104: THE OTHER SIDE
(Kihrin’s story)
I stepped out of the gate just a few seconds too late. Just in time to see Thaena vanish, taking Teraeth with her. Just in time to hear the shocked silence of a crowd that still didn’t quite understand what had happened but knew that it was something terrible.
Immediately, I heard Urthaenriel’s singing. What? I wondered if I had developed an impromptu fever; there was simply no way Xivan could be here in the Manol capital.
Then I heard Senera’s voice. “Lord Var?”
Really, you’d think I would have learned not to assume anything impossible.
“Kihrin!”
I had exactly that much warning before Janel was in my arms, which, while not unpleasant, was clearly not a happy reunion.
There was a clamor. Orders were shouted out and people told to leave the area. The few guards allowed inside the building, knowing only that outsiders had appeared in a time and place where that should have been impossible, were heading our way.
“What happened?” I asked Janel.
She had tears in her eyes while managing to maintain an expression of murderous rage. “The Ritual of Night doesn’t work. And when Khaemezra realized that, she killed Terindel”—her voice broke—“had them crown Teraeth king, and … she took him. I don’t know what happens next. Nothing good. Kihrin, she’s not thinking clearly.”
“Wait. The Ritual of Night didn’t work?” Relos Var’s voice boomed through the hall. “You performed it?” He stood in the center of the hall, looking down at the marks etched in the floor left over from the rite in question. “Oh. You performed it correctly.”
Senera’s voice answered, “Terindel performed the unaltered ritual, sir. He said he’d memorized it.”
Grizzst started laughing. There was a note of hysteria to the sound.
“No one move!” ordered one of the guards, who had somehow decided that this was an excellent time to restore some order and figure out what was going on. I felt sorry for him.
“Put your weapons down, damn it!” some important-looking vané ordered.1 “It’s far too late for that foolishness.”
I stared at the spot where Teraeth had stood just a moment before as his mother teleported them both away from the Mother of Trees. I felt like I could feel the lingering echo, the hollow space in my soul emptied out by Teraeth’s absence, by the sense of loss that absence promised. The echo matched up perfectly with the reality of Doc’s lifeless body, staring up with empty eyes at the vaulted ceiling above.
I buried my despair, pushed it down deep before Vol Karoth could feel it and reach out through that wound to touch the world outside his prison. My heart pounded, the blood in my veins raged, my focus centered on that single truth: Thaena had taken Teraeth.
I wasn’t naïve enough to think she had any good intentions toward her newly crowned son. On some level, she must have predicted this possibility. Thaena must have suspected that something might go wrong with the Ritual of Night, that somehow her enemies might find a way to sabotage the ritual. Surely, it hadn’t been coincidence that she’d put Teraeth in a position to stand in as sympathetic tie-in to the Manol nation. He was their king, after all.
She’d made contingency plans, finally come due.
The betrayal filled my mouth with bile. I’d trusted her. I’d trusted Thaena even though I’d known she’d been willing to gaesh and sell her own granddaughter—my mother—into slavery. I’d trusted her even though she’d refused to Return so many people, even though she’d lied and manipulated again and again. Somehow, I’d actually let myself believe she was somehow different from Relos Var. But she wasn’t any different at all. Even if she hadn’t started off like he had, she’d eventually convinced herself that it was acceptable to kill or betray any number of people for the “greater good”—whatever that meant. She’d taken a duty and turned it into an entitlement, an excuse for her own power. Who had the right to tell Thaena she was wrong to sacrifice her son or the entire vané people, if she felt it was the only way to save everyone else.
I’ll carve my way through nations. Teraeth had told me, But don’t ask me to kill you.
Egotistical as it may seem, I felt like the whole universe teetered on that moment, and I watched the pendulum waver and then swing in the other direction.
“What’s Rev’arric doing here?” Janel said the name like it was a curse word.
I glanced down at her. She’d called both Thaena and Relos Var by their real names, which wasn’t like her. “He was here to stop the ritual,” I said. “My doing. I promise I’ll explain.”
“There’s only one reason that Thaena would demand her son crowned and then take him with her,” Valathea said. She stood at the entrance to the room, and just behind her, I saw both my parents—my father alive and well. Valathea walked into the room, never once looking down at Doc’s body. My parents did, though, and I saw guilt and anguish cross Khaeriel’s face.
“They’ll sympathetically link Teraeth to the nation, not the race. Our deaths would be enough tenyé to power the warding crystal.”
