Darknesses (18 page)

Alustre,
Lustrea

V
estor
stood at the second archway
into the ancient workshop of the Praetorian
Engineers. Behind him glistened the pale green marble walls, and polished
pink-gray granite pillars and floors. Thin lines of brilliant summer light
flared through the narrow windows. The black-haired man wearing the
silver-and-black jacket and silver trousers of the Praetor, scarcely a handful
of years older than Vestor himself, walked toward the archway.

Vestor
bowed. “Praetor Tyren.”

“Engineer.”
The new Praetor walked into the work chamber, stopping short of the workbench
and the narrow tanks on the tables behind it, in which were seed crystals.
After studying the benches and the tanks, he turned to the engineer. “I have
received a number of reports. They all say that you alone remained fighting the
pteridons until your weapons and your archers were destroyed, and that you were
burned and barely escaped with your life.”

“Yes,
Praetor.”

“And
that your arm and hand were damaged.” Tyren paused. “Will they affect your
work?”

“I
can still do the delicate work and the design, but I fear it may be some time
before I can lift much weight on my left side.”

“But
you can build more of the devices that you used against the pteridons?”

“I
have already begun. You can see. It will take time, as I told your father
before we left for Catyr. I cannot grow the crystals faster than they will
grow.”

“Unlike
my sire, Vestor, I have time to make sure we do matters with full preparation.
You had six of the light-knives, with roughly two replacements for each.
Correct?”

“Yes,
Praetor.”

“We
will plan for twenty-five, with five replacements for each. When we strike the
nomads again, we will be prepared for anything. I understand that you have one
working device remaining?”

“I
am using it as a model for the others.”

“Good.
What about the Table project?” Tyren pointed toward the solid black square
table, sturdily constructed of lorken, set well away from the workbenches, and
at the thick glass mirror, also rimmed in lorken, upon the table.

“I
have discovered a way to measure the forces exerted on the mirrors. Given time,
I can at least determine where they can be placed so that we can use them
longer without explosion. I am hopeful that this will lead to a working replica
of the Tables of the Recorders. But that will take even more time, I fear.”

“Do
not neglect that, but take the time you require. The new Duarchy will need
such, and should you succeed, you will be acclaimed and rewarded above all
other engineers in the times since the Cataclysm.” Tyren smiled. “You have
already given much, often with little reward. I have taken the liberty of
making the upper floors of the Northern Tower ready for you. There is enough
space for a family there, in great comfort, and your new stipend will support
that, should you wish such. If not, you will have the comfort and space to
sustain you.”

Vestor’s
eyes widened, if slightly. “You are most kind.”

“Most
realistic, Vestor. Even engineers who love their work deserve recognition and
golds,” Tyren went on. “You will receive the green circlet of valor at the next
assembly of honors.” He nodded, then stepped back. “I also expect continued
progress.” With a smile, he turned.

Vestor
nodded, more to himself than to the departing Praetor.

B
y
the following Octi,
the five companies were well into the Upper Spine Mountains,
far taller than any mountains Alucius had traveled. Even so, the tallest peaks
were shorter, he judged, than the Aerlal Plateau. But then, no one he knew had
ever tried to climb the more than six-thousand-yard-high sheer walls of the
Plateau. As his grandsire had said, years back, after Alucius had dreamed of
climbing the Plateau, there were better ways—and far less dangerous ones—to
make a fool of one’s self.

When
Alucius studied the mountains around and above him with his Talent, even in
midday he could feel a darkness that enfolded the gray stone slopes, slopes
that held far fewer trees than he would have expected. Yet he found no source
for the darkness. The trees themselves were all evergreens, bent and twisted
and old, and he saw but a handful of younger or smaller pines or firs. Even the
few valleys he had seen were almost lifeless, heaped with stones, and with
scattered handfuls of stunted bushes.

“The
winds must be fierce here in the winter,” he said to Longyl, riding beside him.

“Thought
that myself, sir. Haven’t seen any animals, and only a few ravens. Only one
hawk. Can’t be much in the way of small game.”

“No.”
Alucius hadn’t sensed that much life. Even the barren quarasote plains of the
stead, under the Aerlal Plateau, held far more living creatures. “Good thing
we’ve got supply wagons. Be tough foraging here.”

“For
five companies…be impossible, sir.”

“Let’s
hope it’s better in the Barrier Range.”

“You
think we’ll be headed that way soon?”

“No
one’s said, but I wouldn’t wager against it.”

