Rise of the Red Harbinger (48 page)

After descending several yards, the ramp led to a spacious chamber. Torches on the walls revealed a wide room with stone walls. Once they all reached a second chamber, the rider dismounted. Savaiyon and Vasher followed the lead as three figures identical to the rider entered and led the horses away. One figure led them forward through several more chambers. Some were dimly lit while others were bright; some were filled with weapons and armor, others had books stacked neatly from floor to ceiling. One or two were decorated with scriptures written in another language. Vasher knew it to be an ancient language, from the time of the Five, when the Anonymi were first formed.

If Vasher had counted correctly, it was the ninth chamber that had drawn a deep curiosity from him. The ninth chamber had been the largest one yet. Along one wall, nine suits of elaborate armor stood side by side. Each set was identical to the rest and they all bore the same strange color that the rider had on his helmet. Vasher stared at them in wonder until he realized that the décor on the rest of the walls consisted of meticulously illustrated tapestries. The tapestries depicted several scenes of nine Anonymi warriors in combat. Distantly, Vasher heard Savaiyon clear his throat harshly and he scuttled ahead to catch up. Vasher wished there was someone to ask about that ninth chamber.

They soon came to a stop in a dim chamber that led into darkness. The Anonymi that escorted him and Savaiyon gestured with his arm that they would walk straight ahead through the darkness, then turned and went forth. Vasher followed Savaiyon and dared to only walk in a straight line. He assumed that when it was time to stop, he would likely bump into Savaiyon. It seemed like a silly way to proceed.

He walked on in the darkness. His only comfort was hearing the soft footsteps ahead of him. Vasher could no longer tell if he’d walked for one minute or for ten, but he suddenly heard numerous footsteps around him. A few pairs of hands grabbed him and halted him, but not violently. He panicked for a split second, then resisted the urge to defend himself.
I am in the darkness of the Anonymi fortress. If they truly wanted to attack me, they could.
Vasher breathed deeply and calmed his nerves. Something had been placed around his shoulders and then over his head. His eyes didn’t feel blindfolded, so it was likely a mask of some sort. The front felt cold while the sides and back felt soft and plush. Vasher did not attempt to touch his new attire, as the hands firmly held his arms and legs in place.

The hands on his legs and arms let go and one set nudged Vasher’s back for him to move again. He walked forward for a few moments until he was led into a room with one small torch on the ground in the center, and it was now clear that he wore a mask, as he could see through small slits. Based on the shadows, it seemed that the room was circular and draped in black. The hands at his back belonged to a figure that stood directly behind him. Vasher did not bother to turn around or swivel his neck. He already had a hunch about the figure’s appearance. Several other figures filtered into the room and stood around the perimeter along with Vasher, forming a circle. He wondered where they had taken Savaiyon.

Though the light was dim, Vasher could tell that the figures all wore black cloaks and the same masks as the rider he originally encountered. At once, the figures turned around and disappeared into the blackness of the walls. The hands on Vasher’s back spun him around and led him into an enclave, then forcefully sat him down, facing away from the center of the room.
So that’s where they all disappeared to
. The hands then let him go and Vasher heard the echoing footsteps walk away. He was too awestruck to get up. This was obviously some sort of ritual, so he would play along. He wished he knew where Savaiyon was, though. This was twice in two days that the man had disappeared on him.

Each person must have been situated in an enclave around the main room. Vasher sat on a bench in the tiny circular space and waited.

“Let us begin, Anonymi.” A voice echoed deeply throughout the room and even more strongly into Vasher’s enclave. Goosebumps sprung from his arms and shoulders. The voice continued. “Descendant, you have come with a request for us. State your business. If you use any manifestation in here, you will die.” The echo made it impossible for Vasher to determine the speaker’s tone or even accent, or from which enclave it came. He understood immediately that that was the point. Vasher waited a moment, still assuming that Savaiyon would somehow speak for both of them. After a few seconds, the voice spoke again. “Very well. It has been concluded that there is no business to discuss.”

Vasher panicked, “No! There is business! Please! I thought my associate would speak for us! Please allow me to state my request!” Sweat rolled down his neck and back, despite the chill of the room. Silence controlled the room for agonizing moments.

“State your business now, Descendant.”

The echo provided no comfort whatsoever. If anything, Vasher was awestruck. He was unsure of how loudly to speak, and raised his voice short of yelling. “My headmaster, Zin Marlowe, has requested your combat services in the event that Jahmash makes his return.” He hoped he’d spoken eloquently enough.

“Why can you not defend yourselves? The very nature of your existence is that you can perform deeds that ordinary men cannot.” The voice surrounded him.

“Zin Marlowe has put forth a decree that we are not allowed to practice violence, so that we may prove to Ashur that we are peaceful and trustworthy. It is his way of appeasing King Edmund.”

