Dawn of War

Tim Marquitz

Prologue

Sultae felt as though her blood boiled, her pustulant skin flush. Her ears rang in the silence as she wiped the sweat from her brow and looked to her brethren. Their eyes were black pits that reflected none of their suffering. Solemn-faced, they milled about under the cruel sway of sickness.

They waited only to die.

Treated little better than beasts, they had been ushered from their homes and herded to the end of the realm, far from all they knew and loved. They wallowed in the contagion that blistered their flesh and turned their tears into black ooze that seeped in rivulets over their narrow cheeks. Sultae felt the heat of her fury even over the fever that gnawed at her.

Left to rot in the wilderness, she could find no compassion for her fellow sufferers. They had accepted their fate without question and had crawled off to end their days without complaint, as though their lives had no meaning.

Not Sultae.

She had lived too long to give her life away so easily. For her people to have demanded such a sacrifice, just so they might live comfortable, free of the plague that ravaged her body, was too much. They had made no true effort to find a cure, a means to bring the plague to an end. Rather, they sent away the inflicted in a desperate bid to save themselves. It was nothing more than cowardice, a lifetime of trust and honor dashed in but a moment of fear.

Sultae would not suffer such indignity.

She cast one last look behind and turned away in disgust. Her legs trembled and she felt weak, but she started off toward the trees with purpose in her steps. If she were to die, she would do so on her own terms. She would not wait for death to steal upon her, but would stride out before it and force it to give chase.

She would not go before the Goddess upon her knees.

Chapter One

Arrin stared at the black plumes of smoke that spiraled into the dawn sky. He drew in a breath and smelled bitter ash on the wind. The sounds of battle raging in the distance, he checked his blade and strode toward the hillock that blocked the view of the valley below. He knew what he would see.

War had come to Ahreele.

He dropped low as he reached the apex of the hill and looked out over the battlefield. An unconscious snarl curled his lip when he saw the wolfen Grol swarming over the shattered walls of Fhenahr, the capital city of Fhen. His instincts screamed at him to join the fray, but he eased his hand from his pommel. His knuckles sang out in rigid defiance as reality struck home. Only death awaited him on the field below.

What he saw there wasn’t truly a battle. It was a rout.

Streamers of glistening red energy streaked from golden staffs wielded by a small gathering of Grol clustered near the back ranks. Arrin’s eyes narrowed against the glare as the bolts seared through the air to smash into the depths of the city. His heart leapt as explosions rang out. Tongues of fire licked upward at the impacts. The screams of the dying were a dull murmur buried beneath the victorious shouts of the Grol.

Savage like the wolves they resembled, the Grol were every bit as much a predator. Their reddish eyes glimmered over elongated snouts, which were filled with jagged shards of yellowed teeth. Arrin swore he could see their grim smiles from where he crouched. They ran upright, though just barely. Hunched into feral missiles, they barreled through the panicked streets of the capital, seeking warm flesh.

Carnivores all, to be killed outright by the Grol was a small mercy. It was the survivors who’d suffer most. Eaten a mouthful at a time, the meat ripped fresh from the bone, the prisoners would be kept alive to feed the ravening horde. By dint of their defeat, the people of Fhenahr had been relegated to the status of cattle. Herded together into pitiful lines and dragged along behind the war machine, their deaths would linger on for months. The end would come at slowly on the sharpened edges of Grol fangs.

Coldness settled in Arrin’s gut as remembrances of Grol atrocities flickered through his mind. He’d seen their brand of savagery too often in his twenty years in the field. He would never forget, nor could he ever forgive, their merciless brutality. They were savage beasts to be put down, nothing more.

The Grol preyed upon the weak, preferring the thrill of the chase to the difficulties of the siege or uncertainties of the open field. They raided neighboring countries with a chaotic randomness that bypassed all but the most determined attempts at defense.

To the Grol, meat was meat. They made no distinction between animal and man. Worse still, they made none between man and woman, young and old, bathing their snouts in the warm entrails of a child as readily as they would its mother. They left no living spirit behind, only the remnant carcasses of their victims, strewn about like so much detritus.

But in all his time behind the sword, Arrin had never seen them muster a force so large. The sea of Grol, which flung itself at the walls of Fhenahr, was the thing of nightmares. This was no simple raid. They had come to destroy; to conquer.

The strange force that left the walls in charred and shattered heaps only added to the burgeoning uncertainty he felt gnawing at his confidence. Though he’d never seen such a raw display of power, he knew without hesitation what it was: magic.

His hand stroked the silvery collar nestled about his neck. Its curious symbols, raised against the polished steel, prickled the tips of his fingers as they slid over them. A gentle vibration ran through it at his touch. He felt there was a connection there, between the ancient power of the relic he wore and the Grol’s newfound might.

In hopes of proving it, though he knew there could be no doubt, he cast his eyes once more toward the huddled knot of Grol and tried to catch a glimpse of the staves they bore, but was too late. They had ceased casting their bolts and had drifted off toward the demolished walls to join in the bloodbath, which was thankfully out of sight.

Deep in its death throes, Fhenahr was already lost.

Fury trembled at his hands as Arrin crept from the rise. He could watch no longer. His breath caught in his lungs as he drifted toward the sheltering tree line that marked the forest behind him. Empowered by a force not seen in Ahreele since well before his days began, Arrin knew the Grol would not stop at the borders of Fhen. He knew their appetite. It would not be assuaged solely by the defeat of the Fhen.

He pictured Lathah, shattered and raped as Fhenahr, and he felt sick. Thoughts of Malya tore at his heart. He could imagine her standing over her father’s bed, raging, her small fists raised in futile defiance as Lathah’s walls came tumbling down. Bile settled in the back of his throat as he contemplated what such savages would do were they to breach the Lathahn barriers. His thoughts were awash in blood and gore.

Arrin swallowed hard and cast his sight toward the imposing wall of the Fortress Mountains to the west. His eyes followed the spiny chain north toward the land of his birth, and the truth of what he must do settled over him. He had to warn his people. He had to warn Malya. He could do nothing less.

Despite it having been fifteen years since his boots last tasted the soil of his motherland, he knew he had no choice. He had to go home. Once Fhen crumbled, there was no doubt the Grol would set their sights upon the enemy that had long defied them: the people of Lathah.

The massive rows of fortifications that had kept his people safe for hundreds of years would be their undoing. Confident in their defenses, the Lathahns would simply hunker down and wait for the beasts to spend themselves and slink away with their tails tucked, as they had always done. Never once imagining the Grol capable of piercing the layer of walls that defended the city, they would give no thought to retreat until it was too late. They would be like yolk in an egg, Grol snouts gorging once the shell cracked wide.

He drove the image from his mind and started toward Lathah, his steps leaden. Soon he would see his beloved homeland, but no joy fluttered in his chest. There was only trepidation. He carried his warning as a shield, but had no certainty his words would be heeded. Long as he had been gone, he knew it hadn’t been nearly long enough for some. The eyes of shame would weigh upon him at his return, and no matter his cause, he would not be welcome.

Exiled by Prince Olenn, Malya’s brother and Ruler Pro Tem upon the throne of their ailing father, Orrick, it had been made clear there was no place in Lathah for Arrin.

A soldier in the army, Arrin found himself enraptured by young Princess Malya. Her long dark locks flowed over her pale shoulders, and he could remember the piercing stare of her crystal green eyes. He often watched her as she went about her duties in the throne room, her fists firm upon her narrow hips as she challenged her brother’s edicts for all to see.

Though petite, she was possessed of a courage most men must dig deep to find, tempered only upon the field of battle. Hers had been gifted to her at birth, woven into the threads of her very being, seemingly at the expense of her brother’s conscience.

Fascinated by her fiery spirit, Arrin sought out every opportunity to be amongst her personal guard, though much to the amusement of his fellow soldiers. While Malya seemed not to notice Arrin in more than a perfunctory manner, his infatuation was the talk of her retinue. It was through them, she told him later, their whispered comments and jests overheard, that she learned of his interest.

While the princess had been distant at first, Arrin noticed a gradual change in her demeanor. He caught her eyes, which had never once lingered upon him before, appraising him subtly when he would glance up suddenly. Their gazes would connect but for an instant before she would look away. It was enough to stoke the coals of Arrin’s ardor. This went on for months.

Youthful ignorance driving him to be bold beyond reason, Arrin confessed his feelings when he took advantage of a rare moment alone with the princess. Daring rejection, at the very least given her brother’s temperament, he knelt before her. He clasped her hand in his and professed his attraction. His honesty and courage were rewarded with a warm kiss and a confession of hers in return. Malya had arranged their time alone.

It happened often after that day.

Despite the vast difference in station, their relationship flourished. And against all likelihood, it remained a relative secret for years from any who might condemn it.

Malya’s unexpected pregnancy ended any pretense of a happy ending.

Then, a low-ranking officer of the royal guard, though a respected veteran who had blooded his sword upon the Grol, Arrin was dragged before the prince who frothed in rage. Unable to bear children of his own, Olenn had intended his sister to wed a highborn and to provide the land with a noble heir to continue their family’s rule. One he could groom. Malya being pregnant by a lowly soldier was never in the prince’s plans.

Olenn had Arrin arrested, his rank and honor stripped as brutally as the flesh from his back, the bite of the whip merciless. The prince would have had his manhood and his head as well, had it not been for King Orrick.

In a moment of lucidity brought on by the insistent pleas of his daughter, a rare break in the memory sickness that crippled his mind, the king intervened. Though he did not condone what had happened between Malya and Arrin, he appeared reluctant to order the death of a soldier who had fought to defend Lathah. So few of his people left alive to breed and father their continuance, he had said, Orrick refused to murder Arrin to satisfy his son’s fury.

He ordered Malya hidden away until after the birth, the child said to be given to a family who would raise it as their own. It was not to know its true origins, and Malya was never to learn where it had been taken, so he decreed. Malya pleaded, but her father was not to be swayed.

As for Arrin, though Orrick would not condemn him outright, he said he felt it best Arrin be cast out. The king must have known that soon the haze would be upon him once more and reason and control would slip away as though they had never existed. Were Arrin to remain in Lathah, he would die. Of that, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind. He exiled Arrin from the land, never to return-the sentence to be carried out immediately.

Under watch by guards more loyal to the king than to his son, Arrin was taken to the lower gates. Allowed nothing, his back a patchwork of oozing black wounds, Arrin knew his exile was but a momentary reprieve from death. Everything that defined him: Malya’s heart, a father’s love of his unborn child, and his hard-won honor, had been ripped from him in a single, dismal moment.

Even were his body to survive its exile, Arrin would rot inside. It had already begun.

He hung his head low as he drifted desolate toward his destiny beyond the walls, a ghost trapped in the confines of its weary flesh. As the gates were pulled back, their metallic peal setting him to shudder, he heard her whispered voice-

– Malya.

He looked up to see her standing before him. Her face shone within the darkness of her concealing hood, her cheeks reddened and blotchy beneath the stream of her silvery tears. He moved to embrace her, but the guards held him fast. He lacked the strength to fight.

Malya’s own escort stood close, preventing her from closing the distance. So close, her presence was a torture far worse than the lashing. Arrin saw his own sorrow mirrored in her forlorn eyes and felt his legs tremble beneath him. Only the grasping arms of his escort kept him on his feet.

Her tears rolling loose, Malya held her shaking hands out to him. In them was a swathed bundle. She passed it to Arrin with a sob.

Their fingers grazed as he accepted the bundle without thought as to what was inside. An ephemeral tingle ran up his arms. It settled cold inside his chest. He knew it would be the last time they would touch.

Malya had been led away without a word between them. He could hear her weeping as he was pushed out into the desolate night. The slamming gates had drowned her voice in its clatter. When the ringing cleared from his ears, he could hear her no more. There was only silence and the maddening beat of his heart.

Arrin stumbled away from the only home he’d ever known. With nothing left for him in Lathah he had made his way to the woods. The trees had welcomed him, their wintered limbs hanging low in sorrowful commiseration.

Though Arrin still suffered the burden of memory, the woods he strode through on this day showed no kindred to those that had greeted him at his exile. The spring air was crisp in his lungs as the trees reached for the cloudless sky, their branches flush with burgeoning life. There was no sorrow in their leaves, no misery in their trunks. They knew only the joy of their annual rebirth, the frigid winter slumber having passed out of season.

Arrin felt none of that as he trudged on, unconscious fingers upon his collar. It had been the contents of Malya’s bundle; her final gift to him. His boots were heavy as they resisted his course.

A warrior to his marrow, he did not fear Olenn’s wrath. That is not what leadened his steps. There was no harm the prince could cause to Arrin that he had not already subjected him to. Tearing him away from those he loved was a wound that left no room for a fear of death. No, what he feared was the prince’s stubbornness, his arrogance, and what it could bring about.

While Arrin could lay no claim but love upon Malya and the child he had never known, their presence was buried deep inside him. Though apart, he knew in his heart they were there in Lathah. That thought had always been a comfort.

But with the Grol army at his back, that comfort could easily be rescinded. Were the prince to reject Arrin’s warning, he could have no certainty they would still be there, safe within the solid walls, waiting for the day when Arrin could return. Having lost them once, Arrin could not bear to do so again.

That was his one true fear.

He felt his eyes tear up against his wishes and stopped to rub them clear. It was right then he heard a rumbled bark, which echoed through the forest. Arrin dropped low, his short blade in his hand in a single, silent motion.

He cast his eyes to the trees as he heard an answering grumble. No longer distracted from his surroundings by his morose thoughts, he knew the source of the noise even before he spied the Grol warriors. A band of ten, they camped in a small clearing just a short distance from where he hunched. He could smell their rank stench souring the breeze.

He had no doubt they were rear sentries of the army currently devastating Fhenahr. He could hear the discontent in their guttural voices. Though he didn’t understand their tongue, soldiers were the same in any language. He knew their thoughts as well as he did his own.

They milled about, restless, their reddened eyes on each other rather than the trees. They longed for the field, to blood their claws, assured of the safety inherent in their overwhelming numbers. They resented their assignment to the back ranks, far from the glory of battle.

Arrin felt his blood warm. While the Grol soldiers might well be right to presume their main force was shielded by numerical superiority, they were not afforded such certainty.

A grim smile twitched at Arrin’s lips as he drew in a slow, deep breath and crept forward. Staying low, he slipped without sound through the trees toward the rear of the clearing. The collar at his neck trembled, its symbols suffused with a muted, emerald green glow. He could feel its energy coursing mercurial through his body. His smile broadened at the reassuring presence of its power.

Though the Grol outnumbered him easily, they had never faced anyone like Arrin.

Furious at their destruction of Fhenahr, and what he imagined would come next, Arrin felt caution slip to the wayside. He eyed the hunched back of the closest Grol that sat on the stump of a fallen oak. He leapt at the creature before he could rein himself in.

The Grol heard him at the last moment, jumping to its feet as it fumbled for its weapon still in its sheath. Arrin’s blade was a silvered blur, almost invisible in its quickness. He slipped sideways and stepped over the log, past the Grol, heading for the next as the first creature’s neck exploded in a geyser of blackened claret.

He heard the first’s throat sucking air as he buried his blade in the belly of its shrieking compatriot. A twist of his wrist and a sideways tug tore the blade from the second Grol’s gut. Its intestines unraveled with a hissing sigh and put an end to its pitiful screams. Arrin, once again on the move, heard the two Grol crumple to the ground behind him.

The third fared only slightly better. It lurched toward him, black stained claws leading the charge. Arrin feinted with his upper body, as though he would come forward but instead took a half step back, sweeping his weapon in an arc across the creature’s path. The Grol stumbled back with stricken eyes, the squirting stumps of its arms held out before it. Its severed hands, cleaved clean through at its forearms, fell to the mossy earth in spasms.

His rage a palpable heat upon his face, Arrin thrust his sword into the Grol’s eye. It exploded with a muffled pop as the blade slid into the creature’s skull. A gush of blood and pus spewed from the ruined socket and splashed warm across Arrin’s lips and cheek.

He could taste its coppery thickness as he yanked his sword clear and spun about to face yet another of the creatures. It closed on him without confidence, using a blade instead of its claws. Its sword flashed once, twice, Arrin batting it away with contempt both times. As it readied a third attempt, Arrin let his own blade drop low to draw the beast’s attention before scything upward to catch it below its protruding snout.

As if through water, Arrin’s sword cleaved clean through its head. The Grol went rigid as the entirety of its face slid from its skull. It landed on the ground with a wet splash. Its red eyes still projected its rage, not yet realizing it was dead.

The mass of its oozing gray brain squeezed from the opening as though from the gallows trap. It swung upon its stem as the body gave a final, violent twitch and toppled alongside its face.

At that, the rest of the Grol kept their distance, circling Arrin with nervous growls. None looked eager to close the distance. Arrin beamed a goading smile, matched by the eerie glimmer of his collar, and waved them on with a flick of his sword. Drops of blood fluttered through the air, a crimson rain. Still, the Grol stood their ground.

“Cowards! I am but one Lathahn. Have you no heart so far from your lines?” he roared. “Fight me.”

Arrin cursed as he advanced, no longer leaving the choice to them. He swung left toward the sheltering tree line to keep from being flanked and hunted the Grol closest. As he prepared to pounce, he heard a howl erupt in the woods behind him. The Grol in the clearing barked in eager response. Relief flooded their worried eyes. A dozen or more howls erupted in quick succession a short distance away, and Arrin could hear movement through the clustered foliage.

More than willing to stand against a scouting party, surprise on his side, Arrin understood his limitations and what he must do. Though he would take his toll upon the Grol reinforcements that barreled through the woods, he knew not how many approached, the stomp of their feet in the underbrush blurring the accuracy of his count. There was a distinct possibility they would win out in the end by sheer dint of numbers. He could not take that risk.

Malya and his child forefront in his mind, Arrin felt no desire to give his life away. He lunged at the Grol before him, sending it stumbling backward, and dodged into the trees. The path of its fellow soldiers clearly delineated in their rush to get to him, Arrin circled away from their maddened shouts and bolted low through the woods. Leashed as they were to the army at Fhenahr, their chase would end short, discipline reasserted. Arrin knew it would resume soon after though, and with sufficient forces to overcome their fear.

The howls and barks fading into the distance, Arrin sheathed his sword and slowed his pace to collect his thoughts. His adrenaline flickered and he felt his heart begin to slow, its rhythmic thump easing from his ears. He stopped and wiped the foul tasting fluid from his face, and cleaned his hand in the damp dirt.

Assured of what he must do, he took a moment to correct his course by the jagged spine of the mountains and headed off once more through the trees, the collar speeding his steps.

War had come at the flickers of dawn and devastated Fhen. Arrin would be damned if he let the same happen to Lathah.

Chapter Two

Domor awoke to a commotion outside his hut. He wiped the crusted sleep from his eyes, and then crawled to the edge of his feathered mattress to sit up. The brilliant light of morning shined through the cracks in the latticed window. The scuffle of feet and excited voices drifted past.

Curiosity getting the best of him, he got to his feet and leveraged the window open, blinking his eyes against the day’s glare. Out on the dirt path a procession rumbled by, kicking up billows of dust. At first he thought it a funeral, for his people, the Velen, rarely gathered for anything less but to the tending of their fields. After just a moment, he knew it wasn’t so when he saw the cheerful smiles and bright eyes plastered across their obsidian faces. He realized it was something much more, catching the note of almost hysterical excitement in the tone of the crowd.

It was contagious. He rushed to change, casting aside his light sleeping robes for his thicker browns. He tugged the robes over his head, the threads catching on the stubble of his shaved scalp. He slipped on his sandals, tying the leather wraps with sloppy knots, and dashed out the door, foregoing the water basin set beside it.

Outside, Domor caught the tail end of the gathering as it wound its way down the path that led away from the homes of the village elders. The tall, gangly bodies of his brethren blocked his view. It was like peering through dark willow stalks that swayed in the wind, and Domor could see nothing but them.

With a snort, he raced toward the end of the line and began to push his way through. He ignored the muttered comments aimed at him as he bullied his way past, and barreled forward without heed to their complaints. As he drew closer to the center of the procession, he spied a pair traveling in the center of the commotion. All he could see was the silver of their concealing cloaks, but it was clear by their height and their graceful gait they were not of his people.

A chill prickled his arms. His stomach fluttered. It had been decades since the Velen had visitors save for their blood-companions, the Yvir. Cloaked as they were, it was clear these two were not Yvir, which made the mystery even more compelling.

He pushed forward more desperately as the strangeness of it all struck him. He cast a glance about and saw none of the Yviri warriors lurking in the crowd, nor even near it. That alone was curious, and somewhat disconcerting.

