Wytchfire (Book 1) (11 page)

To speak with such open disdain about a Shel’ai—especially Fadarah—was unheard of even among the Unseen, who had more reason than any to hate the sorcerers. The guard said, “You are to meet Lord Shade at the east end of the camp. Fadarah has reassigned you to be his bodyguard.”

Lethe sneered and opened one eye. “From what I hear, that one’s killed ten times more men than I have. I doubt he needs a wet-nurse.” He closed his eye. “Tell Fadarah to find somebody else.”

“Forgive me, Captain, but General Fadarah said that if you do not go at once—”

Lethe chuckled. “Let me guess. If I don’t scurry off like a good slave and serve the sorcerer as his lapdog, the mighty Fadarah will come drag me out himself, and I’ll spend the rest of the day in unimaginable agony.” He snickered, his eyes still closed. “Is that about right?”

The guard hesitated. “Actually, Captain, he said it would be
three
days this time.”

Lethe gave the guard such a withering glance that the man reached for his sword. But Lethe merely rose, dressed, girded his weapons and leather armor, then stepped out to piss on the grass before quietly stalking away. As he did so, he imagined the guard who had awakened him turning to what must be his second task: locating the next Unseen officer in line, another cutthroat probably still drunk off wine and rape, and telling him he had just been promoted.
Poor bastard!

As the former Captain of the Unseen stalked through the camp, soldiers hurried to get out of his way. Even unwashed and unshaven, Lethe was unmistakable in his black leather armor emblazoned with red greatwolves
.
As Lethe walked, he passed two Shel’ai in their bone-white cloaks and wished, as he always did, that he might simply step into their path and shove steel into their throats, angling it into their brains. Of course, that was impossible.

My own damn fault. Gods, why did I agree to this?
Hurrying past the Shel’ai, neither of which gave him a second glance, Lethe considered the complex web of magic that had been seared deep into his mind—as was the case for every Unseen warrior. While the Shel’ai required that all Unseen agreed to the Blood Thrall, it hardly seemed a fair choice since the only alternative had been death.

Used first as an assassin, Lethe had eliminated enemies of the Shel’ai from Dhargoth to Ivairia: rogue slavers, quarrelsome generals, and sellsword captains whose ambitions overshadowed their ability. Lethe had no idea how many he had killed. He only knew that he never failed, never lost. Not even once. Not even when he wanted to.

Lethe often thought that he had been transformed—thanks to the Blood Thrall—into the perfect attack dog. Still, he could not imagine any attack dog who spent so much time considering how satisfying it would be to crunch on the spines of its masters.

Lethe stalked the rest of the way through the camp then spotted Shade just outside the camp, seated on an impressive black destrier and dressed in his bone-white cloak and fighting robes, emblazoned with the crimson greatwolf. The Shel’ai impatiently held the reins of a pack-laden rouncey, along with a palfrey Lethe guessed was to be his mount. Shade threw him the reins to both animals, a short throw that gave Lethe no chance of catching them.

“You should not keep your masters waiting, Human.”

Muffling a curse, Lethe mounted.

“I was awakened. I was summoned. Now, I am here.”

Shade ignored the impudent response. “Your orders are simple. Command of the Unseen has been given over to your first officer for the time being. Tomorrow morning, this army breaks camp and presses on for Lyos. But we must ride ahead, find Silwren, and bring her back with all possible speed. Do you understand?”

Lethe was quiet for a moment. He had witnessed the creature Shade spoke of, just as the rest of the Throng had—an apparition, a dragon of moon-white fire—ripping across the sky, its scream chilling even the Unseen to the bone. That the thing bore little resemblance to the Nightmare did little to assuage the panic that had swept through the camp. Soon enough, the Shel’ai restored order. They swept through the camp, using magic to immobilize warrior after warrior, threatening to burn anyone else to cinders if they fled. The threat worked. Within hours, relative calm had been restored. The Shel’ai explained the event as some spell gone awry, nothing of consequence, but the Unseen knew better.

