Arc 5: Chapter 29: A Bitter Duty

    I walked aimlessly through the elfwood for some time. An hour, perhaps two, and all the while I was blessedly free of intrigue and duty.

    I was not free of the memory of Catrin’s shocked face, or the image of the demonic fly looming behind her. Nor was I free of Fen Harus’s pointed words. Will you not at least attempt the less bloody path?

    Maybe I wanted blood. Perhaps it would wash out all this doubt. Freeing myself of all restraint had worked well enough against the Priory. Why not here?

    I knew why. I just resented it.

    Within the protected bounds of that faerie wood, the more insidious ghosts did not trouble me. Neither was I fully free of them. There were less malignant shades the elfwood did not repel, and they watched me from the shadows with sad eyes. I could not hear them with my ears, but their pleas plucked at my soul.

    Help us. Warm us. Protect us. Guide us. Bless us.

    Once, that had been all the land’s dead had wanted from me, from any True Knight. Now, most of them abhored my fire even as they longed for it.

    Those hollow eyes became too much to bear, and I fled from them. With my red cloak rippling behind me in a soft wind, I followed the scent of the sea until I came to a cliff overlooking the bay. To my left I could see Garihelm’s sprawl, lit by ten thousand lights, the high shadow of the Fulgurkeep marked by a crown of swirling storm clouds. The outer sea wall kept the lashing waters of the Riven from overtaking the metropolis, but further out the illusion of distance made the waves seem more calm. I focused on that, standing there in the glow of the Living Moon as it heaved its bulk through the stars.

    Closing my eyes, I breathed in deep of the clean air and let the od shining down from on high warm me. It almost drowned out that constant inner warmth, let me pretend like it came from somewhere else. When the undergrowth rustled, and my senses felt a brush of something not unlike the moonlight against my back, I knew who’d followed me.

    “Oradyn.”

    The elf shuffled over to stand just out of arm’s reach, joining me on the cliffside. “Your companions worry for you,” he told me kindly. “Should they?”

    His eyes drifted to the precipice beneath us. I snorted.

    “I’m not out here to kill myself, if that’s what you’re all worried about. I’ve had plenty of opportunities to do that.”

    “And yet there is grief in you sharp enough to rend flesh.” Fen Harus’s gaze drifted out over the lapping waters. “You lost someone tonight.”

    I inhaled deeply before I dared to speak. “I’m not certain. She might still be alive, but I’m not sure that’s actually for the best.”

    Fen Harus didn’t appear fazed by the seemingly cruel words. “She was taken?”

    “Yes. By an abgru?dai.”

    The old elf bowed his head. “That is often a fate worse than death. I am sorry.”

    I almost left it at that. What could he say, or do, to change what had happened? What empty wisdom could that old immortal offer me to make it all right? It wasn’t right, and I did not want to be at peace with it.

    “It was my fault,” I blurted. Then, since the traitorous words had already escaped my lips, I continued. “When I tried to pull her out of the Undercity, my magic lashed out at her.”

    I stared down at my scarred hand. “I’ve lost control of it before, but it’s only ever burned me. I understand why. The Alder Knights betrayed their oaths, abused the magic we were given, failed everyone. We deserve to be punished for it. But it’s meant to protect people from monsters, not send them into their jaws.”

    “Who was this companion of yours?” Fen Harus asked.

    I hesitated, then admitted the truth. “She is a dhampir. She was stillborn in the marchlands, revived by some errant magic there.”

    “Ah,” Fen Harus replied, as though my brief descriptor explained all of it. Perhaps he didn’t intend dismissal, but I felt my anger resurge.

    “And why should that matter?” I snapped. “She was... is a good woman. She can love, and show kindness. Why shouldn’t she have the Alder’s protection, same as anyone?”

    Fen Harus did not answer me for some time. A wind rustled the leaves, my cloak, and his silver hair. Only when the night breeze had passed did he speak again.

    “When my people wove the aures, the Alder’s fire, our intention was to grant your ancestors a means to protect themselves against the potent foes we knew would be set against you. Aye, and to protect us. I will not pretend that it was a selfless act. But we also had another goal in mind for the aureflame, as your folk call it.”

