Mistress Of The Ages (In Her Name, Book 9) (24 page)

Ria-Ka’luhr shrugged as he took a dagger and deftly sliced off a hunk of meat, the fat-laden outer layer browned and crisp while the meat inside remained juicy, cooked just beyond raw. He handed it to Tara-Khan, who accepted with a grateful bow of his head before he tore into it. It was stringy and tough, but was the most wonderful tasting meal he had ever had.

Ria-Ka’luhr carved off a hunk of meat for himself before sitting back. Taking a small bite, he chewed for a moment as he stared into the fire. “Seventy-eight cycles, plus two-hundred and thirty-one days, by my count.”

Tara-Khan froze as he was about to take another bite. “But…that’s impossible! I saw you go into the coliseum with Ayan-Dar and Keel-Tath after the inquisition!”

“And so I did.” He gave a bitter smile. “Yet I am here.”

“But how?”

“The how is not important. The why, on the other hand, matters a great deal.” He reached down to pick up a crude mug that was filled with a dark, viscous liquid and handed it to Tara-Khan. Upon seeing Tara-Khan’s nose wrinkle at the bitter aroma, he chuckled. “It’s fermented from a kind of seaweed I found growing deep in a crevasse not far from here. It tastes horrible, but one gets used to it. It is better than fermented blood.”

After taking a small sip, Tara-Khan’s face involuntarily scrunched up at the offensive taste. But he could not deny the rush of heat down his throat that quickly took root in his belly, and he forced himself to take another, longer drink. His tongue and throat were tingling, and the bitter taste was quickly mellowing into something not exactly like ale, but not entirely unlike it, either. Taking a look at the mug itself, he saw that it had been fashioned from the bone of some animal. He hesitated to think how large the beast must have been.

Ria-Ka’luhr chuckled. “Don’t drink too much or too fast, or you will indeed live to regret it.”

“You were about to tell me why you are here,” Tara-Khan reminded him.

With a smile that revealed that one of his fangs had been broken, leaving a jagged ivory stump, Ria-Ka’luhr answered, “I have been waiting for you.”

Tara-Khan set down the mug as he slowly shook his head. “I do not understand. How could you possibly know that I would come?”

“Because it was foretold.” Then, in a low voice, Ria-Ka’luhr told him what happened that fateful day when he, Keel-Tath, and Ayan-Dar entered the vessel of the Desh-Ka Crystal of Souls.

***

Ria-Ka’luhr remembered it as if it were yesterday, the queasy sensation of passing through the doorway into the vortex of space and time that protected the Desh-Ka crystal. Darkness fell when the door closed behind him, blotting out the sight of Ayan-Dar and Keel-Tath, who were just ahead. As he lost sight of them, so, too, did Keel-Tath’s footsteps fade from his hearing. He did not hear those made by Ayan-Dar, for like all Desh-Ka priests, his feet made no sound and left no trace upon the ground.
 

He did not call out or fear for where they might have gone, for he well understood that the vessel around him had its own will, driven by forces that no one, even the keepers of the Books of Time, understood. The ancient constructs were objects of great power and magic that, Ria-Ka’luhr knew, had been technological marvels to his long ago ancestors and would always be beyond his own understanding.

It was then, as he strode through the darkness, his own footsteps leaving no trace, that a curious thing happened. The strings that bound him to Syr-Nagath’s will through the dark curse she had inflicted upon him, making him her puppet and slave, were cut. The dark power that bound him to her was gone.

Not knowing how long this respite might last, he snatched his dagger from his belt and was about to thrust it through his throat when he heard a familiar voice call out, “There is no need, my son.”

Whipping his head around, Ria-Ka’luhr saw Ayan-Dar standing beside him. Blood ran freely from the wound in his chest from T’ier-Kunai’s sword, and his face was terribly pale. His eye was fixed upon Ria-Ka’luhr, and his expression showed nothing if not compassion.

“I must!” Ria-Ka’luhr whispered, trying with all his might to hold back a great tide of anguish and loathing at what he had been, at what he had done. It mattered not that he had not been in control. He felt soiled, right through to his very soul. “You do not understand. How could you? How could anyone?” He raised his dagger to his throat again, but Ayan-Dar reached for it, staying Ria-Ka’luhr’s hand in a grip of iron.

“In here, you are free of her,” Ayan-Dar told him. “I did not know what she did to you, but T’ier-Kunai had always known that something was amiss, and I know now exactly what she did.”

“What? How can you! No one knows beyond the Ka’i-Nur!”

