The Pleasure of Memory (31 page)

XV

THE PROMOTION

OONTA PUSHED HERSELF UP ONTO AN ELBOW AND SPIT THE DIRT FROM HER MOUTH.

A dense fog of cedar smoke shrouded the world. Her eyes were on fire, her breathing agony. The thrum of the fading explosion still vibrated in her head. Somewhere off in the fog and smoke, she heard someone coughing.

She plucked a cedar thorn from her neck and flicked it into the smoke. A quick count revealed four limbs, two oteuryns, and two eyes, all of which added up to no excuse for self-pity. Aside from a throbbing headache and some impending bruises, she’d survived without serious damage. This was nothing. She’d had much worse.

She stood up with more effort than pleased her. A deep pall of smoke cloaked the world like a late autumn fog. The smoke obscured her path, making it a slow, laborious process like wading through the muddy water of a rock-strewn river. The barb-cedar hedge was now a ragged line of fractured trunks and smoking limbs a dozen yards wide. The ground was a maze of broken branches and rocks. Eventually she made the soot-blackened cliff face and began feeling her way toward the sentry.

Out in the field beyond the battered shrub line, shadows of her warriors staggered through the fog like ghosts of the damned. It reminded her of the paintings she’d seen in the Boruoem Temple in Vaemogth as a child. Pictures of the cursed dead wandering blindly through Sken te’Fau, the Swamp of Voices, lost and desperate and deeply mournful. Those images had cost her more than a few troubled nights’ sleep. She wanted more than anything to go to them, to help them, but honor dictated she find Fen’lar first. Like it or not, he was their senior officer and their leader.

The crater left on the cliff by the explosion was wider and taller than her arm span, and yet only inches deep. It was still hot enough that she couldn’t touch it. It maddened her that the explosion had done so much damage to the cedar hedge and her troops, yet hadn’t been enough to breech the cave.

She sensed the taer-cael of a struggle beneath the smoking mat of mangled branches that had been the cedar hedge. It was just next to her, a half dozen feet back directly across from the crater. The image she was receiving was dull and indistinct. Still, it was clear that someone was alive under there.

She immediately began to dig through the branches. The thorns, the thick, oily smoke, and her headache were working in cahoots to aggravate the process of clearing the debris. The taer-cael grew louder as she dug deeper, though the lingering vibrations of the explosion confounded her efforts to form an image. Eventually she dragged away a large cedar branch and revealed…a metal hand.

It was all she could do not to scream at the sight.

For a dirty moment, she actually considered abandoning the fiend to fend for itself, to let it dig its own goddamned way out of the debris. And though it would be the path of deep satisfaction, it would just as efficiently lead her to shame. Instead, she continued clearing. To abandon even as foul a comrade as the wyrlaerd would bring dishonor on her and her family, and she’d have no part of it. Despite that truth, she made a secret prayer as she worked that the beast was mangled thoroughly enough to send it limping back to its master.

The beast soon disappointed her by climbing free from its chains. The heat had ruined the armor’s malleability so that it screeched horribly as the demon moved. Bits of stone pocked its tarry face, and the glowing caeyl of its left eye had drifted lower through the heated tar in such a way that it would have been comical under any other circumstances. Unfortunately, what little humor the sight offered died a quick and tragic death.

The demon lumbered toward her with its metal shrieking, its fists knotted, and its eyes on fire. She instinctively drew her sword as she backed away in tandem, though she wasn’t sure what she’d done to bring its anger. Had the demon read her thoughts? Had it sensed the contempt she felt for it? If so, she was most certainly a dead woman.

The cliff wall rudely ended her retreat, though the demon kept coming. The hot, unyielding stone of the crater at her back felt like standing at the end of the world. There was nothing left to do now but steady herself for the worst. As she hoisted her sword into the disfigured face of the wyrlaerd, she thought of Pa’ana. She remembered his eyes, how he smelled, the warmth of his breath, and in that instant was ready to join him in the Holy City of Pentyrfal.

