Veil of the Dragon (Prophecy of the Evarun) (9 page)

One to walk alone

He will raise twelve to show the way.

Neither spear nor shaft shall harm him

His symbol shall be his passage.

A Martyr by those who claim him

The Dragon’s oath fulfilled.

Twelve to share the Gift

Twelve who did forget.

Herald the Dragon’s return

As the Fallen they will rise.

To bring to fell the Shadowed Pale

When the Giver does return.

To lament the ones who will forget

The Dragon waits within.

The Prophecy of the Evarun.

He never thought it spoke of him. He still wasn’t sure that it did, and he didn’t care why. It was a prophecy for others; it offered him nothing to bring his kingdom or his father back. They were empty words and if it was his fate, then there was little left for him in it. 

Chaelus drew aside the veil of the curtained door. Two Servian Knights stood watch outside. Their gossamer blades hung at their sides over their chainmail hauberks. They were armed for war but, by their oaths, were unable to wage it. For what purpose did they serve? Certainly not for his, but for some promise that had been made of him.

Al-Aaron’s wound would heal, now that he was here amongst his own. They would know the poison that claimed him. But Al-Aaron’s Order answered to another calling than his, and as much as Chaelus wanted to, even needed to, he knew he couldn’t depend on Al-Aaron any longer.

Beside the fire, rekindled while he had slept, more bowls of the dried fruit and bread had been left. His stomach, spoiled from the night before, gnawed at him. 

The shadows lengthened as Chaelus ate. The burning dusk came nearly silent as the cool evening air began to settle, interrupted by the distant sound of laughter, a sound he remembered from many lives before but unlike even the laughter he had heard from the inn of Roanwaith. It was a sound without malice.

A bronze razor, jars of oils, and a small copper mirror had been laid beside a basin. A clean gray tunic, folded, waited nearby.

Chaelus undid his sword belt and set Sundengal down. Then, stripping off his armor and the cares of all the lives he’d already lived, he bathed.

***

Al-Aaron wavered on the thin line spanning the darkness. The chill of his wound whispered. The memories of his past called from its shadow. 

He could still see the man’s face leaning down to him, silhouetted at the sewer’s end, the bright sting of daylight flashing upon the newly fallen snow behind him. 

The sun burned like fever against Aaron’s brow, sweat mingling with the blood that covered him, burning the corners of his eyes. The dead body of Figus, his master, pressed against him, frozen in the darkness behind him. 

Aaron held his breath, hoping that the man wouldn’t see him.

The man reached out his hand to him and waited. 

“Would you end this life, child, and take another instead?” the man asked. “I will not hurt you as he did.”

Aaron let the scarcest whisper of his breath escape. The man already knew. 

“Why not?” he whimpered.

The man stood. His robes billowed around him like a crimson fall against the snow.  “Because you’re brave, my love, braver than most.  You’re so brave, I think there’s someone only you can save.”

“Who’s that?”

The man smiled. “My son.”

***

The soft voices of the shadows whispered within the narrow close, warning him not to try.

Aaron’s hand jerked just as he touched the old woman’s thin cloak. She’d already stopped, already knowing he was there, like no mark had ever made him before.

The two men walking with her stopped as she did. Their eyes pierced through him like the eyes of hawks, but their hands never went to the swords whose hilts he’d already spied beneath their cloaks.

Aaron wanted to run, but he didn’t. He couldn’t.

Her eyes were less predatory than those of her guards. Her eyes though, held him like a watchman would hold his hands upon a thief. It was a feeling he knew well, because that’s what he was.

The old woman gathered her cloak and skirt up from the muddy, snow-clogged street and squatted down next to him

“What do you want, my dear?”

“Are you the one they call the Mother.” Aaron’s voice sounded small and weak against the noise of the babbling street behind them. “A man named Malius told me to come to you.”

The old woman’s face grew pale. Her stare released him.

Aaron wanted to run, but he didn’t. He couldn’t, because something even more powerful than her stare kept him there. Something that told him to stay. Instead, he attempted a smile and continued with what the man named Malius had told him to say. “He sent me to you, so that I can save his son.”

The old woman’s hand seized him. Her grip was cold. Her stare returned, but a reassuring smile turned her lips, like the one he had just given her. “Then you must come with me, for you have seen a ghost, my dear. The man named Malius is dead.”

***

The rush of sound returned as the waters of the Maddea fell away. Aaron knelt just as he’d been taught to, and then he laid down, his face pressed against the cool damp grass of the morning. The warmth of the new sun danced over him.

The soft edge of the Mother’s robes brushed against him as she stood over. He could hear the booted step of Al-Thinneas close beside her.

The gentle prod of her gossamer blade to each of his shoulders felt like lightning, like a promise of a new life fulfilled. And it was, unlike anything he could have dreamed of, and more.

The memory of Figus fled past him, along with the ghost of Malius, the spirit of the fallen Servian Lord who’d brought him here; ghosts of the past he’d left behind.

The sounds of the Garden succumbed beneath the soft lace of the Mother’s voice. “Arise, Al-Aaron, and claim your risen life.”

***

The small chamber fire did little to ease the chill of the Mother’s small private chapel. Yet Al-Aaron knew that the dawn of winter had very little to do with the discomfort he felt.

“Yes, Mother,” he replied. His voice crackled. His throat thickened.

The Mother’s eyes narrowed. “Are you so sure? I wouldn’t be. Not about this. And still my question is unanswered.”

The Mother pulled the thin blue blanket snug about her. She reached with one end of her stave, placing it carefully into the fire pot beside where they sat, shifting the old embers, rekindling them from deep within. Sparks lit out and danced upon the air.

She pulled the stave back. “I’ve heard your words regarding the one you would return to us. They’re the same words I spoke to his father, Malius, before he fell.”

“I won’t abandon this.”

The Mother turned to him. Her stare held him, as always. “Is that what you think it was?” She paused, a question held close within her thoughts. “To say so is to already have lost. Or do you believe you have gained some new power over this?”

Al-Aaron turned his eyes upward, to the three Nephelium painted on the ceiling.  The small glowing angels hovered around the Giver as he bowed on his knees before them. It was a Giver from another age, but the Giver had returned. Al-Aaron’s voice drew thin. “No, Mother.”

“Then again I will ask you. Will you be done with this?”

“I cannot ignore the vision that has been placed before me.”

“The visions of Malius you claim can’t be trusted. For this reason, you are forbidden to go. You aren’t ready, and you’ve already forced too much in trying to be.”

“The blood of the Evarun is in him.”

“This we know, but there are many things we don’t. You’ve been blinded by where your vision has led you, and by the many things you’ve kept from me.”

His chest tightened with a faint fire from the truth of what she said, of what he still hid from her. “Mother, I don’t claim…”

“But you do! You have already claimed too much, much more than you can possibly bear.” The Mother paused. Her voice thickened with emotion. “The burden of prophecy is no idle thing, child. Can’t you see what it’s already taken from you?”

Al-Aaron slumped back, reeling. “I’m sorry.”

The Mother stood. “The time for regret is over.” 

“You don’t believe he’s the One?”

“No, Al-Aaron, he is not the One.” The Mother’s eyes softened as she reached toward him, raising her hand beneath his chin. She smiled. “But trust at least that your vision of Malius was not wholly in vain.” 

“What do you mean?”

“Chaelus is not the One, my child. But I believe he’s the one who will lead Him to us.”

Behind the Mother, the ghost of Malius stepped forward, his dark crimson robes flowing about him. A small smile broke across his face. 

“It’s almost done, my child,” Malius said.