The Gift of Battle (7 page)

Volusia stood
before her many advisors in the streets of the Empire capital, staring at the
looking glass in her hand with shock. She examined her new face from every
angle—half of it still beautiful, and the other half disfigured, melted
away—and she felt a wave of disgust. The fact that half of her beauty still
remained somehow made it all worse. It would have been easier, she realized, if
her entire face had been disfigured—then she could remember nothing of her
former looks.

Volusia recalled
her stunning good looks, the root of her power, which had carried her through
every event in life, which had allowed her to manipulate men and women alike,
to bring men to their knees with a single glance. Now, all that was gone. Now,
she was just another seventeen-year-old girl—and worse, half-monster. She could
not stand the sight of her own face.

In a burst of
rage and desperation, Volusia flung the looking glass down and watched as it
smashed to pieces on the pristine streets of the capital. All of her advisors
stood there, silent, looking away, all knowing better than to talk to her at
this moment. It was also clear to her, as she surveyed their faces, that none
of them wanted to look at her, to see the horror that was now her face.

Volusia looked
around for the Volks, eager to tear them apart—but they were already gone,
having disappeared as soon as they had cast that awful spell on her. She’d been
warned not to join forces with them, and now she realized all the warnings had
been right. She had paid the price dearly for it. A price that could never be
turned back.

Volusia wanted
to let her rage out on someone, and her eyes fell on Brin, her new commander, a
statuesque warrior just a few years older than her, who had been courting her
for moons. Young, tall, muscular, he had stunning good looks and had lusted
after her the entire time she had known him. Yet now, to her fury, he would not
even meet her gaze.

“You,” Volusia
hissed at him, barely able to contain herself. “Will you now not even look at
me?”

Volusia flushed
as he looked up but would not meet her eyes. This was her destiny now, for the
rest of her life, she knew, to be viewed as a freak.

“Am I disgusting
to you now?” she asked, her voice breaking in desperation.

He hung his head
low, but did not respond.

“Very well,” she
said finally, after a long silence, determined to exact vengeance on someone,
“then I
command
you: you will gaze at the face which you hate the most.
You will prove to me that I am beautiful. You will sleep with me.”

The commander
looked up and met her eyes for the first time, fear and horror in his
expression.

“Goddess?” he
asked, his voice cracking, terrified, knowing he would face death if he defied
her command.

Volusia smiled
wide, happy for the first time, realizing that would be the perfect revenge: to
sleep with the man who found her most loathsome.

“After you,” she
said, stepping aside and gesturing toward her chamber.

*

Volusia stood
before the tall arched, open-air window on the top floor of the palace of the
Empire capital, and as the early morning suns rose, the drapes billowing in her
face, she cried quietly. She could feel her teardrops trickling down the good
side of her face but not the other, the side melted away. It was numb.

A light snoring
punctuated the air, and Volusia glanced over her shoulder to see Brin lying
there, still asleep, his face bunched up in an expression of disgust, even in
sleep. He had hated every moment he had lain with her, she knew, and that had
brought her some small revenge. Yet still she did not feel satisfied. She could
not let it out on the Volks, and she still felt a need for vengeance.

It was a weak
bit of vengeance, hardly the one she craved. The Volks, after all, had
disappeared, while here she was, the next morning, still alive, still stuck
with herself, as she would have to be for the rest of her life. Stuck with
these looks, this disfigured face, which even she could not bear.

Volusia wiped
back the tears and looked out, beyond the city line, beyond the capital walls,
deep on the horizon. As the suns rose, she began to see the faintest trace of
the armies of the Knights of the Seven, their black banners lining the horizon.
They were camped out there, and their armies were mounting. They were
encircling her slowly, gathering millions from all corners of the Empire, all
preparing to invade. To crush her.

