The Weight of Honor (26 page)

Anvin stood guard before the Southern Gate, Thebus and his men behind him, and as the sun rose high in the sky, the heat relentless off this patch of desert, he clenched and unclenched his grip on his sword. It was an old habit, one he always fell back on when danger was coming. And as he watched the horizon nervously, he saw looming the greatest danger of his life.

The rumble was growing louder, as it had been for hours, the horizon filled with a sea of black, infantry marching, hoisting the yellow and blue banners of Pandesia. Behind them came rows of cavalry, and behind these, rows of elephants, rhinos, and other beasts he did not recognize, all ridden by soldiers. The infantry bore all manner of weaponry, and they marched in perfect and terrifying discipline. The clip-clap of their boots sounded consistently, like a heartbeat, minute after minute, hour after hour, never breaking rank, never slowing, never speeding. That was what terrified him the most: the discipline. He’d never witnessed such exacting discipline in his life—especially amongst an army that size—and he knew that didn’t bode well. Discipline like that, combined with numbers like that, could destroy anything. He could only imagine the exacting and cruel standards the Pandesian commanders must have employed to maintain it.

It was as if half the world were marching his way. The rows and rows of soldiers marched across the Fields of Ore, their boots now stomping on the hard, black rock, their armor clanging, each step like a small earthquake. There was no mistaking it: they were all, the weight of the world, marching for the Southern Gate. Right for him.

Anvin turned and looked out at the Sea of Sorrow on his one side, and the Sea of Tears on his other, and he took no solace in the sight. The oceans, too, were full of black, all closing in on him. Escalon was being squeezed, surrounded on all sides. There was no doubt: the great invasion had begun.

Anvin had expected this; yet he had also expected Duncan and his men to be at his back when it happened. The Southern Gate could hold them all back—but he couldn’t do it alone, and he couldn’t protect their flanks without support. He needed Duncan and his men. And while Duncan had vowed to be here, he was nowhere in sight.

“And where is your Duncan now?”

Anvin turned to see Durge glowering back, his eyes cold and hard, stung by betrayal. His men, too, stared back at Anvin with the same dark expression. Anvin turned and glanced over his shoulder for the thousandth time, searching the horizon, the barren plains of Thebus, expecting to see Duncan appear at any moment, with his army, to back them up as he had vowed.

Yet as he stared, Anvin was shocked and crestfallen to see nothing. He had been watching since dawn, convinced that Duncan would not let him down. Never once, in all their years together, had Duncan broken a vow, had he abandoned him. Yet now the sun reached high noon, and no reinforcements had arrived. If they had not come by now, Anvin knew, they would not come. Duncan had abandoned them all to die.

“You vowed,” Thebus said, his voice trembling with anger. “You vowed the men of Thebus would not be betrayed again.”

“Duncan will come,” Anvin insisted, wishing he could believe it.

Durge stared back angrily.

“You cling to dreams,” Durge replied. “The time has passed. We are alone now, left to be killed.”

Anvin hardly knew what to say. Duncan’s not arriving meant his death, too.

“He would not abandon us,” Anvin insisted. “If he does not come, that could only mean one thing: he was captured or killed himself.”

Thebus shrugged, uncaring.

“And a lot of good that does me,” he replied.

Despite the death he saw marching for him, Anvin felt more concerned for Duncan, who was like a brother to him. For Duncan not to be here, he was either betrayed, captured, or dead. And if that had happened, then all of Escalon was lost. They had gambled—and failed.

The reality began to sink for Anvin that Duncan would not come. He would be alone out here, with these few men, to defend the Southern Gate against the hordes of the world.

And yet somehow, as the realization sank in, he felt no fear. No remorse. Instead, he felt gratitude. Gratitude that he could be allowed to make such a final stand in life, that he could die with a sword in his hand, outnumbered, facing the enemy bravely, a just cause behind him. It was all a warrior could wish for. Honor sometimes exacted a price, and this, indeed, was the precious weight of honor.

The marching grew louder. A series of horns sounded, deafening, and Anvin watched as the infantry broke into a jog—and then a sprint. The gap was narrowing; they were now but several hundred yards away.

“I won’t die cowering behind this gate,” Durge said.

Anvin saw his sneer and understood at once, feeling the same sentiment at the same time.

“Open the gates?” Anvin asked.

For the first time since they had met, Durge smiled wide.

“Open the gates,” he echoed.

They turned to their men and nodded, and to their credit, their men opened the gates without hesitation, all apparently thinking the same thing, none showing any fear. They turned the heavy cranks, one turn at a time, and slowly but surely the chains rattled, and the massive gates rose higher and higher.