“Right,” Grizzst said, still rubbing his jaw. “Tie it to a country instead of a race. That would work.”
“Yes,” Relos Var said. “I imagine you gave her the idea with what you did to Quur.” He spared a brief glare for Valathea but seemed unwilling to stop and make polite introductions.
“What did Grizzst do to Quur—?” Thurvishar started to ask.
“But the warding crystal’s destroyed,” I said. “It won’t work.”
“It will work,” Relos Var corrected. “If she performs the ritual correctly—and there’s no reason to think she won’t—it’s perfectly capable of wiping out every vané who is part of the Manol nation. It will simply accomplish nothing.”
“Oh, that’s not quite true,” I said. “Seriously, what happens if all that energy goes to a warding crystal that doesn’t exist?”
“I would imagine it blows up Atrine, destroys Demon Falls, and empties out Lake Jorat on to Marakor,” Relos Var answered. “And then millions die … while still accomplishing nothing.” He looked like he’d tasted something foul. “Best-case scenario, she actually stops and thinks for long enough to check the crystal, realizes it’s broken, and has Argas fix it. Then it imprisons Vol Karoth and still wipes out the vané.”
“All that takes time,” Thurvishar said. “Thaena would need time to adapt the ritual, figure out the right marks. That’s weeks of planning.”
“Have you forgotten Shadrag Gor exists already?” Senera said. “While we’ve stood here talking, she’d already had days.”
“We can’t be certain she even knows about—” Thurvishar stopped himself. “Fine. You’re right.”
Everyone began to condense, as those with an interest or even just curiosity in what was going on gravitated toward Valathea, Relos Var, and Grizzst.
I looked around the floor of the room. The normally pristine wood floor was deeply gouged with all the marks of the failed Ritual of Night. “Small consolation, but there isn’t enough room in the Lighthouse at Shadrag Gor to do this sort of work. That means she’ll need to leave it if she plans to perform the actual ritual or some variant.” I looked over at Senera. “Can you find out where the ritual’s going to be held?”
She looked sick as she shook her head. “No,” she said. “That’s the future. The Name of All Things can’t see the future. If there was only one place possible, it would be different, but—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Khored said. “We know where she’ll go.”
A nearly collective inhalation of shock heralded the entrance of the God of Destruction. I hadn’t noticed Khored’s arrival. No open gates, no teleport flashes. And he wasn’t alone either.
Taja, Goddess of Luck, and Tya, Goddess of Magic, flanked him.
It slapped me like a physical blow that both Khored and Taja were vané who might have personal reasons to not want to see their people destroyed. I couldn’t even be sure that Thaena’s ritual wouldn’t affect them in some manner. That wasn’t even counting the fact that while Thaena may not have been historically fond of Atrin Kandor, the emperor’s patron god, Khored, was—and that same Khored was also Teraeth’s grandfather. They had stakes in this outcome. Plenty of them.
People will do stupid things when they’re scared, Kihrin. Taja had been talking about Thaena, and she’d been right to do so.
I was less certain why Tya had chosen to be present, but it was possible she just wasn’t a big fan of genocide.
Khored removed his helmet, revealing a black-skinned Manol vané who looked enough like Teraeth to make me grind my teeth.
“We’re here to help,” Khored said.
The silence in the parliament hall was truly stunning. Here was a group of people—many of the most powerful in the world, including gods—who absolutely hated each other. And the rules were changing so fast.
I found myself wondering just who had switched sides.2
Not Relos Var, of course. I still didn’t trust him, but if I was sure of one thing, it was this: he sure as hell wasn’t in league with Khaemezra. To believe otherwise was to give him credit for a long con that would have put his performance in Atrine to shame.
Also, that fact would have been the answer to the question Thurvishar had forced Senera to ask.
Anyway, Khored and the others had made a hell of an entrance as well as a declaration, so I took the bait. “Okay, where would Thaena perform the ritual?”
Taja gave me a tight, grim smile. “What’s the only location intricately tied to all things vané, the center without which our entire people become lost?”
Oh. “The Well of Spirals.”
I heard the words echo around the room. A whole lot of people had come to the same conclusion at the same time.
Relos Var nodded. “Of course.” He narrowed his eyes as he looked at three gods. “Are any more of you coming?”
The two goddesses pretended they simply hadn’t heard Relos Var, but Khored stopped. The God of Destruction met Relos Var’s eyes. The expression on the god’s face was unreadable—cold and distant as the moons. They stared at each other for several long, tense seconds.