She welcomed the
confrontation. She did not need the Volks, she knew. She did not need any of
her men. She could kill them on her own. She was, after all, a goddess. She had
left the realm of mortals long ago, and now she was a legend, a legend that no
one, and no army, in the world could stop. She would greet them on her own, and
she would kill them all, for all time.

Then, finally,
there would be no one left to confront her. Then, her powers would be supreme.

Volusia heard a
rustling behind her and out of the corner of her eye, she detected motion. She
saw Brin rise from bed, casting off his sheets and beginning to dress. She saw
him slinking around, careful to be quiet, and she realized he meant to slip out
from the room before she saw him—so that he would never have to look upon her
face again. It added insult to injury.

“Oh, Commander,”
she called out casually.

She saw him
freeze in his tracks in fear; he turned and looked over at her reluctantly, and
as he did, she smiled back, torturing him with the grotesqueness of her melted
lips.

“Come here,
Commander,” she said. “Before you leave, there is something I want to show
you.”

He slowly turned
and walked, crossing the room until he reached her side, and he stood there,
looking out, looking anywhere but at her face.

“Have you not
one sweet parting kiss for your Goddess?” she asked.

She could see
him flinch ever so slightly, and she felt fresh anger burning within her.

“Never mind,”
she added, her expression darkening. “But there is, at least, something I want
to show you. Have a look. Do you see out there, on the horizon? Look closely.
Tell me what you see down there.”

He stepped
forward and she laid a hand on his shoulder. He leaned forward and examined the
skyline, and as he did, she watched his brow furrow in confusion.

“I see nothing,
Goddess. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

Volusia smiled
wide, feeling the old sense of vindictiveness rise up within her, feeling the
old need for violence, for cruelty.

“Look more
closely, Commander,” she said.

He leaned
forward, just a bit more, and in one quick motion, Volusia grabbed his shirt from
behind, and with all her might, threw him face first out the window.

Brin shrieked as
he flailed and flew through the air, dropping down all the way, a hundred feet,
until finally he landed face first, instantly dead, on the streets below. The
thud reverberated in the otherwise quiet streets.

Volusia smiled
wide, examining his body, finally feeling a sense of vengeance.

“It is yourself
you see,” she replied. “Who is the less grotesque of us now?”

Gwendolyn walked
through the dim corridors of the tower of the Light Seekers, Krohn at her side,
walking slowly up the circular ramp along the sides of the building. The path
was lined with torches and cult worshipers, standing silently at attention,
hands hidden in their robes, and Gwen’s curiosity deepened as she continued to
ascend one level after another. The King’s son, Kristof, had led her halfway up
after their meeting, then had turned and descended, instructing her that she
would have to complete the journey alone to see Eldof, that she alone could
face him. The way they all spoke about him, it was as if he were a god.

Soft chanting
filled the air heavy with incense, as Gwen walked up the very gradual ramp, and
wondered: What secret was Eldof guarding? Would he give her the knowledge she
needed to save the King and save the Ridge? Would she ever be able to retrieve
the King’s family from this place?

As Gwen turned a
corner, the tower suddenly opened up, and she gasped at the sight. She entered
a soaring chamber with a hundred-foot ceiling, its walls lined with floor to
ceiling stained glass windows. A muted light flooded through, filled with
scarlets, purples, and pinks, lending the chamber an ethereal quality. And what
made it all most surreal of all was to see one man sitting alone in this vast
place, in the center of the room, the shafts of light coming down on him as if
to illuminate him and him alone.

Eldof.

Gwen’s heart
pounded as she saw him sitting there at the far end of the chamber, like a god
who had dropped down from the sky. He sat there, hands folded in his shining
golden cloak, his head stark bald, on a huge and magnificent throne carved of
ivory, torches on either side of it and on the ramp leading to it, obliquely
lighting the room. This chamber, that throne, the ramp leading to it—it was
more awe-inspiring than approaching a King. She realized at once why the King
felt threatened by his presence, his cult, this tower. It was all designed to
inspire awe and subservience.