    I folded my arms, listening. I had not expected a history lesson, but sensed what the elf said was important.

    “It was also intended to protect you,” he continued. “The Alder Knights themselves. The power has a will of its own. It is not intelligent — not exactly, but it acts in accordance with its design. That is to abjure evil, to heal the beleaguered, and to light the darkness. Most of all, it illuminates truth and punishes lies.”

    Fen Harus folded his hands into the sleeves of his robe, pondering his ancient memories a moment. “Men are fallible. Indeed, even elves and gods are fallible. We knew that even those we blessed with power and knowledge could go astray, or be deceived. Many damned creatures wear fair forms so that they may walk among mortals like wolves among sheep, preying on their victims with impunity. The aureflame protects you from these hidden dangers. It warns you when beings of darker nature are near, and may even lash out on its own should they become too brazen.”

    I clenched my jaw, fully aware of his meaning. “I knew her hungers. She did not mean me true harm.”

    “No predator born of death and darkness can survive long without doing evil,” Fen Harus said calmly. “Perhaps she was repentant, even held love for you, but there was certainly also a great part of her nature which desired to do you harm. Whatever else she desired of you as a woman, your blood was a siren’s song to the vampire in her. That could not be hidden from your magic.”

    “So you’re saying the aureflame attacked her because she is evil?” I asked. “Because she was born evil, and always will be?”

    “Because she had done evil,” Fen Harus insisted. “And would do it again.”

    “Then why didn’t my magic burn her to ash the first time we met?” I demanded, turning to face him.

    “The aures is tied to your own soul,” Fen Harus explained. “It is not unaffected by the stirrings of your heart. Indeed, part of its design is to read them and adjust itself accordingly, to hold you to your oaths and help guide your doubts toward truth. It is not all knowing, and needs your hand to direct it. That is why you must look into a being’s eyes, the windows of the soul, for it to see lies. When you let it take shape as fire, then it illuminates truth.”

    “What truth?” I asked bitterly.

    “That there is evil in our existence. It wears many faces, and speaks many sweet lies, but it is a poison. Did your paramour never do you any harm? Did she do no harm that you are aware of?”

    The unhealed wound on my chest ached. There were other marks Catrin had given me.

    I just told you I used to eat kids, Al. You can really accept that?

    I can feel that holy fire in you baring its fangs at me. I hate it.

    I squeezed my eyes shut again, gritting my teeth against the flood of unease that shot through me. “People can change.”

    “People can,” Fen Harus agreed. “But the undead steal their time among the living by parasitizing life. Whatever the nature of her heart, this malcathe took every moment she pretended to live from those who truly did. Just as demons often play at having individuality, but are ultimately only vessels for the Abyss to consume more of Creation.”

    A violent tremor overtook my left hand, and I had to clamp down on my wrist to quell it. It did not help the sudden unsteady rhythm of my heart. “You’re saying... you are saying that the aureflame was designed to attack the undead? And demons, and anything else its makers considered evil? That it doesn’t matter what choices they make, or who they become, just the nature they had from the start?”

    Not just undead and fiends. Apostates too, and those who had been shorn of grace. My powers had even stirred in restless discontent at Emma sometimes, and she had never done evil in her life, only been born of an echo of it.

    How much control did the old powers who’d fashioned these rules have over what my magic considered profane? Did my own feelings on it not matter at all?

    Perhaps he sensed my unease, because Fen Harus’s voice became stern. “It was designed to protect you from being taken in by their deceptions. Too many times has the Adversary ruined good people by playing on their sympathies. Even my kind are not immune to this, and we have often needed to learn the lesson anew. The Alder Table, and many other works of our hands and souls, were meant to keep us from forgetting.”

    “It did not protect me when I needed it.” I held a closed fist against my chest. “When the Adversary was close enough to grip my heart, your damned magic failed me.”

    The elf leaned closer. “Did it not warn you, Alken Hewer? Or did you not heed its warnings?”@@@@

    Tucking my hands into my cloak, I turned from the moonlit sea to face the shadowed woods. I’d heard enough bitter truths for one night.

