Embers of a Broken Throne (14 page)

C
hapter 18

I
rmina sat bolt upright. In an instant she’d sunk into the Eye, shedding the sense of fear and worry that had woken her. She drew in the essences, ready to lash out. But the room was empty save for Ancel still under the covers mumbling incoherently.

Twisting her neck from side to side, she inhaled and exhaled long and low, easing her heart rate. The room smelled of mold and muskiness, old sex and rotted wood, furs and pelts that made up the bed on the stone floor. Warmth radiated from the sunlight spearing through the villa’s windows at an angle that said it was a short time after dawn. Dust motes swirled, tiny creatures playing an aimless game on a breath of air. Gray walls adorned her surroundings, paint peeling, bricks cracked like parched earth. The red and orange eyes of coals peered at her from the hearth.

What had woken her? Surely—

A distant animal’s roar echoed outside. Howls and barking grunts picked up the call from the same area. More followed, this time from inside Benez. The cacophony set her insides quivering.

Gaze locked on the open door to the room they’d chosen, Irmina reached out to shake Ancel’s shoulder. “Get up, there’s—”

Ancel rose as quickly as she had, his sword appearing from under the blankets and furs. The Etchings on his right arm glowed bright, an incandescent spider-web of seamless lines and pictures, colors like the rainbow reflection from a shard of glass. His chest heaved, slick with sweat to match his face’s sheen, and his eyes were unfocused.

Freezing in place, Irmina held her breath, waiting for him to sort his bearings. The sword lowered inch by inch. After a moment his breathing grew normal.

“I had a dream,” he said. eyes like a clear sea as they focused.

The roars and howls repeated.

“Charra,” Ancel uttered, the word a barely audible whisper.

“I know.” She recognized the daggerpaw’s roar as if it were her own voice.

“How long now?”

“I don’t know. The noise woke me.”

A grimace marred Ancel’s features. His gaze clouded, emerald eyes narrowing in concentration. “I can … I can feel him.” He shook his head. “He’s pulling me.”

“Then I suggest we follow.”

The roar echoed again. She had a general idea of its location, somewhere in the Netherwood.

Without another word Ancel threw off the covers and stood, sunlight falling across his nakedness. She could trace the intricate lines of his Etchings across his body. Though incomplete they existed on every limb up to his neck, a masterwork of living art.

Following his lead she got up and dressed in her leathers. Although she wanted to put on a cloak, if they were heading into the forest, it would be a hindrance. By the time she finished, Ancel was strapping on his sword belt with his longsword attached. Diagonally over his back another belt held a scabbard with his shorter weapon.

Eyes serious, if a bit worried, he glanced over to her. “Ready?”

She nodded. For the first time of late she would be at his side in the midst of possible danger. It set her heart beating faster.

When they stepped outside Mirza was waiting for them. So were Edsel and Stefan.

“We were coming to wake you,” Stefan said to his son. “If I’m not mistaken, that’s Charra.”

“It is,” Ancel answered.

“Your father told me of this daggerpaw of yours,” Edsel said. “I don’t know why he would go out into the Netherwood. None of our animals dare. Even if he’s as big as your father claims I doubt he’s a match for what’s in there. I’ve seen those creatures tear apart several Forgers. My men have reported that the wolves, the lapras, and the daggerpaws work together.”

“Lapras?” Ancel asked.

“Normally they’re the size of a wolf, bristling with black, green, or brownish fur.” Edsel shifted his head so his single golden eye took her in. “Black for one that’s infected with the shade, green for the forest version, and brown for plains lapras. Like a few of Ostania’s beasts, they have six legs, claws that can gut a man with a swipe. They tend to hunt in packs, but the different types are natural enemies, territorial. The ones in Netherwood are several times larger, some bigger than a horse. You can ask your Beastsinger here. They don’t take well to taming.”

It wasn’t the first time Edsel referred to her as a Beastsinger. She hadn’t thought much on it before, but perhaps the man knew something others didn’t about her ability. The problem with asking him was his obvious animosity.

“I know how attached to Charra you are.” A painful expression crossed Stefan’s face. “I also know he has some power, but he cannot fight an entire forest. I’ve seen what happens to creatures caught in a lapra frenzy. It’s never pretty. You—” Stefan shook his head, shoulders slumping. “You’re going after him, aren’t you?”

Ancel nodded, his expression leaving no room for argument “We were going to the Netherwood today anyway.”

“For what purpose?” Edsel asked.

“To see if I can tame any of its creatures.” She watched for Edsel’s reaction.