He did not
beckon her, or even acknowledge her presence, and Gwen, not knowing what else
to do, began to ascend the long, golden walkway leading to his throne. As she
went she saw he wasn’t alone in here after all, for obscured in the shadows
were rows of worshipers all lined up, eyes closed, hands tucked in their
cloaks, lining the ramp. She wondered how many thousands of followers he had.

She finally
stopped a few feet before his throne and looked up.

He looked back
down with eyes that seemed ancient, ice-blue, glowing, and while he smiled down
at her, his eyes held no warmth. They were hypnotizing. It reminded her of
being in Argon’s presence.

She did not know
what to say as he stared down; it felt as if he were staring into her soul. She
stood there in the silence, waiting until he was ready, and beside her, she
could feel Krohn stiffening, equally on edge.

“Gwendolyn of
the Western Kingdom of the Ring, daughter of King MacGil, last hope for the
savior of her people—and ours,” he pronounced slowly, as if reading from some
ancient script, his voice deeper than any she’d ever heard, sounding as if it
had resonated from the stone itself. His eyes bore into hers, and his voice was
hypnotic. As she stared into them, it made her lose all sense of space and time
and place, and already, Gwen could feel herself getting sucked in by his cult
of personality. She felt entranced, as if she could look nowhere else, even if
she tried. She immediately felt as if he were the center of her world, and she
understood at once how all of these people had come to worship and follow him.

Gwen stared
back, momentarily at a loss for words, something that had rarely happened to
her. She had never felt so star-struck—she, who had been before many Kings and
Queens; she, who was Queen herself; she, the daughter of a King. This man had a
quality to him, something she could not quite describe; for a moment, she even
forgot why she had come here.

Finally, she
cleared her mind long enough to be able to speak.

“I have come,”
she began, “because—”

He laughed,
interrupting her, a short, deep sound.

“I know why you
have come,” he said. “I knew before
you
even did. I knew of your arrival
in this place—indeed, I knew even before you crossed the Great Waste. I knew of
your departure from the Ring, your travel to the Upper Isles, and of your
travels across the sea. I know of your husband, Thorgrin, and of your son,
Guwayne. I have watched you with great interest, Gwendolyn. For centuries, I
have watched you.”

Gwen felt a
chill at his words, at the familiarity of this person she didn’t know. She felt
a tingling in her arms, up her spine, wondering how he knew all this. She felt
that once she was in his orbit, she could not escape if she tried.

“How do you know
all this?” she asked.

He smiled.

“I am Eldof. I
am both the beginning and the end of knowledge.”

He stood, and
she was shocked to see he was twice as tall as any man she’d met. He took a
step closer, down the ramp, and with his eyes so mesmerizing, Gwen felt as if
she could not move in his presence. It was so hard to concentrate before him,
to think an independent thought for herself.

Gwen forced
herself to clear her mind, to focus on the business at hand.

“Your King needs
you,” she said. “The Ridge needs you.”

He laughed.

“
My
King?” he echoed with disdain.

Gwen forced
herself to press on.

“He believes you
know how to save the Ridge. He believes you are holding a secret from him, one
that could save this place and all of these people.”

“I am,” he
replied flatly.

Gwen was taken
aback at his immediate, frank reply, and hardly knew what to say. She had expected
him to deny it.

“You
are
?”
she asked, flabbergasted.

He smiled but
said nothing.

“But why?” she
asked. “Why won’t you share this secret?”

“And why should
I do that?” he asked

“
Why?
”
she asked, stumped. “Of course, to save this kingdom, to save his people.”

“And why would I
want to do that?” he pressed.

Gwen narrowed
her eyes, confused; she had no idea how to respond. Finally, he sighed.

“Your problem,”
he said, “is that you believe everyone is meant to be saved. But that is where
you are wrong. You look at time in the lens of mere decades; I view it in terms
of centuries. You look at people as indispensable; I view them as mere cogs in
the great wheel of destiny and time.”

