The Legend of Asahiel: Book 03 - The Divine Talisman (39 page)

Another wave of scouts followed half an hour later, and another after them, setting up a relay that would allow reports to extend farther and return more quickly. By then, they rode forth almost without contest. Of the more than fifty thousand Illychar that had assailed Leaven’s walls, perhaps a thousand remained, clustered mostly around the east gate. The rest had been siphoned off with ever-growing haste, leaving the way as clear as it was likely to get.

Nevertheless, Corathel waited, with eyes peeled for the return of his scouts—or the enemy. As the final decision loomed, the people’s anxiety grew, both for and against the planned evacuation. A few small riots broke within the streets, while atop the battlements, soldiers strutted nervously, a mix of hope and dread reflected in their gazes. The winds shifted, so that most believed they could smell now the approach of that great, spreading smoke plume—that which heralded either their doom or their salvation. The columns that fueled it marched alongside one another like disciplined sentinels. Black and ominous, they held a desperate people spellbound, frozen with anticipation.

Another hour passed, with the sun picking its way carefully across a cloud-littered sky. The relative quiet beyond Leaven’s walls struck an eerie, echoing chord in the ears of those who had listened for so long to the roar of combat. As if an entire ocean had ceased to stir.

The first scout to return came from the west. A fiery arrow announced his arrival, and a contingent sallied forth to sweep away the dozen or so reavers that blocked his way. His news brought a sense of relief. The western road was clear.

Two more arrived the same way, bringing tidings from south and east. The reavers were several leagues beyond the reach of the eastern scouts, doing battle upon the Fields of Ravacost. The roots of the smoke columns remained hidden from view, but whatever the source of those blazes, it seemed to be contained.

Southward, along the broken slopes of the Whistlecrags, they had seen only birds—mostly carrion-eaters—amid the trees.

That was enough for Corathel. After a final briefing, the barriers used to shore up the various gates were brought down, and the portals themselves opened. The main gate drew the most attention. Reavers upon the eastern slopes rushed to fill the breach, only to be hewn down by those waiting within. From the south and west, cavalrymen spilled forth, riding circuit around the city walls. All the while, lookouts scanned the horizon in every direction, wary of ambush.

When none came, the true exodus began. Their options were to march west through the mountains toward Laulk before turning south, or ride south from the main gate and cut west later along the tail of the Whistlecrags. The latter was the larger road, and likely swifter, but the former was deemed safer.
Not only would it put more initial distance between themselves and fifty thousand reavers, but, should something go awry, the mountains would help to shield them. Afterward, they would have the option of remaining at Laulk or continuing west toward Alson, should the southern road prove unnavigable to them.

A force of twelve thousand led the way, commanded by Generals Maltyk and Bannon. Behind this shield would stream some four hundred thousand souls—the populations of Laulk, Leaven, and an untold number of refugees inherited from the surrounding lands over the past months. Lar, Dengyn, and another twelve thousand troops would serve as rear guard, with every man, forward and back, doing what he could to ensure a bloodless retreat.

The first few hours were the worst. Despite his wounds, Corathel paced fretfully, and tensed every time a status report was delivered. Most of the populace cooperated readily enough; after hunkering helplessly for more than a fortnight against such ravening creatures, they were more than ready to be on the move. But there were plenty who feared leaving the last shelter they might find, and thousands of others whose infirmities brought the overall pace to a crawl. Packhorses and draft animals were in abundance, many of which balked and brayed with reservations of their own. Ragenon and the city garrison tended to these and other issues, maintaining order and safety while pressing the pace. Despite the effort, it did not seem nearly fast enough.

By dusk, however, only stragglers remained. Lar and Dengyn ushered them on their way, sweeping the streets and plazas of looters and cripples, orphans and urchins, and those who could not bring themselves to leave their homes without a stern nudge. Lar’s troops did not have the time or numbers to ferret out all who might be determined to stay, but Corathel wanted to make sure that none were simply abandoned. Provided those who wished to escape were given a chance to do so, the chief general could suffer the loss of a few dregs.