A pacifist race, the Velen had found themselves at the mercy of the wild races that savaged Ahreele since they first rose up upon the scared flesh of Ree. Were it not for the strength of the Yvir, the people of Vel would have long ago been dust in the memory of the world.

Loyal to the Velen for the belief they were a pathway to the glory of the goddess, Ree, the Yvir built their nation upon the preservation of the Velen. Their own country, Y’Vel, its name a tribute to their dedication to the Velen, horseshoed around Vel to stand guard against the wilds of the Dead Lands to the west and the warrior Tolen to the south. With Ah Uto Ree, the mythical land of the Sha’ree, at the nations’ backs, Vel sat nestled in the embrace of peace. As a result, the Velen had become comfortable in their sheltered lives, shielded from the atrocities of war by their warrior guardians.

None of which seemed a bit concerned by the commotion that strolled down the village path.

Domor could think of only one reason why the Yvir would be so trusting of strangers in the Velen midst: the couple was Sha’ree. Only they could stride amongst his people without confrontation.

His stomach tightened at the thought. A haze of uncertainty settled over him as he struggled backward against the tide of the crowd. Hidden from the world for many hundreds of years, what could possibly have drawn the Sha’ree from their sanctuary to roam Ahreele once more? The tightness in his stomach turned to a roiling sickness as he contemplated the question.

Though Domor had never seen one of the Sha’ree, he knew the legends, pounded into his skull as they were by the village elders. Once a benevolent people, doting immortal parents to the new breeds, the Sha’ree had bestowed upon the races the mystical means to better their lives. Their naive generosity was short lived.

The tools provided, what the Sha’ree called O’hra, were corrupted and abused within a generation. Their mundane uses cast to the wayside as the O’hra became instruments of war and brutality. The races turned upon each other and the blood of Ahreele ran like rivers. Though the violence was short lived, the Sha’ree intervening, it had shown the younger races could not be trusted with the secrets of Ree’s blood, the mystical energy that powered all magic.

Saddened by the lack of maturity in their younger siblings, all children of Ree they believed, the Sha’ree reclaimed their magic but had been reluctant to abandon the other races. However, over time, perhaps burdened by the savage nature of their much slower evolving brethren, the Sha’ree eventually faded from sight. Disappearing from the face of Ahreele, the Sha’ree took their magical secrets with them.

Though not all of them.

Domor slowed his pace as a sour memory washed over him. He stepped away from the parade and blanked his mind with a muttered mantra, lest the Sha’ree learn of his thoughts. He sat quiet until the procession had moved on. Once the chattering voices turned the corner on their way toward Y’Vel, Domor let out his captured breath with a shudder. His hands shook as he surmised the reason for the sudden reemergence of the mystical race.

When the Sha’ree had first set about reclaiming the O’hra, they had been diligent. It had been said they scoured Ahreele and took by force those that were not returned peacefully. They would not be denied. For all their peaceful nature, they were warriors true.

But as time wore on, the remnant O’hra scattered across the various nations, it seemed as though the Sha’ree suddenly lost interest in searching for the handful that still eluded them. Rumors thereafter told of the Sha’ree withdrawal, the mystical race returning to Ah Uto Ree without having recovered the whole of their gift.

Domor knew this to be true for his father had possessed one of the Sha’ree’s tools: a golden rod. Upon his death, as his father and his before had, he passed the rod down the line, first to Domor and then from him to his brother, Crahill. Like Domor imagined of the other missing O’hra, it had become a sacred relic of a time long past, an heirloom to pass on in secret lest the world come to know of its existence or the Sha’ree return to reclaim it.

That was the worry that nipped at Domor’s heels.

His face flush with nervous energy, he grabbed at a cheerful passerby who strode late in the direction the procession had gone.

“Brother! Did my eyes lie? Were those Sha’ree?”

The older man’s smile lighted his ebony face. “They were, brother, they were. Can you imagine? After all this time the chosen of Ree stride the land once more.”

Domor wiped the sweat from his brow and forced a grin as he shook his head. “Why have they come?” Domor heard the guilt projected in his question and hoped the man wouldn’t notice.

The smiled dropped from the old man’s face and Domor felt his throat tighten. The man leaned in close, his eyes narrowing. “They are on the hunt.”

Domor’s heart ground to a halt, his breath frozen in his lungs. He said nothing, waiting for the man to continue.

He did after just a moment. “The Grol raze Fhenahr, even now as we speak, but not with tooth and blade. They do so with magic.”

At the old man’s words, Domor felt his legs go weak. “Magic?”

“Aye. Like the relics of old, massed in hundreds. The beasts have come into power and have lashed out at Fhen. It burns near from border to border, or so the Sha’ree tell.”

“And they’ve come to stop them?”

The old man shrugged. “They did not say. They spoke only of the Grol aggression and asked of the relics from times past. They seek them once more, though their purpose remains their own, tight on their tongues.”

His original presumption as to the Sha’ree motives correct, Domor thanked the man and stumbled back toward his hut. Once inside, he shut the door and slid down its length to sit with his back pressed against the hard wood. Despite the warmth of the day, he felt a chill.

For hundreds of years the mystical golden rod had been in his family, its restorative powers a boon to them all save for a single black night that sat squarely upon Domor’s conscience. And now, the Sha’ree had returned, intent upon taking it away.

A pang of anger suffused his cheeks with heat. He felt that time had bestowed ownership of the rod upon Domor’s family, regardless of the Sha’ree’s previous claims. It had too long been theirs to simply act as though it had never been. He swore he would not let them take it from Crahill as he once had. His brother had suffered great for its loss and Domor for his betrayal. He would do everything in his power to see that such sorrow never befell Crahill again.

Domor got to his feet. He knew what he must do. He went to the wooden trunk at the foot of his mattress and filled his crumpled travel bag with clothes. Once he was done, he tapped out the secret compartment at the bottom of the trunk and drew out a small, silvered dagger.

He cast a furtive glance about before sliding the blade from its sheath and examining its edge. The sharpened blade nicked the flesh of his fingertip with just a touch. A drop of crimson trickled down his finger, bright against his ebony skin. He sheathed the blade and buried it deep inside his pack, wiping the blood away on the hem of his robes. Afterward, he sealed the compartment and closed the trunk.

Not wanting to alert anyone of his intent, he chose to forego the risk of seeking food at the communal dining hall and collected a small chunk of salted beef he’d kept for a special occasion. He grumbled to himself as he packed it away. An unexpected trip to Nurin hardly the occasion he had envisioned.

It wasn’t much in the way of food, but he could scavenge if it became necessary. A waterskin added to his pack, followed by a larger wineskin, he finished off his preparations. He drew in a deep breath to steady his nerves and went back into the street. He closed the door to his home quietly and slipped around it toward the foliage that crowded but a few dozen paces behind it.

Once he cleared the cluster of huts that made up the village, he could see the mass of his people off in the distance, their gazes on the departing Sha’ree. He could barely make out the pair’s silver cloaks but their presence, however faint, buffered his confidence. For as long as they were in sight, his fellow Velen would have eyes for nothing else.

Domor stretched his long legs and reached the covering greenery in just moments. He slipped between the low-hanging branches and set off toward the Vela River. His heart pounded in his chest as he questioned his course of action. Ensconced in Vel for the last ten years after his return, Domor had no cause for travel and a dozen reasons against it.

His people worked in concert to cultivate the land and knew only peace. Their limited skills in handling pure magic, the blood of Ree, kept their country fertile and prosperous. As such, they did not want for food. Edible plants grew in overabundance but feet from his home. Vel’s lush wines, though a pale sibling to those of the Nurin, kept Domor warm through the mild winter nights and fed his raucous dreams of an age gone by. He would be giving up both for the rigors of the road.

Food and pleasant drink aside, Domor had more of a reason to stay with his people than simple creature comforts. There was a safety in Vel not found anywhere in Ahreele, save for the glorious pastures of Ah Uto Ree.

Beyond the buffering country of Y’Vel lay the Dead Lands. Aptly named, the swath of twisted forest stretched across millions of acres and ran rampant with pure magic fonts. Like fiery boils bursting from the flesh of Ree, the fonts spewed magic in its most basic form. Volatile and possessed of an inherent degenerative nature, pure magic was as much a natural threat to travelers as were the horrific creatures that sprang up in its virulent wake.

To reach Nurin in haste, without running afoul of the Tolen, the Grol, or the Korme, Domor would need to pass through the very heart of the Dead Lands. A cold shudder ran through him at the thought. To travel by the river was unappealing and dangerous, but the land route was a certain failure.

His mind set, Domor shook off his dread and continued toward the river. If there was any hope of claiming the rod before the Sha’ree did, he would need to travel the fastest route possible. That was the river.

His head a maelstrom of chaotic thoughts, he almost didn’t hear the crunch of foliage behind him. Domor spun, his hand digging into his pack for the dagger. His wide eyes scanned the woods and he loosed a low growl when he saw the smiling face of Jerul, his blood-companion. The warrior leaned casually against the trunk of a thick oak.

Nearly naked, Jerul looked like a pale version of the tree he rested against. Thick muscle sat like slabs of stone across his hairless chest, Jerul’s stomach distended as though it were a turtle shell. Below the scant covering of his loincloth, too small to be considered modest, were legs that rivaled the branches of the eldest trees. His flesh so white as to be translucent, his veins stood out a brilliant purple against his skin, its marking an honored sign of his people.

Two wide straps crossed his torso that held the serrated swords favored by his kind. Their jagged tips peeked out from behind the bulk of his back, sharp and ominous.

“Sometimes I wonder how your people survived even a day before us.” Jerul’s smile grew wider as he came to stand beside Domor, his gait graceful despite his powerful bulk. His braided, snow white hair swung behind him as though it were a horse’s mane, possessed of its own life. The clean shaven sides of his head only added to the illusion.

Domor’s face felt flush as he met the man’s bright blue eyes and he reined in his thudding pulse. “Sometimes I wonder how we survive now with such ignorant savages sneaking up behind us constantly.” He shook his head. “One day you’re going to still my heart, Jerul. What will you do with your life then?”

Jerul laughed, the veins at his cheeks rippling like worms. “I’ll simply find another of your plentiful people; one with more courage, perhaps.”

Domor’s face brightened. “Good luck with that.” He embraced Jerul with a laugh, towering over the squat warrior.

Jerul obliged, but broke off a moment later, his expression serious. He prodded Domor’s pack with a thick finger. “You are leaving.” It wasn’t a question.

Domor felt a pang of guilt. “There is something I must do, my friend. It will take me far from Vel, and I may not return.” He drew in a slow breath to steady his tongue. “I did not think it fair to involve you. Your place is here amongst your brethren, and with mine.”

Jerul shook his head, his eyes narrowing as though he were speaking to a child. “We are of one blood, Velen. Where you go, so must I.” He set a steely hand against Domor’s bony chest, his palm pressed to his heart. “If you are destined for the womb of Ree, then it is my duty to go first to clear the path.” He pulled his hand away and gestured toward the river. “Besides, thin one, how far down the river do you think the twigs of your arms will get you before they fall off?” He laughed, his voice carrying through the trees.

Domor stared at Jerul a moment before a smile broke across his lips. “If you’re determined to come along, then I won’t refuse your company. I’m headed for Nurin.” Though he wished no harm to befall Jerul, Domor felt his worries lighten at the warrior’s insistence. The trip would be far safer with Jerul along, not to mention much less strenuous. He had not been looking forward to the effort it took to guide a raft down the still waters of the Vela River.

Jerul grinned and jogged over to a nearby tree. He pulled a large bag from the covering foliage as Domor stood watching.

The warrior pointed at Domor’s pack, his nose wrinkled as he sniffed the air. “While I have no doubt you can survive for weeks off the tiny slab of dry meat you brought along, it would not last a day for me.” He returned to Domor’s side with a laugh. “It is also best not to rely upon the land, for we are as much food for the beasts as they are to us; more so, even.”

Domor eyed the bag, his gaze shifting to Jerul’s. “And you just happened to have a cache of supplies hidden along the path to the river?”

Jerul shrugged. “While your people have eyes only for the land and their dreary books, yours drift to the horizon whenever your hands are idle. I knew this day would come.” He motioned toward the village. “When I saw how the Sha’ree quickened your heart, I went to place my bag. If ever there were a time for the wanderer to resume his travels, it would be upon the heels of the miraculous.”

Though he often joked of Jerul’s simple nature, Domor knew there was far more to the Yviri warrior than one would presume. Joined by the ritualistic sharing of blood, they had a deeper understanding of one another that went beyond simple friendship. But to Domor’s regret, Jerul felt the connection more closely, more distinctly, Domor’s own self-guided nature a clogged filter that dulled the bond on his end.

Domor’s chest tightened at the thought. He hoped one day to be free of his burdens so that he could experience the bond as Jerul did. It felt a betrayal to know that the warrior’s blood flowed in his veins, but to not feel it. He raised his gaze to Jerul’s and saw the sympathy in the Yvir’s eyes. He started to speak, but the warrior cut him off.

“If we are to leave before we are discovered, we must go now. The Sha’ree have gone into the Dead Lands, and your people make their way back toward the fields.”

Domor nodded and turned toward the river. He didn’t question Jerul’s statement, simply taking it as fact. The warrior was as in tune with the rest of the Velen as he was with Domor.

A quiet sigh slipped past his lips as Domor trudged through the thick woods with Jerul at his heels. The pair traveled without speaking, the sounds of birds and insects filling in the spaces of their silence.

They came to the Vela River, slipping past its guardian trees to emerge upon its rocky shore. The morning sun glistened upon its reflective face. Like a sheet of polished steel, the water sat deathly still, not a wave disturbing its surface.

Jerul led the way to the handful of small rafts that sat moored upon the rocks, setting his pack alongside one. With a grunt, he lifted a raft, mindful of the dangling oars, and set it gently on the water’s surface. It settled almost flat, only about an inch of the craft’s bottom sinking into the water. The tiniest of ripples fluttered in its wake, disappearing almost instantly.

Jerul held the boat in place with its guide rope and tossed his bag over the low retaining wall that ringed the edge of the raft. He then motioned to Domor, holding his hand out to him. Domor chuckled and made his way down to the raft. He grasped the warrior’s arm and Jerul helped him onto the raft, nearly lifting him from his feet.

He took a seat near the open area in the front as Jerul tossed the restraining rope inside and climbed on after it. On the heavy water, the raft barely even shook under the warrior’s settling bulk. Jerul dropped onto the simple bench set near the rear of the boat and took hold of the long oars.

“You pick an interesting time to brave the water,” Jerul told him as he motioned toward the sky. “The angry eye of Ree awakes. There is still time to stay with your people.”

Domor followed his blood-companion’s stare. The distant, red-orange globe of A’ree, hung visible in the early morning sky. He felt his pace quicken at the sight, feeling as though he were being watched by the goddess herself.

The Great Tumult was nearly upon them and Domor hadn’t even noticed.

The appearance of the second moon unexpected, Domor began to doubt once more. He hadn’t factored in the movement of the moons into his travels. The mistake might well cost them their lives.

A’ree’s sister orb, Nu’ree, circled the sky from east to west. Its pale, blue-gray light shined benevolently down on Ahreele. For nearly a fortnight out of each thirty, its gentle glimmer was a steady guide in the night’s darkness. But once every two years, the two moons’ paths would cross and bring about the Great Tumult.

When Nu’ree, slipped into alignment with A’ree, which traveled north to south and lower in the heavens, the normally placid oceans would boil and froth. The heavy oceans would grow agitated and roil with giant waves that battered the shores. For nearly three days the water would rage until A’ree slipped back into the dark oblivion of the sky.

The rivers and lakes too would bubble and buck like wild horses, the temperature of the water growing unbearably hot, steam rising from the surface. Travel along the waterways became a dangerous proposition during the Tumult. It was like balancing upon the edge of cooking pot held too long over the fire. One slip and fragile flesh would be boiled from the bone.

Domor tore his eyes from A’ree and glanced upriver as he made his choice. The banks were shrouded in the lush green foliage that grew rampant this close to the majestic Ah Uto Ree. He couldn’t see even a hint of the withered darkness that took hold of the trees once you slipped across the invisible barrier that marked the start of the Dead Lands.

His memories of his trek back to Vel ten years ago mercifully blunted by time, he looked back at Jerul and nodded. “If Ree smiles upon us, the Tumult may well speed our journey.” He forced a smile. “Let us go before my sanity returns.”

“Little chance of that.” Jerul grinned as he leaned into the oars. His shoulders rippled and the raft slid effortlessly across the glassy surface of the water. In but moments they were away from the shore and gliding down the river.

Domor’s eyes lingered on the bank as they left the village behind, his hands fumbling at his pack. It was too soon to regret his choice to leave, but he could feel its niggling taint building inside as he set the wineskin to his lips. He sat back with a satisfied sigh and let his arm dangle over the side of the raft. As his fingers trailed through the cool water, he forced himself to feel optimistic. The wine helped.

He had no doubt he would feel differently when they reached the Dead Lands.

Chapter Three

Cael stood rigid in terror as the Korme cavalry rumbled through the lower vineyards toward the village of Nurale, the capital of Nurin. The sound of their passage was like a terrible storm. Thunder rumbled in the distance as a cloud of violence grew ever closer.

Their passage cast dancing glimmers across the land, the morning sunlight reflected off the mass of weapons and shields carried by the soldiers. They rode down the vines as though they were the enemy, slashing their way through the delicate crop. Their blades showed no more mercy for the stunned tenders caught in the field, cleaving them to bleed red alongside the crushed purple of their crop.

Fear spurred him on as though it was a searing brand, and Cael stumbled from the upper vineyard and raced toward home. He cried out a warning as he wound his way through the maze of greenery, finding his voice in the adrenaline that coursed through his veins. Other voices joined his, but all were little more than whispers beneath the roar of the hooves and the maniacal shouts of their riders.

Free of the vineyard maze, Cael dashed along the dirt path that led toward home just as the Korme cavalry reached the outskirts of Nurale. Men and women filled the streets to catch a glimpse of the commotion, children huddled at their feet. Their eyes were wide as they saw the soldiers bearing down on their village. Surprise mixed with a sense of betrayal as parents scrambled to pluck their children from harm’s way.

Little more than a farming nation, the people of Nurin had long ago given up trying to fight the oft-appearing Grol and Korme raiding parties, their resistance a pitiful reminder of their inadequacy with the arts of war. Instead they struck a deal with both, providing each with Nurin’s famous red wine in sufficient quantities to offset the need for either to raid. It worked.

The deal rewarded the aggressors with the much sought after wine in abundance, much more so than any raid had ever produced. Both races agreed to cease their attacks for as long as the wine flowed. Save for the rare, minor border skirmish, The Grol and Korme remained faithful to the arrangement.

Until now.

The Korme cavalry sped through the village, silvered blades lashing out at anything that moved. Screams filled the air, cut short by blade or hoof. The tempest of horses and men sounded overloud as they galloped past. Cael was forced to duck behind a hut to be clear of the charge. The horses barreling on, he peeked from behind the sheltering wall and spied the endless waves of foot soldiers that approached the edge of town.

Though he’d been born after the historic agreement between the Nurin people and their savage neighbors, and had never seen their forces in action, he knew a war party when he saw one. The Korme had not come to raid for wine, they had come for blood. The torches flung at the wooden homes of his people confirmed his belief with brilliant flashes.

Those homes closest to the vineyards burst into flame, tongues of flicking red fire infecting those gathered behind. Billows of black smoke began to waft upward, gratefully obscuring Cael’s view of the soldiers and the burning homes of his friends and neighbors.

His fear making him ill, Cael tore his gaze from the wall of fire and ran the rest of the way home. Korme soldiers rode by in blurs, strafing at any who still lingered in the open. Cael was forced to hide several times as he made his way through the bloodstained streets.

At last he made it to the small hut he and his father shared, the cluster of homes surrounding it still intact. The fires had yet to reach so far. It wouldn’t be long though. He could smell the smoke as it wafted in black clouds over the village. The repulsive scent of burnt meat clung to it. The realization of what it was made him sick.

As his father threw open the door, Cael crumpled to his knees. The revolt of his stomach spewed out in yellowed streams onto the dirt in front of him, its stench nothing compared to what lingered in the air.

His father rushed to his side and yanked him to his feet, his iron grip a vice around his pained bicep. Cael grunted as he was led around the rear of his home and toward the far fields that had yet to be mowed down by the Korme. His legs felt as though they were disconnected from his hips. He stumbled, having trouble keeping his feet beneath him. His breath was ragged in his lungs.

“Come on, boy. We need to move,” his dad told him, the words tinted with fear and fury.