    “What will you do?” Fen Harus asked me without stepping away from the cliff.

    I paused, searching the tangle of my feelings. “I need to talk to my group. Then, I need to get back to the city. I have preparations to make.”

    I left that wise elf there on the cliff, and forged back into the haunted forest with all its restless dead. Among them was Emma, who’d followed me after all. At least she had kept her distance and given me some privacy. I decided not to reprimand her for it, especially after Fen Harus had made me aware of what everyone feared from me.

    Unlike with me, the ghosts did not cling to Emma’s shadow. They kept well away from her, and I heard snippets of their furtive whispers. Carreon. Shrike Daughter. Wicked One. Spawn of murder. Bastard witch. Do not let her take us, O’ Knight. Protect us.

    “Then the best way to prevent that is to have you on the ground. Our trump card...” She glanced at me. “You will not be able to use your powers. They are too flashy, and will tell everyone who you are. That will be a significant handicap.”

    I gave her a pained look. “Rose... you mademe your First Sword well before you sent me to the Table. Did you do that as a favor?”

    A flicker of fierce emotion lit in my queen’s green eyes. “No. I did it because you defeated my enemies.”

    “Calerus and Siriks are boys,” I said in a hard voice. “Boys playing a dangerous game. By the time I was their age, I had slain warlords. No, I don’t need my magic to beat those two brats.”

    “The Ram of Karles reborn?” Rosanna’s lips quirked into a smile. “I wasn’t sure I would ever see it.”

    “Neither was I,” I admitted. “I’ve earned less flattering names since then.”

    Rosanna moved to the window, staring out over the city. “And you’re telling me all of this because you need a patron to claim a spot on the lists. One with great power to do it on such short notice. And you’re asking me instead of my husband because he will not gamble on you.”

    She had always been shrewd, my queen. “You can do it?” I asked.

    Rosanna sniffed. “Who do you take me for? I may need to call in favors, but I am still Empress.”

    She drew closer to me, and in a gesture that defied our stations placed her hand on my wrist. “There’s something else. I’ve known you long enough to see when there is a shadow behind your eyes. Something happened tonight.”

    Damn her uncanny intuition. Even unrefined into a true magic, her aura was perceptive. Or did she truly just know me that well, even after all this time?

    “I lost someone,” I told her after a moment’s uncertainty. “Someone I cared about. Yith took her. Probably she’s dead, or worse.”

    Would tears come, as they had when we’d last spoken? Had that really just been the previous day?

    None did. I felt only rage, and a burning focus on what came next.

    “She?” Rosanna didn’t have jealousy in her voice, which told me her feelings for me weren’t far off from my own for her. Her eyes crinkled with sympathy. “I am so sorry, my sword. I am sorry for binding you to this life.”

    She hadn’t used that name for me since we’d been young. I tried to find some lingering resentment toward her, but none came. “No use regretting it now. This was the demon, and the Vykes.” And me, I thought bitterly. “Not you.”

    I put my hand over hers. “Get me on the lists. I’ll need a set of armor, too. And a chimera.”

    She nodded. “Consider it done. You will have everything you need.”

    Not everything. There was one part of the plan I had not informed her of. If it backfired, the Empress could have no attachment to it.

    “And you should get yourself a hearth hound, or some other protecter for this room.” I smiled to take any rebuke out of my voice. “If I can steal in here with a cheap glamour, others can. Ser Kaia didn’t notice me.”

    Rosanna pursed her lips, a flicker of concern crossing her face.

    I turned to leave, but Rosanna stopped me. With a gentle hand, she turned me so I faced her directly, then placed her hands on either side of my face. Unconsciously, I bent down so I didn’t tower over her. She planted a kiss on my brow, as a monarch does to a favored vassal.

    “I will not be able to do this publicly.” Her breath was warm against my skin. “But go with God’s grace and my blessing, Knight of Karles. I will pray for your success.”

    I wasn’t so arrogant as to not be humbled by that gesture from the Empress of Urn. “I will not fail you, my queen. I swear it.”