“Oh, I understand! One of your pets slipped her leash, and now—”

Shade waved his hand.

Raw pain exploded through Lethe’s body. Even accustomed as he was to his torture, he still yelped when the agony of his Blood Thrall washed over him. Lethe struggled against it for a moment then toppled from his saddle. He fell hard, twitching, but did not even feel the impact. All he felt was the pain Shade wished upon him, pain in waves without end.

An illusion… The pain’s not real, just an illusion…

But this helped him no more now than it had in the past. Once more, the agonies of the Blood Thrall flayed his mind until he wept. Then, at last, the pain vanished.

Shade said, “Get up.”

Lethe obeyed, as though he were a dog.

Shade glowered at him. “Based on how well you’ve served the Sorcerer-General in the past, I thought you’d be more agreeable than this.”

Still shaking, Lethe managed a response. “I serve those I fear. I do not fear
you
.”

“Listen well, Human. I can harm you with impunity. Or, if you obey, I can reward you with what you seek most.”

Lethe did not have to ask. He yearned for the same grace granted to all those Unseen who had perished in battle at Quorim, Syros, and Cassica. True, the Shel’ai presented the Unseen with this rare gift from time to time, but how could Lethe be sure that Shade meant what he said?

Shade smiled thinly. Lethe guessed that the Shel’ai was reading his mind. Lethe knew he should be used to such a violation, but still his face flushed with rage. He wanted to draw his sword and slash the smile from the Shel’ai’s face, but he could sooner fly than accomplish such a thing.

“You know because I said so. If I give my word—even to one such as you—it is good. Now, get on your horse.”

Lethe mounted the palfrey, holding the reins to the rouncey in his other hand. Satisfied, Shade turned his destrier away from the camp. “Follow.” The Shel’ai started off without looking back. Angry and hopeful at the same time, Lethe had no choice but to obey.

She looked nothing like the Nightmare…
Fadarah had not permitted himself to think this before, but he thought it now that he was alone in his tent.
True, the Well gave the Nightmare the same kind of power, but it did not turn him into a dragon. His appearance in battle is just our illusion, done to make him appear more terrifying.

Yet he had seen it himself as Silwren rose from the camp, burning everything around her: though ghostly, her shape was unmistakably that of an ancient dragon: six-winged, scaled, graceful, and deadly.

The Light favors her. If she can harness the power, she might be even stronger than Iventine and El’rash’lin combined!

Of all the initiates, Silwren had been the most hesitant, persuaded less by selflessness than some kind of indignation resulting from a quarrel with her lover. Fadarah thought of Kith’el.

I should not let him call himself Shade anymore. That’s the name he gave himself, the name of a killer. That’s not who he is anymore.
However, even as he thought this, Fadarah wondered if it was true. He remembered finding Shade on the westernmost corner of the Simurgh Plains: a boy, grinning wildly, even laughing as his hands turned a Human family to ashes. From what Fadarah could glean, these Humans had not been enemies per se, just a random clutch of dirty farmers who had the misfortune of being discovered by a vengeful child who could conjure fire.

El’rash’lin had warned him at the time, “That one is no better than a rabid animal. Right or wrong, kill him now before he destroys everything you’re trying to build!”

Fadarah had sensed, even then, that Shade’s magical abilities were nearly on par with his own. With Silwren’s help, Fadarah had managed to civilize that child-killer, returning to Shade a measure of humanity.

But can I trust him to bring Silwren back? True, they were lovers once. But by the time she went to the Well, she had already begun to lose faith in him. Now, she has the power to annihilate an army. Until she regains her reason, she might kill him without a second thought.

Still, Shade was their best option for bringing Silwren back to the fold. He rubbed his eyes. His efforts to heal the wounded had left him exhausted. He needed to sleep, but there was no time for that. There was still a feeling of disorder in the camp. The men of the Throng needed to see him pacing about, strong and fearless—even if it was an act.

