Fall of Light

  Impossibly fast, the entire house was wreathed in flames. From the second level came screams.

  His apprentices.

  Fires now rose along the low walls of the smithy, encircling Raal and Bilikk. The stacks of charcoal raged, the buckets of water boiled and spat, the woodshed vanished inside an incandescent maelstrom.

  Their clothes burned, and yet neither man was harmed, even as the heat engulfed them, and the air itself was devoured by the torrent of flames.

  She spoke then. ‘This will do. Two young lives in the rooms above. Cousins to a slain man, both of them filled with grief. I have purged their torment, taken away the feel of poor Millick’s fists. Now that was a senseless thing, wasn’t it? But all ashes now, all bedded in peace.

  ‘And the witch! Delightful sacrifice!’

  Bilikk cried out something then, but his words were lost in the roar of the conflagration surrounding them.

  Tentacles of flames snared the smith, dragging him screaming into the forge, where he vanished inside the white fire.

  ‘Come along then, Hunn Raal. I was summoned to the fashioning of one sceptre, and now another. I attend the flames. I feed the First Forge all that it needs. The blood in my womb, the lust we ignite between us, the seed you and your kind all spill into me. Step forward, it is time. We await you.’

  He was helpless against her invitation. Suddenly without need to draw breath, his skin untouched by the heat and flames, Hunn Raal strode forward.

  Where the smith’s forge had been there was now only white incandescence, and yet, at its core, there waited something like a gateway, framed in flickering flames.

  The Mortal Sword stepped through.

  The world beyond was a thing of ashes and blasted earth, the sky blindingly white.

  She spoke in his head, her being filling him, like folds of flesh closing about his soul in a mockery of an embrace. ‘Love remains at the heart of this, Hunn Raal. It is shapeless to begin with, a thing of sensations. Warmth, comfort, safety. So it resides in the newborn child, fanned to life by the one who bore it. This bond takes time, but once made, it is unbreakable, and to challenge it is to awaken fire.’

  ‘You are a goddess of the hearth,’ Hunn Raal said. Raging flames marred the horizon, as if they had come upon an island in a sea of fire. The ash filling the air drifted on sullen currents. ‘You devour, and behind your warmth there is the promise of pain.’ He saw Bilikk, kneeling a short distance ahead. Just beyond the blacksmith the ground lifted into a rough cone, and from its ragged mouth smoke rose in sinuous coils, shimmering amidst intense heat. ‘Goddess,’ Hunn Raal continued, ‘you know nothing of love.’

  ‘Every gift of warmth awakens memory of the womb, Mortal Sword. But the child within you drowned in wine long ago. Shall I raise up its tiny corpse? Here, look upon what you have killed.’

  He saw before him the body of a small child. For a moment he thought it sheathed in blood, and then he realized the fluid dripping from its limbs, running lazy tracks down its round face, was not blood, but wine. He staggered back a step. ‘Go to the Abyss!’

  ‘I can return it to life, Hunn Raal. This dead child within you. Dead and deadened. Stained beyond all innocence.’

  As he stared in horror, the creature opened its eyes, revealing the perfect blue of the newborn. ‘Stop this! Why do you torment me? This speaks not of love, you cursed bitch!’

  ‘Oh, we are all mothers to what spawns inside us, for us to nurture or neglect, to love or cast away, to comfort or abuse, feed or starve. To worship as life, or sacrifice with death. No soul exists, Hunn Raal, that does not kneel before a private altar, blessing in one hand and a dagger in the other. What choice do you make for your life? Do you mark each morning with gratitude, or death?

  ‘That dagger can be many things,’ she continued remorselessly. ‘It serves as the tool of slaying, and no matter how blunt the edge, it draws blood each and every time. Blink sleepy eyes open, Hunn Raal, and reach for the goblet – to numb every cut you make upon your own soul.’

  ‘No more, I beg you—’

  ‘Who will bless your beloved altar? That question is asked again and again, day upon day, year upon year. A lifetime of that one question. Set that gift of blessing outside the borders of your flesh, or claim it as your own – the choice matters not.

  ‘But should you curse instead of blessing, Hunn Raal, ah, that is entirely of your own making. And so wounding yourself, you make a habit of wounding others. A life’s habit.

