Dereek khn
Yrxa Castle/adrift upon Hämärä Meri
Pre-dawn
٥ Korunasykli: ٢٢ Days after the Red Storm at Westsong
It took Methias a moment to realize where he was, though he supposed he could be forgiven for that. Some part of his mind immediately tried to remind him that he should look behind to see if the arch, the way back, were still visible. That part of him was low, distant, and easily ignored. Instead, he turned in place from left to right in a wide arc, drinking in his surroundings.
What he beheld was something of a winter’s marvel. To either side of the road—indeed, it was a road, and one freshly cleared at that—snowy hillocks stretched away from one another for some leagues. A disorderly army of scattered pines marched alongside and, in some cases, atop them. At random intervals, thick, deeply green treetops peeked out of the snow, as if checking to see if spring had been sighted. The exposed branches lay less heavy with snow than at first he’d expected. He couldn’t be certain, but as far as he could tell, the snow looked freshly fallen.
Until I know how high up in the mountains I am, or how far south, that doesn’t offer many clues as to exactly how long ago this is. That was but one of the troubles with these visions. He’d seen things happening as near as no matter to now and as far back across the unnumbered centuries as to predate recorded history. There was nothing for it. The dream would spin out, and he would do his best to drag coherence out of the pieces the King of the Dead showed him.
He heard the sounds of battle in the distance and tried to look in that direction. He saw only the wintry landscape strewn atop surfaces both high and lowly.
Battle such as that, especially in the cold, must surely involve fire. Yet I smell no smoke. He looked from one side of this high pass to the other, eyes skyward. If there were smoke on the horizon, he couldn’t see it from here.
“Somewhere,” he said, “the truth of this place is battling with whatever lies the King of the Dead is trying to show me. The question is… how do I find it?”
As if in answer, he became aware of a sound from somewhere behind him, growing closer. Slow hoofbeats in the snow.
He didn’t turn. He stood and smiled, putting out his dim hand as if about to pat the author of that sound. He was spared having to stand like that for long. The horse’s head came into contact with his open palm, dipped, then lifted again, forcing that hand to slide down its neck. He felt strength and focus returning to him almost at once.
“I thought it would be you.” He paused, turning to the left to stroke Mezofel’s flank before swinging up into the saddle. “I was beginning to feel like I was posing for a painter’s pleasure, stood there like that.”
He cocked his head to one side as if listening. “No,” he chuckled. “I wasn’t expecting anyone else in specific. It was just a question of whether you would join me here, or if the King of the Dead would send someone to join me.”
He settled himself into the saddle. As ever, there were no reins to grab. Mezofel wore a halter, of course, but bore neither bit nor bridle.
Once Methias was balanced, Mezofel started to walk. It wasn’t long before he’d begun to trot, then canter. Once the road sufficiently widened, he, at last, broke into a gallop. Through it all, Methias simply swayed in the saddle. On Skolf, he would have had to maintain balance with his knees and stirruped feet. In this intrusive dreamscape—this gift, as the King of the Dead often portrayed it—only his will was necessary.
Methias smiled. “No, Mezofel,” Methias sighed. “Any doubt I had that it was the real and honest you disappeared the moment my…” He paused for a moment, trying to find the right words, then shrugged and pressed on. “The moment my hand touched your flank, I knew. How could I not? Besides, if the King of the Dead has enough power that he can bend the weave to such a degree… If he can make it so our bond is shattered or masked…”
He shook his head. If he had that much power, he would have already won, and the world would be so much dust.
The horse whickered and tossed his head.
“I most certainly am not taking this lightly.” He laughed, albeit briefly. “Did you really not think I’d know you when I saw you?”
The horse trudged on in seeming silence. Methias was about to offer some other platitude or justification to his mount when they crested a hill. Below, not far distant, he saw precisely the thing he’d feared.
Perhaps a mile—perhaps as far as a league below him—sat a town of brick and oak. It lay like a tumble of colored blocks against the snow and winter grass. In happier times, the chimneys would have had pleasant puffs of smoke rising white and grey before blending with the overcast sky. Individuals and pairs of livestock would’ve rested in little paddocks beside or behind these houses. The neat and ordered rows of homes and shops would have looked cozy on any other day, especially this time of year. It was tempting to see that pastoral paradise for what one wanted it to be.
