DemonWars Saga Volume 2: Mortalis - Ascendance - Transcendence - Immortalis (The DemonWars Saga) (205 page)

T
HEY CROSSED THE HOT DESERT SANDS
,
SPEAR TIPS AND ARMOR GLITTERING IN
the unrelenting sun. The mounted Chezhou-Lei led the way, with the Jacintha soldiers marching behind. An army of servants, including many To-gai-ru slaves, came behind them, bearing the armor for the elite warriors’ horses, and with wagons and wagons of supplies to get the marching force from city to distant city across the empty sands. At the very head of the column rode Wan Atenn, proud and fierce and dwarfing the man, who was no warrior, riding beside him.

Merwan Ma did not really become comfortable with riding throughout all the days of that journey. He had never even been on a horse until Chezru Douan had unexpectedly ordered him to go along and bear witness to the glorious march, a command that had surely stunned him and all of the others at the great temple of Jacintha. Rarely was the Chezru Chieftain’s personal attendant allowed outside the temple. He wasn’t to go all the way to the Mountains of Fire, though, for the Chezru Chieftain would not take such a gamble with so important a man. Rather, he was to stop at Yatol Peridan’s principal city of Gortha, where Peridan’s private ship would sail him back to Jacintha.

Merwan Ma tried to make the best of the tedium, attempting to engage Wan Atenn in conversation throughout the days. At first, he had been met with a polite but cold detachment, but when he had finally turned his chatter from exaltations of the glory of the Chezru Chieftain to honest and curious questions about the Chezhou-Lei and their ancient feud with the Jhesta Tu, the proud warrior actually began to respond.

“Once, before the advent of the truth, we were of the same order,” Wan Atenn explained one brutally hot day, the caravan barely inching along. “Those who began the order of Chezhou-Lei were masters of the Jhesta Tu.”

“But who were the Jhesta Tu in those ancient days?” Merwan Ma asked, for he had little knowledge of this chapter of Behrenese history.

“Priests. Defenders of the secluded villages from the bandits who roamed the lawless land.” Wan Atenn looked over at Merwan Ma and nodded. “Yatol gave order to the land, as the ancestors of the Chezhou-Lei understood, but most of the others of the ancient order of Jhesta Tu would not accept the truth of Yatol.”

“And so began the feud,” Merwan Ma reasoned.

“And so came the dominance of the Chezru and the Chezhou-Lei, with the Jhesta Tu in retreat to a land even less hospitable than the sands of the desert,” Wan Atenn replied, his voice the same even and confident tone that the Chezhou-Lei always seemed to possess. “The truth has won out. Every now and then, we of the Chezhou-Lei must remind our foolish brethren of that.”

Merwan Ma settled back in the saddle and let it all sink in. He knew that he was out of his element there, so far out, and dwarfed by the prowess of the warriors all about him, and by those they would soon engage in battle. He was excited, surely, but he was also terrified, and a big part of him wanted nothing more than to be back in the safety of Jacintha’s temple, beside his master.

When the procession crossed through each of the cities, the citizens inundated them with new supplies, the farriers rushed to reshoe their horses, to polish armor and repair weapons. And when they left, all the air buzzed with the excited whispers of the populace, watching their greatest going to war.

The route from Jacintha to the Mountains of Fire was not straight. The army followed the coast all the way to the southern edge of the kingdom, Peridan’s city of Gortha, where Merwan Ma bade the warriors farewell.

Wan Atenn then turned west, marching a zigzag from city to oasis to city, and thus, by the time the rocky black-and-gray mountains were at last in sight, spring had turned to summer.

The ground beneath their feet changed from sand to rocky ground over the next days, and the shadows stretched over them from the mountains in the west earlier each afternoon. The horses were clad in their plated armor, slowing the pace, and the Chezhou-Lei would only allow a march of a few miles each day. They had to stay fresh and ready for battle, so close to the home of the dreaded Jhesta Tu.

O
utside a small village under the shadow of the northern edge of the Mountains of Fire, Belli’mar Juraviel and his two companions first overheard word of the march of the Chezhou-Lei and the Behrenese army. The rumors surrounding that march, that a Chezhou-Lei had been slain outside of Dharyan by a Jhesta Tu warrior, brought even more hope to the elf that he might yet find his dear ranger friend still alive, and only made him more anxious than ever to find the way to this elusive place called the Walk of Clouds.