At hearing the strange tremble in his father’s voice, he glanced over and noticed the wood axe he carried for the first time. Its blade dull from daily use, it seemed a poor defense against an army. He felt his skin grow cold at the thought, the horrible realization that the axe resting on his father’s shoulder was the only thing standing between them and a brutal death at the hands of the Korme.

His eyes welled up and a sob slipped loose before he could contain it with his free hand.

“There’s no time for that, son,” His father chided in a rough voice, though the dark creases of his weathered face showed only compassion. “We have to reach the north vineyard before the soldiers encircle the town. Be strong and hold your tears until then.” He gave a quick squeeze of Cael’s arm.

Cael nodded weak and wiped away the snot that clung to his nose and lips. He slipped his arm loose of his father’s grip and met his pace. His chest ached from his panicked breath, but he stayed close; the axe and the company of his father far better than being alone.

He heard the clopping slap of hooves and pressed himself flat against the wall. His dad tossed a small bag to him and hunched low as the horse grew closer, holding the axe ready before him. Cael barely caught the bag, his hands shaking. He clutched it tight to his chest as a horse’s head appeared from around the corner.

His father waited just an instant longer, then swung the axe toward the galloping rider. Its blurred head just cleared the horse’s bouncing mane and sunk to the haft into the soldier’s stomach.

His father stumbled sideways from the impact, the axe torn from his hands. He hit the ground with a grunt and rolled twice before coming to a stop and climbing to his knees, seeming unharmed. The soldier wasn’t so fortunate.

The axe blade buried in his gut, the Korme fell from his mount as the horse continued its forward gallop. He landed hard on his back, the axe handle bouncing. The soldier screamed and blood gushed from the wound. It spilled down his sides in thick, bubbling rivulets, pouring over his hands as he clutched to the blade trying to pull it free of his flesh.

Cael’s father got to his feet and grabbed the soldier’s sword from where it lay in the dirt. If the Korme noticed, he made no sign. He kicked and strained, the axe too firmly embedded in his innards to budge.

A quick slash laid his throat open and his screams became a wet gurgle that faded fast. His dark eyes rolled back to white and he went limp, falling back into the puddle of crimson that grew beneath him.

Cael looked away to keep from vomiting again. After a moment, his father grabbed him once more and dragged him toward the vineyard. He circled around to keep the dead soldier out of sight. Once they turned the corner, his dad released him and slowed long enough to strap on the shield he’d taken from the Korme. Cael felt a surge of hope wash over him as he watched, his father now armed with the soldier’s long blade and shield. While Cael knew his father was no warrior, if he could bring a soldier down with the dull edge of a wood axe, he wondered what he could do with proper armaments.

He feared he would soon find out.

As they ran through the narrow streets of Nurale, the shouts of soldiers grew louder, carried on the burning wind. The sounds were distorted in the chaos, but were no less hostile for it. Cael stood just to the rear of his father who charged through the thickening smoke. His father’s cheeks glowed with the red of exertion, the tiny nubs of his ears even brighter still. The billowing ruin of Nurale filled his chest and he could hear his father’s labored breaths as he chased the shadows to keep from being seen.

As they neared the far end of the village, Cael’s father stumbled to a stop. He cursed as his shoulders slumped. Cael peered past him and saw the crop depot. His heart sank.

The depot was where the grapes were brought to be stored until they were ready to be pulped. As such, the area was wide open in anticipation of harvest. Out of season, the grapes still on the vine, the only thing there were the empty juicing tubs. Set low to the ground, they provided little coverage.

Cael could see horsemen milling about to his left, their swords stained and dripping with the blood of his people. To his right, his vision was obscured by the swelling darkness of the encroaching fire. It spit ash as it crept toward them, devouring the village in fitful bites.

The way ahead open for all to see, the flames drawing closer, their options were dwindling by the moment. His father turned and met Cael’s gaze. Sadness and determination creased his dark face.

“I need you to be strong, Cael.” Silver glimmered at the corners of his eyes. “When I tell you to run, you run. No hesitation, boy. You hear me?”

Cael felt his throat thicken to capture any words he might have choked loose. He simply nodded as his own tears streamed unbidden down his cheeks.

His father nodded and forced a smile onto his lips. “Use the vineyard for cover and run until you reach Pathrale.” He lifted Cael’s chin with the cold edge of the shield. “Whatever you do, don’t stop and don’t look back. Just keep running. I’ll be right behind you.”

A chill settled in Cael’s stomach as he saw the resignation in his father’s eyes. He glanced past him to the depot, then back to his father. He knew this would be the last time he would see him. The instant he obeyed his father’s order to run, he would be condemning him to death. That thought was too much for him.

A quiet sob slipped from Cael and he buried his head in his dad’s chest. Strong arms encircled him and held him tight, their strength blocking out the horror. It lasted only a moment.

His father drew back, holding him at arm’s length. “It’s time. Make your way to Pathrale and ask for shelter. The Pathra will protect you.” He drew in a heavy breath. “You’ve made me proud, boy.” He kissed Cael’s forehead, then cast his gaze to the open depot, then to the soldiers at its edge. He waited until they swung about, their eyes facing away the open lot before shoving Cael forward. “Now, son, now. Run!”

Cael stumbled forward and managed to get his feet beneath him. The soldiers spun about at his father’s shout and he felt terror give wing to his flight. He sprinted across the lot as the first of the horsemen got his mount turned about and charged. The clop of hooves sounded as though they were right behind him, but then he heard his father’s shout. The sound wavered as steel clashed against steel.

Ignoring his father’s last words, Cael stuttered to a stop behind a building at the far end of the depot and braved a look back. He knew what he would see. His stomach tightened at the thought.

His father stood amidst the circling horsemen, blood on his stolen sword. At his feet lay a twitching horse with its neck nearly severed. Its screaming rider lay trapped beneath the creature’s bulk. The remaining soldiers lashed out at his father, laughing as they did. Each flick of their blades drew red, his father’s torso stained in the running color of his life’s blood.

Cael’s hand tightened about the bag his dad had given him. His fear and disgust grew slow into a building rage. He watched as the soldiers toyed with his father, his arms seeming to grow weaker with each crimson wound cut into his ebony flesh. Cael resisted the urge to go to him, to lash out at the soldiers who dared to take his father from him. But he could hear his father’s words in his head and stood his ground. To go to him would mean both of their deaths.

He couldn’t do that to him. Even if the Korme killed him as he fled, Cael wouldn’t let his father go to his grave knowing it. No matter what happened, he needed his father to believe his sacrifice had saved his son. It was all he could do for him.

Sickened by what he must do, Cael turned away from his father’s last moments and ran.

His heart and head in turmoil, he found cover in the north field and raced through its lines until he was clear of the vineyard. Black smoke filled the sky behind him and he ran until it blotted out the ruin of Nurale and the army that had come to destroy it.

When at last he stopped, his lungs burned as viciously as if he had inhaled fire. He fell to his knees and coughed up mouthfuls of acidic yellow bile that tore at his throat. Too weak to even crawl, he sunk to the ground, heedless of the rank vomit that pooled warm against his sweaty cheek and bubbled with each hurried breath. His tears joined the sickly puddle as he curled into a ball, the storm of his sorrow washing over him.

When a semblance of strength returned to his limbs, Cael pulled himself to his feet. The vomit at his lips was a bitter reminder of his weakness. He wiped it away with a growl. He could still smell the acrid sting of the flames that had ravaged his village, its odor carried by his clothes and hair. Its scent spurred him on.

He set his sights on the dark woods in the distance and staggered toward them to keep as far from sight as possible. His chest burned and his muscles ached, but he pushed his discomforts to the wayside.

His father had died to save him. To whine about such petty annoyances was to dishonor his memory. Cael couldn’t bring himself to do that. Instead he thought back upon the cruel faces of the men who’d laid him low.

The heat of his anger lent fire to his steps.

Chapter Four

A sharpened grin stretched along Warlord Vorrul’s long snout. His casters eager to blood their claws, he motioned for them to join their brethren in the assault upon Fhenahr. They passed the golden staves to Vorrul’s personal attache, the Bloodpack, and raced toward the crumbling city. Their excited howls filled the leader with feral pride. They’d done their work well and deserved to be a part of the kill. There was plenty of meat to go around.

Vorrul turned from the casters to watch the black-coated warriors of the Bloodpack. They carefully wrapped the delicate staves in wide swaths of hide before storing them inside the armored palanquin. They did so with reverence, each staff eased inside with gentle assuredness and under the watchful eye of General Morgron. The thick wooden bolt once more across the tiny door, his soldiers returned to their positions in front. Vorrul breathed a quiet sigh.

The staves safely stowed, he returned his attention to Fhenahr as it burned in the distance. The relics no longer casting their magical artillery into the city, the warlord could hear the horrified cries of its people. His smile grew wider as he pictured the carnage inside its shattered walls. Even at this distance he could scent the fresh blood in the air and the burning flesh of Fhenahr’s unsuspecting citizens. His stomach growled in anticipation of the feast to come, but he would not give in and go to it.

Unlike the short-snouted beasts at his command, Vorrul need not dull his claws to fill his rumbling belly. His men would bring him proper tribute. It would be heaped in a shrieking and squirming pile before him or they’d become his meal. He had no doubt they would provide.

He loosed a raucous bark as he watched his army spill into Fhenahr, the fur at his nape on edge. It had all been too easy. Once the walls had collapsed, the Fhen defense fell into chaos. He crowed as their undisciplined soldiers scattered, unable to defend against the fireballs that rained down from above. Their pitiful defiance ended on the teeth of the Grol.

It had pleased Vorrul greatly.

For years, he had strived to break the neighboring Fhen, his forces returning home with little to show for the blood spilled from the veins of his warriors. He had watched in disgust as his pack fell upon the rotting carcasses of his own people, tearing at one another for a mouthful of foul meat. He could see his future in the stripped bones of every fallen soldier.

He used to notice his men glaring at him when they thought he wasn’t looking. Those eyes plotted his downfall. Only his ferocity had kept their traitorous attempts at bay. Though he had no doubt, had the lean years of his rule continued, his men would have fallen upon him in a savage reminder that even the most powerful warrior can be brought down by the pack.

But those days were behind him. He had cemented his place among the Grol as had no other before. Dawn brought him victory in Fhen, its people shattered in his wake. The present was glorious. The future would be even more so. He would bring all of Ahreele to its knees.

He looked to the bronze bands that encircled his wrists, their unfathomable symbols shimmering with a dull green light. He clenched his fists and chuckled as the glow brightened, the sting of hornets burning through his blood. A surge of energy washed over him, encouraged by his will, and his cropped ears folded against his skull in pleasure.

He cast his sights back to the Bloodpack and saw them watching him. This time there was no hint of betrayal or veiled violence in their eyes. There was only respect. He gave an approving nod when saw his own excitement mirrored in the flickering fire of their gazes. He knew they understood what he felt, though only to a degree, for they too wore the bronze bands at their wrists, glimmers of green fluttering with their mood. However, unlike Vorrul, the bands were the only relics they were allowed.

Only he was worthy of more.

He wore a thin metal harness that crisscrossed his broad chest and strapped tight about his waist, made of the same material as the bracers. Archaic symbols covered the length of it, their strange energy warming the furred flesh beneath.

About his ankles were two more of the bronze bands, which seemed to shimmer in time to the ones at his wrists. Their power made his legs tremble, but he stood strong against it. His control of the magic brought a sharpened grin back to his face.

The stomping arrival of his general wiped his grin clean away.

“One of our rear positions was attacked,” General Morgron told him, a handful of warriors keeping a discreet distance behind him.

Vorrul spun on him, teeth bared. “I want the dead sacks of dung that did it brought to me now!”

Morgron took a short step back, his dark snout tucked to cover his chin. “There was just one; a Lathahn, or so I was told.” He cast an angry glance over his shoulders before turning back to meet the warlord’s furious gaze. “He escaped.”

Vorrul stared without saying a word. His red eyes narrowed to tiny slits and his lip twitched as the seconds dragged on in painful silence.

The general waved the rear guard forward. They moved with hesitant steps, snouts low. Morgron maneuvered around them, placing the warriors between him and Vorrul.

“Tell him what happened,” the general commanded.

The warriors glanced back and forth between each other, none speaking. After a long moment, a pale-furred soldier stepped away from the others and met Vorrul’s stare. He lifted his snout and bared his throat in respect to his leader.

“The meat caught us off guard,” he admitted. “He struck fast and killed two of us before we knew he was there.” Vorrul drew closer, his twitching snout just inches from the soldier’s. He sniffed. The warrior swallowed hard, but held his ground.

“So one Lathahn slaughtered your men while you watched, and you let him get away?” His question was little more than a whisper.

“He used magic.”

Vorrul’s glare shifted in an instant. His eyes went wide. “Are you sure?”

The warrior nodded. “He had a collar around his neck. It glowed with the same type of symbols as the relics you and the Bloodpack wear.”

Vorrul glanced at the other warriors for confirmation and they muttered in instant assent, a choir of barked agreeance. He snarled at them and turned back to the one who had stepped forward. “What is your name, soldier?”

“Rragal.”

Vorrul growled. The sound rumbled deep inside his chest. “Well, Rragal, it seems the failure of your unit was perhaps a gift in disguise.” The warlord reached out and laid his claws against the warrior’s throat. “You understand though, I cannot reward incompetence, however fortunate the results.”

Rragal grunted and lifted his snout higher. Vorrul laughed at the soldier’s courage. The sound was a graveled bark. He showed his teeth and leaned in as the warrior stood rigid.

Then without warning, he released Rragal and leapt past him, his claws sinking into the stomach and shoulder of the surprised warrior behind him. The soldier shrieked as Vorrul dug his claws in deep, creating handholds which he used to drag the warrior to the ground. The symbols at Vorrul’s wrists and ankles grew brighter, showering them both in a green glow.

The rest of the guard broke ranks and started to flee their leader’s wrath, held in check only by the sharp growl of Morgron. They reluctantly stayed put, their wide eyes on the slaughter of their companion.

The warlord’s teeth sliced into the warrior’s throat. His horrified scream went silent as Vorrul whipped his head back, tearing the soldier’s larynx out. The tendons stretched and snapped with a wet pop. Crimson gushed from the warrior’s throat as he twitched and thrashed against Vorrul’s grip. His eyes spasmed in their sockets and he went into convulsions.

The warlord pulled his claws from the soldier’s flesh, tearing loose dripping chunks of muscle and furred-skin. Vorrul rose up to stand over him, casting the handfuls of meat aside. The relics’ glow subsided.

The warrior’s death throes subsiding, Vorrul spit the larynx out and turned to Rragal. Blood ran from his snout in warm streams. The smell of it excited Vorrul, but he repressed his urge to eat his fill, Grol a poor substitute for the soft meat of the Fhen.

“For your courage, you can join your brothers in the city.”

The warlord waved Rragal away. The warrior muttered his thanks and raced toward Fhenahr without glancing back.

Vorrul glared at the remaining soldiers. “No meat for a week.” He bared his bloodstained teeth. “Do not fail me again or it is you who will warm the bellies of the pack.”

At Morgron’s barked command, the warriors scattered. The general snorted as he came to stand before Vorrul.

“This Lathahn, did he truly use magic?” the warlord asked.

“Those who saw him confirm he had a glowing silver collar at his throat and moved far faster than any meat they’ve ever seen. He killed four of the men before a roving patrol chased him away. He would have likely killed them all had the patrol not returned when it did.”

Vorrul glanced back at Fhenahr and drew in a breath of acrid air. “He was alone?”

“The men believe so. They saw no one else.”

Vorrul looked to the bands at his wrist. He knew so little of their magic, their potential. Like the staves he’d used to humble Fhen, he knew there was more to them, a way to tap into greater power. If he could only unlock their secrets, there would be nothing-no one-that could stand in his path.

The meat that tore through his soldiers had to know how his magic worked to have so effortlessly dispatched his men. He must be made to spill his secrets, before Vorrul spilled his steaming entrails across the dirt for daring to challenge the pack.

The warlord turned back to his general with a feral smile. “Send some of the Bloodpack and track the Lathahn down. I want him brought to me; alive.”

Morgron nodded and turned to the closest black-coated warrior and called him over. He issued the order in rapid fire barks and sent the soldier away to do his duty.

A group of five Bloodpack broke off from their positions by the palanquin and made for the tree line. Vorrul watched until they disappeared into the thick woods. Once they were gone, he turned back to Morgron.

“Let the pack play until they’ve subdued the rabble, but have them ready to run right after. I want to be upon Lathahn soil before they know we’re coming. Leave a contingent behind to gather the meat and have them follow after. We’ll camp in the ashes of Lathah” The general acknowledged the order and waited for the next. It was quick to come. “Send a messenger to that rotting piece of dung, Rolff. I want his forces in place before we cross the border.” Vorrul dismissed his general just as his men arrived with his tribute.

The warlord smiled as the meal was laid out before him. A dozen naked infants were set on the ground at his feet, their cries setting his lip to twitch. He could smell their terror. Its scent was as thick as the feces and urine that encrusted their lower halves. Blood pulsed warm through his veins, his hackles raised. Vorrul grinned wide in anticipation of his feast.

He nodded with respect to the Bloodpack who’d brought the bawling meat, then waved them away with an impatient flutter of his hand. This was his feast alone.

He didn’t intend to share.

Chapter Five

Arrin felt the leaden weight of each step as he rounded the furthermost eastern point of the Fortress Mountains and crossed the border into Lathah. Though there was no discernable difference between the rugged forest landscape of Fhen and Lathah, there was an instinctual understanding that he had come home. It was a bittersweet feeling that filled him with joy and sorrow, in equal measure.

Certain he had a sufficient head start on the Grol army, Arrin stopped, though for only a moment. It had been too long since he had tread upon the land of his birth. He could not resist its call.

He dropped to his knees and ran his hands through the foliage gathered beneath the shade of the low-hanging canopy above. A chill sent goose bumps up his arms, tickling the nape of his neck. He breathed in the musky scent of the trees and let it flutter in his lungs. Handfuls of rotting leaves and dirt tumbled through his fingers as he reveled in the mix of emotions.

Grateful to be on Lathahn soil, there was a prickle of nervous excitement at his defiance of the prince’s will and King Orrick’s mandate. In all his years exiled, he had never once gone against it, despite his daily yearning to do so. He had often stood just yards from the invisible line that marked the boundaries of Lathah, but had turned back each time. He had no fear of the prince, but only for what his presence might mean for Malya and his child.

He sighed at the nondescript word: child. It was a pathetic replacement for the flesh and blood he had sired. He didn’t even know if he had fathered a son or daughter. Did it look like him? Did it sound or think like him? Would they know each other were their paths to cross?

His head swirled with his thoughts. He hadn’t dared to let his imagination supply a gender or even guess at a name, in case doing so blinded him to the truth he hoped to one day discover. He did his best to avoid imagining specifics, but it only fed the frustration in him that festered and bled, growing only worse with age. It was an agony not knowing anything, certain a piece of him existed somewhere that he might never get to meet, to hold, or to truly love.

He had already lost the first fifteen years of his child’s life and could never reclaim them. The thought made him sick. His stomach roiled and he doubled over and pressed his cheek to the ground. He felt his face flush despite the coolness of the earth, despair sinking its talons deep into the flagging remnants of his spirit. His ears rang with the intensity of his whirling mind. For his indiscretion and one man’s spite, he had lost everything.

Caught in his malaise, he failed to notice the approaching force until they were upon him. He cursed under his breath as he heard the booted steps come to a halt just a few feet from where he sat.

“You trespass upon Lathahn soil. Stand and identify yourself and your purpose,” a voice demanded, its edge as threatening as the rasp of steel being unsheathed that preceded it.

Arrin lifted his head slow, blinking away the dirt that clung to his eyelids. The collar at his throat warmed in instant readiness, but he willed it to peace as he spied the distinctive blue and gray tabards of Lathah on the soldiers before him.

Swords and shields at the ready, the soldiers stood in a loose semi-circle. Three were positioned behind the main force with five foot spears set strategically between their cohorts, ready to thrust should Arrin act aggressive. All were armored in the standard Lathahn border patrol outfit. Hardened leather jerkins covered their torso and hung to mid-thigh beneath the tabards. They wore no helmets, visibility and speed far more important than heavy armor that would impede their movement. Not meant to engage hostile forces, they were simply a warning mechanism designed to return to Lathah should they encounter enemy forces.

Their presence so far from the city confirmed what Arrin had already surmised: they knew nothing of the Grol invasion of Fhen. He raised his arms, fingers spread wide in a gesture of peace, keeping them from his sword. He had no desire to add their lives to his conscience.