Ayan-Dar’s lips curved upward in a grim smile. “I know because I have passed on to the Afterlife, young priest. I know far more now than I did then.” He stepped closer, his hand still holding Ria-Ka’luhr’s like an armorer’s vice. “And I know how you may redeem your honor and cleanse your soul.”

Ria-Ka’luhr could not believe his ears. “You are dead?" he whispered, and the spirit of his old friend and mentor, a spirit that felt every bit as powerful in death as he had in life, nodded. “How may I be saved?”

The smile on Ayan-Dar’s lips faded. “We must first make sure the Dark Queen no longer has power over you.” He released Ria-Ka’luhr, then reached into a small pouch on his belt, producing two black rings. “If you sever the Braid of the Covenant, you will be beyond her sight.”

“Yes,” Ria-Ka’luhr said, seeing the wisdom of what must be done even as he shivered in anticipation of what lay ahead for him. Putting the dagger back in its scabbard, he took the two rings. Undoing the coils of his braids around his upper arms, he carefully slid the rings along the Braid of the Covenant, working them as close as he could to his scalp.
 

Ayan-Dar drew his dagger, but Ria-Ka’luhr shook his head. “No. I must do it.” With a respectful nod, the old priest agreed, handing him the dagger. Ria-Ka’luhr held the braid steady in one hand as he put the blade’s edge into the tiny gap between the rings. “Let me be free of her,” he whispered before slicing through the tightly woven hair.

With a scream, he fell to his knees and doubled over, feeling like his entrails had been ripped from his body. He had never known such physical or emotional agony. Even the torment that Syr-Nagath had wrought upon him had not been nearly so terrible. Ria-Ka’luhr rocked himself back and forth, his arms clasped tightly around his midsection as he fought to control the searing pain of the spiritual silence that had swept over him. “It is…a small enough price…to pay,” he gasped.
 

After a time, he was not sure how long, the pain eased into a bone deep ache that beat in time with his heart and he began to breathe more easily. He voiced the thought now foremost in his mind. “I can return to Keel-Tath’s service?”
 

“Yes,” Ayan-Dar told him, “but not in the way you might have hoped.”

“What do you mean?”

The old priest frowned as he helped Ria-Ka’luhr to his feet. “I am setting a task before you that will be as difficult as it is necessary.”

“I will do anything you ask of me,” Ria-Ka’luhr said fervently. “Anything!”
 

His enthusiasm faded as Ayan-Dar proceeded to tell him what he must do. After his old mentor had finished, Ria-Ka’luhr slowly nodded his head in agreement, his heart heavy. “In Keel-Tath’s name, so shall it be done,” he whispered.

***

A weary smile crossed Ria-Ka’luhr’s lips as he finished his tale.

“But what did he ask you to do?” Tara-Khan said, exasperated. “Why have you lived here in the frozen wastes all this time, waiting for me? And how did you know it would be me?”

“It is easier to show you.” Ria-Ka’luhr got to his feet. Pausing to light a torch from the fire, he beckoned Tara-Khan to follow. “Come.”

Getting to his feet, Tara-Khan did as he was told.

Ria-Ka’luhr led him from the domed chamber through a low tunnel that had been hacked through the ice, which reflected the hues of yellow and gold from the flickering light from the torch.

After a few paces, the tunnel angled sharply downward, and it was tricky for Tara-Khan to keep his footing on the carved ice steps that were slick as wet glass. Ria-Ka’luhr took the steps easily, as if he was intimately familiar with each and every one.

Down and down the tunnel went. How far, Tara-Khan could not guess. But along the way, just when his ears popped, he felt something strange, a sensation not unlike that of transitioning from a vivid dream to full consciousness. Or, perhaps it was the other way around. The deeper they went into the ice, the more he was sure that the reality around him was not as it seemed.

“Where are we going?” He spoke in a whisper, as if he did not wish to awaken the ancient gods that had long been cast aside, and were perhaps buried in the ice around him. With nervous flicks of his eyes he looked through the clear patches of the walls, expecting to see their long dead faces staring back at him.

Ria-Ka’luhr paused and looked back over his shoulder. “We are nearly there.” In the light of the torch, Tara-Khan could have sworn it was not Ria-Ka’luhr ahead of him, but Ayan-Dar.

At last, the tunnel emptied into a cavern that was perhaps twice the size of the one above. The ceiling was solid ice, perhaps four or five times Tara-Khan’s height above them. One long wall was of stone, as was the floor, both of them roughly hewn and clearly not the work of any builder. A wooden door with thick black metal hinges, roughly fashioned and with a small grated window at eye height, hung open before him. Torches beyond the doorway beckoned with a warm glow of light.

