Fyrd screamed and fled, but it did them no good. Down from the sky, in a hail of thunderclaps, came more Dragons at the same terrible speed. Fyrd began to run mad merely from their passing; the Darthenes began to pursue them, but Eftgan held them back, and wisely, for at first tens of the Dragons came down, then perhaps a hundred, and began hunting in earnest. Shortly Laeran’s Ridings were a mass of fires, or simply charred places, where the Dragons had been able to more accurately control their flame. At the center of it all, the first Dragon to fall from the sky sat reared up, before the Darthenes, watching his people about their hunting—a Dragon black with star-sapphires above, and pale with rough diamond below.
Freelorn laughed for joy, pushing closer. Another huge shape landed near Hasai, all star-emeralds and topaz, and vanished. Down near Hasai’s hind foot she stood for a moment looking around her, then hurriedly made her way into the Darthene press, beyond the scorched ground. Freelorn went the way she did.
He made for Sunspark’s light, and Skádhwë’s, and found them both. Herewiss was sitting on the ground, dazed and hurt. A maw much bigger than the usual had dragged him down and had gotten into an argument with another one about which was going to bite his head off first. That only had saved his life, as he managed to kill the one that had attacked him initially. But the second one had bitten his right leg to the bone, and Segnbora and one of the Rodmistresses who had been with Herewiss were seeing to it, while Sunspark bent down over Herewiss, concerned.
A white radiance fell over everything. Freelorn looked up to see Hasai gazing down on them. “Dhio’Aarhlehni,” he sang in a downscaling chord of approval, “aei’aeluehh.” And the hair stood up on the back of Lorn’s neck as he looked up into those huge burning eyes, for this much Dracon he found he understood. King of Arlen, well met—
“Not just yet,” said a soft voice that seemed very near. “And maybe never.”
***
They all looked around for the source of the voice, but it seemed to have none. “We’re ready now,” it said conversationally. “It might have taken me a while longer, after your pet bonfire there ruined the structure I already had set up: but such structures can be re-erected. And you helped me, too. Death, trapped—the controlled deaths of my sorcerers—that set up the framework for my Master’s intention to be built on. Your army, their deaths and struggles with battle and with warfetter, all those helped me. But to finish, what was needed was fresh death, a great deal of it. Fyrd are as good as anything for that: better, perhaps. They know their Master, their Creator, better far than you do…. ”
The leisurely form was standing there in the evening, looking at them calmly, as if it had been there the whole time. The dark mist lay thick over the ground, rising and falling slightly, as if underneath it, something breathed, and Rian stood in it as if it were part of him. Herewiss, groaning with the pain of his half-healed wound, had managed to get to his feet and was leaning hard against Sunspark. “You’re dead,” he said.
“You mean you tried to kill me,” Rian said. “But I’m one with my Master now. And even the Goddess, for all Her blindness in other matters, knows that He can’t be sent out of the Worlds, not permanently. Nor can I, now.”
Hasai swung his head over to look down on Rian: and opened his mouth, and flamed. They all hid their eyes, but when the heat and the terrible light had died away again, Rian was still standing there, wearing a rueful smile.
“I shan’t bother with you,” he said. “My Lord has annoying memories of you and your people: you’ve chosen a bad day to become real, as you’ll see. But more important matters first—”
The air was prickling with a terrible sense of dread. Almost as one, Herewiss and Segnbora lifted Khávrinen and Skádhwë—and then stared: for there was no Fire about either of them. Rian shook his head at their surprise. “The Fire is merely His own power, stolen from Him and given to humans,” he said: “what do you think he would take back first? No, indeed: no more of that while He rules, nor will anyone else come to focus again.” He turned away from them, looking toward the fields westward between them and the river. The mist thickened, deepened. It ate what light there was. The light of the rising full Moon off eastward touched it, fell into it, was gone: the heat was being sucked out of what remained of the sunset, and it went cold and sick- looking. No Fire showed anywhere in the host, and Hasai crouched down and down as if forced that way by the mere sight of the rising blackness. All over the field, other Dragons did the same, the fire of their eyes going dim and cold, the fire of their throats choked off.