Fadarah straightened. He took a deep breath and let it go. As he did so, he touched the blue glyphs tattooed on his face in a language no one else in the camp could read: the names, in Olg, of all the Olg warriors and chieftains he had personally slain in his younger years.
Perhaps I am not so different than you are, Shade.

As he left his tent, Fadarah wondered if one of the names had been the Olg who raped his Wyldkin mother. His father. He hoped so.

Chapter Eight

The Winged Dead

U
pon rising, dizzy and famished, Hráthbam Nassir Adjrâ-al-Habas ate and drank even more than he had at the Inn of the Drunken Dragon in Breccorry, devouring dry rations and working his way through half a wineskin. Meanwhile, Rowen prepared a vegetable stew, which he flavored haphazardly with spices he found in the wagon: crushed peppercorn, salt, and some pungent red spice that made Rowen’s eyes water but made Hráthbam grin as soon as he raised the wooden spoon to his lips.

Rowen still half-expected that he would wake any second from the strangest, most vivid dream of his life. But sunrise turned to late afternoon, and Rowen had still not come to his senses.
It happened. It all happened.

Hráthbam did not believe at first that he had, in fact, died. But the wound—or lack thereof—proved Rowen’s tale. The Soroccan could not have forgotten how the greatwolf’s claws ripped a long gash in his thigh. Now, that wound was gone. No stitches, no scar.

Otherwise, only the greatwolf’s charred body a little ways beyond the camp, plus the still-overturned wagon, remained to lend testimony to the events of the night before. The Soroccan only dimly remembered the battle and nothing after that until he awoke next to his own grave, Rowen standing over him, shovel in hand.

The Soroccan listened, captivated but skeptical, to Rowen’s tale of the strange, disfigured madman who helped them. “That could not have been a Shel’ai,” the merchant objected. “You said his face was hideous, but Sylv are supposed to be beautiful!”

“I know what I saw. His eyes were just like in the stories. As for the rest of him…” He shrugged helplessly. “If I’m lying, then how are you alive?”

“Maybe I’m not.” Hráthbam scraped his wooden spoon to get at the last of the stew in his bowl then looked around. “No offense, but if I’m dead, you’re part of a thoroughly disappointing afterlife.” He stared into his bowl.

“What do you remember?”

Hráthbam looked up. “Of what?”

Rowen blushed. “Of being dead. The afterlife. Whatever happened to you.”

Hráthbam tossed his bowl on the ground. “Not a thing.” Something in his tone advised Rowen not to press the matter for the time being.

Rowen expected the merchant to be weak, but he was up once he finished the stew, rooting through the wagon and his scattered goods for hláshba. He grimaced when Rowen told him he’d used the last of it to burn the greatwolf.

“That was my private stock, not some common cooking oil. Some of those flasks cost me three silver cranáfi each!”

“If you paid three silver cranáfi for that swill, you were robbed. In the Dark Quarter, we used to brew better poisons than that for half a copper!”

They had pushed the wagon upright again, but two of the wooden wheels were cracked. Other merchants Rowen had traveled with knew enough to bring one or even two spare wagon wheels along with them, plus wood and nails for repairs. Hráthbam had none of these. This only reinforced Rowen’s suspicion that his newly resurrected employer had little in the way of true merchanting experience. Rowen suggested they return to Breccorry and have the wagon repaired, but Hráthbam’s map showed that Cadavash lay only half a day farther.

“Twice as long to get to Cadavash is just as bad as doubling back to Breccorry and starting over,” Hráthbam pointed out. “The wheels aren’t broken yet. We’ll lighten the load and travel slowly.”

If the wheels break tomorrow, before we get to Cadavash, we’ll be in an even worse position!
But he kept his mouth shut and respected Hráthbam’s decision. And after all the strange goings-on of the past few days, if one or both of the wagon wheels broke before they reached the temple of the dragon-priests, that would hardly rival what they had already endured.