“Least
it’s summer.”

As
Wildebeast carried Alucius to a low crest in the mountain high road, he
suddenly sensed a point of dark bluish violet in the heights to the south—a
single point. He forced himself to look upward slowly, as if studying the sides
of the unnatural gorge cradling the high road, but his eyes could make out
nothing. Whatever the creature hidden and watching within the rocks above the
gorge might be, it felt similar to a sander. Were there mountain sanders?
Alucius had never heard of such, and in his readings had never come across any
such reference; but there were few enough references to sanders, and many
people in Corus, especially in the southern lands, thought they were mythical
or legendary creatures, although herders saw enough of them to know they were
far from mythical.

“See
something, sir?”

“I
thought I did, but it’s gone now.” Alucius shifted his weight in the saddle,
looking forward along the impossibly straight high road and the dry canyon
leading eastward.

The
history book had made a passing reference to Deforya as an ancient land of
great sorrow, and one which had been abandoned by all the inhabitants before
the Duarchy. Did the mountains reflect that, or was there something about them
that had created that sorrow? He looked to the north, over vingts and vingts of
near-lifeless gray stone, then back at the road ahead. Did the emptiness of the
mountains really matter?

He
didn’t know enough to answer his own question. Instead, he looked to Longyl.
“How are the mounts doing on water?”

“So
far…we’re all right, and if we reach that stream tonight, they’ll be fine.”

Alucius
nodded. The sense of the blue-violet mountain creature had vanished, as if it
had never been, even without the lingering sense that he felt with sanders on
the stead.

B
y
Duadi,
the combined force was nearing the eastern edge of the Upper
Spine Mountains. A glass before, Twenty-first Company had rotated forward to
take its place as the first company in the main body, a half vingt behind the
Lanachronan vanguard, where Majer Draspyr usually rode.

Less
than a vingt ahead of the vanguard, Alucius saw two vertical cliffs of gray
stone, rising almost two hundred yards above the high road, each in a single
unbroken line. As he rode closer, he could see that the cliffs were even more
unnatural than the gun-barrel-straight gorge they had followed for days, for
they had been sliced from the heart of a single mountain, creating an opening
nearly a half vingt in width, more than enough for both the river to the left
of the road and the high road itself to pass out into the high plains beyond.

Alucius
wondered why the ancient builders—for it had to have been an artifact of the
Duarchy—had not left a much narrower gap that could have been more easily
defended. Then…he laughed quietly to himself. The Duarchy had been built on
unifying Corus, not on creating narrow passes that could have been reinforced
to facilitate uprisings or revolts.

“Sir?”
inquired Zerdial.

“Just
thinking.” Alucius gestured at the artificial cliffs ahead. “About how times
change.”

Zerdial’s
brow wrinkled, but the squad leader didn’t pursue the question.

Once
through the massive cut, Alucius found himself looking out at an endless plain,
with only the slightest hint of rolling hills. The high road had not dropped
more than two thousand yards, if that, from the heights it reached in the
middle of the Upper Spine Mountains until it emerged onto the high mountain
valley that held the land of Deforya.

Alucius
had studied the maps and histories of Corus, and he knew Deforya was bounded by
mountains on three sides and by the rampart-like walls of the Aerlal Plateau on
the north, and that Deforya was essentially one huge valley two hundred vingts
from west to east, and three hundred from the Aerlal Plateau south to the
Barrier Range that separated Deforya from Illegea. Knowing that and seeing the
endless open valley were two different matters.

As
he continued to ride, passing through and then leaving behind the stone gate to
the Upper Spine Mountains, another feeling swept over Alucius—one of immense
sadness, an emotion that had not come from within him, but from the gray stone
mountains he had just left…and even from the plains ahead. A feeling from those
beings he had never seen, whose Talent-colors of maroon-violet had felt so
similar to those of sanders, yet were not? And why would a sander—or whatever
the mountain creatures were—be sad, or show sadness? Or were there other
reasons for the sadness?

He
glanced to his left. The river that had flowed through the ancient stone
channel beside the high road for the last fifty vingts was now carried
completely by an eternastone aqueduct, an aqueduct more than twenty yards wide,
whose graceful arches were already almost five yards higher than the high road
it paralleled.

“Never
seen anything like that, even in Hieron,” said Zerdial quietly.

“They
didn’t need aqueducts in Hieron; but it took as much effort, if not more, to
build the river levees and roads there,” Alucius pointed out.