“I’d visit the Banai or Felani first if I were you,” he said. “Especially the Banai. Stefan can confirm they have some skill with taming.”

“We don’t have time for such a trip,” Ancel said.

“I don’t think it’s worth the risk. Not for a daggerpaw.”

“Not any daggerpaw.” Ancel’s gaze was steely. “My daggerpaw. My friend.”

“And if she fails?” Edsel’s single eye was more than a little disconcerting as he regarded her.

Irmina shrugged, feigning confidence. She still recalled the failure when she attempted to tame Charra, how the daggerpaw thrust her from his mind. “I won’t know until I try. Besides I doubt it’s any harder to control than a zyphyl.”

Edsel gaped. Irmina couldn’t help a satisfied smile. The old man turned to Stefan. “You didn’t mention—”

“In all the fuss it slipped my mind. None of us can see the thing anyway.” Stefan cast his gaze to the cloud-shrouded sky. “She says it’s up there, watching over us.”

“What can it do?” Edsel craned his neck, head bobbing from side to side.

“Well,” she said, “it can pick out nearby Forges for one.”

Edsel gave Stefan an incredulous stare. “That could change everything.” He spread his arms. “Why didn’t you mention this last night during our plans?”

“I seldom rely on things I don’t understand,” Stefan said. “But if it makes you feel any better, I also didn’t want to reveal her secret to everyone. Too many spies of late, too many people who aren’t what they appear to be. Quintess and Trucida already know and can dispatch Matii as Irmina sees fit.” Stefan’s confidence in her made Irmina’s chest swell.

“Very well,” Edsel said, clearly not pleased.

“Anyway.” Stefan brought his attention back to Ancel. “Son, I know I’ve been out of sorts lately. I also know you’ve defended us many times, but,” he paused, “I can’t help it that I’m worried every time. You’re all I have left. I know I cannot stop you from doing this, but all I ask is for both of you to be careful.”

“I’ll keep him out of trouble.” She offered Stefan a reassuring smile.

“So will I.” Mirza planted his long-hafted scythe on his shoulder. Dressed in woolen britches, a shirt with a leather jacket tossed over it, he glanced from one to the other as if daring someone to say differently.

“Not this time, Mirz.” Ancel strode over to his friend. He rested one hand on Mirza’s empty shoulder. “As much as I would like you at my side, my father and the others will need you here. Keep the walls safe for us. Your mother’s life will depend on it.”

Mirza shook his head and made to protest.

The roar echoed again. Answering replies abounded within the forest, followed by the subsequent reaction from Benez’s animals. Even the horses and other livestock joined the din.

When the noise ended, Ancel approached Stefan. They hugged. She couldn’t hear what words passed, but tears trickled down Stefan’s face. Once they released their hold the older Dorn put on a brave face and nodded.

“And don’t think I’ve forgotten about you.” Stefan gazed at her, emerald eyes soft. “We’ve had our differences, but you are as much a daughter to me as if I still had my own. I don’t know what I would do if you didn’t return.”

A pained expression crossed Ancel’s face. “Father—Never mind.”

Stefan’s words made her feel better than she expected. During the trip she’d thought to approach him, to question him concerning her parents, but a good opportunity never presented itself. Not with his outbursts. She had tried not to think on it much, but the Dorns were now the only real family left to her. Or at least the closest thing to family.

“I’ll return, Uncle.” It had been a long time since she’d called him that. Saying the words was more than a bit awkward considering her relationship with Ancel, but at the same time they felt right.

The roars and howls rolled from the forest once more, a sense of urgency about them.

“It’s time for us to go.” Ancel strode over and held her hand.

“You should take horses,” Edsel said, “or better yet, dartans. The first ones woke from hibernation a few days ago.”

Stefan’s lips curled in distaste, but he remained silent.

The mention of the hump-shelled, six-legged beasts brought a smile to Irmina’s face. She missed her old dartan, Misty. One day, if all went well, she would return to Calisto to collect her.

“We won’t need any mounts.” An Etching on Ancel’s arm glowed. “Somehow, I know the place we need to be.” He waved his arm.

A slit formed in the air between them and the other men at the same time as a sound like a sword slicing air. The slit widened into a portal. Through the wavy haze of its surface, Irmina made out towering, dark trees. Things were moving on the other side.

Instinctively, she leaned away from the entrance. Ancel tightened his grip on her hand. Swallowing, she followed him through.

