The Key to Creation (53 page)

He was still riding hard when the first barrel detonated with a roar like all of Ondun’s anger unleashed at once; his mare stumbled from the shock wave, and the soldier he held nearly slipped off the saddle. The explosion spread across the seven firepowder wagons, hammering through the stone blocks and the wooden gate. Boulders, shattered rock, and splintered wood flew in all directions, carried high by the fire and smoke.

From her front line, Queen Anjine watched with awe. The explosions were far more spectacular than she had dared hope. Around her, cavalrymen and Tierran footsoldiers fell silent, drawing a simultaneous breath. Moments later, they exhaled in a wild and frantic cheer.

The explosions had smashed a large hole in the barricade, and the titanic wooden doors groaned with slow thunder as they collapsed inward to crush many of the enemy soldiers waiting there.

“To Ishalem!” Anjine shouted, and a resounding cry from the troops echoed her words. The queen watched from her position as thousands of faithful Aidenists poured through the wall and into the holy city.

The
Dyscovera

When the boats reached the
Dyscovera
and
Al-Orizin
, the two captains didn’t know how their crews would accept such changes in the very foundations of their history, their beliefs. The two holy brothers had sailed home,
side by side
. Aiden and Urec hadn’t hated each other. There had been no betrayal, no abandonment, and neither brother had remained behind in Tierra or Uraba.

Criston had brought the ancient Captains’ Log back from the frozen grotto. The Saedrans would study the pages, learn the stories that had never been told. Whenever Sikara Fyiri was found, she would also want to see it (and no doubt argue endlessly with Prester Hannes over its content).

As word spread about the discoveries inside the grotto, the crewmembers were as confused as they were jubilant. Standing together, both captains called for calm and caution, while even the most devout followers of Aiden and Urec wrestled with the contradictions.

“We have to decide what Ondun would want us to do. We need to learn more,” Criston said. “Tomorrow, we take parties ashore to explore the new continent. At last, we will see Terravitae.”

Prester Hannes could not comprehend why the two captains were so cordial with each other. After the massacre of his hometown, Captain Vora knew full well the violence and treachery that the Urecari held in their hearts.

Meanwhile, no one had found Sikara Fyiri, and the
Al-Orizin
sailors were growing concerned. Hannes hid his satisfaction, but he was particularly annoyed when he heard a silly rumor suggesting that Ondun Himself had translated her off to Paradise, leaving the rest of them behind as unworthy. The followers of Urec were such gullible fools! Even if the vile priestess had lived long enough to see the grotto, she would have found some way to delude herself into thinking that the two frozen brothers proved the
Urecari
version of the story. Lies, of course.

In his own cabin—which he had scrubbed clean of Fyiri’s blood—Hannes stared at the Book of Aiden. How had he misinterpreted the lines of scripture? What other explanation could there be? The things he had seen on the voyage—the Leviathan skeleton, the stone obelisk, a young woman who claimed to be the daughter of Ondun—challenged
everything
he knew to be true. The secret grotto with the preserved bodies of two demigods, side by side, was such a fundamental paradox that it could not be tolerated. Weak-willed members of the church would be confused; they might come to the wrong conclusion, or begin to doubt.

Hannes knew exactly what he had to do.

The following day, boats full of sailors—half of them Urecari—would go ashore and explore the land; other parties might return to the sacred grotto and continue to poke around, where they would probably find more lies. Hannes had to act before then.

After midnight, he came out on deck, passed a sailor on night watch. “I have come out to gaze upon Terravitae and pray.”

“Pray for us all, Prester. Our long voyage is finally at an end.” Hannes performed a perfunctory blessing, and the man went about his rounds.

He could have tried to enlist the watchman’s aid, but he had decided to take Javian instead. Safer that way. The intelligent, respectful young man had always been interested in Aidenism, and Hannes was confident that Javian would understand what needed to be done.

When Hannes roused him and led him to a quiet place at the stern, he spoke in a whisper. “I need you to go with me back to the ice cave. I have a task to do—a task for Aiden and Ondun—which cannot be done with a crowd of people looking on.” He glanced meaningfully toward the battered
Al-Orizin
. “And I want to be away from the eyes of those followers of Urec.”

