EPIC: Fourteen Books of Fantasy (399 page)

“Power?” The dark knight growled scornfully. “You shall have what power I give you, mortal.” He thrust out a gauntleted hand and took hold of his servant’s face, metal-clad fingers encompassing the servant’s skull as if he grasped nothing larger than an apple-white fruit. His hand glowed hotly, turning the color of brass touched by flame.

The scream that tore from the servant’s throat reverberated around the chamber and down distant passages until its echo bounced back like the answering cries of a thousand shrieking souls.

Shuddering, Eydis crept backward until she was pressed against the wall. She didn’t know if her transparent form would be visible to them if either the dark master or his servant turned their eyes her direction.

But thankfully, they did not. The Raven King withdrew his hand, leaving behind a fiery print of splayed fingers and palm on the other man’s cheek. The side of his face was melted now and twisted into the tortured features of some creature out of a nightmare. Where the master’s fingers had spanned the back of his servant’s head, strips of hair were burnt away, exposing red scalp. But the other side of his face remained untouched and piteously human.

“Now,” the Raven King rumbled over his servant’s groans. “You possess what power lies in my right hand. Use it and summon me an army of corpses.”

The servant’s moaning and writhing stilled instantly, as if all pain and fear had fled at some invisible command.

“As you command so shall it be, Great Master.” His mouth twisted in a hideous effort at an ingratiating smile. His right eye now glowed like red coals in a furnace above the ruin of his cheek. The dark master placed the heavy gold chain around the servant’s neck.

Then the scene shifted and Eydis felt herself being sucked away, like a wave pulled back from the shore.

Shore… Water…

She was drowning! She dragged in a hungry breath—or tried to. But instead of air, her lungs filled with water. Choking, she convulsed, lungs afire, everything a dark watery blur. She could not tell up from down. As she struggled desperately to flail toward the surface, her arms felt weak and heavy. Her chest was about to burst.

The darkness faded to grey, and her eyes rolled back. Dimly, she was aware of scaled hands grabbing her from all sides, long fingers digging greedily into her flesh. She couldn’t understand who was trying to drown her, only that many hands held her down. The last thing she saw before fading into oblivion was a pair of milky-white eyes in a green-scaled, elongated face.

The world dropped away.

Light and air filled Eydis. Weightless, she felt nothing. She saw nothing but twinkling specks floating and swirling silently, like soft falling snow, clinging to her hair, kissing her lips, being drawn in through her nostrils… Only that couldn’t be, because she wasn’t inhaling. And she no longer had hair or face. In fact, if she had any physical form at all, she had lost her ability to control it. Was she dead, then? Was this what it was like when one’s spirit exited one’s body? Perhaps she should be worried. Or afraid. But she wasn’t. She felt peaceful, her thoughts pleasantly hazy.

Then the voice came to her. It wasn’t a real voice, for it came from no mortal mouth, and it whispered not into Eydis’s ear, but into her heart. It spoke for what seemed a hundred years, revealing to her the mysteries of both mortal and immortal worlds. Eydis swelled with knowledge, the secrets of the universe laid bare before her. She understood life and death as never before.

But eventually the voice went away, leaving her bereft. All joy fled her, as she searched to find the voice again. Like an abandoned child, she called out for her mother. The glittering lights all around evaporated, and colors and sounds began to close in. In a flash, feeling returned to Eydis’s body. Pain. Wet. Cold. There was something hard under her back. Something cold and wet covered her mouth, smothering her. Or pushing air into her. The world tilted.

Eydis jerked awake, coughing and vomiting water all over the ground. Memories flashed through her mind. Drowning in the depths of the pool. Being grabbed and pulled at by many hands—hands with sharp-scaled fingertips. But somehow she was free now. And alive. Greedily, she sucked in sweet air tinged with the scent of pool-weed and something else. Water lilies? Her lips tingled, and her skin was numb everywhere it had been touched by those mysterious hands.

Something was leaning over her, she realized, its face and form haloed by the sun. Its elongated face, extended neck, and small breasts were iridescent with emerald-colored scales that glittered in the light. Its lips, full like those of a fish, were parted, and slits down both jaws stirred like the gills of a sea creature. A guardian of the sacred pool.

Eydis stared. The creature stared back, green lids flicking over opaque eyes as large and round as marbles. Then there were voices and the sound of running feet approaching. The pool guardian looked up, and her serpentine form trembled.

“D-don’t go,” Eydis tried to say. But her teeth chattered, and her throat was rough from swallowing so much pool water.

Anyway, the creature was already gone, a splashing sound marking her escape. Eydis was alone for mere seconds and then a crowd of white-robed pool attendants were surrounding her, fussing over her, and helping her sit up.

“It is a sign,” one of them said to Eydis. “You have been touched by the First Mother. Why else should the pool guardians pull you out of the water? Why else should one of them breathe life back into you?”

“Be silent, Thea,” said another. “Give the girl space to catch her breath.”

Eydis recognized the speaker as Lytia, the attendant who had first helped her undress before entering the pool. In the same moment, she realized she was shivering naked in front of a growing crowd.

“It is all right,” Lytia reassured her. “We are all sisters here.” She draped a dry robe over Eydis’s goose-pimpled flesh and ordered another woman to fetch a warm drink.

Eydis managed to choke past her raw throat, “What happened to me down there? Was I supposed to be under for so long?”