On the other side the air was thick with the odors of rotted leaves and wild animals. The portal snapped shut behind them, but she took little notice. She only had eyes for what was in front of them. She hissed in fear.

Charra’s white-gray form was stark against the forest’s deep green and shadows, foot-long bone hackles upright, daggers running from his neck down to his rump. His tail whipped from side to side, the spear-shaped tip like a snake preparing to strike.

The daggerpaws, wolves, and lapras surrounding him matched him in size. Snarling, they were poised to attack. Almost as one, they shifted to face her and Ancel.

A force pushed against her mind, conjuring images of the day Sakari had touched her in a similar fashion. Eyes narrowing, she took in the bared fangs and snarling features of countless animals. She concentrated, slamming her will against the presence. Not one of the beasts reacted.

Charra whined.

Shocked, she lost a hold on her focus. When Charra’s consciousness slipped into her head, she gasped.

I
ntermezzo 2

Q
ueen Celina was of a mind to order one of her Deathbringers to take Commander Giomar’s head. On bended knee a few steps below her throne, head bowed, he had attempted to defend his erroneous ways. Now, he awaited her judgment. To his credit, after his return from Granadia, he had seen fit to present himself to her properly groomed and in the formal sky blue uniform his station required. He even smelled of rich perfume, the scent doing well to chase away the Cardian Isle’s salty air. If he died today he would do so with some semblance of honor and tradition. She appreciated the gesture.

Lips pursed, she eyed Deathbringer Kudric. Large and swarthy for an Alzari, a reflection of the clansman’s mixed breeding with the Harnan in the Nevermore Heights, he was the last of her original guard. Stoic, as was his wont, he casually rested his hand on the hilt of one of his black-hafted swords. None of the madness that gave the Bringers their name showed in his amber eyes.

“So, Giomar, you would have me believe that you failed to secure my parents’ safety because you were somehow influenced by the shade?” she asked.

“Yes, Your Highness, it is as I said, Sendeth and Randane were rife with its touch and its creatures. They walk the streets of cities and towns. They are a part of the military, wearing illusions of human flesh like the days of old. Their touch taints the very land, and as they’re known to do, they cast their Forges on the minds of men.”

Giomar might be boastful, a bit arrogant, but he was not a liar. Men who lied to her did not keep their heads.

“And your Pathfinder, Velin, what of him? He was sent with you to prevent exactly that from happening.”

“He died to an assassin.”

She frowned. “One of the shade’s?”

“No.” For the first time, Giomar raised his head slightly to regard Kudric. “I only caught a glimpse of her, but she was Alzari, in possession of twin daggers such as the Deathbringers wield.”

“Who hired her?”

“Apparently she was helping your father’s son, Ancel, escape the clutches of Amuni’s Children.”

It took Celina a moment to realize her mouth was open. She snapped it shut.

Ancel. Ancel.
Unbidden, the name repeated itself in her head.

Stefan and Thania had another child. She had a brother. Named after Anton and her.
Had Sakari known?
He must have. The man, whatever he was, had been good at keeping secrets. One of his greatest as Nerian’s bodyguard, Kahar, had been to whisk her and Anton away, leaving the Shadowbearer to believe they were both dead.

Much began to make sense now: the additional bond that had bloomed far northwest, the recent release of Prima Materium to match the power she felt the night the bond first appeared, and the Eztezian Guardian who had traveled across Ostania into Granadia. That last must have been to train the boy. All of it pointed to the thing for which she had supposedly been born.

The Aegis of the Gods.

Perhaps she would finally learn what being part of the Aegis meant.

“Have you seen this brother of mine?”

“Yes.” Giomar met her gaze, eyes steady. “He resembles his father.”

She recalled Stefan as she last remembered him: tall, hair like midnight, eyes so emerald they seemed to stare into one’s spirit, brave, willing to sacrifice himself so she and Anton might live. With the memory came a brief rush of deeper emotions, no longer smoldering, but simmering inside her. How she wished she had been able to exact revenge on the Shadowbearer. But those days were gone … Nerian, long dead.

Celina touched the pendant around her neck. It sparkled with the bond of life. After so many years of it being dull metal, a keepsake, the power within it had bloomed. She couldn’t pinpoint the exact location if a map was thrust in front of her, but the general area would be northwest beyond the Vallum of Light. Was it her mother, her father, or both? Not that either mattered. Whatever it took she would see them live out the remainder of their days without fear, not in exile or in hiding. There was another similar to it, moving closer, this one on the Ostanian side of the great barrier.