They lightened the wagon as much as they could by filling their satchels and loading much of the provisions in Left and Right’s saddlebags. Rather than ride in the wagon and add to its weight, Hráthbam and Rowen walked instead. Rowen feared that the Soroccan might be too weak for this, but Hráthbam insisted he had never felt better in his life. Each of them took up position beside one of the rounceys. Rowen was glad when the Soroccan volunteered to keep an eye on Right, since the petulant horse was beginning to get on Rowen’s nerves, pulling against the reins and nipping at anything that moved. Left was more agreeable, despite her newly laden saddlebags, and nuzzled Rowen’s open hand as they walked. Rowen fed the horse a few oats from his satchel.

As they traveled, following the rough road westward along the Simurgh Plains, Rowen considered pressing Hráthbam about what it had been like to be dead, but something distant in the Soroccan’s expression dissuaded him. He thought of the madman instead. He had no doubt that the man had used magic to restore Hráthbam’s body and raise him to perfect health. But what kind of magic was capable of such a thing?

Rowen had heard barroom stories of Shel’ai throwing fire from their hands, engaging in deep meditation that allowed them to project their souls beyond their bodies, and speaking to each other using only their minds. He had always figured those stories to be nothing more than fairy tales. But even those abilities were a far cry from men who could raise the dead!

That man must not have been a Shel’ai. He had the eyes… but that kind of magic could only come from a Dragonkin.
Rowen shook his head at the absurdity of this thought. The man had the ghostly eyes of a sorcerer, but his magic was simply too great to be anything less than a Dragonkin—which seemed equally impossible. Hadn’t the Dragonkin vanished a thousand years ago, killed or banished from Ruun during the Shattering War?

Even if one had survived, why would he be here, at just the right time and place to help them? And what did he mean about danger, that if something went wrong, he’d lose control and we’d all die?

Rowen decided to search for answers elsewhere. Producing the weathered Codex Lotius, he scanned the pages as he walked, combing through oaths and poetry for some mention of the Shel’ai or their Dragonkin predecessors. After a while, bored, Hráthbam told him to read the words aloud. Embarrassed, Rowen did as he was ordered. The flowery speech, which Rowen had always loved to read, seemed mangled when he heard it in his own voice. He might have stopped, but Hráthbam urged him on, stopping him from time to time to ask a question about the Isle Knights. By and by, Rowen told how a wandering sellsword named Fâyu Jinn came to the Lotus Isles seeking training. How all the Shao masters refused him—all save one, who treated Fâyu Jinn like a son. How Fâyu Jinn, in turn, founded the Order of the Crane and persuaded the Shao masters to join with him, just in time to turn the tide of the Shattering War.

Hráthbam interrupted him. “The adamune! I may not be dead, but I still want you to have it.” The Soroccan stopped the horses and vanished inside his wagon for a moment. Rowen heard the sound of trunks being opened and wares tossed every which way.

His pulse quickened. He had not seen or held an adamune
since leaving the Lotus Isles. True, the Codex Lotius barred expelled squires from owning such splendid weapons, but who was to know?
If I can’t be a Knight, at least I might look like one!

When Hráthbam returned, Rowen’s spirits sank. The grinning Soroccan did indeed hold an adamune
,
but the weapon looked far from impressive. The curved scabbard was made of cracked wood, wrapped in faded leather that looked like a good shake would send it falling to the earth in tatters. The hilt of the adamune was worse, bound in leather so stained and ratty that Rowen did not even want to touch it. But he was not about to refuse his employer’s gift.

Forcing a smile, Rowen accepted the weapon. The sword’s crosspiece—a brass oval and quillons designed to resemble interlocking crane and dragon wings, rising to grasp the blade—was horribly tarnished. He drew the sword a little and suppressed a groan.

The trouble with mainland swords was that the more you sharpened them, the weaker and more brittle they became—not true for adamunes.
The favored weapons of the Isle Knights were forged from kingsteel, a blend of three metals joined in a secret way, sharpened to a razor’s edge without sacrificing strength and resilience. The hammering and folding of the Shao forge masters left a fingerprint: deep, snow-white swirls buried deep in the metal.