Much to her surprise, the demon didn’t attack her. Instead, it simply shoved her to the side and slammed its fists against the smoking pit that had been the sentry’s post. It pounded the rock again and again, sparks flying with each blow. Finally, it threw its arms out and released a mind-numbing wail that swelled in pitch and volume until her eardrums felt like they would rip open under the pressure of it. The wretched sound was relentless, growing dramatically higher in tone and intensity. She threw her hands to her ears, but it was no use. Her eyes were watering under the pain of it. The sound was unbearable. It was killing her!

Then the nightmarish sound simply stopped, ceasing in mid-shriek, ending as abruptly as it had begun.

She collapsed back against the cliff and tried to breathe again. The pain was already fading from her head, though an odd ringing sound remained. As she struggled for composure, she watched the demon studying the crater.

It was as horrid a vision as she’d ever dared dream. The smoking ruins, the loss of her kadeer, her wounded wandering through the smoke, the failure of a mission in which they’d invested months of efforts. It was too much to bear.

And then there was the demon. The beast was a hideous, vile thing, a tumor in the consciousness of this mortal world, and she loathed it and everything it represented.

Something tingled through the ringing in her ears. She lowered her head and pressed her palm into her brow as she concentrated on it. It was a new taer-cael, and it came from the same heap of debris the wyrlaerd had dug itself free of. This one was fainter and less distinct, but she knew it was Fen’lar. The fool was still alive. She pushed away from the cliff and maneuvered around the wyrlaerd to begin the climb through the rubble toward the source of the vibrations.

Graezon again intercepted her. It seized her by the mail and threw her to the side as easily as she might toss a blanket. She landed hard in the dirt. Before she could even get back to her feet, the beast kicked away the branches and pulled the Kadeer free. At least, what was left of him.

Graezon threw him back against the hot crater and pinned him there by the neck. A jagged line of ripped rings exposed the pale and bloody flesh beneath Fen’lar’s mail. A shard of wood stuck out from his ribs. Bright blood bubbled around the entry wound. His scalp was a blackened cap of charred hair. The skin on his face was raw and blistered. His upper lip was gone, and what teeth he may have still possessed were lost in all the blood. As Fen’lar clawed at the metal hand shackled to his neck, his boot heels kicked impotently against the crater’s rim. The demon grabbed the wolf’s head badge and removed it from the broken mail

Koonta had to intervene. Superior officer or not, the wyrlaerd was
not
going to murder a warrior in the field, not on her watch. She again drew her sword and threw it into the demon’s face, shouting, “Release him!”

The demon didn’t look at her. It didn’t even seem to notice her. “Your incompetence cost us a Divinic Demon,” it snarled at Fen’lar, “You’ve lost the Parhronii and the mage! And now this? You led us to an ambush? You’re a fool and a liability.”

Fen’lar tried to speak, but only managed a wet cough that sprayed the demon’s armor red. He was dying quickly. She had to act.

“Release him!” she yelled at Graezon, “You’ve no right to do this!”

“I’ve every right,” the demon growled back, “This is punishment for gross ineptitude.”

“It’s murder!”

“It’s an execution.”

“It’s murder, and you know it! I will not let you kill him, do you hear me?”

This seemed to amuse the wyrlaerd. It actually looked at her now, looked at the sword tip hovering before its face. Its already twisted features warped queerly, and she felt a surge of repulsion as she realized it was trying to smile. “Why, Saaro,” it said, “Are you threatening me?” It actually looked amused.

A warrior walked in from the smoke and stood beside her. Another immediately followed. They’d both drawn their weapons.

“I don’t make threats,” she told the beast, “But there’s a line between discipline and treason, and not even you can be allowed to cross it with impunity.”

“Those are dangerous words, Saaro.”

“Kill him,” she said, “And it’ll be my responsibility to relieve you of command.”