But that would be up to his lieutenants. The time had come to set his own course. At the head of four thousand remaining soldiers, he and Jasyn set out through the east gate, in search of the southern road. It would be their job to divert and defend against any reavers that came sniffing back too soon, giving the bulk of their people a better chance to reach safety. If the gods were good, all would reunite at the Gaperon before entering the lands of Kuuria. If not…

He grimaced with every jarring stride his mount took upon that rutted road. To the east, the black shafts to which he owed his freedom rose starkly through reddened skies, a line of bruises against the setting sun. It still troubled him, not knowing what they were. A godsend, yes, but what would be the price?

He veered south as darkness fell. By then, the men in his column began to relax somewhat in their stolen freedom. Their words were few, and their voices hushed. But haunted eyes and severe frowns were giving way to relieved smiles and even rare snippets of shared laughter. Corathel was glad for them. The road to Kuuria promised only danger, and even if they were
to arrive safely, they had nothing to look forward to but a long, harrowing struggle for the liberation of their lands.

Let them find solace where they may.

“The tail is clear,” Jasyn reported, having ridden up the column to rein in beside him. “I ordered the east gate barred behind us.”

Did we make the right choice?
“I feel suddenly naked,” he admitted.

“And never so refreshed,” Jasyn replied cheerfully. “Siege defense is about as exciting as sweeping cobwebs from rafters.”

A far cry from the trench-and-field warfare they were more accustomed to, certainly. “Best get used to it. I suspect we’ll spend a lot more time languishing behind walls before this is done.”

Jasyn’s face soured at the prospect. He glanced over his pauldron-encased shoulder, peering to the east. “Shall we lay wager on how long it takes them to find us?”

“I seem to have misplaced my coin purse. But if you—”

“Reavers!” someone shouted.

The call came from the right forward flank. Corathel whipped his head in that direction. A small pack of Illychar was emerging from a copse of hemlock, upon a jutting ridge perhaps ten feet overhead. At a distance of thirty paces, they were already well within bowshot of the archers warding the regiment’s western face. Mounts whickered as they halted, while bows and arrows came to hand.

Corathel wrestled with his own steed, eyes locked upon that shallow ridge. Elves. In the deepening darkness, against the backdrop of trees, it was difficult to discern much else. Five, six, no more. They bore weapons—spears and slings and giant longbows—but did not brandish them. A few crouched low before one who stood tall in the center.

The chief general gaped with hopeful suspicion. “Hold!”

He spurred his horse ahead. Jasyn kept to his side, sword drawn, echoing his order. Though most held their shots, a few of the archers had already loosed.

Their shafts streaked unerringly through the darkness, but the elves avoided them or swept them aside. Corathel did not slow, but continued on with his hand raised and his retinue in tow, until grinding to a halt at the base of the overlook.

A smile split his features as he looked up at Owl and his Mookla’ayans.

“Should you not be halfway home to your jungles by now?”

Owl pointed and clicked his tongue, spouting gibberish.

“They could still be reavers, sir,” Jasyn reminded him.

“Then where are the rest of them? Sheathe your blade.” He bowed to the elf leader, who responded with an indecipherable gesture. He then addressed the commander of his ready archers. “Stand down, Corporal. These are ours.”

Moments later, with greetings and pulses exchanged, they were headed south once more. Corathel ordered his guard ring to fall back, making room
for Owl and his few remaining clansmen. His men obeyed with scowls and wrinkled noses in the wake of spoken protest. Even his horse seemed wary and agitated by the presence of the natives.

Corathel didn’t care. Little had changed, all in all. He had still abandoned Leaven and was leaving his lands to the reavers. A perilous, uncertain trek lay ahead. His wounds still throbbed and would be given scant opportunity to heal. He had picked up a handful of savages was all, onetime enemies he could not even speak with, and whose own numbers had been cut down to almost nothing.

But it was enough to shed new light upon murky hopes, and reassure him in what had been just another dubious venture.

“You seem in better spirits,” Jasyn observed. “Do you truly believe this troop can make any sort of difference?”

