at the sea.

He had done both.

A darker dream had never been dreamt.

To The Found (Revelations)

“What strange creatures they must be, to spring from eggs fully formed, as though it were a chicken, or a monstrous goose! Be wary, in your travels, of stumbling across a dragon breeding ground. Closely guarded are they, and hold vicious retribution for the unwary trespasser! Be wary also of the eggs themselves, as rumour has it that they burn with a mystical and cursed fire. If ever you are unfortunate to come across an unprotected one, leave it be, for the infant dragon may sprout at any time, and emerge hungry and ready for its first meal!”

Excerpt from ‘Dragons and their Features: Lessons in Identifying the Siren Beast’ by Master Wird

‘I
’m beginning to wonder if he’s dead,’ said a ponderous voice to the morning breeze, unknowingly echoing her brother’s words.

‘Nonsense. Loki would have returned already. He would not waste time dawdling in the countryside, keeping watch over a corpse.’

‘I am not so sure. Our brother brims with curiosity.’

‘And do you not? This is your first time here also.’

‘Curiosity can wait until after. If there is one.’

‘The humans are right, Verix, sometimes I wish you’d learn to temper your truthfulness.’

‘What is the truth, if not untempered?’

Heimdall had no reply to that besides, ‘Irritating at inopportune times.’ These younger gods sometimes needed guidance. The others had been quick to doubt his choice in bringing them along, but what they lacked in wisdom, they made up for in eagerness, in passion. Besides, they used up less prayer. Three was better than one, especially when reserves were tight. The gods had to be wary of what was to come…

Heimdall and Verix stood alone in the Nest. It had become their favourite haunt over the last few weeks. It reminded them of home, and, especially for Heimdall, afforded them an uninterrupted view of the city. He had spent long days staring at the city and its dark mountains, searching and straining for that first glimpse of the girl. She was coming for them. He and the others could feel it.

‘How do you expect to find her when you don’t even know what she looks like?’ the Arkmages had asked.

‘I can see more than what is visible to the eye, mages,’ Heimdall had replied. It was true. He could see much, much more.

If he turned his eyes truly loose, the world vibrated in front of him, shedding light and colour in ways that were indescribable, painted with spectrums that no artist could ever dream of. Magick itself lurked in one of these spectrums, and if he concentrated, Heimdall could watch it billow in waves around the patrolling mages, or dart back and forth over the merchants’ wares. Sometimes it clung to certain people like a draping fungus. Other times it crept like fingers of water through a sinking ship; probing, testing, seeping. If he looked up, he could see it wrapping the mountains with its strings. It was never the same colour for long, if colour was really the word for it.

It was how he expected to find her. From the stars and their shadowy void, it had proved impossible. She was a ghost on a misty morning, silent and deadly. But down here, under the clouds, it might be different.

At least, that’s what he hoped.

‘Nothing?’

‘Nothing,’ said Heimdall, wincing as he lost concentration for a split-second. He closed his eyes and switched to using his ears. The sound of the city flooded in, and he began to trawl through it.

Verix sighed. She was becoming impatient. She turned to face north where a little forest of white tents had appeared on the hillside, near a growing building. There was a little train of people going to and from the city gates, bearing sacks and tables and flowers and chairs and clothes and food and rope and many, many other things that were apparently required for this upcoming festivity. A wedding. Verix had never seen a wedding. Her kind had no such thing. She had to admit, she was a little baffled. ‘On the brink of a war like no other, and the maid insists on her wedding,’ she mused. ‘How decidedly foolish.’

Heimdall barely heard her over the tumultuous noise. ‘Better it happen sooner, than later, do you not think?’

‘Better it not happen at all, brother. What target could be more tempting than a wedding where the guest list consists of every powerful mage the Arka have to offer? If I were the spawn, I would attack.’

Heimdall raised his chin a little. ‘Do you not think they know that? Elessi is adamant it go ahead. Why should they hide and cower? If the spawn is indeed capable of what we think she is, what the Lost Song says, then wedding or not, it will not make a difference when and where she strikes. Besides, they have prepared accordingly. The new Spire’s cellars are as fortified as the Arkathedral. The Written will be elsewhere, expecting the worst. As will the army, and the rest of the mages. Better to be wary, than to be surprised.’

Verix tilted her head, as was her habit. A flash of flame in the distance, to the east of the new Spire, caught her eye. In the training yards. ‘True indeed,’ she said. ‘It’s almost as if this wedding is bait.’

Heimdall hummed. ‘I knew it would be a matter of time before you guessed our plan. You are not the goddess of truth for nothing,’ he said.

‘Why did you not tell me? Am I not here to help?’