The prester had brought two of his sturdy preaching staffs, each one tipped with a bronze fishhook. Javian’s eyes were wide and dark in the starlight. “Are we going to set up a shrine beside the preserved bodies?”

The prester smiled. That seemed a good enough explanation. “Yes, and we must do it before Sikara Fyiri tries to defile it with her Golden Fern.”

Javian looked troubled. “We should ask Captain Vora first.”

Hannes fought to contain his anger, making sure the young man couldn’t see it. “
I
am the captain of the church, and this is unquestionably a religious matter.” Later, he would find some way to dispose of the Captains’ Log as well.

Javian pondered this for a moment, then agreed. After the two managed to lower the boat quietly into the water, the young man began to row, while Prester Hannes sat motionless. He gripped the two preaching staffs—one for him and one for the young man—as if they were spears to fight against heretics. The prester stared ahead, listening to the night, wrapped up in his own thoughts.

The rushing waves were loud, scouring the rocks. He closed his eyes as they approached the cliffs, but he could not forget the lie of what he had seen.

He could only imagine what Prester-Marshall Baine would have said about this conundrum. The fiery church leader had picked him to live among the Urecari and study their falsehoods, to expose the enemy’s weaknesses. Hannes’s whole life had shaped him into a soldier for God, with the mission to improve the world in the name of Ondun. And now, on the far side of the world, he found himself alone again with his faith, called upon to save the Aidenist church and its sacred beliefs.

“Tonight, Javian, we will do a deed to help all future generations, whether or not they applaud us for it, or even know what we have done.”

Hannes never questioned whether the young man could maneuver them safely through the surf or thread his way to the icy grotto. He removed the two pitch-wrapped torches he had brought along and lit them to guide their way. Javian pulled the oars, taking them into the gullet-like passage, where ice crystals reflected orange gleams of torchlight in all directions.

Reaching the large grotto, the young man pulled the boat up to where the stone platform met the still water. Icicle stalactites and stalagmites formed the pillars of a mythical temple.

Stepping out of the boat and onto the stone floor of the vault, Hannes wedged the torches into cracks in the stone and handed Javian one of the heavy preaching staffs. “You have been educated in the ways of Aiden, young man. You know the truth, for I have told it to you.”

Javian looked uncertainly at the staff in his hands. “I’ve heard your sermons, Prester.”

“Then you know that the fundamental power of Aidenism is
faith
. No believer who hopes for salvation can question his beliefs, because that would be questioning Ondun Himself.”

Hannes was convinced that the revelations in this tomb would destroy the church. The tableau raised too many unanswerable blasphemous questions, and he could never allow that, no matter the cost. Because the prester’s faith was so strong, he was even willing to strand the two exploration ships, and himself, on this unknown shore in order to preserve the secret. It was the only safe course.

He did his best to explain the obvious to Javian, but the young man turned white, appalled. “So you’re saying our entire voyage, everything we found, every struggle we survived, was just a test for us to discover a…a
trick
? That none of this is real? I can’t believe that, Prester!”

“Nevertheless, you must believe it,” Hannes said. “And this is what we have to do.” He stepped toward the two frozen men seated in their petrified chairs as if positioned to be the judges of mankind. Hannes raised the Fishhook staff back over his shoulder and brought it down hard against the side of Urec’s chair, smashing away the ice. He pounded again, the blow echoing through the grotto as Javian cried out in dismay. A third swing and he smashed one of the navigational instruments.

Panting, he said, “Help me destroy the evidence and cast it into the sea.”

The
Dyscovera
and the
Al-Orizin

In the dark hours before dawn, Kjelnar came to Criston’s cabin, dripping wet. He didn’t look cold, but his expression was grim. “We’ve found something, Captain…something you must see.”

Criston felt a dread in his chest. He stepped out into the starlit air, fully awake, to see other mer-Saedrans climbing up the side of the ship and gathering on deck. The undersea people carried something with them.