She pushed them both to the back of her mind. Giomar’s fate was first.

If even half the reports received held truth, then war was coming on a scale not seen since the Shadowbearer War. The barrier the Kassite provided between the worlds had grown weaker. Rifts had opened at random places, allowing weaker shadelings to cross. The creatures gathered in large masses, most of them heading north as if they had some great purpose. Attempting to banish them back into the Nether or Hydae had proven pointless. They continued to pour through into Denestia. Her armies killed as many as they could manage to stem the tide, but the stream seemed endless. Of late, many of the creatures had been disappearing. One moment several thousand would be in a valley, ripe for massacre, and by the time her forces were ready, the shadelings would be gone. A few Generals said it was a good thing, but the disappearances reeked of something stronger whisking away the beasts. She had dispatched Matii to each town, but who knew what massed in the darker regions, the deep forests, the caves and mines, the places where the shade called home? For what was to come she required a great commander’s service.

“Bringer Kudric, your opinion?”

“He speaks the truth, my Queen.” Kudric’s hand fell away from his hilt as he addressed her. “With Velin dead, Commander Giomar would be susceptible to the shade, more so if they were the same ones responsible for events in Castere and what has been felt from within Granadia. I’m proof. So are the new Deathbringers I was able to train from the Alzari we rescued.”

With those words he relinquished control of his aura, allowing her to see. It encompassed his body in varying hues like a rainbow, laying bare his dedication, love, and commitment to her. More importantly, it showed that the madness, which at one point was a breath away from consuming him, had been pushed to the very corners of his psyche. She remembered the years he spent with Sakari learning how to keep it at bay. It made her wonder even more about her missing savior.
What or who was the man?

“It came with the release of Prima,” he said.

She nodded. When the primordial essences that drove the world had been released, the other lesser elements of Mater that resided in Denestia—the volatile, unstable ones affected by man’s fears, dreams, nightmares and emotions—had been pushed aside. At least for Forgers powerful enough to draw on Prima Materium. Unlike Mater, Prima did not exist in great amounts yet, and she did not know if its presence would continue to grow, but Forging it was the difference between being thrust head first into murky depths and then being brought out into sweet, tantalizing fresh air. Whatever the beings that inhabited Mater, their voices were no longer strong enough to overwhelm her.

Prior to the release she would have needed to travel to the closest Entosis to regain the Prima she used. An idea she no longer relished. Not with Astoca under control of this King Rosival and the Banai siding with him. Or with the sudden attacks by Amuni’s Children and the shade that had spread her forces thin from here in Toval, the jeweled crown of the Cardian Isles, all the way north to the city of Venvar, the Misted Cliffs, and even to the edges of Astocan territory. Every turn spoke of a need for her best officers. Of late Prima crept into her in amounts that given enough time she could replenish herself. It would have to do.

Keeping her face smooth, she regarded Giomar. Defiance and pride shone in his eyes. He held himself more erect, not an ounce of malice radiating from his aura. It was a steady wave of silver hues around him like an extra layer of skin. She sensed hurt for his failure, a bruised ego, perhaps, and deeper still, the loathing at having been subjected to the shade’s taint. He expected death for his mistakes. Under normal circumstances she should have ordered his execution. But these were far from normal times. Showing weakness could kill. Losing an accomplished war leader
would
kill.

Learn. Adjust. Survive.

The Disciplines
echoed in her head. With them came memories of her father reading the rules and theories on war set forth by the strategist Henden although Stefan must have already known the books’ contents by heart.

She stood. “Commander Wendel Giomar, by the order of Queen Lina the Everlasting, Ruler of all Cardia, Right Hand of Aeoli, Left Hand of Hyzenki, you are hereby pardoned.”

Giomar’s entire body deflated, a plaintive sigh escaping his lips. Then he was grinning. “Thank you, Your Highness,” he whispered, voice choked, eyes watery.

“Enough of the tears and joy,” Celina said. “We have borders to defend, and if what I feel is true, then my brother, Ancel, has crossed into Ostania as this High Shin Jerem said, and he means to head for Benez’s ruins. Once the news reaches the Felani and Astocans, they will move against him. With the Tribunal forces massed at the Vallum we may not be able to stop the Felani, but we can give the Astocans quite a bit to consider. It’s past time we dealt with this Rosival of theirs anyway. Oh, and one more thing, find a representative to take word of our plans to Benez, preferably Lord Traushen.”

Commander Giomar turned to one of the servants without missing a beat. “Send for my generals. We have a war to plan.”