Corathel grinned. Though he could not justify the feeling, he was not about to fight it. On this night of their miraculous escape, anything seemed possible.

S
OMETHING WAS WRONG.

Amid the darkness…a whispered murmur, a briny scent, both growing stronger. But he no longer sensed such things. He lacked the form with which to do so. He had no ears, no nose—

His eyes fluttered open, and the darkness receded in a dizzying rush. He thought at once of the dream, and closed his eyes again, seeking to recapture it. Dyanne’s countenance hovered over him, lingering like a lover at dawn. How beautiful her gleaming eyes, he marveled, how radiant her smile. He could still taste the fervor of her kiss, and the rapture that burned within his chest. When he drew breath, a tingling warmth filled his body. Such a glorious experience, he realized in thankful reflection, the most magnificent moment of his life.

Life.

A chill ratcheted through him, sucking the breath from his lungs.
No
,
not again.
Life meant pain, for himself and for others. The Illysp. He had escaped them once. He could not endure that horror to begin again.

He clenched his eyelids in refusal, searching frantically for Dyanne’s departing image. She was still there, but vague now, and distant, crowded aside by a wave of other, comparably hideous figures and impressions. The memories of his life were returning, risen up like an army of ghouls. He willed them away, striving to reclaim the bliss they had taken from him. But his dream had been only that, a portrait of wishful longing, to be swept away by the throes of yet another hateful awakening.

He opened his eyes in surrender, unable to face the deluge of who he had been, the horror of his deeds…the atrocities he had yet to commit. He heard himself groan—

Or had he done that himself? A desperate hope took hold, as he lay blinking at the rafters of a stone-and-timber ceiling. He directed his gaze at his feet, and found them beneath the blankets at the end of the bed in which he lay…to the right, at a stone wall slashed through by arrow slits and soft streamers of light…to the left, at a closed door. His eyes seemed to obey him, but how could he know it was
his
will and not that of an Illysp inside him? He made himself blink once, then twice in succession, then three times, holding the last for a silent count of five.
Hold it
, he urged himself.
Gods above
,
let it hold.

When he reached his count, he felt a smile upon his face. He let go—

And gasped to find a woman leaning over him, young and of bracing beauty, with long, red-gold hair draped to one side, soft pale cheeks without
mole or blemish, and bright emerald eyes, depthless in the light of the taper she thrust toward him.

He recognized her at once.

“Your name,” she prompted, before he could find words for his shock.

“I…” His voice was raspy, unfamiliar. “Torin,” he croaked, and a wary relief flooded through him. “I am Torin.”

The words echoed in his mind.
I am Torin. I am Torin.
But how could that be?

The lass seated herself upon the edge of the straw-filled mattress. Torin recoiled, pushing himself up on his elbows. He winced as he did so, feeling pains throughout his body, none more acute than the fire in his right shoulder.

“You…you brought the dragon down.” The words slipped free before he could truly consider them. His thoughts were a tempest, questions swarming like a cloud of angry bees.

His visitor simply stared at him with those brilliant emerald eyes. Behind her, a small hearthfire crackled. A gust whistled through the arrow slits to his right, bearing the sound and breath of the sea.

“I sapped a measure of its strength,” she admitted finally. “Its energy would have been regained in time, but Lorre’s armies did not give it that chance.”

His head stirred all the faster. Killangrathor defeated. Was it possible? The battle, the woods…too much, too quickly. “Why am I not dead?”

“Because I have no desire to kill you. And for the moment, at least, I’ve convinced my grandfather to extend you the same courtesy.”

“Your grandfather?”

“Lorre.”

Her answers told him nothing. His confusion was too thick. Words without meaning, blown aside by the next—

And then it struck him. “You’re…you’re the daughter. Laressa’s child.”

“Annleia.”