“Zin Marlowe knows that the Anonymi do not take sides in the conflicts of men. We only care for the well-being of Ashur.”

Vasher spoke up again, hoping that he wasn’t cutting the speaker off. “The work of the Descendants and the House of Darian is for the well-being of Ashur. We do not ask you to oppose any Ashurians, only to help us in fighting our greatest threat. If and when Jahmash returns, he will be the gravest danger that Ashur has ever seen. What better reason is there to support us? We cannot defeat Jahmash without you.” Vasher almost felt proud of himself. He hadn’t even used his manifestation and he’d presented a sound argument.

“What you ask of us is revolutionary and falls outside of our responsibilities. We have no obligation to you. If we are to accept, then we ask that the House of Darian first meets a request of ours to maintain equilibrium on both sides.”

Great, now they want favors. Marlowe didn’t say anything about bargaining, but he and Savaiyon will both be satisfied with an alliance if it means meeting a simple request
. “Very well. What is it that you need from us?” Vasher assumed they wanted money or services in return. There wasn’t much else the House could offer.

“You will kill two men for us. Violence is not your way, just as alliances are not ours. If you prove that you are serious about this alliance, then we will defend you to no end.”

Vasher’s throat dried. He swallowed his spit several times just so he could respond. “It is not our way to kill innocent men. We are not murderers.”

“Nor are we. Anonymi kill for justice. For balance. The two men you must kill are Ashur’s biggest detriments in the fight against Jahmash. By killing them, you are not only doing the Anonymi a favor. You are helping all of Ashur and help it prepare for Jahmash. Those are the terms. Do you accept or decline, Descendant?”

Vasher shook his head.
Of all times, Savaiyon picked now to be somewhere else. How is it that I am the one who has to make this decision for the entire House?
He sighed deeply. “Very well. I accept.” He hoped a weight would fall from his shoulders. Instead, they grew tenser. “And these two men, where can we find them?”

“The first is in Alvadon of Cerysia. He sits on the throne.”

Vasher’s hands trembled. “K-king Edmund?”

“It is no secret that King Edmund is the greatest oppressor of Ashur. Kill him and Ashurian conflicts will end.”

Thoughts and questions flooded Vasher’s mind, almost carrying him away from the conversation. He shook his head vigorously. He would worry about how to tell Marlowe about this later. “Very well. Who is the second man?

“The second oppressor is your Headmaster, Zin Marlowe.”

“What? You would have us kill our own leader?”

“There are many among your kind that would gladly bear that burden, given the opportunity. You must simply return home and give that opportunity a voice.”

Vasher never cared for Marlowe, but that was a long way from wanting to see the man dead. “There has to be another way. Another person.” He yearned for the sweet melody of his manifestation.

“None. If Marlowe dies by any other hand besides a Descendant’s, there is no agreement between the Anonymi and the House of Darian. You came to us. If you require our assistance, then accommodate our terms. That is all. You may go now.”

Chapter 19

A Mouse on a Ship

From
The Book of Orijin
,
Verse Thirty-Eight

Salvation shall come from your faith in Us. It is not enough to practice righteous deeds or to have pure intentions. When you wonder why the righteous suffer and the mischievous find happiness, remember that each of you has a place in the Three Rings.

Drahkunov finally stepped
below deck once again and Adria smiled for the first time in as long as she could remember. The man was likely old enough to be her father and more persistent than any boy she’d encountered at the House.
Oh, how I miss that place, though.
She had forced herself to stop thinking about The House of Darian as much as she could. Adria had been gone for several months and she knew the Descendants had assumed she and Gunnar were dead. She would have made the same assumption.

The strange thing, however, was that she was not necessarily happy to see Drahkunov walk away. Despite her being tied up to a mast and hardly fed, Drahkunov was decent company. Adria would have obviously preferred Gunnar, but who knew which of the hundreds of galleys he was on. After Gunnar, though, Drahkunov was preferable to most of the others she’d spent time with. Even some of the captives tried her patience. After just one conversation with Aric, Adria knew she had no patience to speak with him. The boy only cared for combat and strategy. Adria didn’t mind talking about those things, but Aric talked about nothing else. Just thinking about him made her bored.

Then there was Bo’az. Bo’az was a nice enough boy, but his greatest talent was feeling sorry for himself. Granted, they were prisoners and it was easy to be sad and depressed, but Bo’az’s sadness hadn’t even come from being a prisoner. He droned on and on about a girl he’d loved and how everything always happens to him. Adria had only encountered him a handful of times, but she was actually thankful that Jahmash kept his captives separated. She would have hated to have been kept in the same room as Bo’az day after day.