“Not
as much as it did to cut the high road all the way through the mountains, did
it?” Zerdial asked politely.

“About
the same, I’d guess. The levee roads are on both sides of the river, and they
run for over a hundred and fifty vingts, and they probably had to dig fairly
deep to put in foundations. Here, they just cut away stone.”

“Just?”
asked Longyl, easing his mount up beside Alucius on the left.

“Just,”
Alucius affirmed with a laugh. “It’s always easier to build by removing. It’s
like carving. You cut what doesn’t belong away. When you build anything, first
you have to dig deep enough…” He stopped and shook his head. “You may be right.
We don’t know how they did it. If we were doing it today, this”—he gestured
back toward the artificial gorge and then to the aqueduct “—would be easier.”

“How
far is Dereka, sir?” asked Zerdial, clearly wanting to change the subject.

“About
thirty vingts. We won’t make it today. Besides, we’re supposed to stop at a
border post another few vingts or so to the east. We might have to wait there,
until the Landarch sends for us. The majer wasn’t sure.”

“Didn’t
tell him enough, did they?” asked Longyl.

“That
doesn’t change from land to land,” Alucius suggested. “They never tell those
doing the fighting enough.” As he finished speaking, Alucius concealed a frown.
Even away from the mountains, his Talent registered the continuing sense of
sadness.

O
n
Tridi,
the combined force left the outpost early, escorted by a half
squad of Deforyan troopers in crimson uniforms, strikingly similar to those
worn by the second raider company that Twenty-first Company had destroyed in
late winter. The sky was clear, the white sun bright, the silver-green sky
clear, and the day was pleasant, perhaps because of the higher elevation of
Deforya, with a light breeze out of the north.

The
high road and the aqueduct continued due east. Every so often Alucius looked to
the north, but the aqueduct remained solidly there, having risen only a few
yards over the vingts since the outpost. At intervals of roughly two vingts,
circular eternastone pipes ran down from the aqueduct and into the ground, the
water they carried reappearing in functional square stone fountains on the
north side of the aqueduct and on the south side of the road. From the
fountains, open stone channels ran parallel to the orchards. Rather, Alucius
thought, the orchards had been planted paralleling the watercourses.

At
times, there were hamlets around the fountains, and each dwelling looked
exactly like every other dwelling—oblong, with brownish red shutters, walls of
plaster over stone, and old slate roofs. While the houses were well kept,
Alucius saw none that looked new. At other times, there were not even
dwellings, only the orchards.

By
midafternoon, what had first appeared as a golden haze where the road met the
horizon had resolved itself into the first view of Dereka. Rising out of the
green golden grasses and above the neat rows of the apple and plumapple trees
that filled the orchards lining both sides of the high road and aqueduct were
golden stone buildings, as well as three glistening green towers that reminded
Alucius of the tower in Iron Stem. Even from a good five vingts to the west,
the sharp and clean edges of the buildings were clear, as was their size. Many
had to have been a hundred yards or so on a side.

As
Alucius and the column of troopers rode closer, smaller structures—dwellings,
shops, stables—became visible, and while they were also of stone, the stone was
of a yellow shade, and the lines were not as sharp and clean.

The
aqueduct and high road continued straight, effectively splitting the city into
two sections, northern and southern, with half the ancient structures to the
north, half to the south. The dwellings on the fringe of the city were of the
yellow stone as well, but far more crudely cut, and the roofs were of split
slate, much like those of the Iron Valleys. Some of the side streets were of
stone, but most were packed dirt and dusty, and more crowded than in any city
where Alucius had been—but none of the people thronging the side streets
ventured onto the high road. Some of their comments did, although Alucius had
trouble at first with the dialect, an oddly accented form of Lanachronan.

“…black…the
northerners…”

“…Landarch…bought
them…”

“…don’t
need outsiders…just take up water…”

“No…sent
by the young Lord-Protector…rather fight here…”

“…no
fight at all…rock spirits will finish the grass-eaters…”

Close
to the middle of the city, the Deforyan escorts turned south onto a paved
yellow stone road, into which years of wagon wheels had carved grooves almost a
handspan deep. The vanguard and then the rest of the column followed.

Alucius
studied the ancient buildings, whose lines were straight and clean. The windows
were oblong, without shutters. The slanted roofs, some of them fifty yards
high, were of the same polished golden stone, without any chinks between the
roof or building blocks. The one structure directly to the east of the main
street on which they rode was vacant, and Alucius wondered why. Was it gutted
on the inside, the way the green tower in Iron Stem had been? Or were there
other reasons?