“I intend you no harm.” With no one specific to address, he told them all, uncertain of who had spoken and unable to see any obvious rank or insignia on any of the soldiers. “I bear grim tidings for Lathah. I must speak with Prince Olenn.” The man’s name was poison on his tongue.

A dark-skinned warrior from the front rank drew a step closer, distinguishing himself from his men. “I am Sergeant Barold. If you’ve a message for the prince, I can deliver it for you.” He met Arrin’s eyes. “You still, however, haven’t told me who you are.”

Arrin sighed. While he felt certain the young sergeant hadn’t been around long enough to know who he was, there were several aged veterans amongst his men who eyed him with a cold wariness that seemed to go beyond simple suspicion. He thought he recognized one he might have served with, but he was unsure. It had been a long and hard road since then, such memories ancient history in the grand scheme of his sorrowed past.

He contemplated lying, but he knew it would only compound their distrust and possibly delay his warning. There was also no way to disguise the obvious fact he was Lathahn and living outside the walls. That alone marked him as outcast.

Seeing no path but the one forward, Arrin gave it into the hands of fate. “My name is Arrin Urrael, exile of Lathah.”

He watched as one of the older soldiers leaned into the sergeant’s ear and whispered. Another, the familiar one, gave him a shallow nod from the back ranks.

His eyes never leaving Arrin, Barold listened until the soldier was done speaking. “It seems as though there is some confusion as to what is expected of me. Orders from the prince are that you are to be killed on sight.” He gestured toward the veteran who had plied his ear. “However, it also appears that there are long-standing, and contradictory, orders from the king himself regarding what should be done were you to ever return to Lathah.” He motioned for Arrin to rise. “There is no uncertainty, however, to the fact you are not welcome upon Lathahn soil.”

Arrin had expected no less.

“Given my conflicting orders, I think it best you be about your way and we both simply forget about your accidental transgression.” He pointed the way toward Fhen and motioned with his head.

Grateful he hadn’t yet been forced to kill the soldiers, Arrin shook his head. His message needed to be delivered. Though he could easily send it on with Barold, he knew there would be doubt. The prince wouldn’t believe a word passed from Arrin, expecting it to be some elaborate scheme at revenge. As such, it would likely place Barold in the position of unwanted messenger, which could get the sergeant hurt, or worse, ignored.

If there was any chance the prince would accept that the Grol were coming with the means to batter down the walls of Lathah, Arrin would have to deliver the message personally. Even the dimmest of fools would have to take his word seriously were Arrin to willingly deliver himself to the prince, even after all these years.

“I’m sorry, sergeant. I cannot simply leave.” He gave Barold a curt bow. “The prince must hear what I have to say, and it must come from my mouth alone if it is to be believed.”

Barold sighed, frustration at Arrin’s choice written in the lines of his face. “So you would have us both killed for your determination?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I have been nothing if not generous. Give me your missive and I swear to you it will reach the prince.”

“No.” The word came out harsh. Though he hadn’t meant it, there was a challenge in Arrin’s tone. Years in the wilderness, thought second to the quickness of his blade, his nature had grown hard, aggressive. In his travels, he so seldom found the need for civility. He had lost its knack.

Hoping to avoid the needless bloodshed of innocent men, Arrin continued. “I cannot leave, for to do so means the death of all that I love. It would mean the same for you; all of you.”

“You dare threaten us?”

“I offer no threat, sergeant, only a sad truth. A force like none seen before rides upon my heels and threatens to engulf all of Ahreele. Thick with the certainty of Lathah’s walls, your prince will seal the gates and your doom with his ignorant stubbornness.”

Barold lifted his blade, the sharpened tip just inches from Arrin’s cheek. “You’ve crossed the line of my kindness.”

“Then take me to your prince. Would he not richly reward the man who brought me before him humbled, to be slain by Olenn’s own hand?” Arrin slowly moved his left hand to his belt and undid the clasp. The belt slithered down his legs, his sword dropping to the dirt. “If the prince wishes me dead, he can ask for no better fortune than to do the deed himself. I surrender to you, sergeant.”

Barold growled, his eyes narrowing. He glanced at the soldier who counseled him earlier. The older man nodded. The sergeant looked back to Arrin with grim resignation lining his face. He gestured his men forward. “Search him, and then bind him tight.” He sheathed his blade with a snapping clank as his men closed around Arrin. “I’ll grant your wish, exile. I pray you’re wrong about what you say, even though it will mean your death.”

Arrin nodded and gave himself over to the soldiers, one of which patted him down with quick hands. “I too pray I’m wrong, for if I’m not, it will mean all of our deaths.”

Barold retrieved Arrin’s weapon. He slid the sword loose of its sheath and saw the thick blood that still stained the blade. He raised his face to meet Arrin’s stare. Arrin said nothing as Barold sheathed his sword, the man’s dark cheeks paling. The sergeant spun on his heels and motioned for his men to follow. He headed off with quickness in his step.

Arrin fell in with the soldiers who held his bound arms. He looked toward Lathah as leaden knots formed in his stomach. This was not the homecoming he’d dreamed of.

Chapter Six

Commander Feragh led the charge into the Grol village, jumping from his horse in a graceful bound, his sword free of its scabbard before the pads of his feet hit the ground. He growled low in his throat as a skeleton crew of old and maimed warriors burst into view and barreled as best they could toward him in ragged defense of their home.

“Kill them all. Show these loathsome dogs no mercy,” Feragh called out as a decrepit Grol lunged at him, its short blade overtaken by the burnt umber of rust.

The commander shook his head as he batted away the Grol’s pathetic slash. The tip of its sword already missing, the blade shattered against the fine steel of Feragh’s broadsword and exploded in a cloud of dusty brown shards.

The warrior hissed and stumbled back, but not before the commander sunk his blade deep into its protruding chest. The point slid clean between the ribs, it found its home inside the Grol’s heart. Black blood gushed from the wound and the warrior collapsed without another sound, Feragh’s blade pulling free with ease.

He looked over at his warriors and smiled grim as they followed his lead with vicious precision, mowing down the last of the Grol resistance. It was slaughter, not combat. He counted the kills as the bodies fell to the dirt; there’d been little more than a dozen. It was hardly worth the effort.

Feragh cleaned the blood from his sword with lazy wipes as he surveyed the now quiet Grol village. Tiny huts made from overlapping tree branches and sealed with an abundance of shit and mud littered the cleared circle of land that made up the village. The wooden pens the Grol used to hold their prisoners, the walking meals, stood open and empty. Only the scent of its occupants remained. Fetid and foul, it was the vile smell of fear and excrement.

Feragh listened as he had at each village before, thinking perhaps there was a trap yet to be sprung along his path, but no sound drifted to his ears as he scanned the huts for more of the vermin Grol. His sword ached for the blood of a true battle.

“Do a sweep.” He motioned for his men to search the village, but he knew what they would find; nothing.

This was the third village they’d encountered on their way through the country of Gurhtol. It had been the same at each. Only the old and frail met them as they rode up, throwing away their pitiful lives in a futile attempt to bring down the Tolen. It made Feragh laugh.

There were no real warriors, no women, and no supplies. The Grol had taken everything of any value and left the dregs of their society behind to die. The commander was happy to oblige them, however unsatisfying it might be.

Feragh turned his gaze to the dead Grol at his feet as he returned his blade to its sheath. Missing an eye before Feragh and his legion had arrived the corpse looked pathetic, even in the peace of death. Its puckered socket stood in sharp contrast to the wideness of its other eye, which stared without seeing. It lay with its mouth agape, its blackened and blistered tongue lolling. A number of its teeth were little more than jagged remnants like broken shards of pottery poking from its blackened gums.

Feragh had done it a favor by putting it to his steel, but the arrival of his men was a mercy wasted on the Grol.

The commander shook his head and spit a mouthful of yellow phlegm on the dead Grol’s cheek. It made him sick looking at its withered face. No matter how he rationalized it, he couldn’t imagine how the Grol had once come from the loins of his great people. Distant cousins, so far removed from the glory of the Tolen, the Grol were mutts compared to the pure wolfen bloodlines of the Tolen. Nothing more than shit, tangled in the fur of a Tolen’s ass.

“They’re all gone, commander,” the deep bellow of General Wulvren told him as he came to stand before Feragh. “It’s exactly the same as the last two villages. They’ve cleared out, only leaving their trash and infirm behind, as if there were a difference.”

Feragh nodded as he met Wulvren’s red eyes. “They’re up to something.” He drifted from the general’s side and into the village square, such as it was.

Gnawed bones carpeted the area nearest the central fire pit, picked so clean as to reflect the day’s light. A charred and withered Grol body hung from a makeshift spit over the still flickering flames, its arms missing, gnawed off at the elbow. A bent, bronze spear was skewered through its torso, its point bursting from the Grol’s gaping mouth and propped upon a stand of piled stones. The scent of burnt meat competed with the rancid smell of Grol occupation, neither an appealing accompaniment to the other.

Feragh watched as his men fired the huts. He snarled as the odor of burning feces was added to the list of offensive smells that soured in his nose. He regretted his earlier command to raze the villages, leaving nothing for the Grol to return home to, should he fail to learn of their purpose. It was an order given out of spite that he likened did more to offend him than it would the Grol, should they ever return.

The commander moved away from the billowing clouds in search of fresh air and strode toward the far side of the village. Wulvren followed. Once there, Feragh glanced at the dusty ground and gestured for his general to take a look.

“They’ve put no effort into covering their tracks. They don’t care if anyone follows or knows where they go,” Wulvren commented. He pointed toward the distant woods. “If their path holds true, it would appear they’re headed toward Fhen.”

“But why?” Feragh scratched at his long snout, following the trail with his eyes and agreeing with his general’s assessment of their direction. “Ever since the Fhen fell in line with the Lathahns and enclosed their cities behind stone walls, the Grol have been turned back, bloodied at each encounter.”

“Maybe it isn’t the Fhen they are after.”

“Lathah,” Feragh said barely above a whisper as he met his general’s eyes. The name was a lead weight that sunk into his skull, stirring up his thoughts in violent eddies.

It made a strange sense, yet still it didn’t ring quite true. The Grol had been spending their forces against the defenses of Lathah ever since they had forced the Lathahns’ backs against the Fortress Mountains. Sworn enemies of Lathah, the Grol took every opportunity to slay its people, but the beasts had been on the losing end of every major battle for the last two hundred years. Why would they suddenly think things would turn out different?

Something had changed, but what? That was the question that haunted Feragh. Something had happened to embolden the Grol or drive them into a rage beyond all sense of their already limited reason.

Even though he didn’t know what, he thought he knew when. Feragh had been alerted to curious Grol movements, by his spies. They had spotted a Grol force leaving Ah Uto Ree, where Gurhtol and the Sha’ree country touched, just south of the Tolen border. While not reported as a large group, they were said to be well-burdened, a number of armored palanquins carried between them. They were said to be moving fast.

Just daring to cross the border into Ah Uto Ree was a sign that the Grol were up to something. Not even the pious Velen entered the sacred land for fear of what the Sha’ree might wreak upon them for their trespass. For the Grol to have done so, the reward had to far outweigh the risk. It was difficult to imagine anything worth provoking the fury of the ancient Sha’ree.

For Feragh, the Grol violation gave credence to the long held rumor the reclusive Sha’ree had returned to Au Uto Ree so long ago not to be free of the other races, but instead, to die. Though he had little more than myths to go by, the Sha’ree of legend would never have allowed the beasts to soil their land without brutal retribution. History had been written in the blood of those who’d opposed the mystical race.

By the time Feragh’s spies reported in, the Grol force had long since disappeared back into the wilds of Gurhtol. Feragh wasted no time in assembling a legion of his finest warriors to investigate what the Grol had done. To tempt the Sha’ree wrath, whether they be ghosts or not, it had to be terrible.

He and his men swung south, skirting the border of Ah Uto Ree, in hopes of discovering what the Grol had been up to. Not willing to enter the sacred land, they found nothing that might explain the Grol movement. Having expected that, however frustrated, Feragh turned his forces west and drove his men through the heart of Gurhtol, following the presumed path of the Grol force.

This had led him to the first of the nearly abandoned villages, and the two shortly after. Though there was much evidence of mobilization, there was none of what the Grol intended.

That’s what concerned the commander the most.

He turned to his general. “Assemble the men. We’re already too far behind the beasts to accurately assess their motives. I need to know what they’re up to.”

Feragh dismissed Wulvren and returned to his mount. An easy leap and he was astride it, glancing off into the distance. He could see nothing through the thick cluster of trees that stood between him and the country of Fhen. He growled and spurred his horse forward, knowing his men would be at his heels in moments. It was his only certainty.

If the Grol had plans to attack Lathah, Feragh wanted to be there to see the insanity first hand.

Chapter Seven

Sultae strolled from the twisted trees of the Dead Lands, her dark cloak clutched tight about her, its tail flowing loose behind her. She moved without a sound through the waist-high grass that surrounded the Y’var encampment that sat a short distance away. As she drew closer, she purposely stepped on a dead limb, breaking her silence just before she entered the clearing.

The nearest Yviri guard spun about and raised his spear with a shout, his eyes wide. The veins on his face, colored a somber black, only emphasized his surprise. He spied Sultae and lowered his weapon fast, calling out to calm his fellow warriors alerted by his cry. He bowed low and kept his eyes on the dirt as she approached.

Sultae smiled behind the dark veil that hid her face from the world. She said nothing as she strode past the warrior, toward the large tent that housed the tribe’s leader. A number of Yviri warriors circled near the perimeter, but came no closer. Their spears hung respectful at their sides. Sultae ignored them, her attention on the near naked warlord who slipped from behind the tent flaps and came to stand before her.

The warlord bowed deep. “Hail, daughter of Ree.”

Sultae suppressed a grin at the Yviri’s obeisance. It was as it should be. “Rise, Erdor.”

Erdor raised his face and Sultae stood quiet for a moment, examining the warlord. Like the guard she startled, Erdor was clothed only in a tight-fitting loincloth that did nothing to hide his thickly muscled frame. Also like the guard, the distinctive veins of his race stood out against his ghostly-pale skin. Tattooed black, as was the custom of the Yvir who had long ago forsaken their weak-willed brethren of Y’Vel, it looked as though he had rotting vines growing beneath his flesh. His ice blue eyes stared at her chin with practiced patience, the lines about his eyes like blackened stars. He stood at ease, the barrel of his chest rising and falling with slow breaths.

Sultae let him wait a moment longer. Primitive and ignorant, the Yvir were hardly a worthy mate, but their natural tendency toward obedience, combined with their impressive frame, was a temptation Sultae found herself having to push away. Savagery and single-mindedness had no place in fathering progeny, but where simple, unbridled pleasure was concerned, they had their uses.

“Come, walk with me, Erdor.” Sultae spun and glided back toward the tall grass.

The warlord followed, his men daring to go no further than the edge of the clearing, though their eyes never left the pair. Sultae continued on until they neared the forest, stopping just ten short feet from the gnarled trees of the Dead Lands. While she knew the Yvir often hunted just within the boundaries of the woods, it was unlikely there would be anyone there to overhear their words or spy upon their conference. The Dead Lands took cruel exception to any who lurked in its shadows for long.

She faced the warlord and pulled aside her veil to ask, “Does your word still stand?” She knew full well it did.

Erdor smiled, its light brightening his eyes even more. “As given.”

Sultae nodded, taking a step closer to the warlord. Their faces were but inches apart. She could feel his warm breath as it wafted against her cheek. “Then I shall provide as I have promised.” She drifted even closer before slipping to his side, then lithely around to his back. Erdor stood without moving as she produced a small scroll from within the folds of her cloak and eased it into his large hand. Her covered breasts were pressed hard against his warm flesh. The contact hardened their tips and she resisted to the urge to arch into him. “The parchment will lead you to my gift and gives specific instructions as to what I expect of you. Follow them without deviation and what you so greatly desire will be yours, delivered on my oath.”

Erdor grinned and turned his head to look at her. “And when I’m done?”

She kissed him on the cheek, a gentle flutter of her lips. “Then come to me at Hespayr and we will discuss our future…endeavors.” She ran her hand across the darkened trails of his back, silvery glimmers of light reflecting off the band at her wrist.

The warlord’s smile split his face as he turned, his arms moving to embrace her. Sultae set her palm on his chest and held him at bay with the lightest of touches. “Do what I ask first, Warlord Erdor.” Her free hand slid her veil back into place. “There is little time to waste. Once you have completed your task and returned to my side, I will see then about rewarding you as you so rightly deserve.”

Seeming undeterred by her resistance, Erdor stepped back and bowed low, the smile never leaving his face. “As you wish, daughter of Ree.” He held up the scroll as he straightened, his bright eyes once more latching onto hers. “I shall come for you soon, with blood on my hands and fire in my loins.”

He waited until she gave him a subtle nod of dismissal before he ran back to the clearing. Sultae smiled behind her veil as she watched him depart, his voice loud as he summoned his warriors to him. She remained watching for a moment longer, until the grass and distance hid the detail from her view, and then turned her back on the warlord and his camp.

As she did, she caught a glimpse of the red-orange glimmer in the sky. She glanced up at A’ree, meeting the oppressive stare of the moon.

“I see you as well, goddess,” she told it, baring her face to the glowing orb. “Bring the Tumult, Mother. Show us your righteous fury. Together we shall exterminate the idolaters that infest your flesh like creeping vermin.” Sultae dropped to her knees and pressed her forehead against the cool grass. Her quiet words sunk into the earth.

After a moment, she got to her feet and returned the veil to its place. Without so much as a glance back, she strode into the trees, slipping through the tangle of their branches and into the Dead Lands. A’ree fading from her sight behind the gnarled canopy, she could still feel the great eye’s presence.

The time had come.

Chapter Eight

Domor sat comfortable in the enclosed raft, lulled by the rhythmic splashes made by Jerul’s rowing. He watched the oars slice into the water, little more than shadows beneath the river face, until they burst from the surface in a white spray, only to dive once more in an endless rhythm.

Jerul’s tireless pace drove them on, the shore gliding past in a rush. They had cleared Domor’s homeland of Vel quickly, slipping away from his people without being seen. It had made that part of the trip much easier than Domor had expected. He had no answers had the Velen been about to question his departure.

As they neared the far border of Y’Vel, they were spotted by several Yvir who bathed at the shallow banks of the river. The warriors, both male and female, stood unabashedly naked on the shore and waved to the pair as they passed. Domor felt his cheeks flush at the sight of their veined breasts bared so brazenly before him, but he didn’t look away. The Yvir knew no shame at their nakedness, so he felt it was only right to accord them their respect and view it as something natural, and not as something indecent. He kept his eyes level and looked to the moment as it was intended; innocent. He succeeded; mostly.

Jerul called out a greeting and returned a quick wave, his hands gone from the oars but for an instant. The warriors shouted back and returned to their ablutions as the raft sailed past. Domor was glad of Jerul’s fast pace as the Yviri bathers disappeared from sight just a few moments later. He drew in a deep breath and glanced up at Jerul, who met his eyes with a disapproving face.

“You Velen are not as close to Ree as you would like us to believe.” His voice was quiet, the words sharp.

Domor’s cheeks nearly burst into flames at his blood-companion’s words. He had forgotten how closely the warrior could read his emotions, as though he were reading his thoughts. His lust had been as plain to Jerul as if he had given voice to it.

“I-I didn’t-”

Jerul glared for a moment, then broke out into raucous laughter. A broad smile split his face in twain. He fell from his bench as he laughed, nearly dropping the oars into the water. He scrambled to keep his hold on them as Domor stared, realization dawning slow like a misty morning.

“Fear not, Velen, we can always blame your wantonness on the Yviri blood that flows through your veins.” He gestured back toward the shore where his brethren had been, his rumbling laughter barely contained. “But if ever you were to give up your chaste ways, there is none better than a Yviri woman to help you sing a proper song of praise to Ree.”

Domor, catching on, growled. The heat from his cheeks shifted to his ears. He stared at Jerul for several moments until his anger at being teased broke apart on the waves of his blood-companion’s unrepentant grin.

“You are a devious savage.” He settled back with a deep sigh as Jerul continued to chuckle. But for all his discomfort, Domor had to agree with his blood-companion’s assessment, though he would never admit it.

Grateful still for Jerul’s company, despite the teasing, Domor gave his companion a wan smile, then twisted about to glance ahead, and to hide his thoughts so clear on his face.

It was only a momentary concern.

A chill settled over Domor as he spied the darkening forest just ahead. Jerul’s laugh drifted away behind him.

“This is truly the last safe moment to turn about, Velen.”