King Sonhir crossed his arms over his bare chest as two mer-Saedrans spread a body on the deck—a woman’s body, still wrapped in bright red robes. “We found the missing priestess, Captain,” Kjelnar said. “The body was weighted down.”

“Did she…kill herself?” Criston knew that Prester Hannes’s faith had been disturbed by recent events; had the Urecari priestess been unable to cope with the revelations?

Sonhir let out a humorless snort. “Not unless she found some way to plunge a dagger into her own heart, then tie the weight-stone around her ankles and jump overboard.”

The mer-Saedrans pulled aside the red robes to expose the knife wound over her heart. Fyiri’s skin was gray and puckered, her face bloated and ugly. Parts of her fingers, lips, and nose were already missing from where undersea creatures had fed.

The slowly awakening truth was far uglier than the corpse. “Go to the
Al-Orizin
and send for Captain Saan immediately.” He clenched his fists, then released them. “And somebody bring Prester Hannes out here, now. I have questions for him.”

Saan wore a tense, contradictory expression; Criston knew that his son had clashed with the Urecari priestess, just as he himself had often disagreed with Prester Hannes. “My crew is not going to like this,” Saan muttered.

Mia came running back to them, her expression curdled. “The prester isn’t in his cabin, Captain—and I can’t find Javian, either. What if he’s done something to
Javian
?” She looked down at the sikara’s corpse. “It’s obvious he killed that woman.”

Ystya was distraught. “I did not think you came to Terravitae for murder.”

Criston wanted to stop the situation from growing into a deadly clash. “If Hannes did this, I will not defend his actions. We have to find him.”

Another crewman ran up. “Captain, one of the ship’s boats is gone.”

Criston swore out loud, immediately knowing the answer. “Hannes must have gone back to the grotto himself, and he took Javian with him.”

Saan gave a grim nod. “We’d better put a stop to whatever your prester is doing.”

When King Sonhir looked from the sikara’s body to Criston, he spoke no accusations, though his thoughts were clearly judgmental. Kjelnar said, “The mer-Saedrans will pull you along—that’ll be fastest. Take one boat from each ship. No telling how long the prester has been about his mischief.”

Criston indicated Fyiri’s body. “Get some canvas to wrap her up and take her below until we get this solved.”

The captains climbed into the pair of boats at water level, followed by Ystya and the two Saedrans, as well as Grigovar and Yal Dolicar. Mia insisted on going along, concerned for Javian, and Criston didn’t have the time or inclination to argue with her. “Javian isn’t part of it,” she said.

“That remains to be seen.” King Sonhir dove into the water in front of the two boats. When everyone was situated, a group of mer-Saedrans grasped the tow lines and took off, pulling the boats at a fast pace toward the sacred grotto on Terravitae.

Ishalem Wall

The Teacher struggled to remain conscious after her brother left. Though her arrow wound ached, Alisi could not let herself be found like this, wounded and weak. With Unwar gone, she pulled the bloodstained robe around her and fought to gather her strength. The ominous figure of the Teacher needed to be visible to trigger any
ra’virs
who might still be among the Aidenist invaders. This was their last chance.

She fixed the silver mask in place and pulled the hood over her close-cropped dark hair. Walking slowly to hide her faltering steps, the Teacher made her way through the chaos of running soldiers, past numerous dead and dying men who lay akimbo with long arrows sprouting from their bodies. She spotted her brother standing just above the wooden gate, calling for his soldiers to stand firm regardless of the Aidenist archers.

And then the wall exploded.

The blast knocked her backward and she fell sprawling. It was agony to regain her feet, but she paid no attention to the pain. Through the rock dust and smoke, she watched the stone barrier collapse, burying—burying!—her brother. The Teacher scrambled forward, screaming his name through the silver mask.

God’s Barricade came tumbling down. Broken stone blocks, powder, and smoke accompanied the roar, and the Aidenist army flooded through the breach. They trampled the shattered gate, their cavalry horses screaming and rearing as riders urged them into Ishalem.