Chains of a Dark Goddess (4 page)

“Orisala can’t see me like this. I’m a ghoul.”

“Nothing we can do about that, though I can teach you a glamour that can mask your appearance somewhat. That green sparkle in your eyes will be the hardest part to mask, especially if you lose control of your emotions and it flares.”

Beside him lay his patina-crusted bronze death mask, with the traditional slits for the eyes, nose, and mouth. Nalsyrra had removed it when she began her ritual. He picked it up.

“A mask,” he muttered. “Do you have any twine? I think I could fix this upon my face if I tied it through the eye slits.”

“I can do better than that.”

Nalsyrra took a needle from her pack and spoke words of power. With twine as thread, she pushed the needle through the bronze as if it were cloth. She made one strap at the forehead level and one at the mouth level. 

Breskaro fixed the mask into place and looked at himself in the mirror again.

“I have no other face now. If I use a glamour, I shall glamour over this.”

“As you wish.”

“My heart is now a witch’s channeling stone. I have become the sort of necromantic thing I used to fight.” He sat silently for a moment. His hands unconsciously clenched into fists as he looked up and pinned Nalsyrra with his otherworldly gaze. “You said I would have powers. Can I cast magic with this thing?”

Nalsyrra reverently wrapped a ratty leather-bound grimoire in spidery gauze and placed it in a pouch.

“Most of the stone’s power must be used to keep you functioning. However, your qavra is strong and filled with a lively malevolence, so you should be able to employ a number of minor spells with it. Plus, the stone itself and your wraith nature will provide you with some innate abilities. For instance, you will be able to see in the dark as if you were in twilight.”

“I spent my life battling witches and the followers of Zhura, Harmulkot, and many other heathen deities. I even battled a few demons.” Breskaro shook his head. “And now look at me, I
am
a demon.”

He climbed down from the stone burial table. He stood and his knees wobbled, threatening to buckle. But they held. After several faltering steps, he could move with ease, though joints continued to creak and pop. Tentatively, he walked around. He willfully ignored the other two people buried in the chamber.

Nalsyrra lifted a large pack from the ground and dumped its contents on the burial table: reinforced leather armor, clothes, boots, a scabbard, a pair of knives, a heavy cloak, and other necessities a warrior would need. Beside those items she placed a cavalry saber of the finest Eprosian steel.

“I brought you a suit of lighter armor since they buried you in heavy ceremonial pieces. A mount awaits you outside.”

“What of the Sword of Shadowed Light?”

“It is not a physical sword. I may only summon it in the Shadowland.”

“Pity.” Breskaro donned the clothes and armor. “I’d like some answers now. Where is the benefactor who aided you? Who is she?”

“I cannot tell you who she is. I am sworn to secrecy. She could not come here herself, though it would have made you stronger if she had. You will meet her soon. This is how Harmulkot wished it.”

With some difficulty, he buckled on his arm guards. His withered fingers had not yet recovered their dexterity. “So what exactly must I do for Harmulkot?”

“The Matriarch is about to launch the Fourth Crusade. You must stop the Issalian army and save Harmulkot’s people.”

His eyes blazed with emerald fire. “I have to save the
Mûlkrans
?!”

“You will become their champion, their leader.”

“There’s no way.”

“I did not say it would be easy.”

Breskaro shook his head. “Mûlkra is impoverished and diseased, a shadow of glories centuries gone. The city is corrupt, its army tattered.”

“You know the Issalians’ tactics better than anyone, and your identity alone will cause dismay.”

“That won’t be enough to dampen the zeal of the Matriarch. Nor will it slow Magnos, assuming he’s still the supreme commander of the army.”

“He is.”

“Neither of them will relent while Mûlkra stands. Magnos isn’t the best tactician, but he’s no fool, and he has never failed in any endeavor.”

“If anyone can stop them, you can.”

Breskaro sat on the burial table to rest. “I was dead seven years. According to our plans, the Fourth Crusade should have ended three years ago.”