The sound of rowing dropped away. Domor watched as they glided toward the darkness that appeared to hover over the trees. The sounds of the forest that had followed them since Vel seemed to die down as they grew closer to the Dead Lands. Domor could no longer hear any birds chirping in the trees or insects buzzing in his ears. Silence fell over them like a funeral shroud.

Domor steeled his courage and waved Jerul forward. “We must go on.” The words were certain, but his voice wavered.

Without hesitation, Jerul leaned once more into the oars, driving the raft onward. Domor watched as the shadows of the Dead Lands swept toward them, then overtop as though it were a storm cloud readying to unleash its burden.

The temperature dropped and Domor felt his skin prickle at the sudden change. The trees that had stood so straight and tall just twenty yards back now drooped and bowed as though they shouldered a great burden. Their branches were twisted and deformed, bringing to mind the elderly of his race, their fingers gnarled and useless on the trunks of their hands.

Where there had been clear sky and sun above them just a moment before, there was now a knotted canopy that seemed to reject the light, letting little more than random pinpricks of daylight through. A palpable hush settled over them as they sailed into the shade. It was as if the trees had swallowed all the ambient sounds, leaving only the splashes of the oars and Jerul’s grunts of exertion.

Domor clutched to his pack and eased it open as he glanced back at Jerul. The warrior shifted to sit at the edge of the bench and leveraged the oars against his ribs. He loosed his swords from the cradle at his back and set them side by side at his feet. With a smile that failed to brighten his eyes, Jerul sat back and took up his oars again. He bore down and Domor could see the strain at his chest as his blood-companion endeavored to speed their journey as best he could. The purple veins at his neck pulsed in time with his effort.

Domor looked once more to the way ahead before scanning the canopy as they sailed beneath it. The eerie silence and monstrous trees seemed to close in on him, a garrote around the neck of his spirit. Though he knew it was Ree’s blood that corrupted the land so deeply as to make it untenable, he felt nothing of the great goddess’ presence. It was as though she had turned her back upon the Dead Lands, letting its malignance fester and grow unchecked, virulent in its gangrenous deformation.

He saw none of her beauty in the shadows that clung like a thick mist to the shore, its darkness bleeding into the water to taint it black. Domor leaned over the side to examine the water closer. The glassy surface of the river no longer reflected his wavering face, but seemed to swallow the image, drowning it in an obsidian shimmer. He moved away from the side, a nervous sickness growing in his stomach.

Domor had no fear of the river itself, for his only certainty in the ruin of the Dead Lands was that nothing living dwelled in the water’s depths. In her wisdom, Ree had damned the water of Ahreele to never carry natural life within its current. The heavy water that sat so still was like a sack of stones in one’s lungs. While it could be ingested in small quantities, as was necessary for continued life, its unnatural denseness was an anchor that would pull one down into the depths should a body ingest too much.

It was the same for any living creature.

As a child, Domor watched a horse stumble into the river. Its thrashing attempts at swimming filled its mouth with water, its panic driving it to swallow. As its stomach filled, the horse sank lower and lower, drowning with its head still above the surface. Its frantic motions caused only more water to be ingested until the horse ceased its thrashing and sunk silent to the bottom of the river. The mirrored surface, no longer broken by the horse’s motions, settled to a fine sheen. Just a moment later, it was as though the horse had never been.

Domor purged the image from his memory and focused his attention on the way forward. The forest felt as though it were closing in on him, the silence deafening in its somber strangeness. Domor hunkered down inside the raft, his eyes just high enough to peer past the retaining wall. He slid his hand inside his pack and clasped the hilt of his dagger.

It would be a long trip to Nurin.

Chapter Nine

Arrin stumbled as he emerged from the forest, the walls of Lathah suddenly looming before his vision. For fifteen years they had stood ominous in his mind, a memory both cherished for what they protected and despised for what they had kept him from. They were far grander than he remembered. His recollection was but a pale substitute for the spired glory that now filled his eyes.

The soldiers at his sides righted him as he took a moment to collect himself. They released his arms and took a step back. Oblivious to their withdrawal, Arrin stared at the outer wall that projected from the mountain itself as though it were the jaw of a giant, the crenellated battlements its dull and stained teeth.

The inner walls, of which there were nine, were set in rows within one another, each providing another layer of protection for those behind it should the wall before be breached. Since Lathah had risen from the mountainous land on the backs of its people, it had never happened.

The great gate stood solid near the western rear of the outer wall. Placed thusly, it forced a sieging army that wished to test its stoutness up an incline and into a narrow valley that had been designed for just such an occasion. Lining the length of the city wall was an array of murder holes that looked out over the makeshift valley. A lower wall walk was set behind them, which allowed a legion of archers to fire upon those in the valley as the men on the walls above provided support between volleys.

Were that not deterrent enough, a massive collection of skull-sized stones sat piled in a small cave that bore into the mountainside, its camouflaged mouth open just above the valley. Beneath it was a steep slope that prevented enemy forces from reaching the cave directly, the only entrance being through a network of tunnels that run through the mountain itself, all the way into the back of the city.

The frontal slope provided a direct line of fire into the valley. Several wooden troughs, adjustable and mobile, had been built inside the cave mouth that could be loaded with dozens of the stones at a time. Once the barricades were removed, the stones would tumble from the troughs and down the steep slope, gathering momentum as they careened toward the valley. Like a miniature avalanche, the stones would crash into the enemy forces and shatter bones and crush skulls. At the very least, they would scatter the attacking soldiers and break apart their formations as the Lathahn archers rained death down atop them.

“We have yet to be seen by the watch. Do you still wish to go through with this mad scheme of yours?” Barold asked, drawing Arrin’s attention from the city’s defenses. The sergeant looked even paler now than he had when Arrin first told him his name and demanded to see the prince.

“There is no other way, sergeant.” He met the man’s gaze. “Olenn will never believe a message from me is sincere if I do not offer myself up to him as proof of my warning. However stubborn he may be, he is not stupid. I’ve spent fifteen years of my life longing for my love, my child, and my home, yet never once set foot upon Lathahn soil. To see me here, now, he must recognize that I am serious to so willingly cast all that aside and risk his wrath.” He gave Barold a grateful smile. “Thank you for your honor, but this is what I must do.”

Barold nodded. “Then it is as it shall be.” He motioned his men forward.

The soldiers at Arrin’s side latched onto his arms once more and tugged him forward. Arrin drew in a deep breath, savoring the rich scent of the oaks and evergreens as he was hauled toward his destiny. He might never smell them again.

There was no doubt in his mind he was being led to his death, placing his neck in the noose for what he believed would be nothing more than a valiant waste of his life, his feet to swing just days before the truth of his words were to be discovered. It sickened him. He was no martyr to be prostrated for a cause, but he knew it was the only hope he had of saving Malya and his child from a horrific death.

He heard the cry from the watchtower just moments after they entered the razed and uneven killing field that surrounded the city. Barold called back and the men slowed their pace to be certain no nervous soldier on the walls mistook them for an enemy. Archers stood ready across the battlements, the numbers growing as they moved closer. It was clear from their wide-eyed stares they were more interested in learning who Arrin was than in defending the walls.

Arrin lowered his chin to his chest as they made their way up the slope toward the main gate. He knew it was likely there’d be men on the walls who would remember him if his name was given, so for the sake of his family, he felt it best to simply avoid any unnecessary attention. Not that he expected anyone to recognize him, especially from a distance. Much had changed in the fifteen years he’d been gone.

His once close-cropped hair had grown long and shaggy, the dark brown of it littered with streaks of gray that were well on their way to white. The freshly-shaven face of his youth had been supplanted by a wild mustache and beard, deep lines furrowed at the corner of his eyes. Exposure to the elements had darkened his skin and made it like leather where it stood out from under his armor.

Where he had once been wiry and thin, he was now thick with muscle heaped upon his frame by his years of battle against the other races of Ahreele and the deformed beasts that populated the Dead Lands. Had he not experienced the intervening years and were presented an image of himself now, even he would never have guessed at his identity. There was little left on the outside of the young man he once was and far less of him inside.

The changes were a small comfort. While he might not have to face an uncomfortable reunion with the men of his legion as he passed, bound and humble, his appearance would alter nothing once he stood before the prince. Hate knew no disguise.

A chill gnawed at his spine as he was led before the opening gates. The harrowing squeal of the gates struck a dismal chord and Arrin pushed the awakened memory to the side. There was too much sorrow in it to dare let it surface.

Barold stood at his side as the watch commander came toward them, a dozen armed and armored men at his heels. Arrin peered through the tangle of his hair that hung in his face and groaned inside.

“What is this, sergeant?” the commander asked as he came to stand before Arrin.

Barold slammed his fist against his chest in salute. “Commander, we bring an exile before the mercy of Prince Olenn. We found him near the border at Fhen; he surrendered without resistance.” He paused for just a moment, drawing in an audible breath. “He says he is Arrin Urrael.”

Arrin lifted his chin as the commander drew closer and brushed his hair from his face.

The watch commander growled low in his throat and shook his head. “You had to come back on my watch, did you, Arrin?”

Arrin straightened and met the man’s steely gaze. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but I didn’t think to ask about the guard roster before I gave myself over for my likely execution.” A tight smile touched his lips. “I presume you’re doing better than I, Maltis.”

The commander twisted Arrin slightly to the side to look at the tight binds that held his arms. “I would have to say so if this is what it’s come to, my friend.” He gestured for the men to release Arrin and met Barold’s questioning stare. “I’ll take responsibility for him, sergeant.” When Barold hesitated, Maltis motioned with his eyes for the sergeant to follow his order. “We served together, Arrin and I. We blooded many a Grol in our last campaign beyond the walls, before…” He let the statement die away. “Just cut him loose, sergeant. He’ll mind his manners. I promise you.”

Barold relented and passed Arrin’s sword to the commander before saluting him. Afterward, he let his shoulders slump. He nodded somberly at Arrin as his men cut the rope free.

“Feed your men and then return to your station in an hour,” Maltis told the sergeant.

“I’d wait to send them back out,” Arrin advised. The commander turned to look at him with narrow eyes. “You’ll understand when I deliver my message to the prince, but it’s best to keep every available man who can wield a sword close to home.”

Maltis stood for a moment saying nothing before turning to the sergeant. “Two hours, but stay close should I call.” He looked back at Arrin. “I may need some help disposing of a body.”

Arrin shrugged the ropes loose and shook his arms to speed the blood flow through them. He gave the sergeant a grateful smile.

Commander Maltis waved Arrin on as the soldiers drew closer. “Welcome back, old friend. I suppose today is as good a day to die as any.” He spun on his heels and marched off.

Arrin fell in step as they walked beneath the great arch of the gates. While the sense of coming home had struck him when he crossed the border, to walk through the gates of Lathah was to be bludgeoned with the feeling.

The odious scents of civilization lay thick in the air, but Arrin drew them in with vigor, savoring even the basest of them. The smell of horse dung wafted rank into his nose, second only to that of the shallow sewers that ran behind the clustered houses and stores of those who lived on the lowest level, the Ninth. With the slight downward grade from the top levels down providing the momentum, the Ninth was assailed the worst by the odor before the waste was collected and sent out to fertilize the fields.

The sharp scent of cooking meat and fragrant spices mingled with the other less attractive smells, and Arrin’s stomach rumbled in hungry dissent. He’d traveled for days without stopping, not realizing how much he’d relied on the power of the collar to see him through it. It had seen him through it all since he had been cast from Lathah.

He was glad that Barold and his men hadn’t noticed it when they searched him for weapons. Not that they could have removed it if they had. The collar was bonded to his flesh by snaky tendrils that were sunk deep into the flesh of his neck and ran throughout the network of his veins. It was a part of him until his death. A death that was likely close at hand. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that, though the dreaded weight of certainty pressed down upon him.

Possessing the collar now was a dilemma, a thought he had never before entertained. He had to resist the urge to use it when he confronted Olenn. With its power, he could easily kill the prince and slaughter his guards, and perhaps even escape from Lathah. But what then?

No matter how much he hated the prince, Malya was still Olenn’s sister. She loved him as all sisters with good hearts would. Even if the people of Lathah let her ascend to the throne after what Arrin had done, knowing what their relationship had once been, she would be obligated to do what she must; what was expected of her.

That would be to order Arrin’s death.

However, the more likely outcome would be that another of the royal households would supply one of their own to be leader and remove the line of Orrick from the throne altogether. At the very least, that would leave Malya without a future, an outcast princess brought low by the irresponsible acts of her young lover, fifteen years removed from her life. That would be little better than death.

Neither option sat well with Arrin, thus making the choice of sacrificing himself to save Lathah and Malya the only viable course of action.

Not having noticed he had slowed, his legs leaden with his thoughts, Arrin muttered an apology to the soldier at his side who nudged his shoulder. He sped his pace as they wound their way through the city, once more keeping his chin tucked to avoid possible recognition.

Built like a puzzle to thwart any invaders that might make it past the outer wall, the gates to the next highest level had been placed on opposite sides of the city, each level alternated. From one gate to the next, an enemy force would need to traverse the entire span of the crowded level to reach the next entryway. Caught between two walls and slowed by the multitude of buildings between them, the passage was a charnel house waiting to happen.

Defensive battlements lined each and every wall, all prepared with the same instruments of war that the outer wall was. An enemy force would be bombarded along the entire route without mercy or reprieve. Were all else to fail, the level could be fired, the inner walls keeping the flames contained and the upper city safe from harm as Lathah’s enemies were consumed.

Against any normal foe, such defensive preparations were a guarantee of safety. However, against the empowered Grol, who didn’t need to traverse the gauntlet of levels to reach the throne, they were nothing.

Able to rain down fire from the sky, the Grol needed do nothing but attack and wait. Soon enough, the fires would flare up or the walls would crumble and chase the Lathahns from their holes and out into the open.

It would be a slaughter.

Arrin shook the vision from his head as they continued on, winding their way through the crowded city streets as the sun slowly set behind the wall of the fortress Mountains. He gritted his teeth at what was to come.

While he was in no hurry to see the prince and learn of his fate, the trip to the Crown seemed as though it would take yet another fifteen years.

With a sigh he swallowed his impatience. His death would come soon enough.

Chapter Ten

Desperate to not be caught out in the open fields by the Korme soldiers, Cael hugged the tree line, traveling just within the shadowed boundary of the Dead Lands. Despite its well-deserved reputation for terror, he had encountered nothing in his day-long flight from Nurale. For that, he was grateful.

His limbs tingling and unsteady, he stumbled to a halt beside a thick copse of twisted bushes. He dropped to his knees to catch his breath, setting the bag his father had given him beside him on the ground. His fingers ached when he released it, having clutched it so tight, for so long.

The rumble in his stomach had turned into a searing boil over the course of the day. His throat was parched and it stung each time he swallowed, a painful reminder of his thirst. Days from the river, Cael didn’t think he’d make it. He felt weak.

His head throbbed, pressure pushing against his eyes. There was a constant ringing in his ears that only seemed to further emphasize the near silence of the woods. His thoughts were mired in an agonizing quicksand, each sucked screaming into the depths before reaching full coherency.

Anger and adrenaline had spurred him onward since dawn. Each and every sound that sprung up around him was but another dose that lightened his step and sent him scurrying for cover. With no food or water to fuel his horrified flight, he had run until his joints felt on fire and his heart threatened to burst from the cage of his ribs. He had not stopped since he saw the Korme cavalry mowing down the vineyards that morning. It had taken its toll upon his flesh and his spirit.

Disjointed, he crawled and propped his back against the nearest tree trunk. His burden seemed to ooze from his shoulders as the tree bore his weight. Glad to be rid of it, he loosed a whistling sigh as waves of exhaustion washed over him. As he rested, the pain in his skull eased. Reveling in the opportunity to sit and do nothing, he stared off into the cluster of withered foliage before him. His eyelids blinked once, twice, and then stayed shut.

~

Cael’s eyes sprung wide to an ear-splitting screech. He sat upright, searching the trees for signs of movement. The shadows that had sheltered him as he made his way along the tree line had deepened, sinking into the true darkness of night. The silence that had allowed him to sleep so easily was gone, replaced by the screeches and cries of the unknown. He held his panicked breath at a rustle of branches just to his side. An instant later, he heard it again, only closer.

He crept to his feet with pained effort, nearly hissing as he realized he no longer had his father’s bag. It lay in the darkness, just feet away; somewhere. Certain of what was inside, Cael knew he could never leave it behind. What he wasn’t so sure of was exactly where he had left it. He remembered dropping it before he had fallen asleep, but with the exception of the morning’s horror, everything that happened before his eyes closed was a tangled blur in his head.

The rustle of branches seemed even closer, a low, feral growl accompanying it. With his breath held Cael inched forward, barely daring to let his feet touch the ground before taking the next step. His heart thundered as he squinted, doing his best to see in the nocturnal gloom. His eyes were slow to adjust. After several steps his foot bumped something solid that seemed to shift with the impact. Sure it was the bag he squatted and reached for it. Warm relief flooded his cheeks as his fingers closed around the clasp of his bag.

The snap of a twig beside him popped him upright. Bag in hand, Cael turned and bolted into the trees away from the noise. No longer worried about stealth, he ran as fast as he could while trying to avoid the thick tree trunks that were little more than darkened shadows.

Sharpened branches tore at his skin and caught his clothes, slowing his run. Rubbery limbs shoved from his path slapped back, leaving burning lines across his face and body.

The sounds of the night were all around him. Ominous howls filled the forest with their deep resonance, discordant shrieks erupting in the dark as though in answer. Unknown insects buzzed without fear in the branches as mysterious birds cried out way above. The sounds grew louder as he ran, more insistent.

Having expected to break free of the trees, Cael suddenly realized he was running deeper into the woods. Cold fear chilled his skin. He dug his heels in to stop but caught his foot on a half-buried root. He tumbled forward, tucking in tight and throwing his arms over his head and face. He careened forward until his shoulder struck a tree trunk. Cael cried out as he bounced away. He crashed onto his back with a grunt, his breath knocked from his lungs.

His senses still sharp, perhaps even heightened by the throbbing pain that consumed his shoulder and arm, he rolled over on the damp undercarriage of the forest and climbed back to his feet. Or at least he attempted to.

As he put his weight on his foot, a sharp agony seared through his ankle as though it had been pierced by an arrow. He bit back a scream but he could nothing to stop himself from falling. Cael crumbled to the ground, the fall jarring his shoulder.

White dots of light whirled before his eyes, tiny stars in the sky of his suffering. His hand went to his ankle and he knew then it was more than a simple sprain. The slightest touch sent lightning bolts of agony shooting up his leg. Before the pain forced his hand away, he was sure he had felt the sharp edge of a broken bone protruding against the soft leather of his boot.

Cael felt his panic rising. All around him strange noises rumbled and roared, the forest coming alive with terror. He took just a moment to scan the thick foliage, to listen, assuring himself nothing lurked nearby. The sounds of the night were close, but not right atop him.

Assured as well as he could be, Cael tried his best to blank his mind as he reached down to remove his boot. No time to be delicate, he simply latched onto the heel and yanked. The pain he’d experienced moments before was a pale mockery of what assailed him now. It was as if the sun had exploded inside his head. His vision went white, the darkness chased away in an obliterating flash. He slumped to the ground in a trembling heap, tears and frothy spittle mixing to blur his face. He lay still, not daring to move until his vision began to reassert itself, shadows rushing in to restore the dark night. At last he felt well enough to sit up.

When he could trust his hands enough to do what they must, he fumbled with the bag and pulled it open. His fingers wrapped around the metal cylinder inside. Its surface was almost too cold to touch. Ignoring the bee sting chills that stabbed at his palm, he drew the cylinder out of the bag.

The moment it was free, the archaic symbols etched along its golden length began to glow. Eerie green in the dark of night, the light flickered and cast its glimmering shadow over the area. Able to see his ankle under the gentle glow, Cael looked away fast as the image of bloodstained bone poking through his skin burned itself upon his retinas. He felt his stomach knot and tasted bile at the back of his throat.

He willed it away and clenched his teeth. Without looking, as he had seen his father do a hundred times, he reached out with the rod and set it against his leg. He sucked in a lungful of air and gently slid the cylinder down his leg, to his ankle. He resisted the urge to scream as he pressed the cold rod against the wound.

Cael ignored the pain as best he could and focused his thoughts on wholeness and renewal. He felt tears run down his cheeks as he pushed harder with the rod, willing it to work. Just as he felt he could take no more, a frigid chill numbed his wound and sent relief prickling up his arms.

Cael relaxed his grip as he felt a subtle pressure at his ankle. He stayed motionless for a few moments, a gentle vibration thrumming against his palm. Seconds later it ceased, warmth returning once more to his leg.