He noticed, though—as he had since he and his companions had left the rebel band on the steppes far to the north—that one of his companions didn’t seem to share his enthusiasm for the journey.

Indeed, Agradeleous had come along more hesitantly each day, a pace that had slowed even more once the small cluster of towering and rocky mountains came into view.

“We must find them before this battle is joined,” Juraviel remarked that night as the three settled into a camp in a rocky alcove in the foothills of the mountains. “Perhaps in the dark of night, you can assume your natural form, Agradeleous, that we might fly about the mountainsides for sign of the hidden monastery?”

“No,” the dragon answered, simply and firmly, and both Juraviel and Cazzira turned curious looks his way.

“Are you too far from home?” Juraviel did ask.

Agradeleous didn’t answer, other than to give him a skeptical smirk.

“Then what troubles you?” the elf pressed.

Agradeleous narrowed his reptilian eyes threateningly, and Juraviel knew that he should back off this particular subject.

And then it hit him. The dragon feared, or at least held a healthy respect for, the Jhesta Tu mystics. The revelation surprised the elf, but only at first. Certainly, dragons had been slain in the past, usually by mighty gemstone-wielding Abellicans, and several of the battles against marauding dragons waged by the barbarian Alpinadorans in the frozen north were nothing less than legendary.

Agradeleous did not want to openly expose his true form before the walls of the Jhesta Tu monastery; the dragon apparently held the Jhesta Tu in equal esteem to the mightiest Abellicans. That, too, gave Juraviel some hope that Brynn had somehow managed to escape the tragedy of Dharyan alive.

B
rynn brushed Runtly in a small and fairly secluded field around the rocks and through a long and boulder-strewn valley from the monastery stairs. The two had just shared a fast and furious ride from the larger fields where the rest of the wild horses roamed, to the small field near a stream so that she could cool down and brush the pony.

Those were the hours of peace for Brynn, the times of absent reflection, of memories of hopes and of her own feelings concerning this very special interlude in her extraordinary life.

She lost herself there, in the small lea, and so, oblivious to her surroundings, she didn’t take note of the movement along the rocky borders of the field and was completely surprised when a voice rang out behind her.

“Stand where you are, or die where you are!” came a rough call, in a dialect that Brynn knew to be Behrenese before she ever turned to regard the speaker.

And when she did turn, she paled indeed, for there stood not just one, but a line of warriors—of Chezhou-Lei warriors!

“You wear no sash,” the man remarked.

Brynn didn’t even hear him, so caught was she by his presence here. For Brynn recognized him from the battle of Dharyan, from his leap down from the walls when he had killed Ashwarawu.

“Why do you wear no sash, if you are of the Jhesta Tu?” he asked.

Brynn understood that he did not similarly recognize her, and when she thought about it, she realized that it made sense. She was not outfitted for battle; she hadn’t worn her beret or even her sword down from the monastery, and in the fight at Dharyan, while she had seen this one so very clearly, he had likely not even noticed her, just another body in the mass of turmoil.

“I am not of the Jhesta Tu,” she answered honestly, keenly aware now that other warriors were moving out of the shadows all about her.

“We watched you come down the steps,” the man answered.

“I … I am visiting there, but am not of their order,” Brynn stammered, having no idea of where she should try to guide this unexpected conversation.

“Take her!” the man growled suddenly. “A prisoner to lure the birds from their aerie!”

A rush came at her from behind, and Brynn responded reflexively, without even thinking, dropping low and skittering underneath the pony.

She came up and around to Runtly’s back hard, angling her leading arm to deflect a punch heading for her face, then stepping in closer and snapping her head forward, smashing her forehead against the attacking warrior’s nose. As he fell back, Brynn drew his sword from under the sash he wore, rushing past him and shoving him all the way down as she did.

She wasn’t used to the curving blade, though, and as she tried to parry the slash of another warrior, she barely connected, and at the wrong angle, and his sword slid up and opened a gash between her thumb and her index finger.