Jahmash. The Red Harbinger. It feels so strange to say the name. It’s like he was never a real person until a few months ago.
Adria had seen the man, spoken to him, even had him repeatedly attempt to infiltrate her mind. She did not miss that, though since they set out on the galleys, she felt a jab inside her head every now and then. If she died on this journey, the thing she would be proudest of in her life would be that she’d resisted Jahmash’s power. It had been a scary feeling at first, like the edge of a dull knife trying to cut open her mind. She’d learned to harden herself and brace herself against the pain. Sometimes it was so severe that she would fall to the ground and writhe until he gave up.

In the end, it didn’t matter anyway. Jahmash was smart. He threatened to kill her if Gunnar didn’t direct the galleys to the House of Darian. Adria was sure it had been an easy decision for Gunnar, though Adria had tried to gesture to Gunnar to let her die. She knew that for Gunnar, there had never been a choice. He wouldn’t let her die. From the time the galleys had departed, Jahmash had controlled Gunnar’s mind, forcing him to use his eyesight manifestation to locate Ashur and then the island where the House of Darian resided. Adria had never known that Gunnar’s eyesight was that good. She knew he could see miles away, even in dim light, but they had been sailing for roughly a week. Either they were going to kill Gunnar with his own manifestation, or they were keeping him very well-fed. She assumed the former. Adria only hoped that the Descendants could defend themselves well enough to make it all worthwhile.

For the first time since she’d initially arrived at the House, Adria felt guilty for not letting one of the boys influence her mind. Badalao had asked quite a few times to bond her mind, but she refused to trust him. She knew exactly what boys his age were capable of and had heard dozens of rumors about Badalao’s forays with girls. She assumed he just wanted her to be his next accomplishment. But even if her instincts about him were right, that bond would change the complexion of this surprise attack. She would have easily been able to warn him of their coming. Adria knew she would feel guilty for every casualty and injury that resulted from this attack. She only hoped that there would be Descendants left after this that she might be able to atone for her shortcomings.

“Lost in thought?”

She didn’t even realize Drahkunov had returned until he was sitting down next to her. Every time the man came close to her, he confused Adria even more. He didn’t touch her or make any advances. He didn’t outwardly flirt or make lewd remarks. He would simply smile and continue wherever the conversation had left off from the previous time. Adria almost swore that Drahkunov needed a friend more than anything else. “You could say that. So what exactly do you want with me?”

“So direct. No subtlety.” He smiled again. “Careful, you might take away the fun of talking to you.”

Adria rolled her eyes, but she wasn’t truly annoyed. “You didn’t answer my question. I am very confused about your intentions. And the books say you are from Galicea. Your accent should be much stronger, then.”

“There are books about me? Oh, what an honor! I have been gone from Ashur too long and been to too many places for that accent to be helpful. Even people in Ashur have trouble understanding Galiceans. The accent only holds me back. But tell me, do these books treat me fairly? Or am I only judged for my treachery?”

“Concerning you, I’ve only read historical and military books about the war between Galicea and Fangh-Haan, as well as the construction of the wall. They only provide the facts. And the facts certainly speak to your strengths. But answer me; I only want to know what to expect. What do you want with me?”

Drahkunov shook his head. “Right now, I want only to speak with you. You are quite literally the most interesting person that I have met in the past twenty years. Right now, I simply enjoy our conversations. I am making the most of my time with you. Who knows whether Jahmash will have me kill you once we destroy the House of Darian?”

“Is that a certainty for you? How can you be so sure of yourself?”

“I do not make assumptions when it comes to war, my dear. Jahmash has eyes on the inside of your precious House. He knows very well that most of you haven’t the slightest clue how to use your manifestations. Why do you think we are sailing? He knows that the House of Darian cannot be attacked from land.”

Adria was mad at herself for not having thought about that. She blamed it on the lack of food. Normally, that would have been a detail she would have noticed right away. “I understand why he wants to kill us all. But why you? What do you have against us?”

“Oh it is nothing personal. I hate all of Ashur. I even hate the word ‘Ashur’. Ashur is a lie. Ashur is an illusion. It is an idea that men a long time ago contrived so they could fool everyone else into believing something that was never there.”

“What?”

“Ashur is a name given to a collective of nations. But those nations hate one another. There is no brotherhood. No peace. There has never been peace and there never will be. That is why I left in the first place. Our war with Fangh-Haan disgusted me. I got so caught up believing that the Haans were the enemy that I never questioned why we were fighting in the first place. Do you know the reason? Do your books explain that objectively?”

“I read that it was because neither side could ever agree on a border. Your leaders were always at odds over whose land belonged to whom.”