To be sure. And the movement I see amounts to nothing more than parents chasing their children through the cobbled streets… just trying to catch them before they do themselves an injury. What other cradle songs should I sing myself, then? If the song’s loud enough, perhaps I can block out the screams … and the soldiers.
Indeed, a legion in gleaming plate was marching into town from the south. He watched as a column of figures in ancient-yet-pristine armor of bronze and steel strode calmly down the street. Most of them wore closed helms, which must have added to the terror. A faceless foe wields fear as well as fired steel… Another maxim of Fyken’s.
The soldiers below were ruthless and efficient. They wasted no time in slaying literally everything and everyone they came across. With wide, leaf-bladed spears, they ran through men, women, children, and livestock. They did precious little damage to property, however.
They’re here for blood, not property.
Reluctantly, Methias reached toward his left hip. He wrapped his hand around War Cry’s hilt and made as if to draw it forth.
It’s as it was before… as if my hands are numb. It’s here, but also … not here. He added his other hand for good measure. Still no change.
“I’ll try one other thing, but I expect I know how this will play out.” His voice was distant, calm, and detached. He knew this was a dream, albeit a lucid one. He had little scope to affect it one way or another.
That isn’t right, though. If it’s a lucid dream, I should be able to take at least some level of control over it or at least of myself within it. Not for the first time, he found himself wondering how in the hells the venerable thing had crafted this rote. It defied reason, but that simply meant Methias didn’t have the knowledge to solve the riddle.
Not yet, at any rate. For now, I’m meant only to witness this… whatever it is.
Methias opened his hands wide, splayed his fingers, and positioned his hands and arms as if he were carrying some wide weight. He began to murmur.
“Berfehv… vehm hol berfehv. Puehv ka Berek, xu ruulth… nuth jhaiyv Zet.” (Burning… see the burning. My will burns, and now… so shall you.)
He felt no use of power. His hands began to glow, and there was a ripple of heat cascading between them, but there was no power here. Still, he made ready, using his knees to guide Mezofel to the edge of the drop. A moment later, he urged them forward as much with his mind’s mouth as his knees.
They galloped at full speed down the mountainside. He was out of range by a goodly margin—at this distance, his spell would have done little more than alert the enemy to his presence. It didn’t take long to realize that they were making no headway. Out of frustrated disgust, he threw the fiery ball, but it winked out of existence only feet from him.
As I thought.
“You may as well stop, my friend. We’re only here to witness, so we might as well see what there is to witness.” The King of the Dead will show me what he wants me to see, try to sway me with craven councils, and send me on my way. Then it falls to me to untangle truth from lies, fact from fabrication.
Now that the urgency was gone—now that he knew intervention was impossible—Methias truly looked at the town below him. The place looked familiar to him, though he couldn’t place from where. He’d seen so many such villages over the last several years. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d been here before.
Voices rose off to his right as if in answer to his unasked question.
“Are you satisfied, my Lord?”
He didn’t know this voice. No matter. He recognized it for what it was. It sounded as if the speaker were in a shallow cave or the corner of a nearby room with the door swung wide. He, or perhaps it, was a creature of bone.
Methias was just turning toward the speaker, hoping to catch some telltale visual marking or affectation to identify him. If nothing else, it would make taking notes an easier task. However, the voice that answered the creature’s question utterly obliterated the calm and focus he had regained since Mezofel’s arrival.
“I cannot say that it pleases or frustrates me, Loegrem, but yes. I would say that I’m satisfied.”
Jannon… Jannon, you live! They have you still, but you live!
A pair of pale warhorses stood stolidly off to one side. Though they were saddled and bore the long, shaggy coats common to Traedish steeds, their flesh hung off them in peeling ribbons. Their eyes were missing, replaced by glassy black stones.
Jannon and Loegrem sat at their ease astride these ghastly mounts. Loegrem wore the same armor as the attacking force below, though his helm bore no bevor. His head was a gleaming skull of either gold or copper—Methias couldn’t tell which. The glimmering metal turned what would surely have been bleached bone into something too perverse to simply be called monstrous. The fact that he spoke in such a jagged, atonal manner only added to the horror he evoked.
