So when Alahir started hearing voices, his mother was terrified. One night Alahir had crept downstairs and listened to a conversation between mother and father. “Madness runs in families,” he heard her say. “What if he is another Gandias?”
“He’s just a boy with an overactive imagination,” his father told her. “He will grow out of it.”
Alahir never forgot that conversation. It was why he had never married. If he was to go mad like Gandias, he would do so as a single man. No wife of his would be walled up to die in a dark, airless room.
As the years passed he had grown a little more confident about the voices. Never convinced he was free, but allowing his hopes to grow.
Now they were back.
Turn east, Alahir. There is something you must see.
“You need to step down from the saddle, man,” said Gilden. “Your face is whiter than snow.” Gilden reached out to take his arm.
“I’m fine!” snapped Alahir, snatching his arm out of reach. The movement was so sudden that Alahir’s skittish horse reared and sprang to the left, moving out onto a steep scree slope. Immediately he began to slide. Alahir fought to keep the animal’s head up as he scrambled for footing. There were few riders better than the Drenai captain, but even he almost lost control. Finally firmer ground appeared under the horse’s hooves, and he scrambled safely to a rock shelf some two hundred feet below the other riders. Alahir looked up at the worried faces above him and waved to show he was all right. Then he rode on, seeking a path back to the high trail.
Irritation flared as he was forced to continue along a rock trail running east, away from his men.
Ahead of him was a sheer wall of rock that had been split open by the earthquake. Several tons of earth had been displaced, and a score of trees leveled. As he rode by he glanced at the desolation. His eye was caught by an odd sight. Just beyond the huge mound of fallen earth he saw a wide lintel stone above a half-buried doorway. It made no sense. Who would build a doorway into a mountain?
Alahir knew he should get back to his men. The enemy lancers may have regrouped or been reinforced. And yet . . . The doorway beckoned to him. How long must it have been hidden here, to have been covered so completely?
Dismounting, he trailed the reins of his mount and climbed over the earth mound. On closer inspection the lintel stone was beautifully carved, and an inscription had been engraved upon it. It was full of earth, and Alahir scraped some of it away with his dagger. He soon realized it was in a language unknown to him. Considering the history of the land, he decided the inscription must have been Sathuli. Possibly a tomb of some kind. His interest waned.
Then the voice came again.
Go inside, Alahir.
“Leave me alone, damn you!”
If you wish it I will never speak again. But go inside. The hope of the Drenai lies within.
No other inducement would have caused him to lever himself into the dark of the tomb, but his heart and mind had been filled with worry for his people for too long now. With a sigh he removed his crested helm, laid it on the earth, then climbed inside. Beyond the entrance was a tunnel going off into the dark. Alahir moved along it. Some fifty paces ahead he saw a shaft of light shining down through a crack in the ceiling. Alahir made his way toward it.
The shaft was illuminating a great block of what at first seemed to be ice, shimmering and glistening. Squinting against the glare, Alahir approached the block. It was too perfectly shaped to be ice. More like a gigantic cube of glass. Then he saw what it contained and his breath caught in his throat.
On a wooden stand within the block was a suit of armor, beautifully crafted in bronze. It had overlapping scales of plate, and the breastplate was emblazoned with a golden eagle, wings spread, flaring up and over the chest. There were scaled gauntlets, and a winged helm crested with an eagle’s head. Beneath the breastplate was a bronze ring-mail shirt and leggings with hinged kneecaps. Then there was the sword, the hilt double-handed, the guard a pair of flaring wings, the blade gold. It shone in the shaft of light as if it were crafted from fire.
Alahir’s mouth was dry.
He stepped forward on trembling legs. His booted foot crunched down on old bones, and he glanced down to see the desiccated remains of a man. Shreds of dry cloth clung to the bones.
“Who was he?” he asked.
Lascarin the Thief. He saved the Armor of Bronze and brought it here, before the horror that was the last battle.