They
continued to ride south, nearing a second ancient and massive building, at
least three hundred yards in length. There, from a staff before a wide circular
drive and entrance, in the light afternoon breeze, flew a red banner, rimmed in
gold, and featuring a golden half-moon and a full and smaller green moon under
an arc of four eight-pointed stars. From the northern end of the structure rose
a tower with the shimmering green stone finish that made it a duplicate of the one
Alucius had passed so often on his way to Iron Stem growing up.

“Must
be the Landarch’s palace,” Longyl suggested. “Looks like it’s been there a long
time.”

“Gold
eternastone,” Alucius said. “It’s mentioned in the histories, but they don’t
say anything about Dereka being built of it. There wasn’t any that I saw in
Madrien.”

“Ah…”
Longyl offered apologetically.

“You
saw it?”

“Yes,
sir. There were some buildings made of it on the outskirts of Faitel. Center of
the place was a big circular lake, black water. They say it was created in the
Cataclysm, but they didn’t tell us how. Maybe two vingts back from the black
lake, there were buildings, sort of like that one.”

“That’s
interesting.” It was more than interesting, and it fit, but Alucius couldn’t
say why, just as he hadn’t been able to figure out the meaning of Hieron’s
construction in the beginning.

The
iron gates to the palace were open, but guarded by a half squad of mounted
troopers, who did not move as the column rode past and toward another ancient
structure, far lower, if as long, that was farther south on the western side of
the main street and surrounded by a stone wall two yards high. The gates to the
city fort were guarded by two sentries, in open wooden posts.

Directly
inside the gates was a large paved courtyard, but the stones were old and
cracked, although the cracks had been filled with mortar and the joins between
stones had been repointed, if not recently. At the western end of the courtyard
was the long ancient structure, and in the center on the lower level, a stone
platform with a balustrade extended some ten yards into the courtyard.

“Form
up by company, left to right, centered on the platform!” Draspyr’s orders
bellowed across the courtyard.

Twenty-first
Company, in the middle of the order of march, ended up directly in front of the
stone platform. Then all waited as the ten wagons creaked into the courtyard
and came to a halt. Alucius glanced back over his shoulder. The five
companies—more than five hundred troopers and officers—and the wagons covered
only half the courtyard.

A
tall man, dark-haired, with a square-cut beard and wearing a crimson uniform
with silver epaulets and silver collar insignia of crossed sabres over an
eight-pointed star, stood at the front of the platform, behind the stone
balustrade. The platform was tall enough that his head was a yard and a half
higher than those of the mounted troopers and their officers. “Welcome to
Dereka and Lancer Prime Post, and greetings on behalf of the Landarch.” He
looked to Majer Draspyr. “Your presence, and the friendship which it betokens,
are most appreciated. You have had a long journey, and I would not wish to
prolong it unduly. There is a welcoming feast for you in several glasses. Your
troopers will be feted in the troopers’ hall, and you, Majer, and your officers
will dine with the Landarch in the Great Banquet Hall…”

It
took a moment for Alucius to adjust to the accent, but the words were familiar
enough.

“…the
stables are ready, and so are your quarters, so that you may care for your
mounts and refresh yourselves.” He gestured, and from the building behind him
appeared ten men in crimson uniforms, the equivalent of squad leaders, Alucius
judged, walking out into the courtyard, two toward each company.

“…and
now…a word with you and your officers, before you begin your preparations.”

“Officers
forward!” Draspyr ordered.

Alucius
eased Wildebeast toward the platform, reining up beside Feran. Heald slipped
his mount next to Alucius, while Koryt reined up alongside Feran. Clifyr took the
end.

“I
am Submarshal Ahorak, the Assistant Arms-Commander of Dereka, and I am pleased
to see you. You will all be quartered in the visiting barracks. There are
officers’ quarters at the north end, more than enough for you all. There is an
officers’ café in the headquarters building here, on the lower level, and it is
open from one glass before dawn until midnight every day…Tomorrow morning…we
will have a briefing on what we know of the nomads’ movements, and on Quinti
you will be on your way south to join our border guards…”

Alucius
listened to the brief explanation, keeping a pleasant smile on his face, but
studying the submarshal all the time. Ahorak had no traces of Talent, and
behind his pleasant façade were condescension and arrogance, probably because
he had to welcome a mere majer, Alucius judged, realizing that, by sending only
a majer the Lord-Protector had delivered yet another message.