By contrast, Jannon wore the same modest mail he’d worn five years prior. They’d seen him since, but only from afar, across a battlefield or in a crowded market. A great blade rested across his back. The leather of its grip was now a pale white. Methias was fairly certain the blade was the same as before. The pommel certainly was. The white wrapping was a new addition, making the blade look simultaneously righteous and ominous. A single liquor-blond hair peeked out from beneath the iron-crowned helm he still wore.
Haunak’s Helm. I opened the way; you claimed the crown, and later, it claimed you.
“I do not suppose anyone accounted sane would take much pleasure in this, but it is necessary, isn’t it?” Loegrem’s speech sounded … off. Listening to the once-man evoked a brief sense of vertigo. It was somehow discordant, though his notes and inflections seemed deliberately chosen.
His voice … draws you in, then makes your flesh crawl. It’s… it’s like an oboe played purposely out of key.
“It is. Even my host understands why it’s necessary, though his opinion on the matter is not truly being solicited. It’s a simple enough stratagem.”
I suppose he’s right. This is Longcliffe. I’m almost sure. Destroy places like this, and you strike at the kingdom’s very heart. Traead’s piety would be a genuine threat to them, were they prepared for the fight. More… Longcliffe is where we found the crown… where I set this all in motion. Perhaps they’re covering their tracks?
Methias nodded, mostly to himself. He was fighting back the grief and rage that warred impotently inside him. He could do nothing here. He could only stare at Jannon, trying to find some sign of resistance—some spark of life.
His voice was still so familiar, even changed into that of his jailer.
“I’m not concerned with hunting for anything in specific. Simply gather and stand up all of the men, women, and children that you can find. Is that understood?”
Loegrem nodded. “I’ve already instructed the men, my Lord. I’ve added to that instruction that they are to kill any livestock they see. I thought it best to make certain that any survivors do not, well, survive for long.”
Methias resisted the urge to shout—to speak some empty child’s oath. None of them had given up on the idea of saving Jannon Saysh. Unfortunately, Methias still didn’t know how it was possible to save him, despite years of research. Exorcising a creature from the hells was easy enough to accomplish. He’d learned how it could be done years up the hourglass now. The problem was that Jannon had made a willing pact. Breaking such a bond—betraying such an oath was…
Jannon spoke again, forcing Methias back to the moment at hand.
“Once Longcliffe has been washed clean, gather the men and the new recruits. The land slopes down the further west we go—the snows won’t be so difficult there. We march as soon as may be.”
“As you wish, my Lord.”
“I want to cleanse the pass in its entirety before the plains feel winter’s first breath. We need to take Traead entirely off the field. With that done, the largest of our remaining obstacles is settled.”
“Yes, my Lord Haunak.” Loegrem nodded only slightly, but then turned and regarded Methias.
This is the part where you address me directly, then. You are the King’s vessel this time.
“There is no reason for this to go on any longer.” Loegrem’s voice had been replaced. It was now deep and sadful—a disappointed father, resigned to watch his errant child do something foolish. Jannon didn’t appear to hear him, and Loegrem didn’t appear to mind. “I suspect you’ll need to persist for a little while longer before you yield the field. I can accept that delay. The truth, however, is simple and honest. We are implacable, and we will make our way, eventually, to every corner of this world, until we finally end it. You can stand against us—stand against me—if you like. I won’t stop you until I have to. Send word to every high seat. It makes no difference.”
Methias spoke the next few words in unison with the voice issuing from Loegrem’s golden skull. He’d heard them many times before.
“You may raise every hand against me, and though every sword and spear are turned to the same purpose, it will … not … avail you. You may slow me down for a day… for an age. It will … not … avail you. I will return again and again and do battle with the next generation long after you are dust or have become deified. Stand against me, stand outside, or stand at my side. The choice is yours.”
With that pronouncement concluded, Methias knew the dream would end. He took one last look at Jannon’s stolen face. By force of will alone, he resisted the urge to weep, scream, or yield to the maddeningly calm, hatefully reasonable voice of the enemy. Instead, he tried to take in all that he could before it was too late.
As if thinking it made it so, the dream simply ceased. Next he knew, he was alone in his room at Yrxa Castle. He became aware of the warmth of his bed, the sweat on his brow, and the urgent need to find quill, inkpot, and blank page.