He glanced down at his ankle and breathed deep. Though the remnants of his blood still stained his foot and the ground beneath, his ankle was no longer swollen abnormally. He dared a touch and released his pent up breath at realizing it had truly been healed. The bone no longer protruded, the flesh sealed.

Though he had seen the relic at work, had felt its power first hand, Cael was always uneasy about using its power. He knew nothing of how it worked or why, or if it would cease to function at some point. There were just too many questions. All he knew was that it was too valuable to waste its power.

His father had only used it to heal the most serious of wounds, often waiting until the certainty of infection set in before daring to use the relic. He’d kept it a secret from the village, once suffering through a broken arm for over a month, one he’d injured publicly, rather than risk anyone learning of the relic. He feared it would be taken from him; like Cael’s mother had been.

Though he had been too young to remember his mother, her being just a blur of indistinct childhood memories, he had heard the story of her passing often when his father was feeling maudlin and had drunk too much wine.

Cael’s uncle, Domor, had once possessed the relic, before he had passed it on to Cael’s father. Desperate to heal his ailing wife, Cael’s father had sent a missive begging his brother to bring the relic to Nurin. Hesitant at first, his brother gave in, but he had come too late.

Cael’s mother passed just hours before Domor arrived with the relic.

In a drunken rage, Cael’s father met his brother at the door at dawn and the two fought. Domor fled, leaving his brother to his grief. In what Cael’s father had believe was guilt for his selfishness, Domor had left the relic behind. Cael’s father insisted he would never let the relic leave his hands ever again for fear that what happened to Cael’s mother might happen to Cael.

A guttural growl threatened to cast aside his father’s resolution.

Two red eyes pierced the darkness between the trees just ten feet from where Cael sat. Caught up in his thoughts and the pain of his ankle, he hadn’t heard the creature approach.

The eyes crept forward slow, a constant low rumbling sounding in the depths of its throat. A second pair of eyes joined the first, followed by a third, each adding their voice to the first’s threatening snarl. The low foliage pushed outward and then slipped clear as the creatures stalked forward and began to spread out to encircle their prey.

White bone shined in the gloom, illuminated by the fierce glow of the creatures’ eyes. Maws of glistening teeth led the way as they moved without rush, seeming to savor the terror of their presence.

Cael returned the rod to the bag with a shaking hand and inched his way to his feet. His boot lay on the ground beside him, but he knew there was no time to worry about it. He slid the bag into the waistband of his pants and glanced around, looking for a way to flee. All he saw was darkness.

The growls lowered in pitch, a trinity of sepulchral dirges loosed for Cael alone. The creatures drew closer and he could now make them out. Cael instantly wished they had remained hidden by the shadows of the Dead Lands.

His heart sputtered and threatened to fail. Fear like he had never known washed over him as though it were a tsunami of fire, searing his every nerve and drowning him in fiery despair.

Death had come for him.

The creatures stood no higher than Cael’s knees, but it wasn’t their size that inspired horror. Stripped clean of both fur and flesh, the creatures appeared to be wolves, but none like Cael had ever seen.

White bone stood in place of muscle and skin, the entirety of their bodies covered in jagged burs that protruded like tiny, barbed hooks. Their tails whipped the air behind them. Mace-like masses of bone swung back and forth at the tip, sharpened spikes visible even in the gloom.

Frozen where he stood trembling, Cael’s eyes were drawn past the creatures’ skeletal ribs, to what lay inside. Despite no flesh or muscle or tendons to hold anything in place, he spied the beating heart of the wolf as it circled to his left. The wet red muscle spasmed with slow beats, but he saw no veins for it to fill. He saw only the twitching mass of its stomach below it, thin and clearly empty.

Cael knew it wouldn’t be so for long.

He looked around once more as the skeletal wolves advanced and spied a low hanging branch. No time to worry whether the limb would support his weight, Cael spun on his heels and jumped.

The wolves charged at his movement, voicing their fury at his attempt to defy them of their meal.

Cael’s hands latched onto the limb and he swung his legs up behind him. He felt the muscles in his injured shoulder tear the moment his full weight was in the air. He had no chance to hold back his pain.

His scream filled the air, burying the growls of the wolves beneath it. He felt his left hand go numb and slip. His other shoulder, suddenly bearing the entire burden creaked in its socket, but his hand held strong.

His legs, already moving with the momentum of his jump, continued forward. Feeling his fingers beginning to slip, he swung his legs with desperation and wrapped one around the limb just as the wolves leapt at his exposed back.

He felt the grazing sting of teeth and pulled hard to move clear, his weakening arm straining against even his slight mass. With the last of his energy dwindling, his reserves long ago spent, he wriggled his leg around the groaning limb and managed to climb on top of the branch. He heard a rubbery creak as the branch wobbled underneath him. Clutched near the center of it, he dangled more than five feet from the safety of its thickest part.

The wolves leapt at him, howling furious, but their flashing fangs fell short by several inches. Fearing the limb would break and drop him to his doom, Cael inched forward. His left arm hung lifeless and he could feel the hard, cold metal of the relic grinding into his hip as he dragged himself along the branch. Every movement threatened to break his tentative grip and cast him down amongst the wolves.

Minutes dragged by in an agonizing blur until he reached the relative safety of the tree trunk. The wolves, having given up their attempts at dragging Cael down, now circled below. They growled their fury, wanton hunger visible in their glowing red eyes.

Cael felt his body tremble as he hugged the tree. His left arm was on fire and he didn’t dare loosen his grip to try to pull the relic out to heal it. With it wedged between his stomach and the limb, it was an uncomfortable reminder of how close he was to the means of being healed, yet so horribly far, all at the same time.

He pressed his cheek against the rough bark of the trunk and tried to get comfortable. The only thing he could think to do was to wait the creatures out until morning. He didn’t know how long he’d slept before being woken up, but he felt certain it was a long way from dawn. Even then, he had no way of knowing if daylight would chase the wolves away. Little more than fresh meat dangling helpless in a tree, they might camp out until his strength gave out and he fell. Both he and the wolves knew it was only a matter of time.

The throb of his arm brought tears to his eyes. He watched the skeletal wolves through blurry eyes as they paced below, settling in for the long wait. He bit back a sob as the weight of the day fell over him. Death had reaped more than its fair share this day and he couldn’t help but believe it was not yet done. He didn’t want to die.

“Ree damn you!” he screamed at the wolves, riling their fury. Angry howls rose from skeletal throats.

A sudden stirring the bushes cut the wolves’ howls short as their collective eyes whipped as one toward the noise. A silvery shape leapt from the foliage and landed beside one of the wolves without a sound. The wolf let loose a tiny whimper as it was yanked into the air by its head. Its bright eyes illuminated the surprise on its skeletal face.

A sharp crack echoed through the darkness as its head was spun free of its body, its spine splintering like brittle driftwood. The silver shape, now recognizable to Cael as the concealing fabric of a cloak, an unknown figure hidden inside, flung the wolf’s head away as its body dropped limp to the ground.

The remaining wolves bared their fangs as the cloaked figure lashed out so fast as to be almost invisible. One of the wolves was kicked in the snout and was catapulted backward to slam into the trunk of the tree Cael clung to. He felt the impact as it vibrated the branch beneath him, a hollow snap sounding below as the creature crumbled into a heap at the base of the tree.

A silvery arc streaked through the air before the figure and the last of the wolves stumbled, its torso severed in half.

The wolf loosed a piercing howl as its two halves tore apart with a wet rip and it crashed to the ground. Its teeth gnashed in impotent rage as its front paws dug at the moist humus that layered the forest floor. Its back paws kicked and kicked, spinning its lower segment in a maddened circle.

The figure ended the wolf’s suffering, thrusting its blade through the creature’s eye and into its skull. The wolf twitched once and then its upper body went still, the lower half winding down a moment later. The woods went silent in commiseration.

Cael shuddered as the figure withdrew his sword from the wolf’s oozing eye socket and turned to look at him.

“You’re safe now. You may come down.” The figure’s voice, a man’s, was smooth and melodic. He shook the blood from his narrow blade with a flick of his wrist before sliding it into the sheath at his waist.

Cael hesitated and did nothing as the man pushed his hood back. Not sure what he expected, Cael gasped when he saw the man’s face.

Large oval eyes that were set diagonally across his yellow-green face stared at him, their soft pink disturbing. Only a tiny stub of a nose was visible between them. Similar to his own ears, a trait of his Velen heritage, the man had only the slightest trace of external cartilage, small bumps the only visible sign the man had ears at all.

“Do not be afraid, young one. We mean you no harm,” the man spoke from his narrow, lipless mouth.

Cael’s eyes widened at the word ‘ we’. He looked about and spied a second figure in a silver cloak similar to the first. This one stood a few yards back, in the trees, with its hood pulled away as well. Its features were decidedly more feminine. The sharp lines of her face were more distinct, more defined, lacking the slight roundness of the first. Beneath the cloak, she wore a tunic of black material that protruded somewhat at her chest and seemed to shimmer even in the darkness. A silver-hilted sword hung at her belt, its sheath leathered in black.

The man took a slow step forward with his hands spread, as Cael clung to his branch. “I am called Uthul.” He gestured to the woman. “My companion is Zalee. Come. We will not hurt you.” He waved Cael down with a thin, black gloved hand.

Never having seen anyone like the pair before, Cael reasoned if they had meant him harm they would have simply left him for the wolves. They could kill him in the tree, for that matter. He hung but ten feet from the ground. While just out of range of the wolves, he was well within reach of the man’s long blade.

Cael’s resistance crumbled, but he knew he couldn’t make it down without assistance. “I could use some help…please.”

An awkward smile bent Uthul’s mouth as he placed himself below the limb where Cael dangled. Zalee went to the end of the branch and waited.

“Tell me when you are ready,” Uthul told him.

Cael drew in a breath and nodded. Zalee jumped easily into the air and grabbed ahold of the far end of the branch. Her weight pulled it down and Cael felt gravity return with a sickening twist in his guts. He slipped to the side and squeezed his eyes tight in expectation of hitting the ground.

Instead, he felt Uthul’s arms beneath him, slowing his momentum and easing his fall with smooth resistance. He opened his eyes as he was set gently on his feet. The motion sent spikes of pain through Cael’s shoulder. He winced, but pushed it away. He went to thank Uthul, but was cut off.

“You are hurt. Let me help.” Uthul reached out to touch his wounded shoulder.

“It’s okay. I just have to-”

Before his sluggish mind awoke to caution him, Cael pulled the bag from his waistband. Realizing what he’d done, he raced to cover his action, but his shaking hands betrayed him. He fumbled the bag and it slipped from his fingers. It fell to the ground with a heavy crunch, spilling its contents.

Uthul leapt back, his large eyes narrowing into glowing pink slits that were focused on the golden rod. Zalee too stepped away, her cloak brushed to the side, her hand on the hilt of her blade.

Cael saw the hostility in their stances and raised his good arm in hopes of calming them. “No, no, it’s not a weapon. It’s okay.” He reached to pick up the rod so he could show it to them.

“Leave it where it lay,” Zalee demanded as she drew her sword and edged closer, her tone as sharp as the silvered edge of her blade.

The rasp of steel stopped Cael in his tracks. He straightened slow, moving his hand away from the relic, his eyes locked on Zalee.

Uthul glanced to his companion and raised a hand before looking back to Cael. “Where did you find this?” He pointed to the rod, but kept his distance from it.

“It’s my father’s,” Cael started, his eyes tearing up at the thought of his dad. “Was my father’s,” he corrected. “It’s mine now.”

The pair shared a look and Zalee returned her sword to its sheath. Uthul gestured to the rod. “Do you understand its use?”

Surprised by the question, Cael realized Uthul had to know what the relic was to have asked it. He shook his head. “Understand it? No, but I can make it work.”

“Do you know how it came to be in your father’s possession? Could he use its power too?”

Certain the pair could take it from them if that was what they wished, Cael saw no point in lying. “My father used it to heal.” He met Uthul’s bright gaze. “Before it was my dad’s, it was my grandfather’s, passed to him by his father. I don’t know how he came to own it.”

“It was once a gift from the Sha’ree; our people,” Zalee said, the heat of anger still tingeing her voice.

Cael stared without blinking as the words sank in, but they made no sense. He looked to the relic and then to Zalee, then at last to Uthul. If the relic had come from the Sha’ree, why did they seem so afraid of it? He had never known it to do harm.

“Have you come to take it back?”

“No. It is yours to keep, but we seek the bearers of such gifts. It is fortunate tidings indeed that we happened upon you. Will you travel with us?”

Cael didn’t hesitate to accept. He nodded.

Uthul reached inside his cloak and drew out a silver pouch and a small, shimmering blue orb. He tossed the bag near the rod and rolled the orb gently over the ground. The orb spun to a stop in the undergrowth and Cael could hear a whispered hum emanating from it as its glimmer grew brighter. Soft white light leaked from its crystalline face and illuminated the forest for ten feet around as though the sun had dawned right there. Despite its impressive brightness, Cael was able to look directly upon it without any ill effect.

Without a word, Zalee drifted into the trees at the very edge of the light’s domain and disappeared.

“Use the rod to heal your wound. When you are done, place it in the pouch I provided. Once the pouch is sealed, call to us. Zalee and I shall be nearby, so you will be safe.” He drew back until he was little more than faint silhouette against the darker shadows outside of the light’s range. “Make haste, young one. There is much ground for us to cover.” His voice drifted through the darkness as he too faded away.

Once Cael could see Uthul no more, he dropped down beside the rod, plucking it from the ground. The cold stings pricked at his fingers immediately. Wanting nothing more than to rid his shoulder of the terrible, throbbing pain that set it afire, he moved his dirty tunic out of the way and pressed the relic to his flesh.

Once again, the symbols along its length shimmered with green. He willed its power alive and after just a few moments, his arm was once more whole, the pain gone.

He did as he was asked and slipped the relic inside the silver pouch, pulling the ties tight. Once he was sure it was closed, he called out to Uthul.

The Sha’ree were at his side within two beats of his heart, appearing like ghosts from the murk of the forest. He jumped at their sudden arrival, holding up the sealed bag to cover the palpitations of his frantic pulse.

“Good. Now store it away, young one.”

Cael stuffed the pouch into his waistband and drew the clasp of his belt tight to hold it there. “The name’s Cael.”

Uthul gave a shallow bow. “We are well met, Cael.”

Zalee did the same, the look on her face having softened somewhat. “Come, Cael, we must go.” She gestured to the glowing orb. “Take up the light so you may see, but bear it gently in travel. The fire beetle inside might not take kindly to its entrapment were it to be freed.”

The Sha’ree turned and strode into the darkness of the woods. Cael, not wanting to be left behind, snatched up the crystal orb and was surprised to notice it was cool to the touch. No time to marvel at its power, he raced to keep up to the pair. Though he knew not where they were leading him, he was certain he no longer had to fear the terrors that roamed the Dead Lands.

For Cael, that was enough.

Chapter Eleven

Ellora stared wide eyed as a young boy dashed around the corner, nearly colliding with her. She threw herself against the wall as the boy kicked up a cloud of dirt in his attempt to stop. A few feet past her, he finally skidded to a halt, spinning on his heels to look at her.

“The watch,” he gasped, pointing back the way he’d come. He drew in a deep breath, his chest expanding almost comically. “The watch is coming.”

Before Ellora had time to respond, the boy tore off down the road to warn the rest of orphans from the Ninth who were out on the Sixth begging for a few meager coins to make it through the day, or stealing it when the opportunity presented itself.

Ellora’s heart thumped loudly in her chest as the boy’s words sunk in. While there was no specific law against the orphans being on the level, the watch had made it very clear they were not welcome there. As the levels rose toward the Crown, so did the quality of life for those who lived on them.

The first two levels were jammed with the poor, the crippled and unwell, those unable to bear their own burdens without help. The level right above those were where the soldiers and field workers lived. Ranking officers, merchants, and the lower nobilities started on the Sixth, where Ellora and her orphan friends often gathered to make their way.

The Sixth was the perfect place to garner sympathy, its residents close enough to the circumstances of the Ninth to feel pity. Go any higher and the callous cruelty of the noble classes set in. With little patience for beggars, and far less for thieves, to beg on the Fifth or higher was to earn a beating, at the very least. The nobles valued their property too much so to simply give it away and their vengeance was swift upon those caught stealing.

Ellora dashed into a nearby alley and ducked low behind a haphazard pile of waste that waited to be shipped to the Ninth for disposal. The rank smell filled her nose, but she barely noticed. Compared to what filled the air in the Ninth, its mild stink was nothing.

She peered out over the trash as the stomp of boots sounded around the corner. Though the watch was often lenient with the orphans they found on the level, doing little more than escorting them back to their rightful place, there had been a number of complaints made against them in recent days. To make matters worse, the soldiers had kicked them off the level just hours before.

The watch wouldn’t be so lenient this time.

Ellora’s breath caught in her lungs as the soldiers stomped into sight. She readied to run but knew immediately they hadn’t come to chase dirty orphans from the Sixth. They were about far more important duties.

She cast her eyes over the group of sour-faced men, led by the watch commander himself. In the middle of the wall of soldiers, shields and spears, a ragged man walked with his chin down, his bearded face turned away from the world.

Emboldened by the soldiers’ focus on the man, Ellora stood and stepped from behind the obscuring waste to get a better look. She hugged the shadows of the wall and inched toward the street, her eyes never leaving the prisoner.

He walked like a man destined for the gallows, his strength and will drained from his stride as though he knew his breaths were numbered. Ellora had seen such a walk before; she had seen it with her own father.

He had gone to the rope for killing a merchant who’d cheated him of his last few silvers. Those coins had meant everything to her father. They were what would have kept food on his family’s table through the cold winter months and wood in the oven for heat. To lose them was the final step off a steep cliff, her father’s pride and wavering hope shoved mercilessly over the edge.

Ellora was told he had strangled the man so violently the merchant’s eyes had popped loose from their sockets. The watch found her father, his hands still tight around the merchant’s cold, rigid neck, wracked with sobs that wouldn’t cease. They dragged him away in tears only to march him out into the field two dawns later. It was the last time Ellora had seen her father alive.

She watched as the trap opened beneath his bare and dirty feet. He dropped through it with a surprised gasp, his body dancing as he reached the end of the rope. Though only six at the time, the details of his final moment still shone clear in her mind.

Grateful for the blackened hood that hid his face from sight, Ellora watched in horror as her father’s bowels and bladder gave way without restraint. Urine soaked the tented front of his wool pants as shit ran in thick rivulets down his leg to stain the ground beneath in a dark, foul smelling puddle that cast off steam in the cold winter air. He twitched for several long seconds and then swung dead on the rope. He swayed back and forth in the wind until the hangman cut him down at dusk. In the darkness of her nightmares, he swung the same from that moment forward.

On that day, happiness and hope had died alongside her father. Ellora’s mother did what she could to keep food in their grumbling bellies, but with nothing to sell and no skills to trade, she had only her flesh to give.

Ellora remembered hiding in the shadows of their tiny hut, covering her ears to the sounds of men grunting and sweating overtop her mother just feet away in what had been her father’s bed a mere week before. Her mother’s soft squeals frightened her and she wished herself deaf.

Though she knew not then what her mother sacrificed to keep warm gruel in Ellora’s bowl, she understood deep down that it was wrong and that it hurt her mother more than she could know. It wasn’t right that her mother should suffer so.

Ellora pushed away the image of her mother’s weary eyes and empty stare and crept onto the street behind the squad of soldiers that were headed toward the gate to the Fifth. She wished the ragged man well and hoped he had no family that would suffer in the wake of his death as hers had at her father’s.

There were more than enough parentless children in the Ninth than the streets could provide for. They needed no more at the orphanage. Save for but a few children who’d been taken away by the Royal Guard when Ellora was but a child, the orphans only left when they were old enough to fend for themselves.

As the soldiers escorted the man from her sight, the heavy stomp of their boots fading away, she saw the rest of the orphans slip from the shadowed alleys and out from darkened corners to return to the street. Their faces were all turned toward the Fifth and the disappearing watch.

Ellora felt a growing heaviness in her chest at having seen the strange man’s arrival, a sense of foreboding she could not place. For no reason she could explain, she glanced up at the sky and spied the red-orange eye of A’ree staring down upon her. A squirming sickness roiled in her stomach at the sight.

The moon was a portend of ill tidings to come. She looked away as a chill prickled the skin of her arms.

Ellora’s father had gone to the gallows under the angry eye of Ree. Her mother too had met her own sad death during the Tumult. Her spirit broken, her flesh ravaged by the diseases borne of her desperate need to provide for her daughter, she drew her last ragged breath as the Iron Ocean raged against the far side of the Fortress Mountains. But despite her effort, that last breath was one of condemnation.