Grimacing through the pain, Brynn turned her blade all the way over, forcing the Chezhou-Lei’s sword down to the side. Then, instead of retreating, she reached out her left hand and slapped Runtly on the rump, and the pony responded with a kick. It didn’t connect fully, just enough to clip the man and send him stumbling away.

Brynn had him dead, easily so, but several others were closing fast. She started for the vulnerable warrior, and the other Chezhou-Lei moved to intercept.

Brynn threw her sword at them, pivoted about, placing her hands on Runtly’s rump and, leaping up, fell into place on the pony’s back.

He leaped away immediately, cutting to the side at Brynn’s command. She ran a short circle, looking for an opening in the shuffling and shifting line of warriors, and then she darted straight out at the initial speaker.

An arrow just missed her head; another one hit hard in Runtly’s flank.

The pony stumbled and almost went down, but Brynn tightened her legs on his flanks and urged him on. He caught his balance in a dead gallop, veering to the side, Brynn bending low over his neck, urging him on.

The Chezhou-Lei warriors blocking the way held their ground until the very last second, then two of the three dove aside. The third moved out a single step, lifting his sword, thinking to unhorse the rider as she passed, but Brynn and Runtly were too in harmony for that. Even as the situation unfolded before her, even as the woman thought that she should veer the pony, Runtly was already doing just that.

The Chezhou-Lei warrior didn’t even try to abandon the attack, trading the impact from the charging pony for a slash at Brynn. To his credit, he did score a hit as he went flying aside, but there was no momentum behind it, and while the fine sword did open the woman’s leather tunic and put a decent gash across her side, as well, she held her seat and galloped away.

Arrows flew after her, another scoring hard on poor Runtly’s flank, and then a third.

Tears welled in Brynn’s eyes whenever her beloved pony stumbled, but the gallant pony would not stop his run, would not allow the enemy warriors to catch her.

They went down the rocky ravine, coming out onto the stone-filled clearing at the base of the mountainside staircase. As if understanding the course, Runtly brought Brynn to the base of the stairs and pulled up short.

She leaped from the pony’s back, turning to attend to him, but he jumped away before she could begin to tend the arrow wounds, running out the other end of the clearing.

Brynn took a step, as if to follow, but she heard the pursuit, coming hard. Only then did the woman appreciate her own stinging wounds. “Run,” she whispered at her fleeing pony, and she turned and scrambled up the stairway. She paused and glanced back at Runtly several times, watching him move away, limping, and she thought of going to him.

But then she heard the shouts as the warriors came on in pursuit. Brynn recognized her responsibility here, to the Jhesta Tu, if not to herself, and so she turned and charged up the stairs, driving on, step after step. Weariness overcame her soon after, along with a deep burn in her side. She reached over and brought her hand back covered in bright blood.

She growled away the pain and shook the weariness from her head and drove on, step after step, pressing onward and upward.

She lost all sense of time, and though she heard no pursuit on the stairs behind her, she wouldn’t stop, not even to rest. For she felt that if she sat down to rest, she would not find the strength to get back up and go on again. Growling with every step, the young ranger determinedly and doggedly continued, even going down to all fours and crawling up the steep stairs.

Finally, when she thought that she would have to just lie down and let a cool darkness overcome her, Brynn came over the lip of the ascent, to the landing to the side of the arching stone bridge.

She called out, or tried to, then went down to the stone.

She heard the voices all about her in moments, then felt herself lifted into strong and caring arms.

When the world stopped spinning, Brynn found herself lying on a cot in the main house of the monastery. She opened her eyes to see Pagonel and several other Jhesta Tu looking down at her.

“Chezhou-Lei warriors,” she said, gasping. “Many of them. In the valley below.”

Pagonel’s features crinkled up at that, and he slowly turned to regard the old Jhesta Tu master at his side.

“I have brought the blood of war upon us,” he said.

“The Chezhou-Lei should not have come,” Master Cheyes replied.

“They march to avenge their dead,” Pagonel explained, and Cheyes nodded.

“They will not gain the Walk of Clouds,” the old master assured Pagonel. “Not if all of Behren marches behind them. No army can overcome our position.”

Pagonel didn’t disagree, but his expression remained quite troubled nonetheless. He looked back at Brynn. “Rest easy,” he said. “We are in no danger up here.”