“Not just your fears, this time,” Rian said calmly. “That has worked before, as a stopgap measure. This time—the fear itself, the cause itself. Death itself: the Dark itself: the real things, of which your little fears are poor images. He comes in His splendor, in His power, to take back His world—”
The darkness wavered, grew, towered up, blotting out the stars. Freelorn looked up at it, transfixed with terror, unable to look away. No one else was doing any different: all resistance or power seemed to have leached away, suddenly, in the face of this one. Sunspark was just a horse now, and a lean, frightened-looking one, with a bleeding man leaning against it on a crude sword. Next to him was a thin woman trembling and holding a sharp piece of shadow, the only thing blacker than the darkness that rose up before them. Near them was a carved statue of a flying lizard, frozen in the act of gazing upward, impotent. There was a young woman on her knees nearby, weeping into her hands, next to a torn piece of cloth on a pole. And all around them, behind them, the bodies of the dead, the thin wails of the living and the dying, all lost in never-ending night —
Freelorn watched the blackness rise and struggle into shape. Utterly lightless, the essence of strife and hatred, It strove even with Itself, and the blackness of it hid Prydon, the whole western sky, the last vestiges of his sunset. All the dreams were right. Here it would end at last, as this shape refined itself into the one that would kill or drive insane all who saw it. It was the Dark, which the Dragons unaided had not been able to drive away, and could not now: and in that darkness were held ready all other fears, all gathered together and made real at once, as the Goddess was all joys. And no one was going to be able to save them. Freelorn clutched Hergótha in trembling hands, and collapsed to his knees.
Will you pay the price? the voice said to him, very still and small.
Freelorn fought for breath as the fear and bitterness sought to squeeze it out of him. You brought him here, the darkness said, starting to flow into some more terrible shape. He will die now; all of them will. Your fault. None of this would ever have happened if you had not forced the issue—
Freelorn caught a breath, held onto it as if it were to be his last one. What price? he thought.
You know, She said. Savior of your people you may be: but man again—
Lorn tried to speak, but no words came out, only a kind of choked noise.
There is no hope. All of them will die, their souls destroyed: and your kingdom will die, and there will be no rising again, for any of you. Despair—
He clutched Hergótha, bent double over it.
Will you pay?
The pain tore him like a blade. Freelorn fell forward and ground his face into the dirt.
***
Herewiss saw him fall, but the sight of what was coming real out there held him immobile with terror. Truly this was the Dark risen again, and many another old horror, come back to live here forever. But the new shape it was taking, as it towered up against the stars, was the shape of madness. The Shadow had been the Goddess’s Lover once, and had been fair. But It had long since rejected that beauty along with all others, since they came from Her. Now it shifted among countless mockeries of everything She had made, gloating with its width of choice; then slowly began to refine itself—winged like a Dragon, but warped and hunched, all gross splayed limbs and bloated body, monstrous. And a human face: but with eyes empty of any human expression, any joy or interest or even clean rage. Th
is face wore a look of inane pleasure in its own horror, of dreadful intelligence used merely as a tool, and a loathsome one to be cast away as quickly as possible. Delight in Its own malice, eternal spite, jealousy that a universe was too small to contain: all these were there. Before that face Herewiss felt the strength run out of him like water. He fell, wishing he were dead… and knowing it would be a long time yet.
The cry that came from his left was the only thing that could have stirred him. It started as a moan, and scaled up and up, a sound of final anguish that never quite became a scream, though plainly it wanted to. O my loved, Herewiss thought, and the tears ran down: but there was nothing he could do. Still, he looked up, strained his eyes through the darkness. If Lorn was finding his death, he would at least wish him well on his way to the Shore, assuming he managed to get there—
The darkness was less. Some moonlight was managing not to be swallowed in the mists that still surrounded the shape of despair before them. It shone on Lorn, crouched there on his hands and knees on the ground. But then Herewiss shook his head to clear it, for this didn’t really look like Lorn, though it had a moment ago. Herewiss thought that the pain of his own wound, or of his smothered Fire, or the sight of that awful face, was confusing him. It wasn’t Lorn, certainly. It looked like someone on hands and knees, yes, heavy head hanging down. The moonlight clung about whatever it was, seemed to strengthen. The head lifted. White. Taller now, and it wasn’t moonlight; it was light shed from the huge creature itself. It shook its mane, and light scattered from it. A long tail lashed about its flanks, and it lifted a heavy paw, took a step forward. A low growl rumbled in the air like thunder.