The demon laughed at that. “Relieve me of command?”

Three more warriors joined them, coming in from the smoking field on the other side of the wyrlaerd. The demon considered the gathering company. “You’d find that an unhealthy move,” it said, throwing its foul eyes from warrior to warrior, “I would urge caution to you, Saaro, lest your comrades pay the price of your pride.”

“This is no idle threat, Commander,” she said back, “Continue this path and none of us will track for you.”

“I have other trackers.”

“The closest company of elite trackers is in the Nolands. It’ll take you weeks to gather and bring them here. By then, the fugitives will be in Barcuun and you’ll lose your precious prize. I don’t think Lord Prae will be amused when he hears how you lost his Blood Caeyl.”

The demon’s eyes narrowed at that. “And pray tell how you expect Lord Prae will hear about it if you’re all dead?”

More warriors emerged from the smoke, some scrambling over the burning chaos of the mangled barb cedars behind the beast. All had their swords drawn.

“You’ll never kill us all,” she said, “Some of us will escape. But kill one of us and you lose us all.”

She could feel the cold tentacles of the demon’s thoughts again tickling at the edge of her consciousness. She steeled herself against it, but the beast only pushed more determinedly. A sensation like cold, thick water filled her mind, though she fought the dark feelers back with every bit of faith she had left. She refused to submit.

The demon abruptly withdrew. Then it released Fen’lar. Her warriors rushed forward to catch the dying man as he slid down over the crater’s lip. They eased him carefully to the ground.

“You’re strong willed,” Graezon said, turning to her, “You’re devoted to your compatriots.”

“I follow the rules,” she said seriously.

“The rules of war? Why on earth would war have rules?”

“The rules of honor.”

“Meaning?”

Koonta’ar watched the warriors working to save their Kadeer at the feet of the demon. How could she define loyalty to a creature that would so easily kill its own confederates? One of the warriors tending to the Kadeer looked up at her and shook her head.

Graezon waved a hand at Fen’lar’s corpse without taking its eyes from her. “You see? He would’ve died anyway. You might’ve gotten yourself killed for nothing more than the pomp and circumstance of pride.”

She suffered a surge of anger that she could not rein back. “Do you know what loyalty means?” she demanded of the beast, “What allegiance means?”

The wyrlaerd only watched her.

She stepped closer to it. Her heart was pounding with her rage and terror, but she would not stand down. “It means I follow your orders because my leaders say it should be so. But if you think loyalty to my leaders equals betrayal of my comrades, you are making a dangerous mistake.”

“Harsh words, Saaro.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“Oh, you’re afraid of me, all right.”

“I’ll never yield to you.”

“Yes. That, I can see.”

As she stared up into those horrible eyes, she knew the creature had spoken the truth; she wasn’t just afraid of it, she was absolutely terrified. In fact, she wanted nothing more in that moment than to run, run as fast and far as her feet would carry her. Nevertheless, though she couldn’t control what darkness this world brought to her doorstep, she could resist yielding to it. She would not let fear define her.

“You’re second in command over this company,” the demon said matter-of-factly.

“Appears I'm first in command now, doesn't it?”

This seemed to amuse it. “You’re angry,” it said, “You’ll get over it.”

Then the demon grabbed her mail and dragged her forward. Its movement was so sudden, she didn’t even have time to flinch. It quickly secured the dead Kadeer's wolf head badge to her mail, placing it directly beside her Saaro’s fox head badge. Then it pushed her roughly back.

She stumbled backward and fell again. She cursed as she hit the dirt. It was becoming more than tedious. Her comrades quickly pulled her to her feet.

“Congratulations,” Graezon said, “You’re now a kadeer.”

She didn’t look at the badge and she didn’t acknowledge the promotion.

“I admire your courage, Kadeer,” the demon continued, “But I would advise you to make a greater effort at controlling your impulses.”