“…You,
Majer, as the commander of this force, will sit at the high table with the
Landarch, and, if you will supply the names and ranks of your officers, they
will be seated at the long table of the Deforyan Lancers, with its officers…no
weapons at table…not even sabres…”

After
another set of instructions, Alucius followed a Deforyan squad leader to the
officers’ section of the stables, where he saw to Wildebeast before walking
back to the building that held the visiting officers’ quarters. The quarters
were on the upper level of the barracks, and close to luxurious. Each chamber
was walled in marble, with inside shutters on the windows, and had a wide bed
with a thick mattress, as well as a writing desk and a large armoire, and
plenty of wall pegs for gear, even a rack for rifles. The floors were polished
granite, but with a large woven cloth rug beside the bed.

In
addition, rather than having a common wash chamber, each officer’s room shared
a large washroom, containing a tub, with one other chamber. There were even two
spigots to the tub, one admitting warm—not hot—but warm water. After talking
matters over with Heald, quietly, Alucius and the other overcaptain had agreed
it was best that each take a chamber shared with their captain counterpart.

Alucius
enjoyed getting thoroughly clean, and, after Feran bathed, and before Alucius
fully dressed, washing out his other undergarments and riding uniforms.

In
time, two open carriages took the six officers from Lancer Prime Post to the
Landarch’s palace. There they were escorted down a long great hall, thirty
yards in height, and fifty wide, supported by golden eternastone pillars that
exuded antiquity, for all that the hall was spotless, the polished stone floor
bright enough to catch the reflections of the officers. They then made their
way into the even larger Great Banquet Hall, with similar pillars and ceiling,
and with crimson hangings draped between the pillars on each side of the hall.

The
high table was on a dais a yard above the floor of the rest of the hall. The
tables set up below the dais covered but the front third of the banquet hall.
While Majer Draspyr was escorted away, Alucius found himself seated between two
Deforyan officers in crimson dress uniforms with the silver epaulets. Heald was
seated across from him, and two places more toward the head of the table.

They
had barely reached their places when a functionary in gold stepped forward and
rapped a heavy staff on the stone of the dais. Then the Landarch appeared,
wearing not crimson, but a dark green trimmed in gold. He was not a large man,
and his face was thin, but even from twenty yards away Alucius could sense the
presence he projected, but without Talent.

“To
the time eternal, to the One Who Is, and to the Unknown, as all three are and
have been forever!” The Landarch inclined his head in the silence, then added,
“And to our friends from the north and west who have most generously offered
their services against the scourge of the south. There are no speeches tonight,
and no toasts! Just wine and good food and friendship!” With that, he turned
and walked to his place at the middle of the high table, seating himself.

Immediately
servers appeared, all young men.

Alucius
glanced around, realizing that he had not seen a single woman since he had
entered the Landarch’s palace. He focused on using his Talent, knowing he might
feel overwhelmed, but he had to know more than his eyes were telling him. He
took in the lifethreads of all the men in the banquet hall, and almost all were
of a rust red, a shade that conveyed an ancient sadness or sorrow, or something
close to it. Did the lands hold those feelings and pass them on? How?

“How
did you become an officer in the…Lanachronan forces?” asked the overcaptain
across the table from Alucius, a man who looked even younger than Alucius was.

Alucius
had to take a moment to refocus his attention on the words addressed to him
before he could reply. “I was captain in the Iron Valleys Militia when the
Council agreed to become a part of Lanachrona. Shortly after that I was
promoted to overcaptain.” Sensing a certain frustration from the other even
before he had finished speaking, he added, “I had served some time at that
point.”

“I
fear…I was not clear. In most cases, how does one…become an officer? By birth,
or schooling…by appointment from the Lord-Protector…?”

Alucius
nodded. “I cannot speak for the officers of the Southern Guard. What is now the
Northern Guard, those of us in the black uniforms, gets its officers in several
ways. Personally, I was raised as a herder—”

“The
landholding kind?”

“Yes,”
Alucius admitted. “We have a large stead north of Iron Stem in the Iron Valleys.”

“You
are a younger son, perhaps?”

“No.
I’m the oldest. My family does not believe that a herder can hold the respect
he must have unless he has served in the…Northern Guard.” He’d almost said
militia, because the habits of a life did not change easily, especially when he
was trying to slant his answers while still being truthful.