  ‘And yet,’ she added in vicious contempt, ‘your Urusander dares speak of justice. If he would have it, who would be left standing?’

  The child, hovering in the air, flecked with ashes, blinked languidly.

  ‘Send it away,’ he whispered.

  The conjuration vanished. ‘Balance. The blessing and the knife. The time has come, Mortal Sword, to forge us the symbols you will need.’

  As if tugged, Hunn Raal stumbled forward, and moments later found himself standing beside Bilikk. The blacksmith was weeping, but no tears survived the scalding heat.

  ‘The First Forge. Oh, it manifests in myriad ways. I doubt Draconus found it beneath a sky of white. In his place of finding, it would be dark, with the sky sheathed in impenetrable smoke. Only the glow from the forge’s eager mouth to guide him. Hunn Raal, have you brought what I asked?’

  The Mortal Sword reached to the hide-wrapped object he had strapped to his weapon-belt. He loosened the bindings and let the hide fall away, revealing a length of bone, sun-bleached and weathered. ‘Dog,’ he said. ‘Or wolf, if it matters.’

  ‘One more elegant in its irony than the other, Hunn Raal. The dogs of my children, or their wild brethren. Found on the plain, yes?’

  ‘Yet another of my commands that left the scouts bemused, but they found what you asked for, goddess. But is this all we are to have? A thigh bone to make the Sceptre of Light? What need for a forge?’

  ‘Light’s essence dwells in fire.’ He sensed her amusement. ‘You have recovered your arrogance, Hunn Raal. Your sly superiority – the drunk’s first and only game. But you remain utterly ignorant. He kept you all children, and that was a mistake. And in your isolation … when at last he offered you all a mother, it was too late.’

  ‘Enough of your insults. Bilikk waits – guide him in what must be done.’

  ‘I am not the one to guide your blacksmith,’ she replied. ‘Here, the will of the First Forge commands. It chooses whom to use. If you had come alone, your lack of talent, the dearth of your knowledge and skill, would have yielded a poor result. But this one, I imagine, will prove a worthy source.’

  Bilikk had remained kneeling, motionless, his head lowered with his chin on his chest.

  Proffering the thigh bone, Hunn Raal said, ‘Here, take this.’

  But the man made no response.

  Tapping his shoulder with one end of the thigh bone elicited nothing. Crouching, Hunn Raal leaned close to peer at Bilikk’s face. ‘Abyss take us, the fool’s dead.’

  ‘Well, yes. You have need of his skills and experience. I think we are ready—’

  As if he had been punched, Hunn Raal’s head snapped back, and in the stunned confusion filling his mind, he was assailed by a sudden rush of memories not his own. Fragments, shredded and momentarily nonsensical, images flashing in his thoughts, igniting behind his eyes – the village was little more than his extended family. He knew them all, and there was warmth, and any child – every child – was safe. In those years, had he known it, he had lived in a paradise, in a realm where love abounded, and even the common petty rivalries and disputes as might plague any large family proved rare and quick to wither on the vine.

  There was something there. The commonplace was made somehow sacred. There was no reason for it, nothing he could point to, and dwelling in its midst felt wholly natural, and in those early years he had no sense that the world beyond the village was any different. He – I—

  How we lived was how we were meant to live. How we lived
was, I soon discovered to my horror, what others only aspired to, or dreamed of, or cynically dismissed as impossible.

  I was a child there, and then an apprentice to Cage, learning the art of the forge. For all the hard tools of the farmers and the coopers and wheelwrights, Cage’s greatest love was in the making of toys. From castoffs, from tailings, from whatever he could find. And not simple creations for the village children, either! No, my friends, Cage crafted tiny mechanisms, physical riddles and elaborate jokes that confounded and delighted all.

  For all his size, he was a gentle man, was Cage. Until the day he left the smithy and walked to the far end of the village, went into the house of Tanner Harok, and there broke the man’s neck.

  Paradise was a living thing, like a tree, and occasionally, among its many roots sunk deep into the rich earth, one root turned foul and infected, and finally rotten.

  Infidelity. A word I’d not even understood until then. A crime of betrayal. The victim was trust, and its death sent shock through the entire village.