No one to care for her, Ellora was taken to the Ninth and cast amidst the orphans who fought for space to sleep on the mildewed and cold floorboards of the old orphanage. The king’s meager coppers did little to make their life better, but it kept a rotting roof over their heads and maggot-infested bread in their bellies.

Ellora’s hand brushed against the hidden pocket sewn inside the waistband of her threadbare pants and sighed as she fingered the two, thin coppers snuggled inside. It had been a poor day for beggars on the Sixth.

She glanced at the moon once more and cursed it, turning to watch the sun as it dipped below the jagged peaks of the mountains. She called impatient to the other orphans, gesturing toward the sky. It was a long way back to the Ninth. If they hurried they could make it before the shadows swallowed the streets.

For all the difficulties the orphans of Lathah faced during the day, they were nothing compared to what nightfall would bring were they to be caught out in the dark.

Ellora shivered and counted heads. Once she was sure they were all together, she rushed them toward home.

The shining glow of A’ree at her back, Ellora wondered what she could have done to the goddess to have upset her so.

Chapter Twelve

The daylight silence of the woods around him exploding with the coming of night, Domor sat low in the raft as the inhabitants of the Dead Lands shrieked in eerie displeasure at their presence.

He glanced at Jerul and noticed even his blood-companion had sunk lower on the wooden bench. Having rowed throughout the day, save for a few hours when Domor had taken over so the warrior could nap, Jerul’s arms trembled with effort. The purple veins at his cheeks stood out, swollen against the almost glowing pale white of his face. The warrior huffed with each rotation of the oars, glistening sweat running like rain across his broad chest.

But despite the weariness that seemed to infest his movements and had stolen his voice from him, Jerul’s blue eyes shined with an alert wariness. They darted like angry wasps, flitting back and forth but never lighting on any one thing for more than just an instant.

Feral howls peeled from out of the darkness, sending cold shivers dancing down Domor’s neck and back. He slunk further into the raft, cursing his long limbs when he could sink no lower. His feet butted up against Jerul’s swords and pack, and there was nowhere for them to rest. The craft had not been built with the gangly limbs of a Velen in mind.

He muttered a quiet complaint and glanced out over the rail to spy movement at the water’s edge. A dozen red eyes glared back at him, shifting and shimmering in the formless black that devoured the trees. Guttural barks and growls were flung at them as they passed, the eyes attempting to keep pace through the dense underbrush. Muted splashes followed them along as the creatures repeatedly tested the boundaries of the water.

Higher in the trees, sibilant shrieks cut through the night like the whistle of arrows. Domor searched the dark sky of the canopy each time he heard the droning buzz of an insect whirl by. Tiny tracers of pale green light marked their path overhead.

Domor’s knuckles ached, having clutched at the hilt of his dagger since he and Jerul sailed into the Dead Lands. He finally released his hold and groaned as he extended his fingers, the knuckles popping like bugs in a fire. He shook his arm to return blood to his hand, tingling pricks dancing amok along the skin.

Every once in a while, glimmers of A’ree cut through the canopy and seemed to dye the water blood red where it struck, as if opening a wound upon the surface of the river. Jerul drew Domor’s attention to one such beam.

“Ree watches us in her fury.” Jerul’s voice was raspy, the words harsh whispers.

Domor grunted and reached into Jerul’s pack to pull a waterskin from within its crowded depths. He tugged the plug free of the valve and squirted a liberal amount into Jerul’s open mouth.

“I had just begun to believe that Ree had blessed us with traveler’s luck, my friend, keeping the beasts at bay upon the shore, their sharpened teeth far from our flesh.” Domor flopped back onto the deck and took a sip of the water before sealing it and returning it to the pack. “But I defer to your judgment that we’re simply waiting for our doom to descend upon us, and I have only fooled myself into believing we might make it to Nurin alive.”

A tiny smirk of measured tolerance flickered at Jerul’s lips. “Ree tempers the good she provides with ill to humble even the most charmed of her children. Your sharp tongue may well strip the skin from fools, but it does little to sway the goddess from her path, of which only she knows. Mock her not lest you draw the attention of her fury.”

Domor settled back with a wry grin. He and Jerul had danced to this tune many times since their bonding. It was a rousing composition, with much give and take weaved amidst its notes.

Though born a Velen and raised amongst their pious kind, closest of the races of Ahreele to the Sha’ree, Domor asked questions that his people had no answers for. It was what set him apart, a near pariah amongst the Velen.

He’d been taught the story of Ree’s awakening and could recite it by rote, even deep within his cups. He knew the power of the magic that spilled from the ground, yet he could give no credence to the goddess’ presence as more than the stone upon which he walked. In all his fifty years, he had never once felt her hand in either guidance or disdain.

Though he believed in Ree-her flesh the earth, her anguished tears, shed at the misery of her great awakening, the oceans-he could not subscribe to the blind faith of the Velen, or the Yvir for that matter, that the goddess played a role in their lives beyond the physically obvious. Life was just life; it ebbed and flowed like the weather, clear skies to storms, only to clear once more when it was ready. Life was theirs to navigate, built upon their choices, good or bad, and not fettered to the whims of the goddess.

It was this belief that most upset Jerul.

The screams of the dark woods in his ears, Domor was in no mood to argue. He raised his hands. “Forgive me, my friend. I concede…for the nonce. This is not the time, nor the place, to discuss such things.”

Jerul grinned. “You give in too easily, Velen. I was hoping for a fight. What troubles you?”

“This is what troubles me.” Domor swept his hand toward the wild shrieks that flooded the trees.

He cried out mid-arc as something struck his wrist. His cry of pain and surprise was mirrored by another, much higher in pitch, and then a quiet splash that flung droplets of cold water onto his face. Domor drew his arm to his chest and scurried to the far side of the raft.

Jerul set the oars in a quick motion, locking them in place before retrieving his blades from the deck. Domor stared up at him. The hammer’s blow feeling at his wrist sent throbbing shards of pain down the length of his forearm. He sat stunned.

The warrior moved to the center of the raft and stared into the darkness. His blue eyes shone like beacons as they darted about. He blinked once and his lids narrowed as he seemed to focus on something. He ducked low with a grunt, his eyes suddenly wide. An obsidian shadow led by four yellow dots zipped over him with a hoary screech, missing the wild white hairs of Jerul’s mohawk by just inches.

Domor followed the creature as it winged by, unable to make out any of its features save for the blurred trails of its lurid eyes.

“Stay low, Velen,” Jerul told him unnecessarily as he crept closer to hover near him. The jagged edges of his blades glistened against the backdrop of darkness.

Domor once again cursed his height as he did his best to sink below the low retaining wall of the raft. Though he knew his wrist had not been broken, the bones still in their rightful place, the slightest movement loosed spears of misery that starred his vision. He ground his teeth together and let his wounded arm lie in his lap as he drew his bag to him. He dug inside and pulled the dagger from hiding. With his teeth, he yanked the sheath free, letting it drop to the deck, before twisting to face the invisible shore. The darkness was filled with malevolent, glowing stares.

Whereas before, the raucous sounds of the night had resounded with such volume and intensity as to have been little more than a wall of noise, it had since dimmed, drifting into the background. Sharpened wails cut through the rest as though a blade through sand, carving a trail to their ears. The sounds grew closer as shadows winged above, the branches rattled in their passage.

Jerul growled low, his head on a swivel. Yellow dots appeared out of the darkness only to disappear as blackened shapes zipped close before veering away at the last moment.

Domor was buffered by the wind of one of the creature’s passes, and shifted just in time to see the yellow eyes of another just before they went dark. He spun about on his knees and lashed out with his dagger, catching the creature as it flew past.

The creature screeched as Domor’s blade bit deep. It shifted directions instantly and shot into the sky, knocking Domor back with a slash of its leathery wing. Off balance, Domor fell to his back, his shoulders crashing into the tree trunks of Jerul’s legs.

The warrior stumbled forward, twisting about to keep from falling over the rail of the raft.

“Be careful, Ve-” A grunt of pain cut his warning short, and Jerul spun, his blades bright blurs against the backdrop of darkness.

Something wet rained warm across Domor’s face as he scrambled back toward the rail. He could feel it running slow down his cheek and wiped it clear with his injured arm, ignoring its protests. He heard Jerul cry out once more. Jerul’s voice was a rumble that billowed up from the bulk of his chest. His companion’s pale outline visible, Domor could see dark stains along his back. They spread quickly, devouring the lighter areas with each passing moment.

He was surrounded by a horde of yellowed eyes that swooped down from the canopy in twos and threes, blackened missiles that winged past, leaving behind darkened trails along the warrior’s flesh. Jerul lashed out with his swords as the creatures closed. Sounds of the butcher’s block filled the air, the meaty thud of a blade meeting bone.

There was a pair of loud splashes, followed by Jerul’s blade striking the deck. The warrior stumbled, his free hand pressed to the side of his head as a quartet of yellowed eyes hovered at his shoulders. Dark water gushed between his white fingers as he stood doubled over, his eyes closed.

Though he was no warrior, Domor knew he had to do something to help his blood-companion before the beasts brought him down. He jumped to his feet and whipped his robes off. Used like a net, he dropped the bottom opening of the robes over the creature that tore at Jerul and drew it to the side fast, tightening his grip to seal the beast inside. The creature thrashed and squealed as its wings became entangled in the thick material. No time to waste, he pinned the beast to the deck with his foot and stabbed his dagger into the squirming mass. Over and over he sunk his blade hilt deep until the trilling shrieks ended and the beast lay still.

Cold sweat and warm blood dotting his face, he moved alongside Jerul and pushed the warrior to the deck, nearest to the slim shelter of the retaining wall. Certain he lacked the strength to wield his companion’s heavy, jagged blades, he left them where they lay as his eyes traced the path of the next wave of beasts that dove toward them. He set his dagger between his teeth and ignored the sting as its sharpened edge bit into the corners of his mouth.

Having seen what the creatures had done to Jerul, Domor knew he stood no chance of bringing them down with his dagger. So thinking, he loosened the tie from the closest oar and freed it from its swivel. His wrist sang with pain, but he pushed it aside with a loud growl.

Frenzied screeches were thick in the darkness as he turned to face the growing shadows. His hands trembled and his heart thundered loud in his chest as he waited for them to come a little closer. He judged their speed by the trails of their eyes and counted quick, swinging the wooden oar like a club in a wide arc.

The flat of the oar smashed into the outermost of the trio with a solid thump. Domor ground his teeth together as impact vibrations threatened to shake the shaft from his hands, but he clutched tight and managed to keep his grip. His wrist went blissfully numb.

The beast he struck was knocked sideways, its momentum redirected into its companions. Furious squawks erupted above as the creatures became tangled, their dive averted in the effort to get clear of one another. Two sets of eyes broke loose and flew back toward the darkness of the canopy as a blackened shape fell into the water.

Domor couldn’t stop a smile from stretching the corners of his mouth against the sharp blade he held in his teeth, but he knew his success was likely short-lived. He glanced around to see another creature hurtling toward him, coming fast and low over the water. He spun around and swung the oar with desperate strength just as the beast cleared the retaining wall.

The shaft collided with the creature just a few feet from where Domor’s hands clutched to it. His fingers rang out with the sting of impact and he felt the slap of the beast’s wing against his bare stomach. He stumbled back and fell to his knees, his hip grinding into the hard wood of the retaining wall.

Out of instinct, he reached down to steady himself and hissed as his injured wrist exploded in agony beneath him. The dagger tumbled from his mouth. He crumpled hard against the wall and heard a loud crack that reverberated against his back. He felt the support of the wall give way behind him, and he fell.

He went to shout but his mouth was suddenly filled with the heavy water of the river. He gasped drawing more in as his shoulders followed his head under.

White light filled his eyes as something clamped down on his wrist like a vise before he could sink any further. There was a sudden sense of upward movement and he was clear of the water, slammed face first onto the hard wood of the deck. A vicious blow was struck to his upper back and he felt the water surge from his stomach in response, up into the passage of his throat. He gagged once against the tide before the swallowed river spewed from his mouth in a deluge that flooded the deck. Domor vomited twice more, bitter bile tearing at his throat as he cleared the last of the water from his lungs.

Angered grunts sounded over him as he lay curled into a ball and trembling on the deck. The solid slaps of wood against flesh echoed in his ears in competition with the piercing hum that seemed to fill his tender skull with white noise. His stomach roiled like the Tumult and the sour scent of vomit clung to his nose.

He rolled to his side to see Jerul standing over him, the warrior a blur of motion through Domor’s clouded eyes. The oar was in his companion’s hands, methodically being swept back and forth over their heads. His muscular back was dark with his blood, the lines of his veins invisible beneath the oozing claret.

“Jerul,” Domor croaked, the words coming out as a ragged whisper.

“Stay still and recover, Velen.” Jerul shifted the oar in mid-swing to bat one of the creatures from the air with a satisfying thump. “You have shown me the way. No more of these beasts will dine upon our flesh tonight.”

Domor looked once more to the blood that flowed free from Jerul, dripping dark to the deck beneath his feet. “You’re hurt, my friend.”

“I have known worse injuries in the mating hall,” Jerul countered with a laugh. “Rest and regain your strength. I will see us through until dawn.”

Even through the dull link of their bond, Domor knew Jerul lied. He could see the warrior’s arms trembling, the muscles at his back tensed so tight they twitched with random spasms. He was hurt far worse than he was willing to speak of and there was nothing Domor could do to help him.

Little better himself, Domor fetched the waterskin from Jerul’s bag. He did his best to disguise his own pain as he got to his feet, his legs wobbling beneath him. Though there was no hiding how he felt from his blood-companion, he tried anyway, joining in on the warrior’s game.

In between Jerul’s swings, Domor quenched his defender’s thirst and did what he could to slow the loss of blood, using strips cut from one of his spare robes. Quickly soaked through, they were of little use, but they were all he had.

Exhausted in a way he had never felt before, Domor forced his hands to keep pressure upon Jerul’s wounds, ducking low as the creatures soared past only to meet the blunt end of his blood-companion’s makeshift weapon. The constant motion and the quiet splashes that followed soon became a wearying rhythm that lulled Domor into a stupor.

The night crept by and he no longer had any sense of how long they had stood there, Jerul batting away the creatures and he tending to the warrior’s needs. He stared blankly up at the dark canopy, willing his vision to pierce its knotted mass, but only the blackness of night met his eyes.

He knew not how much longer it would be before the sun rose and the Dead Lands returned to its diurnal slumber, or if even that would cease the beasts’ attack, but he dearly hoped it would.

He only knew one thing for certain: dawn could not come soon enough.

Chapter Thirteen

The soldiers closed in tight around Arrin as he was marched through the gate that opened onto the Crown Level. He lifted his chin for the first time since he’d been led away from the Ninth, and let his eyes wander.

Memories flooded his mind at seeing the crowded masses of white stone homes and the gilded spires that rose up so high above as to challenge the mountains at their backs. They stood out bright against the backdrop of night. Arched windows peered from their stone faces like flickering eyes that stared out across the whole of Lathah. Nu’ree seemed to peek back as though hiding, its blue-gray orb just beginning its ascent into the eastern sky.

Arrin’s mood far too sour to enjoy such grandeur, he lowered his eyes to the narrow streets. They were free of the rampant clutter that plagued many of the levels below, the cobblestones polished to a fine shine. The air smelled of fragrant wood and musky spice, burned in small quantities in most every home to chase away the fetid scents that occasionally wafted up from the lower levels.

He glanced behind him as the gates to the Crown swung closed without a sound, the hinges oiled and gleaming in the light of the torches that hung in silvered sconces in excess upon every wall. They cast dancing shadows along the streets, an audience of blackened ghosts assembled to witness his shameful return.

He looked once more to the tall houses as he was herded forward, as his past weighed upon him. He’d spent the best years of his life on the Crown as he’d courted Malya. He couldn’t walk the streets without imagining her there beside him. His chest ached at the thought and his eyes danced in his skull in the hopes he might see her, though he knew she’d never be out after sundown. She’d always been a child of the sun.

He was almost grateful when the commander’s gruff order to halt interrupted his remembrances.

“Go tell the prince’s advisor we have an important prisoner I wish to bring before Prince Olenn, at his earliest convenience, of course,” Maltis told one of his men, who started off immediately. The commander grabbed the man’s arm before he got far. “Be as vague as possible as to who the prisoner is. I don’t want the prince angrier than he’s already going to be at such a late summons. The very last thing we need is him on a rampage before we’ve even reached the hall.”

The soldier nodded, understanding etched across his face, and darted away when the commander released him. Maltis turned to face Arrin.

“This is it, Arrin. There’s no more turning back.” He gestured to one of his men and the soldier pulled a pair of manacles from the pack of the man in front of him. “I’ve given you as much freedom as I possibly could, but I cannot have you unbound when I take you before the prince. You have far too good a reason to want our dear prince dead for me to trust in only your word. I hope you understand.”

“Of course, my friend,” Arrin answered without hesitation, placing his arms behind his back. “I would expect no less from one in your position.” He gave the officer an understanding smile, which made Maltis grimace.

The soldier placed the heavy iron shackles around Arrin’s wrists, the cold iron locks clanging shut. Arrin tested their mettle instinctively, willing the power of the collar to remain at peace. With its magical assistance, the manacles would delay him no more than a single heartbeat should he feel the need to be free of their binds. They were more a benefit to him than a hindrance, everyone likely to believe he was helpless and at the mercy of the prince’s whims. Shackled and seeming powerless, it might serve Arrin’s purpose and salve Olenn’s fury at his unexpected and unwelcome return.

Once the shackles were secured, Arrin nodded to Maltis. “Let’s be done with this, commander. The waiting is killing me.”

“I pray that is all that kills you,” Maltis replied, his hand resting light upon the pommel of his blade.

The message was clear. Despite the blood they had shed side by side upon the battlefield, the meals and laughter shared, and the loyalty of soldiers, Maltis was honor bound to the prince here in his home. Arrin could expect no mercy should it come to a choice between him and Olenn. Maltis would cut Arrin down as quickly as any enemy he had ever faced.

“Clear your conscience, friend. It won’t come to that.”

Maltis cleared his throat. “If only I were so certain. You know our prince as well as any, and time has done nothing to lessen his willfulness.” The commander turned away and waved his men on. “I can see no happy end to this night…for you,” he added as strode ahead.

The soldiers around him shuffling forward to follow their commander, Arrin matched their pace. Their boots thumped against the bright cobblestones as they paraded down the main road, which led toward the throne room.

The streets eerily quiet, Arrin glanced at the windows of the homes they passed, but they remained sealed tight against the night and the clamor of heavy boots. Lights flickered behind their shutters though he saw no shadows cast by their residents. While his memories were blurred by the time gone by, Arrin couldn’t recall the Crown having been quite so lifeless, even after the sun had set. The silence was foreboding.

“Is Lathah under curfew,” Arrin asked the soldier beside him.

The man hesitated to answer, his eyes drifting to the back of Maltis. He shook his head quick, his eyes staring straight ahead.

Arrin watched the soldier for a moment, then cast his eyes to the rest that surrounded him. None would meet his gaze, so he let the question die in the air. He would likely know the answer soon enough or he might well be dead. Either option would resolve his curiosity.

He kept his tongue still and his eyes open as they tromped through the center of the level. Arrin saw several of the watch out on the street, the prince’s own men, but he saw no urgency in their steps, no sense of restlessness about them. They moved about in their golden suits of chain, their eyes steady on the odd procession of soldiers and prisoner that marched past.

As they approached the massive double doors of the Great Hall, and the commander’s messenger soldier returned to the ranks with heavy breath, all thoughts of the somber town were forgotten. His pulse fluttered at his throat as his confrontation with the prince drew nigh. In just moments, he would be stood before the man he despised more than anyone in this life, the man who had stolen everything he loved from him, and Arrin could do nothing to revenge that cruelty. To do so was to lose even more.

He drew in a deep breath as Maltis pounded upon the doors, each reverberating blow setting his eyes to blink. Beyond the portal was a world that had continued on with its life after Arrin’s departure. For all his memories of that world, he knew not what to expect. His hopes were dying bitter on the vine.

The creak of the doors being opened set his heart to pounding. A Withered old man peered out from behind their reinforced bulk, his eyes dark and curious below the bald dome of his skull. A grimace bent his lips, which were buried amidst the wild white hair of his flowing beard and unkempt mustache.

“Sorry to disturb you at such a late hour, Lord Xilth, but as my man informed you, I have need to speak to the prince,” Maltis said with the barest of bows.