Those swirls were nowhere evident in the blade he now held. True adamunes
were impervious to rust, but rust had eaten parts of this blade clean through. He suspected the sword was just one of countless cheap imitations sold on the mainland. In such a state, this blade would surely shatter at the slightest strike, as though made of glass.

He inspected the sword more closely and saw a darker stain just above the crosspiece, along with an inscription he could barely make out. Though written in Shao, he had seen other imitation adamunes bearing Shao script as well: an attempt to make the cheap blades look more authentic.

“Fel-Nâya,” he read aloud. He almost laughed.

“What does that mean?” Hráthbam asked.

“It’s the sword’s name, I think.” Rowen tried to keep a straight face. “It means ‘Knight’s rage.’
Or ‘Knightswrath,’
though I suspect the fire went out of this wrath a long time ago.” He immediately regretted saying it. “A fine gift, though. I’m sure its name was well earned in its day.”

Hráthbam shrugged. “Not much to look at, I know. It belonged to my father. He always said he won it in a dice game with a Sylv. We never believed him. But I figured even an antique adamune must be worth something to somebody! Gods know you deserve better, lad, but it’s yours if you want it.”

“I’ll treasure it,” Rowen lied. “This sword has history. Thank you.” He bowed. Hráthbam took the horses’ bridles and got the wagon moving again. Rowen waited until the merchant was looking away before he sighed with disappointment. He scrutinized his new weapon again. He realized he probably deserved no better.

Given their ill fortune thus far, Rowen had expected the cracked wagon wheels to split apart long before they reached Cadavash, or even for them to be attacked again by greatwolves or bandits, but luck favored them. They traveled without incident until the Simurgh Plains gave way to a gray, wasted circle of land in the distance.

Hráthbam looked disappointed. “Don’t tell me that is Cadavash...”

“Maybe it’s not as bad as it looks,” Rowen offered.

“Something tells me it’s
worse
than it looks!”

Rowen was inclined to agree. They slowed the wagon a moment and stopped to look. Ahead of them, the Simurgh Plains sank farther and farther before they eventually gave way to a gray, rocky fissure that resembled a great, open sore. Lean-tos filled with shabbily dressed pilgrims crowded the mouth of the fissure, shadowed by a gaudy temple. The temple walls and pillars looked as though they had originally been painted blood red and then were touched up whenever patches of color wore off, but the work had been done unevenly, so the temple had the appearance of being unintentionally two-tone. Priests congregated around it. They wore extravagant robes and jewelry that shone even from this distance with gold and precious stones.

“Business must be good,” Rowen muttered.

Well-armed men patrolled the mouth of the fissure. Like the priests, all wore the green emblem of a man’s body with a dragon’s head and wings. Whenever one passed by, Rowen saw a fey look in their unnaturally wide eyes. He wondered if they were drugged, mad, or both.

“Watch yourself,” he warned. “I don’t like the look of the guards.” He reached down and loosened his recently borrowed shortsword. Knightswrath was strapped across his back now—purely for appearances, since the sword was too long to draw that way, even if he wanted to. He wished he’d left it in the wagon, as it would only be in the way if a fight started.

“I see.” Hráthbam loosened his scimitar then sighed. “Come, my friend. Let us do our business and be gone from here.”

They started forward cautiously. The plains sank so rapidly toward the fissure that Rowen’s stomach lurched. He had to struggle to control the horses and keep the wagon from barreling on ahead of them. When they got closer to the fissure, Rowen heard a wailing that chilled him to the bone.

“Dyoni’s bane, what are they up to?” Hráthbam asked.

Rowen gritted his teeth. “That’s how they pray, I think.” He pointed toward a cluster of priests. The men wept and lamented theatrically, tossing themselves upon the hard earth, often cutting their bodies against the rough stones. Rowen had met Zet worshippers before in Lyos, but never had he seen them behave like this. “I think they’re crying for Zet. Or the dragons.”