Alahir knew the story of that battle. Every Drenai child did. The civil war had raged for nine years, culminating in a fierce exchange at Dros Delnoch. The fortress had been built to withstand an assault from the north and was virtually open to attack from the south. The defenders had been vastly outnumbered, and, three days before the last battle, the thief Lascarin had stolen the Armor of Bronze. Two days later an earthquake ripped through the fortress, bringing two of the walls down and killing more than a thousand men. The surviving defenders had taken their families and fled north to the colony of Siccus. These were Alahir’s ancestors.
“Why did he steal the armor?” asked Alahir.
He did not steal it. He saved it.
“Who are you?”
One who cares, Alahir. One whose voice can echo across Time’s vast valleys.
“You are a ghost?”
In a manner of speaking. I am alive as I speak to you, but in your time I am long dead. I cannot speak for long, Alahir, so question me not. You know what you see here, and you know what it means. This is the Armor of Bronze, crafted for Egel, worn by Regnak as he stood beside Druss the Legend. You stand before your own destiny. For this Armor is yours, Alahir, by Blood and by Right. You are the earl of Bronze, and it falls to you to help save your people.
“I have less than fifty riders. The armies of Agrias are a hundred times larger. And even were I to defeat him there would still be the Eternal.”
There is a man coming to you. He carries the Swords of Night and Day. Ride with him, Alahir.
“And this will save my people?”
I cannot say for certain. There is much I do not know. I will try to speak again, but for now I must leave you. My strength is waning. Draw the sword, Alahir. Draw the sword.
“Wait!” he shouted. His words echoed, and then there was silence.
Draw the sword, the voice had said. Not an easy task when it was encased in crystal. Alahir reached out toward the hilt. His hand slid through the crystal as if it were mist.
He shivered.
Then drew the golden sword from the crystal. It was lighter than it looked, and yet perfectly balanced, the golden blade glittering in the shaft of sunlight. Alahir sighed—and returned it to its scabbard.
A skari found a deep cave in which the travelers could shelter from the wind, and the four of them hunkered down in its mouth and risked a fire. Skilgannon had been withdrawn since the death of Gamal, and had spoken little. Harad and Charis seemed oblivious to everything except each other. They would walk hand in hand, and at night wander off to be alone. Askari, too, had left the brooding Skilgannon and gone scouting. Her thoughts were troubled as she found the cave. So much had happened in these last few days. Her entire world had been torn asunder. Her settlement was ruined and deserted, her friends fled or slain. Landis Khan was dead. Above all this, though, the handsome swordsman filled her mind. She found herself watching him, noting with satisfaction the easy grace of his movements, the calm, assured style of his speech. It was difficult to look into those sapphire eyes without reddening. It was as if he could read her thoughts, and they were not thoughts considered seemly.
Desire was not a stranger to Askari. She had desired Stavut, and before him a tall, young woodsman who used to travel to the settlement for supplies. Her feelings for Skilgannon, however, were vastly different. A glance from him would set her heart beating faster. She sensed in him a similar desire, and yet, for some reason, he fought it. Askari could not understand such reticence.
As they settled down by the fir
e she saw him staring out over the mountains, his face expressionless, his eyes distant.
“What are you thinking?” she asked. For a moment she thought he had not heard her. Then he sighed.
“I was thinking of a temple that no longer exists,” he said.
“Why?”
“It holds the key to everything.”
“You are a strange man.”
“Yes,” he admitted, “strange indeed. You spoke of Reborns earlier. You said I should beware Decado, because he is soulless.”
“I remember. You gave an odd answer.”
“Not so odd, Askari. I am Skilgannon. Once I was called the Damned. I led armies, destroyed cities. Cities that are now dust, and forgotten by history.”
“I don’t understand,” she said. “How could that be?”
He gave a rueful smile. “Because I am a Reborn. I died a thousand years ago. Landis Khan brought me back . . . from hell,” he added.
