The Rift War (35 page)

Emrillian lunged upwards with her near-molten sword. She rammed it through the shield
of magic that shot off black and purple sparks. Through Edrout's breastplate, through the
juncture of his ribs.

Baedrix slashed down, putting all his weight and strength and belief into his blow. His
sword caught halfway through Edrout's neck and an incredible stink of corruption gushed up
from the ground and down from the glowering skies.

Emrillian's armor flared red, then purple, turning to blue, growing brighter and brighter
until it was a white that pierced Baedrix's closed eyes and filled his blood and burned the stink of
Edrout's corruption from the air. The light became a sound that rang and made his bones
sizzle.

He opened his eyes to see a blackness in Edrout's shape turn gray, then to the white of
old ashes, and crumble to dust that fell to the ground. Baedrix went to his knees, his muscles as
useless as water, and still that ringing sound filled the air.

"Zygradon," Emrillian gasped. She tottered forward a few steps on her knees, to grasp
Baedrix. "It's the Zygradon, Baedrix!"

"It's here?" He clutched at her as she pulled him to his feet.

"It's everywhere!" She laughed, breathless, and raked her hair back from her face.

It was raining, he realized. They were both drenched, but the light was sound and
wrapped around them with palpable force like the wind tangling their cloaks and their hair. He
clung to Emrillian. She dug her gloved hands into his chest and they staggered away from the
pile of pitiful ash that used to be Edrout.

"It's a Vale. Emrillian made a Vale, just big enough to hide the Zygradon. That's why
her husband could never tell where she went, why all the clues people followed, from the
memories of the survivors, couldn't help them find it.

"She didn't go to a physical place--she
made
a place. Look." She pulled him
sideways with her, so he could see what she saw, using their mental eyes.

The tangled knot of enormous Threads pulsed and writhed around itself, just a few steps
from them. Even as they watched, it shrank a little with every heartbeat.

"All the magic battling, the reaction to Papa's announcement, all this star-metal." She let
go of him with one hand to slap at her armor. "It's
brought
the Vale to us. It made the
Zygradon react and sing to us. Maybe, because we are both linked to it through our
ancestors..."

She laughed and shook her head. "Help me open it. I don't know how, but we have to
open it."

"Believe." His voice cracked on the single word. Just like he had believed he could kill
Edrout, despite his filthy magic and magical strength, believing was the key to open the
door.

For good measure, he took off the torque Meghianna had given him and held it out to
Emrillian. She grasped it, still wearing her star-metal gauntlet. The two objects flared bright, the
white light changing to match the rainbow streaks of the knot in front of them.

The knot writhed, churning, folding in on itself while they watched, willing it to open.
Baedrix kept his eyes open, when his natural reaction was to close them against the
brilliance.

"It's working," Emrillian whispered.

"How?" All he could see was churning rainbows.

"It's changing." She stepped away from him, still grasping her side of the torque, and
reached for the knot.

He swallowed a shout of fear when she stretched out her other hand, covered in
rainbow-shimmering star-metal, and slid it into the churning mass that kept folding in on itself,
over and over. His shout turned into a gulp of amazement when the rainbow softened and turned
silver. A hollow spot formed in the center of the churning. The silver turned transparent, and the
multiple chords that had rung in the center of his head and his chest all this time diminished,
merging into a single chord, as if a single harp the size of the forest rang with the final strum
from a master harper.

Emrillian let go of his torque and reached with both hands to catch the flower-shaped
bowl that hovered in the air for just a few moments, then slowly drifted down to the ground.
Gasping and shaking and sweating, she clutched it to her chest and wrapped herself around it.
Baedrix went to his knees beside her and folded himself around her. He felt as if he had run from
one shore of Lygroes to the other without stopping.

Grandmother, can you hear me?
He listened, but there was silence in the
Threads. He suspected either he was deaf, or the massive expenditure of energy had drained
them for the time being. It didn't matter. Edrout was dead. They were safe.

Grandmother, we have it. We won.