“What’s the word you all love to use? Oh–gobshite! That’s a lie. The Haan leaders are very meticulous people. The borders have been set for ages. The real reason is because the Haans wanted to set up a post on the Serpent so they could regulate boats going back and forth between the nations. They were concerned about Haan smugglers in Zebulon–their own city! Our own Lords took offense and destroyed the post. How stupid is that? Every nation should be able to regulate their borders, especially if it is doing so to maintain the integrity of its own people. And look at how many people died because of that. I have no problem with all of Ashur being wiped out so we can start over and live in peace.”

“So you would kill everyone in the name of peace?”

“Is that not what mankind has done since the time of the Harbingers? At least if I had it my way, we could destroy everyone until the lesson is learned.”

“That is stupid. And if you did kill everyone, who would be left to fill your ‘peaceful’ nations?”

“This is why I enjoy speaking with you. You ask meaningful questions. Every nation that I have visited outside of Ashur is more peaceful than Ashur. Even those that are founded on military ideals know how to maintain peace so that violence is not necessary.”

Adria got stuck on one thought. “There are nations beyond Ashur?”

“I thought you were smarter than that, dear. Most of Ashur is too stupid to think that life exists beyond its waters. When Darian drowned the world, he did not kill all of it except for Ashur. He simply put oceans between the nations. However, it seems that only Ashur has not learned to live in peace. Our world is so much larger than just Ashur.”

“So then why not just leave for one of these better places? Why be concerned with Ashur if you have better options?”

“I have seen too much violence to ignore the hearts of men. Sooner or later, Ashurians will find these other nations. And when they do, they will likely bring their violence and narrowmindedness with them, like a plague. Ashur is dangerous for the rest of the world. Better to destroy it now than allow it to fester and become a problem later on. Do not misinterpret the metaphor in my words. There are those in Ashur who would welcome peace. We would likely spare them. But once Ashur is clear of all the vermin, the rest of the world can come here in peace, as well.”

“Jahmash will be satisfied then? Is that all he wants–for the Ashurians to be wiped out? And what, he’ll live among you in peace?”

Drahkunov chuckled. “All Jahmash cared about is righting the wrongs that Darian committed. You all think that Darian was so righteous. So heroic. He had his flaws, just like the rest of them. And he allowed Abram and Lionel to die for him while he ran away.”

“And he saved the lives of thousands by drowning the world and trapping Jahmash. Obviously his intent was not to kill, considering that he spared Jahmash’s life.”

“He treated women like whores. How many children did he father, from how many different women?”

“He loved every one of his wives. Why else would each of them willingly wed him, when they knew about the other women? If they were being used or only wanted to be attached to Darian’s status, they wouldn’t have bothered.”

“And you would marry a man with twelve wives? Just because he told you that he loved you equally?”

Adria stumbled to find a retort. She desperately said the first thing that came to mind. “How many lives have been brought into this world because of him? Valuable lives?”

“Pointless lives. Weak, violent lives.”

Adria’s shoulders tensed even more. She hadn’t thought that could be possible. “It is clear that no amount of logic will win with you. There is no point in arguing.”

Drahkunov stared at her from the corner of his eye, then huffed and stood. “I had hoped for a better argument. You disappoint me. Perhaps your mind is too tired from resisting Jahmash. I shall bring you some food.” He walked back below deck.

Adria looked forward to the meal. They did not feed her much, but the food was the same that Drahkunov ate. She felt somewhat disappointed that she’d let him down, but the man was right. She hadn’t eaten a proper portion in months. Once or twice, they needed her manifestation, so they fed her well. She hadn’t really thought clearly in a long time. Hunger always seemed to get in the way and she never knew when Jahmash would try to trespass her thoughts again.

Drahkunov had mentioned that Jahmash had someone on the inside. If true, then there was at least one traitor in the House. Maybe even more. But Drahkunov could easily have been lying to her. Regardless, it was a disturbing notion. She regretted not bonding with Lao even more.

Adria also regretted that no fight training was allowed at the House. When Gunnar had proposed the idea of sparring at night so that Marlowe wouldn’t know, Adria had strictly opposed it. She had figured that if Marlowe had a rule against it, then it was likely a bad thing. Since then, especially now, she had regretted opposing Gunnar and those whom he’d recruited.

The only comfort was that physically fighting back would do no good right now. She was in the middle of hundreds of ships in the ocean, on a ship with dozens of men who likely did know how to fight. As angry as she was, Adria knew she had to maintain her composure and wait for a better time. She would have to save her energy and fight with her mind.

Before she left her parents in Taiju, Adria had visited the Blind Woman in the city to see if anything pertained to her. All that Katre had told her was that she would return home to see her parents. At the time, Adria had been disappointed at the banality of the prophecy. It hadn’t spoken of anything exciting or adventurous. At this point, however, Adria could not have asked for a more uplifting thought. She wondered if Katre had known more and simply held back some information. Luckily, Adria would have the option of finding out one day.