She looked at him closely, hoping he was lying for some reason. She saw in his face that he was not. “Why are you telling me this?” she asked.
“I was brought back for a purpose—one that even Landis did not fully understand. One that I certainly do not yet understand. I need to find that temple. The answers are there.”
“You did not answer my question.”
“It is not easy to answer.” He glanced back to where Harad and Charis were sitting together in the rear of the cave, holding hands and leaning in close. “Harad is also a Reborn.”
“No!”
“I am afraid so. You think he has no soul?”
“Landis Khan brought him back?” she asked.
“Landis Khan could not bring back the man he was. He tried. He went to Harad when he was a child and asked about his dreams, hoping, I think, to gain some insight to who he might have been in that previous life.”
Askari looked into those sapphire eyes and this time did not redden. “He asked me about my dreams also,” she pointed out.
He nodded. “Then do you need your question answered?”
A cold knot appeared in the pit of her stomach. The ramifications of his words were too ghastly to contemplate. Anger flared.
“You are suggesting that I am a soulless Reborn?”
“I said nothing about souls. And I am suggesting nothing. I know you are a Reborn. That is why they are hunting you. That is why Decado called you Jianna.”
“I don’t believe it! I know who I am. I am Askari.”
“Yes, you are,” he said, softly. Then, as best he could, he told her of the process Landis Khan had described to him, the placing of shards of bone in an arcane machine, and the impregnation of a willing surrogate. “You were born, as any child is. You were nursed and raised. But the essence of your physical being comes from Jianna the Eternal. Everything about you is identical to her. It is why she has become the Eternal. Young women are bred from her essence and born. As the years pass the Eternal casts off each aging body, and takes . . . steals . . . a new form.”
“She casts out their souls from their bodies?”
“Yes.”
“Where do they go?”
“To the horror of the Void and, perhaps, through it. I do not know.”
“And this is her plan for me?”
“I don’t think so. I think Landis Khan wanted you for himself. It is my belief that he loved the Eternal, and that she discarded him. You were his future. That is why he wanted to take you to distant lands.”
Askari looked at him closely. Anger was still strong in her, but she could no longer deny the obvious. He had called her Jianna when first they met. Decado had also been convinced of her identity. Inner turmoil raged and she felt the need to strike out. “So,” she said, at last, “when Landis Khan created you, he did it the same way?”
“I would imagine so.”
“Your body would have been born and then grown to manhood. Then the soul was cast out and you were brought back to . . . how did you put it . . . steal the body?” She saw the shock register. The sapphire eyes closed and a look of pain crossed his features.
“How stupid of me,” he said. “It did not cross my mind. I have been too self-absorbed. Of course. A young man was bred to be slaughtered so that I could return.” She saw his pain and felt a stab of guilt that she had caused it, and her anger passed.
“Why did he bring you back?”
“He thought I could end the reign of the Eternal. He tried to tell me his actions were to protect his people. They were not. It was all so that he could find a place to be with you, without fear that Jianna would find him.”
“Did he think you would kill her?”
“I don’t know what he thought. He was relying on an old prophecy. It referred to my swords, and some magical silver eagle. That was why he sought my tomb.”
“I know of the silver eagle,” she said. “It flies among the stars, granting wishes to righteous wizards. An old hunter told me the tale on the night he gave me my first longbow. The ancient gods crafted it from silver and blessed it with life. Then they hurled it into the sky and it flies around the world, forever, chasing the moon and feeding on the sun.”
He smiled. “Ah well, then perhaps that is my destiny. To be cast into the sky to seek its nest.” Then the smile faded. “The truth is, I do not yet know my destiny. What I do know is that I must fight her, and do everything in my power to end her reign.”
“Can you?” asked Askari.