Herewiss dared the slightest glance at the black Beast’s face, though doing so made him sick and weak. Its expression of vacant hatred did not change, but It shuffled slightly backwards through the dark mist, and the black airs of certainty and damnation that had breathed from it now felt less sure. The White Lion looked at the Beast, and the growl grew louder as He took another step forward.
Héalhra! Herewiss thought—and then caught a sidewise glance of His eyes, and felt weak again, but from other causes.
This White Lion was not Héalhra.
No thought came to him through that glance, though, no sign of recognition: only a sense of tremendous rage and power, long-hoarded and now ready to be tremendously released, the way the earth grinds slowly and silently against itself until its force releases itself suddenly to crack the roots of mountains. The Beast coiled down on Itself at the sight and feel of this power, as if about to leap. In that moment the Lion lifted His head and roared. Not even the Dragons had been able to make such a sound; and it was more than a mere challenge, but a summons to whatever power might be in that place that was still unused, or free, to come to His aid. And He leapt at the Beast’s throat.
They began to fight—if fight was the right word for something that felt and sounded more like an earthquake or an avalanche, some irresistible power of the world venting itself in fury. The screams of the Beast were every sound of horror that had been heard since the world’s creation, every keening of grief, every cry of the murdered; but the Lion’s roaring kept blotting the horror out. And then came one scream that was not horrible, but clean and fierce, a sound of challenge. In a storm of white wings, as if the Moon came flying, the Eagle came, and struck with talons of Fire, biting behind the Beast’s head while the Lion held it down.
The darkness in the fields east of Arlid began to wash back and forth like water in a storm, as the Lion crushed the Beast’s neck in his teeth, and threw Himself down on it, despite all Its flailing wings and claws, to kick it to death cat-fashion: and the Eagle’s terrible talons ripped and tore, and black blood flowed. Now the Beast’s screams were terror for itself—frustration and utter fear that It had invested too much of Its nature in this form, and might actually now die. It was struggling to escape. But the struggles were futile. When a god takes form in a physical world, even godlike form, there are certain rules that apply—and chief of them is that other gods may affect that form. So it had been at Bluepeak, an age ago: so it was now. The Beast screamed for release and escape, and shrilled hatred that should have killed half those on the field who watched the battle—already barely half-conscious themselves with direct experience of the awful intensity of the emotions of gods. But the Beast’s screams made no difference. After a long time, they got fainter. After what seemed an eternity, they stopped altogether.
All who could looked up in that silence. The darkness was washing away, and the Beast’s body, lying half-concealed in it, was beginning to be washed away by the dark mist as it retreated—the stuff of a bad dream, half evaporated already. The Eagle took wing and perched on Vintner’s Hill, taking a moment to ruffle feathers back in order: then looked at the Lion, called one last time, and faded away, like the Moon going behind a cloud.
The White Lion stood looking at His city. Moonlight was bright on it again; but not as bright as His glory, reflected in the walls, and the waters of the Arlid. He turned then, already fading, and looked at Herewiss; and huge and fiery though they were, His eyes were Freelorn’s. The look was a King’s look, a conqueror’s look: noble, benign, remote.
Loved— Herewiss thought, a last desperate cry of the mind.
No answer. The eyes closed, and the great form faded, became a ghost of itself in the moonlight: was gone.