As it opened high enough, Anvin walked through it, Thebus by his side, two veteran warlords, two men who had seen it all, who had devoted their lives to Escalon. Two men who could command armies in their own right. They stood there, on the other side of the gate, unprotected, side by side, facing off against the hordes charging for them, thundering, deafening. They stood proudly, unflinching, neither looking back.

Anvin heard boots crunching in gravel, and he was proud to see, one at a time, all of his men step forward beside them, on this side of the gate. All unflinching. All doing what they had been born to do.

As Anvin squinted into the sunlight, into the rising clouds of dust, he thought of his life, of his family, of Volis. He thought of his friends, his children. He thought of Duncan. He thought of Kyra, how much he admired her, how he had always been a mentor to her. And for some reason, of all his final thoughts, he wished that she, above all, would survive. Would live to avenge him.

The hordes neared, hardly a hundred yards away now, the ground shaking, and Anvin drew his sword, the distinctive sound still able to be heard above the din, while Thebus and the others drew theirs, too. Not one of them looked back. They all stood there in the open, no gate before them, unprotected. Welcoming. Ready to embrace their fate.

“MEN OF ESCALON!” Anvin shouted. “FOR FREEDOM!”

They all let out a great shout, as suddenly, Anvin broke into a sprint. He would not wait for the enemy—instead, he would rush out to greet them. His men followed close behind, a few men against a million, racing toward battle, toward death, and toward the glorious ecstasy of honor.

Kyra, riding Andor, Leo at her side, galloped through the thick forest of Ur in the morning light, haunted by her visions and determined to reach her father in time. She saw her father’s face as she recalled her vision of his getting killed, and she closed her eyes and tried to blot it out. She saw Theos, too, lying dead, and she hoped and prayed that somehow it was all just an illusion, all just another test. Yet somehow, deep down, she knew it was not.

Kyra rode on and on, as she had for hours, knowing the capital was still far away yet determined to cross Escalon. She would not stop until she reached him. She heard Alva’s warning ringing in her mind, urging her not to leave, and she tried to shake that, too. But she could not shake her own premonition that she was heading into danger. She did not care; if her father was dead, then she had no reason to live, either.

Kyra galloped, head down, increasing her speed, pushing herself as hard as she could, when something caught her attention in the early morning light. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something glisten in the woods, and as she looked over, she saw a pond, reflecting light. Standing over it, in beautiful silver chain mail, she was shocked to see, was Kyle, his long golden hair down to his waist, staring back at her with his mesmerizing gray eyes. The boy who had saved her. The boy she had been unable to stop thinking about.

He held out a hand, looking right at her.

“Kyra,” he called out. “Help me.”

Kyra, entranced by the voice, by his eyes, had no choice. Without thinking she pulled on the reins, stopped Andor. She quickly dismounted and ran through the forest clearing, to the pond, to help him.

Kyra stopped a few feet away from him, the morning sun catching his eyes, radiating such beauty and love that she could hardly breathe.

“Are you hurt?” she asked.

“I need you,” he replied.

She sensed something different about him, his voice. There was something different in his mannerisms, his expression, something she could not quite process.

She took a step closer, puzzled.

“What has happened to you?” she asked, concerned. She owed him her life, and she would do anything to help him.

Kyle removed a hand from his chest and as he did, Kyra was horrified to see it was covered in blood.

“Who did this to you?” she asked, breathless, wondering if he were dying.

She quickly tore a strip of cloth from her shirt and held it to his chest with both hands, pressing it into the wound. She examined it, expecting it to fill with blood, and was baffled to find no blood on the bandage. She looked up at the wound, and it was now entirely healed.

Kyra looked at Kyle, baffled, and to her shock, she no longer saw the boy’s face. Instead, it was the face of an old, haggard woman, dressed in armor, in the blue and yellow of Pandesia. She sneered back at Kyra with a hateful smile, and as she reached up with a glistening object, and as Leo snarled, Kyra realized, too late, that she had been tricked. It was not Kyle after all, but a powerful shapeshifter.

At the same moment, Leo and Andor rushed forward, to protect her and, snarling, leapt for the woman; but the woman merely raised a wrinkled hand, and as she did, they both collapsed to the forest floor, immobile.

Kyra was too stunned to react as she saw something flashing, and a moment later, before she could fully process it all, she felt the agony of a sharp blade puncturing her skin, entering her stomach, deeper and deeper, until she could no longer breathe. She had never felt pain like that in her life.

Kyra gasped, gushing blood, unable to think, the pain so intense.

“Greetings,” the woman said, “from Pandesia.”

The woman cackled as Kyra fell to the ground, limp. She lay there, getting weaker by the moment, only dimly aware of her surroundings. As blood dripped from her mouth, as she felt herself leaving this world, one final thought swirled in her mind:

Forgive me, Father.

Coming soon!

Book #4 in Kings and Sorcerers

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