From the Ashes (2 page)

Stone rose from his knees, up to his
full height. Despite the yawning emptiness within him, his comparative powerlessness, cut off as he was from his former masters, he still dwarfed all those about him in stature and strength, a demi-god in a crowd of mortals. Arbistrath, to his credit, wasn’t bowed.

“You would have us believe that you have changed?” he interrogated Stone as the crowd watched on, doing his best to look down his nose
at someone a clear foot taller than himself. “You would have us believe that you now
regret
all that you did? The Hunts? The assassinations?”

Stone nodded, sombre in the face of the tirade.

“I would.”

Arbistrath screamed as he drew his ancestral family sabre, a fine sword that dated back a hundred years to the Merchant Princes of the East Coast.

“My family served you, faithfully!” he yelled at the giant, voice trembling. “My grandfather, my father and I, too! I helped these Shamans because I was told that it was the right thing to do by my people. Yet what did I gain? Nothing! What did I lose? Everything! My station, my Pen. And all by your hand…”

He lunged, sword held firm in both hands and
bore down on his stunned former King. Even without the benefit of mystical powers, Stone was still clad in the raiment of physical perfection; his body, the human ideal. His reflexes honed with a century of conquest. Even as the deposed Lord of the Land charged, Stone could see a hundred different ways that he could parry the attacks, avoid them and bring his foe, broken, to the ground.

He did none of these things.

He merely stood.

Arbistrath, in the midst of his rage, called upon none of
the exquisite training drilled into him under the tutelage of Sergeant Poland. He simply rained berserk, mindless blows down upon his victim, who stood, taking it, not making any attempt to protect himself from the assault. The blade shrieked in protest as it slid across Stone’s muscled torso, scoring line after line of trickling blood as he vented the rage that had been building this past year.

             
Finally, his blade slick crimson with the blood of a fallen god, he fell, sobbing, to his knees.

             
Silence, as the crowd watched to see how the confrontation would unfold.

             
Stone ignored the lines of burning pain that criss-crossed his chest, for they would heal, soon enough. Instead, he regarded the man who knelt before him, broken and humbled. And he felt it himself, a true empathy, for he too knew what it was like to feel manipulated at the hands of powers greater than himself.

             
He knelt, slowly and spoke to the man, who listened, sniffling, yet refused to meet his gaze.

             
“No words of mine can take away the suffering I inflicted on my people, Arbistrath. Nothing I say can ease the pain of loss. But, perhaps, given time, my actions will prove to you that I am truly changed. That Invictus was not who I am, deep inside.” He paused for a moment, allowing the man to catch up, before continuing. “If you hate me for the remainder of your days,” he raised his voice, looking up, speaking to the room at large now, “then I won’t blame you. But harness that hate and put it to good use. For there is a struggle ahead and you will need all your strength, wherever you can find it.”

             
A hand on his shoulder, ancient and strong.

             
“Come, my apprentice. We have much to discuss. A lot has happened whilst you have been lost to us.”

***

The side chamber that lay off the main hall was quiet, cool and bright, one wall opening out onto a balcony that overlooked the valley, and Stone found himself mesmerised by the view. The bright sunlight that warmed his face shone down upon a marvel in the mountains, a haven in the hills, a land of green splendour and wondrous growth, free from the cruelty of the winter and untouched by the ravages of man.

             
“What is this place…?” he whispered to himself in quiet awe.

             
“We call it the Retreat,” came the reply from Wrynn beside him. “This has been the only home of Spirit-Craft this last century, a place where people have come to learn and commune with the elements, free from the predation of the Seeress and the Hunt.”

             
Stone looked down, guiltily, at the last comment, but the Shaman continued.

             
“The elements enjoy watching the race of man grow and prosper, but the suffocation of the land weakens them. And as they grow weaker, so too does our ability to stand against those forces ranged against us.” The old shaman looked out with undisguised pleasure on the land that stretched out before them. “This is their ideal; a land where man and nature co-exist, peacefully and to mutual benefit. If only the entire world were like this then we might stand a chance at repelling our foe…”

             
Stone frowned at the comment, turning to look at his mentor.

             
“What do you mean? I’ve raised twenty Pens, sure, and mighty cities they are; but they don’t encroach upon much of the land. The Plains, the Steppes, the Hills – all vast and almost untouched; surely the land can still breathe?”

             
Wrynn smiled, wistfully, as he shook his head.

             
“You talk of Pens, but have you ever sat and wondered, my apprentice, at how penned in we truly are?”

             
Stone looked bemused, so the shaman explained.

             
“We are in a cage, my young friend. A sandbox. An arena. Have you ever ventured beyond the great ocean to the South and East? Have you ever crossed further North than the land of fire? Further West than the great desert?”

             
“No…”

             
“Beyond those barriers that shut us in, there lies nothing, my friend. Only death. Only decay. We are the last bastion of hope on a grim and endless ball of dust, drained dry of life and vitality.”

             
Staggered by the revelation, Stone took a pace back, before pressing further.

             
“Who, exactly, do we face? Who are the Whispers? What do they want with this world and mine?”

             
Wrynn didn’t reply for a moment, instead walking away from the balcony to a table, simple and plain, whereupon sat a jug of cold water. He poured himself a drink, took a sip, relishing the crispness, before responding to his apprentice’s questions.