“Losing you and the Valiants prolonged the campaign in Brekka which took a year longer than expected. After that, unrest in several provinces delayed the Matriarch’s plans and the Issalian people lost heart. But all the previous gains are solidified now and she is ready to move forward again.”

“Harmulkot has dealt me a poor hand.”

“Harmulkot is not as strong as she once was, and she has risked much of what she last left on you. Though they have largely abandoned her, she is desperate to save her people from this crusade. Many would die, their culture would end, and Harmulkot would fade into obscurity.”

“As you say, I have no choice. I’ll do what I can, but the chance of success is
slim
at best. I really don’t see how it will be possible.”

“That is why you must first recover the Akythiri Mechanism from Peithoom. This ancient device allows one to animate and control corpses. Harmulkot once used it to create an army of undead warriors and conquer all of what is now the Issalian Empire and more. But eventually the mechanism stopped working and her army was destroyed in battle. She abandoned the mechanism in the city of Peithoom, her original capital, when the rivers flooded that cursed land.”

“I know of Peithoom Swamp, but I’ve never heard there was a city there. I’ve never heard of this empire of Harmulkot’s either.”

“Her empire fell twelve centuries ago.” Nalsyrra sighed. “The world was different then.”

“So what good will the mechanism do her now?”

“Only one small part of the device was broken. I have recently … discovered … a replacement piece that Harmulkot never knew existed. Once fixed, the device will allow you to raise a new army of the undead and save Harmulkot’s people from the conquering force that threatens them. And should you fulfill your mission, Harmulkot will use the Akythiri Mechanism to repair Orisala’s broken form.”

“What’s stopping me from recovering the device and doing this myself?”

“You can use the device to animate mindless corpses, but only Harmulkot can use it repair a broken body.”

“I have your word that the device
can
heal Orisala?”

“Harmulkot kept one of her favorite followers alive for centuries until the device broke. I can give you no better assurance than that. You will have to trust her.”

“After you get the device, you must go to see your benefactor at the Chapel of Blessed Night. Harmulkot herself will meet you there.”

“I know the place. Reaching it won’t be difficult.”

Nalsyrra lifted her pack and opened the door to a hallway that led to the other chambers within the Varenni Mausoleum.

“I shall first take you to see Orisala, so that you will know that I have spoken true. Beyond that, the quest is yours. My part will be done.”

Breskaro followed. “You’re not going to assist me? Doesn’t your goddess need you as well?”

Nalsyrra’s eyes widened and her voice took on the intensity of fanaticism. “I owe Harmulkot
nothing
. She is
not
my goddess. I am a servant of the Star Spirits whose power is
greater
than that of all the deities of Pawan Kor combined. The Star Spirits are beyond even the Great Deities — Taalos Sun King, Avida Bright Moon, and Zhura Dark Moon combined — for they are the power of destiny that drives all existence.”

“So you’re here to further a destiny these Star Spirits ordained. Are you preserving destiny or causing it to come about?”

Nalsyrra flashed a smile. “Does it matter? It is one and the same.”

She shoved open the stone door leading outside. Breskaro remained.

“I need a few minutes alone. I’d like to visit my relatives now that I understand death as it truly is.”

Breskaro stepped into his father’s burial chamber. He removed the old man’s death mask and stared down at the long-decayed ruin of a broad, handsome face.

“Not much now are you, old man? I’m certain you got no better than Oblivion. I wish I’d told you how I felt before you died. I wish now that I had allowed myself to go somewhere,
anywhere
, outside your shadow.”

Breskaro removed his mother’s mask and stroked her leathery cheek. “You were distant, but that wasn’t your fault, was it? Father guided both our destinies with an iron hand. You could have been more loving, but I hold nothing against you, Mother. You did no wrong by me. I hope you found Paradise.”

Breskaro ignored two older sisters, an infant brother he never knew, and a score of aunts, uncles, and cousins that he had rarely seen and never had any interest in. He entered his grandparents’ chamber and gazed at them a few moments without removing their burial masks. He made a half-bow as he exited.