* * * *

Grego couldn't see the Zygradon. Emrillian found his disgruntlement so amusing, she
suspected she was exhausted to the point of idiocy. Her friend could touch it, and he could hear it
sing when he touched it, and that had to be enough for him.

She and Baedrix were exhausted, drained by Edrout's surprise attack and the appearance
of the Zygradon. They were deaf to all communication through the Threads into the bargain.
Grego got them on their horses and kept them together, headed away from their battleground,
just in case any Encindi were in the area and bent on revenge. She lost count of the times one of
them fell asleep and slid off their horses. Each time they both burst out laughing.

By necessity and to avoid injuries to them, Grego kept their journey to a crawl. He had
called for help from Meghianna and Mrillis both. Shalara used the tracking function in Grego's
datapad and Eleanora used the Threads. A hunting party of the Queen's Ladies found them and
brought them to the Stronghold. Brysta tore herself away from her domain in the archives,
visibly worried for Grego, their disagreements cast aside.

When she had recovered enough to hear the story of their journey, Emrillian was
delighted for Grego, and this sign of his sweetheart's forgiveness. He and Brysta would have
their forever after.

Emrillian recovered enough to be on her feet and coherent when Mrillis, the male
scholars of Wynystrys, and Athrar, Ynfara, and Kayn arrived at the Stronghold. She was only a
little peeved when Meghianna undid the guardian spells to let men not of the Stronghold's
bloodlines to enter. She supposed it was worth the price of allowing Kayn inside to let Grego
come in. Now her father could go beyond the healing hall in the Stronghold and that pleased her
even more.

She and Baedrix and Ynfara retreated to the library when Meghianna and Mrillis, Athrar
and the scholars took the Zygradon and Braenlicach up onto the highest bluff of the Stronghold
to perform the ceremony to separate Mrillis from the bowl of power. Ynfara held her hand, and
they both were silent, not even pretending to be distracted by scrolls, as the Zygradon and
Braenlicach sang. The very bedrock of the Stronghold vibrated with the energy flowing through
the Threads.

Emrillian felt it, like an infinitely sharp knife slid through her chest with the ease of light
through water. She saw through Athrar's eyes when he used Braenlicach to sever the Threads
that bound Mrillis to the Zygradon, and the Zygradon to all the Threads of the world.

"Is it over?" Baedrix whispered.

His voice was loud in the sudden silence.

A bubble of startled laughter escaped Emrillian. Ynfara clutched at her with one hand
and wiped tears from her smiling face with the other.

"I thought..." Her voice cracked. "Everything was so quiet suddenly, I thought we had
gone deaf, or we were all dead or..." A sob of sudden fear choked her.
Grandfather?

Have faith, my dear,
Mrillis responded. His voice sounded tired, but cheerful in
her mind.

Emrillian and Ynfara were still holding each other, smiling through their tears, when
Athrar came down to the library to fetch them. They were to have a feast of celebration, the first
feast in the Stronghold in centuries.

* * * *

Three moons later, ships from every nation of Moerta slid into the harbor of Quenlaque.
Nearly every delegation was met by a team of Archaics from that country, wearing star-metal
jewelry, trained in their
imbrose
, and sworn to defend the peace and sovereignty of
Lygroes at all costs.

Peace throughout the entire world was an impossible dream, Emrillian knew. She fully
expected at least three of the most paranoid, reclusive, isolationist nations to leave the
convocation early and in a ruckus. They would either be spewing threats and seething in
self-righteous indignation when they were denied what they believed were their "rights." Or they
would be ejected for making demands and threats and refusing to cooperate.

Three moons had barely been enough time to prepare for this convocation of nations.
She had been busy testing and training her Archaic friends, and educating the Valors and
scholars of Lygroes in the history and ways and general principles of technology in Moerta.