“I don’t think so. No one has ever been before,” Lytia said. She hesitated. “No one who survived, anyway. You are lucky the pool guardians intervened—something else I have never seen.” Her pale brows drew together. “The First Mother must have had a great deal to share with you.”

Then Eydis remembered. Not just the visions but the light. The voice that spoke to her heart and the many things it had said.

“I must see her,” she realized aloud.

Lytia looked startled. “What? Who must you see?”

“The oracle.” Eydis hoped her voice was steadier than her hands, which she hid inside her robe. “You must take me to the oracle of the grove.”

“The oracle? Why? What did you see down there?”

Eydis swallowed. “The end of the world.”

Chapter II

E
YDIS
WAS
USHERED
PAST
THE
silver trees and up a narrow path through a labyrinthine garden. The garden was tended by white-robed groundskeepers who watched curiously as Eydis and her entourage of attendants passed. Through the trees, Eydis caught glimpses of a temple’s many-peaked roof. But it wasn’t until the grove was behind her that she had her first clear view of the Temple of Tranquility.

The structure was striking in its simplicity. Many levels high, each level was topped with a multi-inclined roof, its curves sweeping to high points at the corners. Separate unenclosed staircases marched up the outsides of the temple. Many areas lacked outer walls and were separated from the outdoors only by thin linen sheets that fluttered in the breeze. Bells hung from the roof edges and dangled from the branches of surrounding flowering trees. With each gust of wind, they set off tinkling music that chimed like a whisper through the clearing.

The temple walls were of pale marble veined with gold, echoing the fine white pebbles of the entrance path and the golden hue of the flower petals drifting from the treetops. It was a scene of peace and light. After the horror she’d witnessed in her visions, Eydis’s soul was soothed by the tranquility. It was difficult to believe evil and violence could exist in a world capable of such radiance.

Flanked by attendants, she mounted the steps to the temple porch. There Lytia clapped her hands and ordered the other women from the pool to return to their duties.

“Wait here,” she instructed Eydis when they had gone. “And trade your shoes for these.” She proffered a pair of new slippers made of some fabric so delicate Eydis could see through them. It was impossible to imagine they would provide any protection for the soles of her feet.

“It is symbolic,” Lytia explained, “of casting aside the filth of the outer world and arraying oneself in the purity of the inner woman—or man—before entering the presence of the oracle.”

Eydis nodded, asking as she complied, “Are you sure you can gain me admittance? What if she won’t see me?”

“I can promise nothing,” Lytia admitted. “You must appreciate how rare it is for pilgrims to be permitted access to the oracle. Her foretellings come through purity and solitude. She must keep herself untainted and absolute, separate from the aggression and greed of the outer world.”

“I understand,” Eydis said. “I have lived half my life among adherents in a seclusionary, where we hold similar beliefs.”

When Lytia had gone, Eydis paced up and down the terrace, asking herself what she would do if her attempt to deliver her message to the oracle should fail. “Please, First Mother,” she murmured. “You sent me the visions in the pool. If you want me to make use of them, give me this sign. Sway the oracle’s heart in my favor. Help her sense the urgency of my request.”

It seemed like a long time before Lytia returned. And when she did, she was not alone.

Accompanying her was a slender, statuesque woman whose knee-length white braid belied the smoothness of her features, making her age impossible to guess. She wasn’t beautiful. But her timeless face and form, combined with the mature years her silver hair and gray granite eyes hinted at, produced a striking effect.

“This is Server Parthenia, the oracle’s primary advisor and companion,” Lytia introduced the newcomer. “Without the server’s approval, no one enters the oracle’s presence.”

Eydis inclined her head. “I’m flattered by your condescension in meeting with me, Server. I am only a simple pilgrim from the seclusionary at Shroudstone—a hopeful adherent to the order of the First Mother. I would not trouble you unless my message was urgent.”

The server looked her up and down, from the worn out hose and rough tunic of the traveling costume she had changed back into, to the top of her head, still damp from the pool. Her gaze was coolly dismissive.

“I am told the pool guardians intervened to save you from drowning?” she asked flatly. “Is this true?”

“Yes, Server.” Eydis smoothed the frayed hem of her tunic, seeing the doubt in the other woman’s eyes. Did the server think she had invented the story? Why should she do that?

“Tell me about the visions you saw in the pool,” the server commanded.

Eydis surprised herself by saying, “I’m afraid I’m not comfortable discussing that with anyone but the oracle. Suffice to say the First Mother has entrusted me with important information the oracle should be made aware of.”

Server Parthenia’s smile was mocking. “Do you truly think you could be privy to anything the oracle in her wisdom has not already anticipated?”

Eydis held her ground. “That is not for me to say. Does not the First Mother share knowledge where she wills?”

The server’s smile disappeared. “The oracle is in her meditation chamber, and I will not disturb her under any circumstances. If you will not convey your message through me, it shall not reach her ears at all.”

“I am sorry,” Eydis said earnestly. “But I cannot accept that. My message is too important to be delayed by your arrogance.”

With that, she stepped around the server and tried to push past the temple doors. In her haste, she bumped into a pedestal near the door, toppling both it and the statue it held.

With a cry of dismay, she watched the sculpted likeness of a three-tongued dog shatter into pieces all over the terrace. She was on her knees in an instant, picking up the pieces. “I’m so sorry, so very sorry,” she rushed breathlessly. “I never meant to break it.”