“Once there was a time when I believed there was no deed beyond me. I was younger then. Now I am a fifty-four-year-old man in a young body, striding through a world that is alien to me. I cannot undo the evil that Jianna has wrought. But I knew the woman who made the prophecy, and I trust her. Therefore there must be some way I can win.”
“And you believe this . . . this lost temple is the answer?”
“Yes. All the magic seems to have flowed from it. I went there once. I saw the ancient artifacts, and the glittering lights in the walls, with no flame in them. I stayed there for a month. It seemed to me that all the priests there were wizards, in one form or another.”
“You say it is no longer there?”
“Gamal told me the entire mountain in which the temple was carved has disappeared. All that remains is open land, where metal twists out of shape and natural laws hold no sway.”
“Mountains cannot disappear,” she said.
“My thoughts exactly.” He laughed then, the sound rich and full of humor. “But then I am a thousand-year-old dead man in a world full of monsters. Who am I to deny the power of magic?”
Just then huge flocks of birds took off from the trees below the cave, soaring into the sky like a black cloud. The wind died down, and an eerie silence settled over the land. Askari pushed herself to her feet. “That is not natural,” she said.
A low rumble came from the ground beneath them. Skilgannon surged to his feet. “Earthquake!” he shouted. “Get out of the cave! Harad! Get out into the open!” Hauling Askari to her feet, he held tightly to her hand and they began to run. The earth twisted beneath their feet. Skilgannon staggered. Askari fell against him. From above them came a great crashing. Rocks and boulders began to tumble down the cliff—then a huge section of stone sheared away. Harad and Charis came running from the cave. A massive rock crashed down mere feet from where they stood. Charis fell. The black-bearded axman picked her up and began to sprint for open ground. More boulders tumbled, then an avalanche began. Skilgannon ran down the slope, seeking out a place of safety. There was none to be found. So he ran on for a while. Boulders came flying past him. Finally he swung around. “What are you doing?” shouted Askari.
“We can’t avoid what we can’t see,” he told her.
A hugh rock, twice the height of a man, came hurtling toward them. Skilgannon darted to the left. The rock crashed into a tree, snapping the trunk. The ground lurched—and opened beneath Askari. Even as she fell Skilgannon dived, his hand stretching out. Her fingers clutched at his wrist. For a moment i
t seemed her weight would drag him over the edge of the huge crack in the earth. But he held on. Using her feet Askari scrambled up from the yawning gap. Skilgannon hauled her to solid ground. With a grinding roar the earth closed. Dust spewed up around them. Trees were tumbling around them, and with the dust clouds and the shifting earth there was no way to avoid disaster. Skilgannon drew Askari in close, holding tightly to her. Helpless against the fury of nature she suddenly relaxed, laying her face against his cheek. And they stood, waiting for the end.
Then silence came again, and the dust slowly settled.
“We are still alive,” said Askari, genuinely surprised. All around them were fallen trees and massive boulders. One tree had crashed into the earth no more than ten feet from where they stood.
“So it would appear,” he said, releasing his hold on her. A sense of emptiness touched Askari as his arms fell away from her. “Where is Harad?” he said, suddenly. Together they ran back over the ruined land, searching through the fallen trees. Skilgannon found Harad pinned beneath the trunk of an elm. Touching the axman’s throat he felt a pulse, strong and steady. He had been hit by the upper part of the tree, and thrown from his feet. Skilgannon had no way to test for broken bones or internal injuries. Calling out to Askari he tried to lift the tree from the unconscious axman. It was too heavy. Even with Askari’s help he could raise it only a few inches. “You take the weight again,” Askari told him, “and I will try to pull Harad clear.”
Crouching down he grasped the trunk, and waited for Askari to get into position alongside Harad. “Ready!” she said. Skilgannon took a deep breath, then heaved at the trunk. Askari grabbed Harad’s jerkin and hauled at the huge body. Skilgannon strained to hold the trunk, as inch by inch Askari eased Harad from beneath it. “Clear!” she said.