A black horror filled him, clawing at his lungs and chest. Aefengaard. Her home. He had destroyed it. He had slain her mother, butchered her people. “I
was
dead,” he insisted, and heard the pleading in his own voice, the need to deny it all and return to his eternal slumber. “Before…before…”

“You were possessed?” She leaned closer, and he pulled back, drawing himself up higher despite the pain. She studied him a moment, then exchanged her taper for a cup and pitcher set upon a table at his elbow. She filled the cup with water and offered it to him. “The Illysp raised you. I purged your body of its spirit.”

No. Bloody gods
,
I don’t deserve…
He wanted to swat the cup aside, but took it in hand. “Why?”

“Because that was the calling given me. We’ve much to discuss, Torin of Alson, some of which may be difficult to understand, and none of which will be pleasant.”

Her gaze seemed to engulf him, to swallow him whole. He closed his eyes and drank. This was not about him. This was about the Sword. It was always
about…He opened his eyes and looked around. Even that simple movement felt clumsy and awkward. “The Sword. Is it—”

“In my grandfather’s keeping. Lorre’s hunters found us shortly after our…
meeting
in the wood. His orders were to capture, if possible, rather than kill. But there was no way he was going to leave the talisman in your possession.”

“We’re at Neak-Thur, then?”

“In Lorre’s citadel, former seat of the Council of Rogues, I’m told. What else do you recall?”

More than I care to
, he thought, staring into his empty cup. Atharvan. Aefengaard. “The wood,” he said instead, and reached with his left hand to rub his injured shoulder. “You wielded magic against me.”

When he looked to her wrist, she did so as well. Her lightweight dress had long, pointed sleeves. She drew back the left-hand one to show him a loop of crystals strung together on silken thread. A central crystal dominated the array, larger than those that surrounded it, teardrop-shaped and multifaceted. The room’s dim light seemed to pulse within its depths.

“An heirloom,” she said, “passed down by Eolin’s royal mother to mine. A wellstone, it is called, in your human tongue, for it serves as a receptacle for the storage and transfer of energy. The energy I fed into you was borrowed from the dragon—far too much for your human body to contain. Had I released it all at once, it would have destroyed you.”

“A safer course, don’t you think?” he remarked grimly. “I nearly killed you.”

“But
I
was warned
not
to kill
you
. So I had to err toward caution, releasing only a little at a time.”

“A risk either way. The Sword should have—”

“The Sword will not repel a power meant to strengthen you.” Her tone suggested that she was already weary of the topic. She had not brought him back from the dead, he supposed, merely to explain how she had done so.

“I was given to believe that the Vandari and their powers are no more,” he countered. “You seem to know much you should not.”

Annleia lowered her sleeve, hiding her wellstone from view. He wondered if she had it ready to defend against him now. Perhaps he should find out, and return to his dreams.

“My father did not lie to you,” she said sternly. “Yes, we possess some knowledge of what you call magic, as all Finlorians do. But you sought answers on how to combat the Illysp, else rebuild the shattered seal between their world and ours. That sort of power, my people no longer have.”

Torin frowned. She had traveled a long way, and risked her own life to preserve his. If she hadn’t come to help him…“Then why are you here?”

“I am here because the elf I called Father is dead. I am here because my mother looks enough like one that she would not have made it through the first settlement she encountered. I am here in their stead to learn what knowl
edge
you
have, to learn if together we may not find a way to save both your people and mine.”

Torin’s stomach knotted at the reminder.
Her
people’s fate had already been decided. He realized suddenly that she been avoiding that subject as much as he had. But the dreaded question was there now, in her taut face, in her focused gaze.

He could go no further until he spoke to it.

“Annleia, I…the dragon and I, and the other Illychar…we did not cross the ocean to attack Lorre.”

The young woman tried to remain stoic, but her lip began to tremble, and her eyes rimmed with wetness. “Tell me.”

“Annleia, you don’t want—”

“They escaped, did they not? My mother was prepared. She knew…”

Her voice cracked, and tears began to spill. Torin wished his mattress were stuffed with blades instead of straw, that he might be cut to pieces rather than give voice to his shame.

“Some escaped,” he allowed, staring again at the empty cup in his hand.

“Others perished. I cannot number them except to say, too many of the latter.”