  Poor Cage. So bitterly perfect in his naming – he’d found his knowing a prison, tormented by what he could not ignore.

  And then there were two widows, not just the one, and the village was in need of a blacksmith.

  While I, poor apprentice, not yet ready, not yet recovered, I needed a new village.

  There are all kinds of betrayals. By the Abyss, that wide-eyed boy who was me learned that fast enough. Fuck one thing and it fucks everything else.

  The Legion found me and then pressed me into service. There was a war to fight. As if I cared. I remember my first sight of you, Hunn Raal—

  Snarling, Hunn Raal choked off Bilikk’s voice – the squalid memories, each one crowding the next as they mapped out the dull lessons of a dull life. He had no interest in such things, but there was new knowledge in his muscles and bones, skill behind his measuring eye, a timbre to his senses. He knew the art of the forge now.

  Stolen talent, stolen skill.

  It’d be useful to learn how this is done—

  The fire bitch’s harsh laughter echoed in his skull. ‘Then aspire to godhood, Hunn Raal! But no, not even godhood. Become an elemental force, a disembodied will, a flavour in the air, a stain upon the ground.

  ‘The First Forge’s gift to you will not last, in any case. Once we leave this realm, the ghost of your blacksmith will flee your wretchedly mortal body. You cannot hold what would not have you. Anything else is possession, and I assure you, Hunn Raal, you would not like possession.’

  ‘Then we’re wasting time here,’ Hunn Raal said. ‘I have a sceptre to forge.’

  ‘Then descend into the fires, Mortal Sword. I will await your return.’

  A sudden suspicion took him and he scowled down at the thigh bone in his hand. ‘Dog or wolf. This creation will not belong to Light – not in its entirety.’

  ‘My reward for this bargain, Hunn Raal. By your blessed Light I will see. A privilege I do not mean to abuse, I assure you.’

  ‘A detail you’d rather the High Priestess knew nothing about, I take it.’

  ‘True enough. Only you.’

  ‘Then I in turn might make use of your … sight.’

  ‘I expect you will. Now go.’

  He glanced over at the kneeling corpse beside him. Just as well. Saves me killing him later.

  * * *

  Old things returned to life exuded an air of fragility that no amount of polish, paint or gilt could hide. Resurrection was an illusion, as what returned was never the same as what had gone away, although a careless glance might suggest otherwise. That, or the willing blindness of belief.

  Lord Vatha Urusander’s armour was brought to him. Freshly oiled, lacquered and bearing new leather straps. The vambraces to sheathe his wrists were newly painted, inlaid with a gold sunburst. A breastplate of white enamelled wood, fringed in gold filigree. A fur-lined cloak of crimson, embroidered with gold thread. Only the weapon-belt and its scabbarded sword remained unadorned.

  As he was dressed by his servants, Urusander stood motionless, and upon his lined face there was no emotion. Then he spoke. ‘In my mind, I see Kadaspala. Paintbrush between his teeth, three more balanced in one hand. He eyes this regalia with a jaded disposition, and yet nods at its political necessity. He would play that role. Purveyor of legend. The elevation of the banal into myth.’

  Renarr, seated in her usual chair, tilted her head and said, ‘In such pose, Father, you more invite the artist who works in stone, or bronze.’

  ‘They battle each other for permanence, I’m sure,’ Urusander muttered. ‘But my thoughts are on Kadaspala. Some thought him an inveterate complainer, a wallower in misery. Some voiced their dismissal of him with careless ease, as if from a position of intellectual superiority, or at least wizened pragmatism. How that always angered me.’

  ‘He was well able to fight his own battles,’ Renarr pointed out, watching the servants cinch straps and fasten buckles, fussing over the falling folds of the cloak.

  ‘Against such fools, nothing he could say would shake them from their judgement.’

  ‘No, nothing would,’ she agreed. In the compound below, officers of the Legion had gathered, flinging jests and laughter as they readied their mounts or checked weapons. Captain Tathe Lorat had collected her daughter for this, under the wary eye of Infayen Menand, and by all reports Hunn Raal was still missing.