Approaching the door, Tara-Khan asked in a quiet voice, “What is this?”

“Take a look for yourself. There is nothing to fear.”

Stepping through the doorway, Tara-Khan found himself in a room that was neither small nor large. In fact, he was at a loss to come to grips with its size. Everywhere he looked, stacked in precise order on shelves and stands along the walls and in standalone cases that went from floor to ceiling, were scrolls. Reaching for one, he gingerly removed it from its place and unrolled it enough to see the neat, graceful glyphs of one of the ancient tongues. He could understand a few words, but the rest was beyond him. But he knew well enough what these were. “Books of Time,” he whispered. “And very ancient ones, at that.”

“Yes,” Ria-Ka’luhr told him. “Some are inscribed upon stone, of course, others upon metal. But most are as you see here, on scrolls that are more elegant and easier for one to hold for study.”

“But of what use are these to me?”

“If you are to help Keel-Tath, if you are to become what she truly needs you to be, your skill with a sword is not enough. Merely being a warrior, however great, will not be enough.”
 

Tara-Khan stared at him, uncomprehending.

“You must become a consort who will be worthy of what Keel-Tath herself must become if she is to fulfill the prophecy and save our people,” Ria-Ka’luhr told him.
 

“And you would have me do that by reading from dusty parchment?” Tara-Khan angrily tossed the scroll onto the nearest rack, and was stabbed by a spear of guilt as he missed and it clattered to the floor. Books of Time were as sacred as healers, and to treat one in such a fashion was shameful.
 

Ria-Ka’luhr balled his fists as he glared at Tara-Khan. “The secret to the greatest weapon at her disposal is in this room, penned by the very hand of Anuir-Ruhal’te.”

“And what would that be?”

“The resting place of the Ka’i-Nur Crystal of Souls,” Ria-Ka’luhr told him. “Keel-Tath’s ascension will fail, and she and countless others — including yourself — will be lost without it.”

“I have heard enough.” Tara-Khan shook his head, looking at Ria-Ka’luhr with pitying eyes. “I do not understand how or why you are here, but being alone so long has addled your brain. Put an end to this nonsense and take me to her. You have been here all this time, and must know where the Ka’i-Nur crystal is. You can tell her yourself. There is a war to fight, and both of us should be at her side!”

“You will return to her when you are ready, and not before.” Deftly stepping back outside, Ria-Ka’luhr slammed the door closed and slid home the thick bolt, locking it.

“
No!
” Tara-Khan crashed into the thick wood, which was as hard and unyielding as living metal. Drawing his sword, he slashed at the gray-brown timbers, but the blade left little more than faint scratches in the wood.
 

“Do not bother, young one,” Ria-Ka’luhr advised. “You could chisel away at the door for all eternity and still not break free. You cannot escape until you have done what has been tasked to you.”

Tara-Khan looked through the window at the priest, and in a fit of rage stabbed his sword through the window at Ria-Ka’luhr’s face.
 

The priest snatched the weapon away with contemptuous ease. “You will not be needing this, but you might want to hold onto your dagger to cut the meat I feed you.” He turned and headed back toward the ice encased steps. “Best you take to your studies. The faster you learn what you must, the sooner we can get to the rest of your training.”

Tara-Khan thought not only of the thousands of scrolls behind him, but of those that were not even written in languages he could understand. “Are you mad? To do what you ask would take me a dozen lifetimes!”

Ria-Ka’luhr paused and turned to face him, a dark expression on his face. “I know, my son. Believe me, I know.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

Uulan-Rul’te, warrior of the Ka’i-Nur, stood upon the world that bore the name of the T’lan-Il priesthood, savoring the carnage that he and his brothers and sisters had unleashed. They had first driven the priests and priestesses from their ancestral home, leaving the temple little more than a smoldering ruin, before turning their attention to the various kingdoms that opposed Syr-Nagath and the rightful ascension of the Ka’i-Nur.
 

With a flick of his powerful wrist, he cleared some of the blood from his blade before sheathing it in the scabbard that, like his armor, gleamed like a mirror, spattered though it was with gore from the most recent battle. “I accept your honor on behalf of my mistress and high priestess of the Ka’i-Nur, Syr-Nagath,” he said in a low, gruff voice to the exhausted and battered warrior who knelt before him, sword held high in both hands. It was the second battle they had fought and won this day against one of the lower kingdoms. But who they were and to whom they were bound mattered not at all to him. His only concern was their obedience once they surrendered. “Attend to your affairs.”