Finally Breskaro returned to his chamber and turned his eyes, at last, upon the bodies that had lain not six feet away from his own.

He went first to Metra. His second wife. Deceased two years before him.

He removed the mask and kissed her forehead.

“I forgot about you in the Shadowland. I’m sorry for that. I was a poor husband, forever in love with another. You
deserved
better. We both deserved better. But you accepted Orisala. For that, I shall always be grateful. I hope you rest in Paradise.”

He placed a hand over her heart. “It wasn’t fair. That poison was meant for me. If I have the chance after saving Orisala, I will search for the assassin again. Perhaps his tongue wagged after my death.”

He replaced her burial mask. “Sleep well.”

Breskaro went then, feet shuffling, to his first wife, Adelenia. Her golden mask sparkled under the light of the torch he carried. Breskaro touched the sleeve of her silk gown and suddenly became disoriented. 

His vision darkening, Breskaro gasped and stumbled back. It was too much. He couldn’t bear it. The Shadowland pulled at him. To face Adelenia was to face death itself. He had loved her so fiercely and he had never been able to deal with her passing. He still couldn’t, even now, even having experienced death himself. 

After Adelenia had died in childbirth, he had set off on quest after quest, trying to outrun his grief. He had returned a renowned hero, to a beautiful daughter who daily reminded him more and more of her mother. Together, Orisala and Seshalla filled the void Adelenia’s death had left. 

To save Orisala was to save the memory of Adelenia as well.

“I’m sorry, my love. I’m sorry I can’t face you. We should have been in death together.”

Breskaro banished thoughts of Adelenia from his mind. He couldn’t let memories of her weaken him as they once had. Heart-heavy, he ambled out into the moonlit night where Nalsyrra waited for him.

A glorious night sky hung above him with the bright moon Avida overhead and charcoal Zhura hovering as a crescent above the horizon. Stars arranged in their myriad patterns sparkled throughout the sky. With the wind against the city, he breathed in the fresh scents of grain fields, olive trees, and the muddy banks of the Ayre River. Though he could smell these things again, after the scentless years spent in the Shadowland, he didn’t recall the scents being so weak and bland as they were. 

“I feel alive again ...
almost
.”

He pulled up the hood of his cloak to shade the patina-crusted death mask that hid his gaunt face.

A warhorse awaited him, a magnificent specimen adorned with packed saddlebags, a crossbow, a blank kite shield, and a lance. Breskaro rans his hands along the flank of the black charger.

Nalsyrra petted the horse with an admiring gaze. “The Star Spirits told me this beast would serve you well. I saved him from near death and nursed him back to health, though it was necessary to bind a minor Zhura spirit to his body to keep him alive.”

“You placed a demon in this horse?”

“You could it put it that way, yes.”

The horse’s dark eyes peered into Breskaro’s. They stared at one another until the horse stamped a hoof, blinked, snorted, and stamped another hoof. Then it bowed its head and Breskaro rubbed its neck.

“I feel a kinship exists between us,” Breskaro said to the horse. “I shall call you Nightsoul.”

He gazed up from the High Cemetery toward the city of Issaly, a blanket of multi-story apartment complexes, packed shops, private estates, and lavish temples stretched across a series of seventeen low-lying hills. A manned wall surrounded the city and seven gates led in. Though past midnight, the lamps of Issaly yet burned, casting an orange aura into the night and illuminating the tallest spires of the Grand High Temple of Seshalla.

“I
loved
that city,” Breskaro said.

Nalsyrra climbed into the saddle of her mount. “It has never suited my tastes.”

“It was the center of my world. If only I could see my old haunts again…” He tried to smile beneath the mask. “And Quaint Nine Hill Chapel, without all the hypocrites and fuss of the Grand High Temple. I’d spend hour after hour there, praying to Seshalla. What a waste that was!