Heimdall wagged a finger. ‘You are, in other ways. Truth has its downfalls, Verix. We could not afford an honest tongue in the wrong place. ‘But if you value your life, I wouldn’t mention it around the maid. She doesn’t know.’

‘AGAIN!’ came the deafening, rasping order of the drill sergeant. A hundred hands punched the air with a shout of a spell. Flame roared. Smoke puffed. The air flexed and bowed as the heat rose.

‘ONE MORE TIME!’ The man’s guttural bark had the tonal quality of two rusty saws duelling. The mark of a true School instructor.

Once again, a hundred lips moved in unison, and a hundred palms threw bolts of fire into the azure sky. All except one. There was a cry as two recruits were soaked with ice-cold water. The sergeant found his prey and pounced.

‘By Njord’s festering ballsack!’ he yelled, stamping his way across the dusty training yard. The gathered recruits stood as still as they could possibly manage. They were the very epitome of mismatched miscellany. Any handful could have been dragged from their lines and not a single one would have anything in common with the next. They were farmhands, goatherds, veterans, butcher’s apprentices, travelling merchants, bored sailors, toothless brawlers, council members’ daughters, and freed slaves from across the sea. They were old, young, fat, malnourished, poor, rich, muddy, perfumed, bald, and coifed. Some had never seen the city before, some had never bothered to leave the comfort of their velvet-clad houses. Even their clothes were at odds. The pure, mind-boggling variety was an assault on the eyes.

But all of them, every single one, had felt the stirrings of magick in them to some degree or another. Down to the last hair on the very last head. Not in the history of the School had such an odd assortment of recruits been allowed through its prestigious, brutal doors. A blessing and a curse, all rolled into one.

‘Stand still, all of you!’ barked the sergeant. He had made his way to the back of the ranks, homing in on his quarry like a falcon, a red-faced and muscular falcon at that. Had the man not stood over six feet tall, had he not been built like the broad side of a house, his stormy face alone would have set the recruits quaking. His nose looked as though it had been on the wrong side of a row of knuckles too many times. Burst blood vessels decorated his cheeks. His russet hair was shaved into a wide, waxed line that ran from his brow to the back of his neck. Paraian fashion.

Had all of that failed to strike fear into the hearts of a recruit, then the man’s reputation would have finished the job up nicely. Exclamation was his middle name. Expletive his last. School rumours had it that Sergeant Toskig had once strangled a minotaur to death with his bare hands. It was also widely known that, while he had never been directly responsible, many a recruit had died under his instruction over the years. Learning magick was a dangerous game. The School was a dangerous board to play it on.

Toskig hauled a man out the furthermost rank and clapped him hard around the head. A man equally as tall and muscular, but with a fair face and a glum expression. It was the third time that day. He was beginning to bruise.

‘Gurmiss, you fecking idiot. For the last time! Get. Your. Spells.
Right
!’ bellowed Toskig, right in the man’s face. Each word was a slap in the face. Gurmiss nodded. He must have only been about twenty. From a privileged background too, by the looks of his clothes. ‘You a water mage, Gurmiss?’ demanded Toskig.

‘No, sir,’ replied Gurmiss.

‘Then why are you casting a water bolt spell in my fire class?’

Gurmiss made a face. He didn’t seem to be the brightest fish in the net. ‘I don’t know, sir.’

‘Cast it again. Just you. Right now.’

‘Now?’

‘By Evernia’s wilting tits!
Now
, Gurmiss!’

Gurmiss began to mutter something and held his hands out in front of him. The men and women around him began to scatter. Toskig smacked him on the arm. ‘Back in line, gobshites! Point it up, you fool. Up!’

Gurmiss bit his lip and put his hand in the air. He cleared his throat, closed his eyes, and began to mutter anew. Seconds later his hand began to tremble. He planted his feet as instructed, and a fountain of orange flame burst into the air above his palm. Gurmiss’ glum face broke into a wide smile. Several of his nearby compatriots cheered quietly, relieved. Some of them were soaked to the skin.

Toskig clapped a hand to his head in exasperation. ‘Thank the bloody gods for that! Back in line!’

The recruits scrambled to do his bidding, readjusting their ranks as quickly as they could. They weren’t fast enough, and Toskig began laying about with the back of his hand again. ‘This is a military school for military recruits, not a dancing class, you sorry sacks of septic entrails! Start acting like it!’ Toskig took his place at the front of the formation and put his hands by his sides at attention. He stamped his foot, and the hundred recruits did the same. They tried their best to be snappy about it. Most failed. Toskig looked up to the heavens for help. He need only have looked behind him.

‘Working them hard I hope, Sergeant Toskig?’

The sergeant turned and immediately saluted the shorter man standing behind him. ‘Undermage Modren, sir!’