  ‘So it falls to me,’ Urusander continued. ‘I am disinclined to ignore stupidity, no matter how seemly its garb. Oh, I do not decry the act of judgement itself, or even the notion of righteous opinion. Rather, it is the tone I so despise. No, their dismissal proclaims nothing that is intellectually superior. And the insult behind their judgement fails to hide their venal paucity of wisdom. Every fool eager with an opinion invites the same judgemental weapons wielded against them. As in a field of battle, all is fair. Would you not – no, give me that belt, I’ll set my own sword, damn you – would you not agree, Renarr?’

  ‘Stunted intellects are rarely stung by such judgement, Father.’

  ‘Then let us drag them into the clearing, into the light. I am no artist. I am simply a soldier. I will call them out and challenge their defence, such as it is.’

  ‘You’ve not the audience,’ Renarr replied.

  After a moment, Urusander sighed. ‘No. I have not.’

  ‘In any case,’ she continued, ‘I am less forgiving of the notion that all opinions are equally valid. Some are just plain ignorant.’

  Urusander grunted. ‘Leave me now,’ he said to the servants, and watched as they hurried from the room. He faced Renarr. ‘My mind is diminished with age. I lack the verisimilitude of years past. Worse yet, my fires have ebbed. Awaiting me now, Renarr, is the desire to dispense with contemplation. Have done with the musings that so afflict the artist who sees too much, who knows too well, who would defy the rush of base appetites. A battle awaits us. Let us ride to meet it.’

  She rose then, collecting her own cloak. ‘You have set your mind as well as your sword.’

  Urusander paused, and then sighed. ‘No matter the outcome, this battle will be my last.’

  She studied him, but said nothing.

  He stood, still possessing all his airs of command, the grace of competence, while beneath all the gilt, the surficial propriety, something broken hid its swollen face.

  Duty, it seems, is a harsh mistress to this man. We are invited to sympathy.

  But see him march to the river of blood.

  ‘Will you ride at my side?’ he asked.

  ‘Father, from this moment on, I’ll not leave it.’

  The swollen face lifted then, revealed itself to her, and she saw it clearly.

  Well, that is no surprise, is it? We hide our own, each and every one of us. Bruised and beaten by injustice.

  And in that child’s face, so bloated with tears, she saw hope.

  Oh, how the lessons of betrayal are so quickly forgotten.

  * * *

 
From the high wall of the keep, High Priestess Syntara had looked down upon the curled snake of Urusander’s Legion, watching how it seemed to ripple in the dawn. Steam rose from it as if the entire creature had just crawled out from the earth, mixing with the smoke from the town’s forge, where a fire had burned the building and its yard to the ground, taking with it at least four people, including the Legion’s blacksmith. Townsfolk had fought that fire through the night, finally quenching it just before dawn.

  The Legion’s tail half encircled the town, but its blunt head was angled facing south. The image remained with her as she led her procession down into the courtyard, cutting through the gathered officers awaiting the arrival of Urusander.

  She was not inclined to join them. While the soldiers of the Legion still turned to their commander in all things, the faith and its sacred servants did not bow to that now insufficient military structure. Until Urusander was made Father Light, he was nothing more than the leader of an army.

  This serpent is mine, and we holy servants of Light shall lead the van. With blinding venom, we shall be its fangs. Best Urusander understand this immediately. Best this lesson be delivered to every officer here, and every soldier down below.

  Their petty lust for wealth and land is too base for the righteousness awaiting us.

  Still Hunn Raal was nowhere to be seen.

  If he’ll not be first, surely he’ll be last. The Mortal Sword desires a vast audience, presumably. Or, perhaps, he’s lying insensate in some alley … though I should not hope for such an unlikely ignominy.

  I will find me a destriant of the faith. I must choose my champion, a worthy foil to our Mortal Sword. Perhaps among the highborn, or in the Citadel itself.

  Passing through the gate in solemn silence, the High Priestess and her flock, one and all brocaded in white, set out down the cobbled track.

  * * *

  ‘The whore has airs,’ murmured Tathe Lorat, watching the procession pass. Torches and lanterns, fine flowing robes of bleached and crushed wool threaded in starburst patterns, and skin so pale as to be cadaverous. She grunted. ‘See how bloodless we seem.’