Lygroes had undergone more cataclysms as it adjusted to the world of the future and the
last filaments of the dome melted away. Weather patterns were chaotic for the first two moons,
and more sections of Lygroes' coastline fell into the sea. The Encindi who remained were
sufficiently cowed by the wholesale destruction of their race to promise loyalty to Athrar and the
Warhawk throne. If they would keep those vows remained to be seen, but Emrillian had strong
hopes that the elimination of Edrout and whatever magical influence he had held over them
would contribute to a more durable peace.

Arrangements had already been made with Sevron Kayn to act as mediator with the
government of Goarlotte-Welcairn. Her home in Moerta would become Quenlaque's embassy.
Emrillian and Baedrix would go to Moerta to serve as ambassadors for the Warhawk, while
Grego and Kayn would stay in Quenlaque, to advise Athrar. The years ahead would be rocky.
There would always be some who would insist on trying to dominate the others. Arguments over
who, if anyone, had the right to hold the world's supply of star-metal would occur again and
again. For now, though, she felt confident in the future, and satisfied that she had served her
kingdom well and lived up to her heritage.

Two things made her especially happy, as she stood in the highest tower of Quenlaque
Castle and watched the teams of Archaics ferry the delegates from their massive ships to the
docks. She suspected Ynfara might be pregnant already. A sibling meant she could someday
renounce her position as Warhawk's Heir.

And second, Baedrix had grown more comfortable in using her name instead of her title.
They had become partners, learning from each other, acting as bridges between her modern
world and his time and culture. They decided that their unity started the day when, on the
journey from the Stronghold to Quenlaque, Mrillis announced Meghianna had agreed to marry
him. Emrillian and Baedrix had been the only ones who hadn't been surprised. She had every
reason to believe that Baedrix would finally see the light in his relationship with her, just as
Mrillis had awakened to his feelings for Meghianna.

Emrillian had long ago resolved that she wouldn't hope for a love match, and she would
marry the best man to ensure the peace of Quenlaque and the security of the Warhawk's throne.
However, as she had learned in the battles now behind her, for those who took risks and
sacrificed themselves for the greater good, even the impossible was possible.

END

Michelle Levigne has been a book addict since kindergarten, starting with Dr. Seuss and
graduating to the
Happy Hollisters
juvenile sleuth series, then an abridged two-volume
set of Rudyard Kipling found in her parents' bookshelf (fell in love with Mowgli and Kim)
before detouring through a flirtation with
Star Trek
in fifth grade (who is better, Trek's
Dr. McCoy or
X-Men
's Dr. McCoy?) before being captured by the
Black
Stallion
like all the other girls in her class. In junior high, she fell captive to Greco-Roman
mythology and found
The Odyssey
after watching an old Kirk Douglas movie on rainy
Sunday afternoon. (And some people still believe her when she says she read it in the original
Greek.) Then in senior high, the addiction took over her life and she became a pusher--she
started
writing
.

The
Zygradon
books, which are original to Uncial Press, have a firm
foundation in the Mary Stewart
Merlin
books (
The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills,
The Last Enchantment)
, which she discovered in college. During a brief flirtation with
fanzine publishing, influenced by a friend who wrote
Fantasy Island
stories (yes, that
long ago!), she wrote a
Fantasy Island
episode where the daughter of King Arthur,
awakened from an enchantment, became Mr. Roarke's ward and came to the island to find
Excalibur. Ten-plus years ago, she turned the short story into a novel,
Athrar's Heir.
After many years of thinking and brainstorming and daydreaming, she realized that there was a
lot of backstory to report--the civilization of the fantasy world, the foundations of magic, the
Warhawk throne, the creation of Braenlicach and the Zygradon--and that equaled a lot of
prequels.
The Zygradon Chronicles
were born, changing from one novel to five.

Welcome to the
Zygradon
series, and many thanks to Uncial for inviting me to
join them at the beginning of this adventure.

We're going to have a lot of fun.

To learn about other universes and genres Michelle writes in, visit her Web site:
www.Mlevigne.com.

* * * *

Uncial Press brings you extraordinary fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Put a world of
reading in your pocket.

www.uncialpress.com