             
“The Avatars spoke to you, once, of dark powers that hunger for the life they bestow upon the world. These powers lie beyond the Veil, existing in a world of fire, brimstone and suffering. They thirst for our essence, seeping in where they can through gaps in the curtain of reality to take, to plunder, to pillage, leaving behind worlds dry and charred; blackened and lifeless lumps to float endlessly in the void.”

             
“They are spirits?”

             
“Of a sort, yes. But not under the jurisdiction of the Avatars. The elements exist to bestow life. The dark powers exist to take it. They are eternal and spiteful and relish in taking the forms of our worst nightmares. We’ve all seen them, in our darkest moments. We all fear them, fearing them to be the punishment that awaits us, should we fail in life.”

             
Stone paused for a moment, thinking back to his previous life on Earth, to the religions he had studied as a child at school. Images of hell, pitchforks; horned, goat-legged monsters prancing about a lake of fire.

             
“Demons…”

             
The shaman nodded, sombre.

             
“As good a word as any.”

             
A thought struck Stone and he frowned, puzzled, before asking the question.

             
“If they can enter worlds under their own power, why do they need the Portal atop the Beacon to enter mine? Why can they not simply pour out and ravage it as they have so many others before?”

             
The Shaman bade Stone follow him, back over to the balcony, gesturing up into the blue sky.

             
“How good’s your eyesight these days?”

             
“Good.”

             
“Look up, through the blue; what do you see?”

             
The Nagah-Slayer did as he was told, gazing up into the sky, his immortal eyes piercing the blue and reaching out into the void above.

             
“Stars. Twinkling. A sea of them.”

             
The Shaman nodded.

             
“And your world circles none of those stars. It lies further beyond than even you can see. Across a gulf of nothing, an ocean of cold so vast that even the ravenous hordes of hell can’t cross it. That, my apprentice, is why they need the portal. Once it’s open, they shall cross, have a presence in your world. And once they have that presence, the floodgates will open, for they shall construct their own means of transporting their legions. And your world shall fall.”

             
Stone shuddered.

             
“How do we stop them? The portal I constructed is indestructible; only by channelling all of their powers could I shape the cradle.”

             
“We cannot.”

             
The statement caused the towering warrior to start, for he wasn’t expecting such defeatism from the Shaman.

             
“What do you mean?”

             
Wrynn sighed.

             
“This world,” he stretched out his arm to encompass the view outside, “is at an end, my friend. No matter what happens, a world cannot survive with only a hundred miles by a hundred miles of life. Slowly this planet will crumble to dust. And you are quite right, the cradle for the portal cannot be destroyed – they made sure of that by using your skills. No matter the outcome of our struggle, they will merely attempt the crossing again at the next astral alignment in a hundred years. And the one after that. And so on, until they succeed.”

             
“Then what do we fight for?” spat Stone, his fingers splintering the wood of the balcony as he leant on it. “If it’s inevitable, why bother?”

             
The Shaman put a soothing hand on his shoulder.

             
“For though this world is lost, we may yet save yours and, by extension, countless others. If you can cross through the portal yourself, whilst at the same time preventing the legions from doing the same, then close it behind you…”

             
“Then I shall have a hundred years to prepare my world to face them…”

The realisation hit Stone hard as he realised the truth in the Shaman’s words. This world, whatever it may be called, wherever it may be, was lost. But the Earth might yet be saved.

“The portal, though. What if it is already open? What if, as we speak, the legions of hell descend upon the Earth?”

The Shaman shook his head.

“We have scried the Beacon – the portal yet forms. We must act quickly, however, for in a week, ten days at most, the gateway will be stable enough for them to use.”

Stone sniffed, nodded. A week. Ten days, tops. Not long. Certainly not if they were to march an army down from the mountains to the Steppes.

“And, assuming we fight our way through the hordes of my former Clansmen, past my darkly empowered Council members, past whatever gribbly, infernal monsters they summon from beyond the Veil; assuming all that, how then do we close the portal behind us?”

“With this.”

A new voice, a young woman, bold and confident, and so familiar sounding that it caused Stone’s heart to race, putting him in mind of gentle hazel eyes from a century ago. He turned, wondering if some fresh new miracle were about to surprise him, but alas, no.

This girl had green eyes, not brown. Her
long curly hair was flame-red and, as she made her way across the side-chamber towards the two, holding a crystal object in her hands, Stone realised that this must be the shaman that Ceceline had spoken to him about, almost a year ago. She came to a halt, before them and she looked up at Stone, curious and he regarded her in turn, two sets of green eyes, so rare in this land and separated by a hundred years.

“Stone,” introduced Wrynn, “this is Gwenna. Gwenna – this is the Nagah-Slayer.”

Stone nodded at the girl.

“I’ve heard of you before, Gwenna. It is you who saved Arbistrath when my troops came calling. And it is you who bested the Seeress…”

An almost imperceptible shudder went through the girl and Stone was taken aback as he felt the curious wash of emotions at the memory. He glanced, sidelong at Wrynn, but the elder shaman hadn’t appeared to have noticed the conflict. Momentarily it was gone, leaving Stone to wonder whether he’d even felt it at all.