    A foolish oath, but I had already failed one person that night. If I had to bind myself to keep from doing it again, then I would.

    I returned to my lonely tower on the island’s edge in the dim hours of the morning. It was cold, dark, and empty. The others wouldn’t return until later that day. There were still some hours left until I would need to get back to work. Time enough to get a bit of rest.

    I trudged up to the higher chambers where my dingy office, with its cluttered desk, chests, and shelves waited. The room where I slept waited beyond that, with a clean bed and a small fireplace to chase away the coastal chill.

    The room where I slept. My room. If we survived the next few days, this would be my new home for the foreseeable future, possibly even the rest of my life. I had yet to decide what to feel about that.

    Separated from the greater fortress complex by a narrow bridge, the old prison tower I’d been given lacked the blessings and other protections that helped keep the Fulgurkeep free of malison. Shades crawled in the shadows, drawn by the gloom, the night, and my isolated presence. I tuned their sulking whispers out as I worked.

    I got my armor and cloak off, put them on their stands in the main room, then pulled several items out of a single small chest I’d kept from my temporary house in the docks. There were three strings covered in little talismans, and these I wrapped around both my wrists. Two on the right, one on the left. I unstoppered a small vial and pressed a tongue-wetted finger into it before dabbing its contents on my eyelids. A small pouch contained a powder, which I rubbed into my ears. A bronze medallion packed with scented roses tied to my left palm.

    On it went, until I’d festooned myself with enough accoutrements to perform some ancient pagan ritual. I’d added to the collection the past several months. Some of them I had made myself, and others I’d bought or traded for.

    The arsenal of wards would grant me at least a few hours of safe rest, protecting me from parasitic od and ghosts as my lost ring once had.

    But not from my own mind.

    How could I rest, when my enemies abounded with their plots? I had hurt Hyperia, and she seemed malicious enough to be brash and vengeful.

    How could I rest, when she might be suffering?

    But I needed rest, or I would be no good to anyone.

    I was moving toward the bedroom when my senses shivered with warning. Freezing, I touched the dagger at my belt. Faster than summoning my axe, which I’d sheathed into the shadows, and better in these close quarters.

    I’d lit no lamp or candle, relying on the light in my eyes to see through the dark room. Searching, I tried to find the source of my sudden unease. My gaze went to the single window overlooking the sea, a sliver of moonlight in the otherwise pitch black chamber.

    And almost as though they had waited for that, a figure stepped into the moonlight. At first it only seemed a human-shaped shadow, slender and quiet. I caught no sight of a weapon, but the sensation thrumming through me warned of something malign.

    But as my eyes adjusted, I could make out the pale material of a white camisole and waist wrap, and curling red-brown hair.

    My heart lurched.

    The figure’s head lifted, fixing me with two ruby red eyes that shone in the darkness.

    At first, a wave of sheer relief and joy almost staggered me. But even as I stepped forward, the fire in me crackled hot enough to become pain. It made me pause.

    She clutched her right arm close to her chest. As I focused on it, I could make out an array of ugly burns from hand to elbow, many of them bloody and weeping. Even as I noticed that, she noted my wards. Her face twisted.

    “You’re about to sleep? It’s only been hours, Alken. Did you even try to find me?”

    My stomach dropped. “Of course I did! But...”

    But I’d believed her dead, or trapped where I couldn’t reach her. “I had a plan,” I hastened to explain. Then, to try and change the subject, “How did you get out?”

    Her red eyes watched me steadily. Again, I felt the aureflame roil in warning. Remembering what had already happened, I forced it down with a savage effort.

    When she said nothing, I took another step forward. “We need to get your wounds taken care of. I can—”

    Catrin flinched, almost cowering against the window. “Don’t.”

    I froze, then in a tight voice said, “I won’t hurt you again. I swear it.”

    She stared for a long moment, her shadowed features unreadable. I realized she’d bared her fangs. She seemed to get control of herself, shuddered, and spoke more calmly.

    “I didn’t escape, Al. Yith is here with me... and he wants to talk.”