He took a step
closer, his eyes searing.

“Some people,
Gwendolyn, are
meant
to die. Some people
need
to die.”

“
Need
to
die?” she asked, horrified.

“Some must die
to set others free,” he said. “Some must fall so that others may rise. What
makes one person more important than another? One place more important than
another?”

She pondered his
words, increasingly confused.

“Without
destruction, without waste, growth could not follow. Without the empty sands of
the desert, there can be no foundation on which to build the great cities. What
matters more: the destruction, or the growth to follow? Don’t you understand?
What is destruction but a foundation?”

Gwen, confused,
tried to understand, but his words only deepened her confusion.

“Then are you
going to stand by and let the Ridge and its people die?” she asked. “Why? How
would that benefit you?”

He laughed.

“Why should
everything always be for a benefit?” he asked. “I won’t save them because they
are not
meant
to be saved,” he said emphatically. “This place, this
Ridge, it is not meant to survive. It is meant to be destroyed. This King is
meant to be destroyed. All these people are meant to be destroyed. And it is
not for me to stand in the way of destiny. I have been granted the gift to see
the future—but that is a gift I shall not abuse. I shall not change what I see.
Who am I to stand in the way of destiny?”

Gwendolyn could
not help but think of Thorgrin, of Guwayne.

Eldof smiled
wide.

“Ah yes,” he
said, looking right at her. “Your husband. Your son.”

Gwen looked
back, shocked, wondering how he’d read her mind.

“You want to
help them so badly,” he added, then shook his head. “But sometimes you cannot
change destiny.”

She reddened and
shook off his words, determined.

“I
will
change destiny,” she said emphatically. “Whatever it takes. Even if I have to
give up my very own soul.”

Eldof looked at
her long and hard, studying her.

“Yes,” he said.
“You will, won’t you? I can see that strength in you. A warrior’s spirit.”

He examined her,
and for the first time she saw a bit of certainty in his expression.

“I did not
expect to find this within you,” he continued, his voice humbled. “There are a
select few, like yourself, who do have the power to change destiny. But the
price you will pay is very great.”

He sighed, as if
shaking off a vision.

“In any case,”
he continued, “you will not change destiny here—not in the Ridge. Death is
coming here. What they need is not a rescue—but an exodus. They need a new
leader, to lead them across the Great Waste. I think you already know that you
are that leader.”

Gwen felt a
chill at his words. She could not imagine herself having the strength to go
through it all again.

“How can I lead
them?” she asked, exhausted at the thought. “And where is there left to go? We
are in the midst of nowhere.”

He turned away,
falling silent, and as he began to walk away, Gwen felt a sudden burning desire
to know more.

“Tell me,” she
said, rushing out and grabbing his arm.

He turned and
looked at her hand, as if a snake were touching him, until finally she removed
it. Several of his monks rushed forth out of the shadows and hovered close by,
looking at her angrily—until finally Eldof nodded at them, and they retreated.

“Tell me,” he
said to her, “I will answer you once. Just once. What is it that you wish to
know?”

Gwen took a deep
breath, desperate.

“Guwayne,” she
said, breathless. “My son. How do I get him back? How do I change destiny?”

He looked at her
long and hard.

“The answer has
been before you all along, and yet you don’t see.”

Gwen racked her
brain, desperate to know, and yet she could not understand what it was.

“Argon,” he added.
“There remains one secret he has feared to tell you. That is where your answer
lies.”

Gwen was
shocked.

“Argon?” she
asked. “Does Argon know?”

Eldof shook his
head.

“He does not.
But his master does.”

Gwen’s mind
reeled.

“His
master
?”
she asked.

Gwen had never
considered Argon having a master.

Eldof nodded.

“Demand that he
bring you to him,” he said, a finality in his voice. “The answers you receive
will startle even you.”