The young woman wept openly. Torin sat silent, miserable, knowing how hollow and useless any apology would be.

“And my mother?”

A lump came to his throat, and it felt as if a giant fist squeezed his heart. He looked up, the horrible truth perched on his tongue. But as he met her gaze, something stopped him. It had nothing to do with fear of personal consequences. Whatever punishment she might choose, he would submit to gladly. Yet he could not imagine stealing what small hope remained to her—that which the truth would destroy.

Before he realized it, he was shaking his head. “The dragon did most of the killing, and the goblins their share. I did not see the faces of all who fell before them.”

It was not a direct lie; nevertheless, he hated himself the moment he said it.

Annleia sniffed. “So she might have escaped.”

Had he not found her amid the ruin of that toppled tree. Had she fled, instead of foolishly trying to buy her people time. “I imagine she had as much opportunity as the rest—though they were not given much.”

The young woman searched his face a moment longer, then turned her eyes to the floor. Torin hoped she would not press him further. He told himself again that it was better to leave her question to doubt and spare her any further devastation. At the same time, he silently cursed himself for a coward, wondering if the decision had truly been made for
her
sake, or his own. By what right did he—

“She warned me,” Annleia murmured softly. “She told me I could not do both.”

Torin hesitated, uncertain that she was speaking to him. “Your mother?”

“The crone,” she said, turning to face him once more. “In the forest. The one who carried your blood.”

“My blood?”
Who could be carrying—
He froze, the witch’s ravaged face appearing suddenly before his mind’s eye.

“Necanicum, she called herself. I set forth of my own accord, but it was she who found me, and showed me what I must do.” Annleia wiped the streams from her cheeks. “She gave me a choice: Return to warn my people, or poison your body in a manner to drive the Illysp from you.”

Torin scarcely heard her, fighting instead to recall all that he could of his strange confrontation with the eccentric woodswoman. The episode seemed a hundred years removed, a blur of inane babble and superstitious ravings.
Immortal One
, she had called him. Was this why? How could she have known?

“Seems to me you made a poor decision,” he said sullenly. “Why save a stranger when—”

“My decision was not made for
your
sake, but for those you are meant to save. According to Necanicum, you, Torin of the Crimson Sword, control the fates of all.”

Torin glowered. For a moment, he considered telling her what he thought of the old madwoman, and of such prophecies in general. If Annleia was foolish enough to believe…

Yet such anger was misdirected. He realized that what he really wanted was to express his own remorse, to tell her that he understood her pain better than she knew. After all, he had made a similar choice to hunt for the Sword rather than return to his village, and in so doing had unwittingly let his home be destroyed, all in the name of the greater good. In some ways, he regretted it to this day—now, perhaps, more than ever.

But he could not see where knowing that might lessen her own pain, so he kept it to himself.

“And did she tell you what answers I am supposed to have?” he asked instead.

Annleia scoffed. “You are the first I know of to escape an Illysp’s thrall alive. You are here to tell what none before you has had the opportunity to reveal. Would you tell me you learned nothing?”

I learned of hatred
,
of hunger
,
of reveling in another’s misery…
“The Illysp stole my mind. It used my memories and knowledge against me.” He shivered at the recollection, at the hundreds—the thousands—slain. “But its own thoughts were never revealed to me.”

“You walked among them,” she said pointedly. “You
led
them.”

Indeed, it remained difficult to believe he was even having this conversation. The horror was still so fresh in his mind. He stared at his hands, still pale and slashed and scarred. He fiddled with the empty cup, remembering what it had been like—the strength, the fury. He remembered how it had felt, to see others cower before him, while shrugging aside injuries that would have felled any normal man thrice over. He could only imagine how the rest of him
appeared. More significantly, he wondered if his body would ever truly belong to him again.

“I recall what I saw, and the words I spoke.” A shudder ripped through him. “Their armies are everywhere—I can tell you that. Their aims, you already know. If I am to banish them, I know not how. Those answers were supposed to lie with the Vandari. But your father—”