Then Khored turned to me and said, “Thaena’s had Argas fix the crystal. Naturally, Galava and Ompher will be helping her defend their position.”
Relos Var’s jaw clenched.
“‘Naturally’?” My father came to stand next to me, put his hand on my shoulder. I put my hand over his.
“They used to be married,” Tya murmured.
“Which ones?” I asked her. “Thaena and—?”
“All of them,” Taja said, shrugging as if to say, “You know how it is.” “Thaena, Galava, and Ompher. They stayed close, even after Thaena left the marriage.”
“Oh,” I said. “I see.” I glanced over at Janel. She didn’t seem to think the idea was particularly strange.
My father squeezed my shoulder, which I took as a reminder to focus even if he hadn’t meant it that way. “Galava helped me once. It’s hard to believe—” He exhaled. “She seemed nice.”
“She is nice,” Tya said bitterly. “But she’s convinced herself resealing Vol Karoth’s prison is worth the price. A price she won’t be paying.”
“But the vané can’t pay it either,” I protested. “Isn’t that the whole point? They already did.”
“They’re not sacrificing our race’s immortality,” Khored answered. “They’re sacrificing the nation—the lives of every man, woman, and child—and they’re telling themselves it’s only fair since we’ve all long outlived our ‘human’ life spans. When my grandson finishes the ritual, he’ll kill himself and in doing so will also kill the millions sympathetically linked to him. And Vol Karoth’s prison will be resealed.”
An uneasy silence answered this. Most of the people in the room qualified as Manol “citizens.”
Which meant they would die.
“Have they already started?” Relos Var said.
“Sixty-three percent chance,” Taja replied.
After a beat of hesitation, Relos Var nodded. “Then let’s do this.”
“No, wait—!” I started to say that we needed to do a little planning of our own, perhaps figure out a battle strategy.
But no. He opened the gate underneath the entire parliament floor. The whole area that the ritual carvings had taken up and a bit more, so all of us—all of us—fell through.3
I wasn’t prepared.
As we landed, I felt a moment of profound disorientation. I’d expected the Well of Spirals: a beautiful manicured garden of reflecting pools under an illusionary blue sky, filled with green-gowned attendants and luxurious calm.
All that was gone.
The redwoods of the Kirpis had been cleared for miles in every direction. A giant slab of granite had been raised up out of the ground in the distance, leveled off and (I presumed) carved with the necessary symbols for the ritual. I didn’t see any of the Well of Spirals priests, but I took it as given that they were very likely dead.
A figure danced on that platform in the distance. I felt my gut twist. I knew it would be Teraeth and, worse, knew he danced a variation of the Maevanos.
Janel liked to talk about being groomed by Relos Var, but that was nothing compared to what Thaena had done to her son.
And in between us and him?
Armies.
I had barely a second to comprehend what I saw. Not just armies of people, although that too, but animals, monsters. Gryphons and giant thriss lizards, massive white elephants that glowed ethereally, betraying their otherworldly natures. The trees hadn’t been cut down but had simply moved themselves to the side. Thriss armies. Black Brotherhood assassins. So many and so varied that I couldn’t even comprehend the full array of forces, never mind label their nature or numbers.
Three figures stood near the edge of the plateau, and I recognized them all: Galava dressed in green; Ompher, who looked like there was no difference between where the rock stopped and he began; Argas, hallowed in mathematics, surrounded by a swirling field of weapons instead of his normal books.
And towering above all of them …
“You know,” I said, “I forgot Thaena knows how to change into a dragon.”
From a distance, she both did and didn’t resemble her son Sharanakal. No lava showed between cracks in her skin. No molten rock dripped from her mouth. She was black-scaled and glossy, trimmed in silver that matched her eyes.
I looked around me. Besides the core group of us, Relos Var had scooped up everyone who’d been on the floor. Founders were there, guards, people from the crowds who’d just wandered too close. My parents. No more than a hundred people in total. People who certainly hadn’t asked for this and probably wouldn’t survive it.
But no matter how much I wanted to get them away from this, if we didn’t stop this ritual, they were all dead.
“So it begins,” Thaena said.
She gave us no time, of course. Thaena breathed fire even as Black Brotherhood archers loosed a hail of death into the sky. The ground began to shake, whether from earthquake or elephants, I couldn’t tell. Trees near us began to move.
Their armies surged forward.