***
It was a good while before anyone moved. Herewiss was one of the first to manage it. With Sunspark’s help, he staggered out into the open space where the Beast had been. The mist had cleared away on a breath of chill wind that was coming down from the northern side of the Road, toward the Sea. Of the soul-killing thing that had fought there, there was no sign. Only one thing Herewiss found, and he and Sunspark stared down at it for a good while—the body of a tall, handsome man, with only one wound on him, where a sword had pierced his heart. He was otherwise unmarked, but there was a burnt, used look to him, and he was stiff already, as if he had been dead for a good while. His face in the moonlight wore a look that was difficult to decipher. It might have been doubt.
Segnbora came along after a while, with Hasai behind her. Hasai’s eyes were aflame again, and so was Skádhwë. Herewiss was glad to see this, but himself, he had no heart to look at Khávrinen. Together they looked down at Rian’s body in silence. Finally Segnbora said, “What will we do with his body?”
“Take it back to Prydon,” Herewiss said dully, “and give it the usual rites. He was a minister of the Throne, after all. And his wife and child have a right to their grief.” He didn’t say it aloud, but he might as well have, that his own grief would not even have that slight balm brought by the ceremonies with which a loved one is sent onwards. There would be nothing left to burn, as there had been nothing left of Héalhra. Herewiss knew as well as Freelorn had the price that had been required of the Lion.
And there all his self-control deserted him, and he turned away from Segnbora and Hasai, and buried his head against Sunspark’s flank. It twitched at his tears, but didn’t move. Lorn! he cried. Oh, Lorn—
“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Freelorn said from behind him, just a little crossly. “My head hurts enough as it is.”
The shock was like being hit by a spent arrow, but much worse. He staggered around, and put his arms out as much to hold his loved as to keep himself from falling over. “But you—”
Freelorn, though, was looking at him strangely. “Wait a minute. What are you doing here? Weren’t you the Eagle?”
Herewiss blinked and wiped his eyes. The feeling of some ancient power, rooted in the earth and finally mastered, flowed off Lorn and left Herewiss feeling delighted and confused. But right now the confusion was winning. “Me? Are you off your head? Why would I be?”
“I don’t know—I just always thought that you would—I mean, when we played—and you are of His line—”
Hasai lifted his head and looked northward. “If you are looking for the Eagl
e, then I believe she’s walking down Vintners’ Hill just now. And she’s cursing, because on the way down she’s found some kind of insect that’s eating the vines’ roots.”
Herewiss laughed, though it came with difficulty: his throat was still choked with his emotion. “The descent in her line was direct, Lorn. The Brightwood people are just a cadet branch. Don’t I have enough, with this, to keep me busy?” And he hefted Khávrinen, and didn’t mind seeing its Fire now. Then he shook his head, and dropped the sword, and just held Freelorn again. “Let her be the Eagle all she likes. What I don’t understand is how you—how you didn’t—”
Freelorn slipped his arms around Herewiss. “It seems,” he whispered, “that She doesn’t care to repeat Herself—so She won’t ask the same price twice. Or rather… She asks.” He smiled against Herewiss’s neck, and said, “It seems it’s possible to bargain from a position of strength…. ”
They said little to one another for a long while. Finally, Segnbora said, “Well, Lorn, are we going to stand here all night? What do we do now?”
“Go home for dinner?” Freelorn said, and looked across the river to Prydon, shining under the Moon.
EPILOG
“A timely marriage”: one made before your children start nagging you about the subject.
(s’Dathael, Definitions: c. 1870 p.a.d.)
They watched the King of Arlen come home, that night, from the gates of Prydon, though at first they didn’t know it. The guards at the gates, and the people on the walls, saw a group of people came walking and riding down the Road in the dark, up to the end of the old Bridge, where it had been broken. There they stood looking at it briefly, and then, carefully, took their way down the path that led to the small pier from which people went down to fish. One of them let himself down then, and the people on the walls thought that perhaps there was a boat there, and the people would come across that way. But the single figure, indistinct in the bright moonlight, simply walked out across the water. No one quite understood why he stopped by one of the broken piers of the bridge, and leaned against it. Some of the sharper-eyed people said that he was hugging it. No one argued with them. Stranger things had happened tonight, as everyone knew who had been up on the walls—nearly half the city, as it turned out. Nor had any of them needed sharp eyes to see what was happening.