Xilth nodded at the shallow courtesy. “Prince Olenn is curious as to who might possibly be so important as to interrupt his supper.” The lord gestured toward Maltis’s messenger with a gnarled hand. “Your man seemed most reluctant to divulge the name of our guest, so he wonders if, perhaps, you might do so before he concedes to your humble request.”

Maltis turned to look at Arrin, his eyes rolling in their sockets. “But of course, Lord Xilth. A simple oversight, I assure you.” He waved his men to the side. “I bring Arrin Urrael before the prince, if he so pleases.”

Xilth’s eyes widened as the soldiers stepped away and cleared his view of Arrin. Shaking the hair from his face, Arrin lifted his chin and met the gaze of the old lord.

Xilth had been Olenn’s advisor since even before the madness had begun to settle upon the prince’s father, King Orrick. Arrin had no doubt it had been Xilth’s serpent-tongued words that had advised Olenn and encouraged the disposal of Arrin once his and Malya’s affair had been discovered. He had seen it in the man’s eyes when the prince had sent him to the whip. Xilth’s spite was visible in the glimmer of smile that cracked the old man’s lips at each blow that stripped the flesh from Arrin’s back. Had the king not come to clarity when he had, Arrin was certain it would have been the old lord’s hand that would have signaled the headsman to end Arrin’s life.

Arrin held no more love for Xilth than he did Olenn, but he knew the trial of passing on his message had already begun so he reined in his anger. He drew in a cold breath and bowed deep. “Lord Xilth. I have come with a dire warning for the people of Lathah, which I must deliver to the prince before it is too late. As a loyal servant of Lathah, I humbly request an audience with Prince Olenn.”

Xilth’s gaze wandered between Arrin and Maltis, settling on Arrin. “You are many things, Urrael, but loyal is not one of them.” He turned to the commander. “Hold him here until I have spoken with the prince.” His voice was cold as he turned away and shut the door heavily behind him.

“That went well,” Maltis said as he glanced at Arrin, letting loose a long sigh.

“I still live. I can ask for little more given the circumstances.” Arrin mustered a smile for his old companion, but the weight of his mission bore it away. “Stay close to me as I speak my peace, for if the prince deigns not to heed my words, I would have someone with more sense be privy to them.” He met the commander’s narrow eyes.

Maltis remained silent for a moment, his gaze lingering on Arrin’s until the creak of the door resounded behind them. The commander nodded, then turned to face the opening door.

Xilth stood in the arched doorway, five of the prince’s royal guardsmen, dressed in the traditional golden chain mail armor of their calling, at his back. “Prince Olenn will see the exile as requested, commander. Send your men away. Lieutenant Santos, of the prince’s guard, and I will escort you both to the throne room.”

“Thank you, Lord Xilth,” Maltis replied, nodding to his soldiers. Arrin noted the tone of his voice had softened, as though the commander too realized it was best to pet the dog of your master with care.

The royal guard surrounded Arrin and checked the shackles at his wrists. Once they had, men on either side grasped Arrin’s arms tight about his elbows and marched him forward. Maltis was pushed to the rear as the golden-garbed soldiers pushed through the door and into the foyer of the hall. Lord Xilth strolled before the group, setting a slow and deliberate pace.

Arrin repressed a smile at the petty gamesmanship displayed by the two factions: the men of the crown and those of the people. There had always been friction between the two, the desires of each so at odds with one another, but to see it so clearly without being a part of either was a shock to Arrin. The fact that Olenn refused to allow men of the wall before him was very telling. The division had grown since his time in Lathah.

At the ivory arch that led into the throne room, where four more royal guardsmen stood at the ready, Xilth came to a halt and turned to face the commander. “Your blades, please.”

Maltis complied, passing over Arrin’s weapon first, followed by his own.

“ He has been searched, I presume.” The old lord pointed at Arrin.

“He has,” Maltis replied.

“Good.” Xilth waved to his men. “Search him again; just to be certain, of course.” He smiled without cheer at the commander who stood stoic.

Arrin felt his heart flicker as Santos began his search. Unlike the men he’d encountered at the border, the prince’s guard would know no loyalty to a fellow soldier and would not be satisfied with a cursory examination. He held his breath as the lieutenant dug his hands beneath the leather of his armor in search of hidden weapons.

As Santos neared his neck, Arrin forced his body to relax, chasing back the tension that flooded into his shoulders as instinct called out for him to react. The man grabbed a handful of Arrin’s matted hair and lifted it with a hiss, his hand running beneath and over the collar. Arrin clenched his teeth at the lieutenant fiddled with the collar a moment, sliding his hand along its length. Without a word, Santos released Arrin’s hair and shook his hand as if to clean it.

“He bears no weapons, my lord, though his scent might be considered a danger to the prince’s nose.”

Arrin let his breath out slow and silent at Santos’s declaration, lowering his chin to hide his relief.

Xilth laughed, its sound echoed by the guards. “Excellent. He won’t be near enough to our lord for him to wield that weapon. Bring him before the prince.” The lord spun on his heels and entered the throne room, still chuckling to himself.

The guards resumed their hold upon Arrin’s arms and tugged him forward. His moment was at hand.

The throne room stood before him in all its remembered glory. The vaulted ceilings arched way above, their mirrored surfaces brilliant above the spider’s web of fine oak rafters that crisscrossed the roof. Long, flowing banners hung in abundance from their thick beams, all of the royal families represented in a place of honor, the coat of King Orrick and his line-swords crossed before a jagged mountain range-displayed foremost near the center of the hall. A great tapestry depicting the great Lathahn victory over the Grol, the first wall of Lathah weaved with amazing detail, hung behind the throne, covering the entirety of the wall.

Large golden lamps were spaced out along the length of the side walls, their light shimmered up to the ceiling that reflected it back down into the room as though the sun hung overhead in tribute to Lathah. A deep blue carpet lay unfurled along the floor, running from the arched entryway all the way to the raised dais upon which sat the throne.

Arrin’s eyes followed the carpet to its end and slowly raised his eyes over the stairs, up to the throne itself. The golden chair sat empty. He didn’t know whether to be pleased or offended.

Lord Xilth caught his gaze. “The prince will be here soon enough, so have no fear, exile. You will most assuredly have your audience, though I doubt your reunion will be pleasant.”

Arrin ignored the man as the guards led him forward until they reached the foot of the dais. Maltis stopped at their heels as Xilth climbed the wide stairs, coming to rest on the last. The old man wheeled about, crossed his arms over his chest, and looked down on Arrin through narrow eyes, but said nothing.

Uninterested in Xilth’s posturing, Arrin glanced about the hall. Images of Malya assailed him, her voice echoing in the vaults of his mind, but he waved it all away as he felt his eyes begin to rebel. He’d remembered too much since he’d begun his journey home, and he could bear it no longer.

The arrival of the prince made it much easier, his thoughts of love and longing seared into ash at the sight of Olenn.

The prince walked slowly to his father’s throne, a sneer on his lips as his dark gaze settled on Arrin. He held a crystal goblet in his ring-burdened left hand, the crimson wine inside leaving dark trails on the glass as though it were blood. His right hand, free of adornment, sat upon the pommel of a gilded short blade that hung easy on his hip. His fingers tapped at the hilt.

Dressed in silks colored in the traditional blue and gray of Lathah, the trim in silver, he moved with a quiet swish. His clean-shaven jaw was set in a hard line and his eyes were narrowed, starring the corners, but he showed no signs of the years gone by. He looked as young as he had fifteen years passed, whereas Arrin knew he looked a thousand years older. It only enraged him more to think of the soft life the prince had led in his absence, but Arrin held his temper.

The flattering clothes did little to hide the serpentine strength that lurked beneath them. As the prince settled upon the throne, he did so with a fighter’s grace. While he had seen no true combat, had never been on campaign, Olenn had trained extensively with the blade under the greatest masters of Lathah, but he did so without honor.

He was no warrior king who led from the front ranks, destined for the annals of legend. He was simply a cruel man who had learned the way of the blade to benefit only himself; to instill fear in those whose skill was no match for his and to ward away those who might dare to challenge him.

It sickened Arrin to be in his presence. He resisted the urge to spit at Olenn’s feet as the prince sat in silent appraisal of him. Their eyes were locked and Arrin hoped the prince could not see inside his skull, into his thoughts, for they were very dark indeed.

Xilth broke the stalemate with a cough. “My lord, Commander Maltis deemed it necessary to bring before you the exile, who was commanded, I might add, never to return to our fair land, by royal decree.” The lord gestured to the commander. “What have you to say, commander?”

Arrin’s stomach hardened into a mass of tangled knots as he realized his presence had opened the door to Olenn’s persecution of the watch commander. He had not intended that.

However, Maltis seemed unconcerned, perhaps inured to such battles with the crown’s advisor. “The exile claims to carry a warning of impending doom for Lathah. I would be remiss were I to ignore such a warning and it come true, would I not, Lord Xilth?” Maltis bowed low before he continued. “The prisoner has been searched, twice if you recall, and remains bound in irons. Surely he is no threat to the crown in such a state, encircled as he is by a handful of your finest royal guard. I thought only to bring him before the prince, who is infinitely better suited to judge the value of the exile’s words than I.”

“Watch y-” Xilth started only to be cut short by the smooth voice of the prince.

“Restrain the urge to spew such passionate flattery, dear commander, for the overeager stroke of your words has begun to chafe my manhood.” Olenn took a sip of his wine, setting the goblet aside with a quiet chuckle. “You have done your proper duty in bringing the outlaw before me. I thank you for your service to the crown.” He cast a smile Maltis’s direction, but its warmth did nothing to dispel the chill that swirled within the prince’s eyes.

“Thank you, my lord.” Maltis bowed and stepped aside, casting a furtive glance at Arrin, a warning buried in the lines of concern wrinkling his face.

The prince stood. His hand still sat eager upon his blade. “So, exile, what news have you that is so dire as to be worth your life?”

Arrin reflexively strained against the shackle’s hold and willed his pulse to slow, grateful for the restraint. He swallowed the bile that had slithered into his throat and met the prince’s gaze. “The Grol have-”

“The Grol?” Olenn barked, spittle raining down over the steps, his voice tinged with bitter laughter. “You came here to tell me of the Grol?” He turned to Lord Xilth. “Can you believe this fool?” He turned back to Arrin, dropping onto the step beside his advisor. “We Lathahns have driven the beasts from our walls, time and time again, for hundreds of years, and yet you feel the need to warn us of some great Grol threat as though we have never weighed their measure?” He shook his head, his smile cruel. “I had taken you for brazen, and impulsive, and a treacherous miscreant, but I hadn’t thought you a halfwit, as well. Has life outside our walls so addled your senses that you would believe a ragtag army of dogs could lay Lathah low?”

Arrin felt the heat at his cheeks, but resisted the urge to break loose of the shackles and kill Olenn where he stood. “Sheltered behind your glorious walls, you have not seen what I have seen beyond them. The wretched beasts you so easily dismiss have come across a means of power.”

“Do tell.”

“You mock me, but I have no cause to lie, Olenn.” He smiled inside to see Xilth’s reaction to the missing honorific. “Given what you’ve left me with, I could easily have kept my distance and let you find out firsthand just how dangerous the beasts have become, but I have an obligation to Lathah that transcends our feud.”

“Ah, and now we are to the truth of the matter.” The prince clapped. “Tell me then, of your precious duty to Lathah, exile.”

Arrin ignored the jibe. “The whole of Fhenahr burns, as we speak, brought down by the Grol who are armed with some manner of magical weapons.”

“Magic?” Xilth asked, seeming barely able to keep his laughter in check as he faced the prince. “My lord, I do believe you were right to question his sanity. He has been too long in the wilds. The crows have picked the sense from his skull.” He grinned from within his beard and pointed to Arrin. “Speak true, exile: have you lost your mind? I imagine the prince will be far more lenient of your unwelcome return were you to admit to your obvious insanity.”

Arrin caught the look of disbelief on Maltis’s face, out of the corner of his eye. He sighed, knowing his hope of convincing Olenn of the threat Lathah faced had been a false one. “Believe as you will, but the beasts have traveled to Ah Uto Ree and returned with relics of great might, like those spoken of in lore. These relics will be the end of Lathah. Your walls will not save you this time.”

“Now we know you speak false,” Olenn replied, the first hint of heat coloring his voice. “The Grol would never dare to cross the Sha’ree border, no matter if the stories of their death are true or not. The beasts are cowards and fear their own shadows. They’ve not the courage to challenge even the ghosts of Ah Uto Ree, let alone the might of Lathah.” He stormed down the remaining stairs and drew up so close Arrin could smell the sweet tang of Nurin wine on his breath. “I know not your true purpose here, but I shall not look the fool chasing the tail of your lies.” His hand was at his sword once more, his knuckles white.

It took all of Arrin’s will to keep from reacting to Olenn’s provocation. “You are blinded by your hatred of me, but there will come a time when you rue the dismissal of my words. The Grol will come, and soon. They will batter the walls down around you like so much dust, and there will be nothing you can do to prevent it if you do not act now.”

“You spout fantasy like the tales old maids whisper to children to keep them in their cots after nightfall.” He jabbed a ringed finger into the Arrin’s leathered chest. “Would you have us believe you truly care what fate might befall us?”

Arrin met Olenn’s dark eyes. “I care not for what end awaits you, dear princeling, as long as you suffer, but there are those I care about still within Lathah’s walls.”

“You dare?” Xilth blustered.

The soldiers at Arrin’s sides drew steel and set their blades against his sides. Maltis loosed a weary breath.

Arrin ignored them all. “If I can save no others, I would see Malya and my child safely away from here before your arrogance does them any more harm.”

A feral grin washed away the fury on the prince’s face. He held his hand up to stay his men. “I see the years have not dimmed your ardor for my darling sister or the bastard child spawned of your illicit affair.” Olenn turned away and strode slowly to the stairs of the dais, his hands clasped behind his back. A quiet chuckle shook his shoulders. “Let me tell you of your sweet love, Arrin.” His name was spoken with venom. Olenn turned to face him, eyes glimmering with malevolent light. “While you have slept beneath the stars and cradled dirt these long fifteen years, far from the land you once called home, pining over my sister like a lovesick fool, you have been suffering alone.”

Arrin stared at the prince, unsure of what he meant.

“I can see by the look on your pitiful face that such a thought had never entered your vacant skull before. This makes what I have to tell you so much more exquisite.” His grin grew wider. “Whatever the folly of youth once wrought, your love of my sister is unrequited, exile. While you spent your lovelorn seed on memories of the past, she has spent the intervening time sharing her bed with another man.”

Arrin felt his heart still within his chest, the calm of the grave. He looked to Maltis in hopes of seeing denial in the warrior’s eyes, but the commander lowered his face to stare at the stone floor. The strength drained from Arrin as though it were blood from an open wound. He looked to the prince to see the satisfaction painted in broad strokes across his face. His advisor’s expression mirrored that of Olenn. He spoke the truth. Tears filled Arrin’s eyes, but he said nothing.

The prince needed no encouragement to continue. His words cut deeper than the whip. “She has been wed for nearly thirteen summers, my sister. It was a beautiful ceremony. All of Lathah turned out to watch the lovely couple exchange their marriage vows before the royal court and the goddess Ree herself.” Olenn’s stare felt like daggers piercing Arrin’s skull. “Malya has been so truly blessed since you’ve been gone, Arrin; blessed twice, in fact.”

The words settled in Arrin’s ears like pebbles dropped into a well, their meaning sinking ever deeper until they struck the murky bottom. His stomach roiled with the news, a storm of sickness and betrayal threatening to break.

The blade embedded, Olenn sunk it to the hilt. “She has two sons with her husband, ages twelve and nine; Argos and Kylle. Handsome lads, the both of them. Willful and independent as their mother once was, before she wed a true man worthy of her hand. They’ll make fine kings one day, much like their uncle.”

Arrin’s tears ran free, warming trails down his cheeks.

The prince climbed the dais and dropped down lightly upon the throne, retrieving his goblet. “When I first heard you had returned, Arrin, I had intended to take your head. I’d envisioned posting it upon the outer wall for all the people of Lathah to see, a message to those who might dare to defy my will. However, I see that killing you now would be a kindness I just can’t bring myself to offer.” Olenn downed his wine in a single gulp, his red-stained lips forming a smile as he pulled the cup away and looked to his guard. “Escort the exile to the gates and cast him out into the night once more. Let the truth be his punishment.”

The men sheathed their blades and clasped Arrin’s arms tight.

“Return to my kingdom again, whatever your cause, I promise you the sorrow you feel now will be but a pale shade of the torment I will inflict upon you and those you care for.” He cast his gaze to Commander Maltis. “Feel free to join your old sword-companion on his final walk through the streets of Lathah. Oh, and be sure to inform me should the Grol come to call. I would see their magic with my own eyes.” He waved his men away with a laugh.

Arrin went with them without complaint. Though he no longer had any reason to comply, Olenn unwittingly freeing him from the binds that had held his fury in check, he could find no will to resist.

As he was led through the grand archway and back out into the quiet Lathahn night, Arrin could think only of Malya and the bitter sting of Olenn’s words. She had waited but two years before wedding another.

Though it sickened him, Arrin could almost excuse her marriage, the politics of court a difficult taskmaster, especially given her situation after their relationship had been discovered. But for her to have borne the man two sons, one so soon after their binding, spoke of her feelings for her husband. Willful and determined, Malya had done very little in her life she did not agree with, and only at her father’s insistent urging, never Olenn’s. She would not have a family forced upon her as though she were some broodmare. Her brother had spoken true. The words were a killing blow.

Arrin stumbled at the thought, the men catching him before he struck the ground. Maltis shouldered the soldiers out of the way with a growl and latched his arm about Arrin’s waist.

“Come, brother. If this must be your last night within the walls of your homeland, let it be a friend who sees you to the gate.”

Chapter Fourteen

The dark forest seemed to part before the Sha’ree as Cael followed in their wake. Beasts growled in the distance, piercing shrieks whipping by overhead, just beyond the glow of the crystal orb he held. Though he could see the glowing red and yellowed eyes of creatures that lurked within the shadows, they kept their distance. Be it through fear of the light Cael carried or the presence of the mystical pair, he didn’t know, but he was grateful nevertheless.

The Sha’ree said little to him as they walked without sound through the wild trees, though they cast regular glances at him over their shoulder to ensure he was still there with them. They stayed a distance away, not too far, yet never too close. While Cael knew not the specifics of why, he knew it had something to do with the relic he carried. For some reason he couldn’t understand, even though history claimed their race had been its creator, they seemed to fear the golden rod his father had passed to him.

It made little sense, but it was a source of confidence he sorely needed. Far from home, his father dead amongst the smoldering ruins of his village, everyone he knew gone to earth as well, and lost in the vast wilderness of the Dead Lands with people of a race known only in legend, Cael needed something to cling to. Like a ship caught up in the Great Tumult, he had been set adrift through fire and fury. The idea that even the Sha’ree could know fear made his own seem less significant, less of a weakness.

He wiped at his tears as he walked.

There was no doubt in his head the Sha’ree could slay him easily, as they had the skeletal wolves, but he sensed no cruelty in them, only an uncertain wariness. They seemed nearly as lost as he as they strode through the woods. It was not that they didn’t appear to know where they were going, but only that they seemed not to know where they would arrive.

Realizing he had slowed, Cael sped his pace and closed the distance between he and the Sha’ree. Uthul looked back at him as he neared and smiled, at least that what Cael believed it to be. Their features alien, smooth faces, unmarred by lines, it was difficult to truly understand their expressions. It was as though they wore a mask that hid their true selves from the eyes of the world. It was unnerving, made more so by the flickering shadows of the globe he held.

The knotted growl of his stomach drew his thoughts from the Sha’ree and he slowed once more, painfully reminded that it had been over a day since he had eaten. A day in which he had not stopped to rest, save for the short time his body had shut down out of exhaustion.

Zalee stopped and looked back at him as he fell behind once more. “Come, Cael, we have but a short ways further to travel, and then you may rest.” She waved him on, not waiting to see if he complied.

Cael nodded to her back and willed his tired feet forward. He didn’t know if the Sha’ree had the need to eat, but it was clear they did not suffer for the journey as he did. They seemed tireless. His stomach rumbled in complaint once more and he struck his belly, grumbling for patience as he hurried to keep time with the pair.

They traveled for nearly another hour in relative silence-the sounds of the night always there-Cael arguing with his vociferous hunger under his breath, until the crooked foliage gave way to a large clearing. He stumbled into it, falling to his hands and knees as the resistance of the gnarled branches suddenly gave way. The orb rolled from his hand and Cael stared at it wide-eyed until it settled unharmed. Cael sat back and dusted the dirt from his hands as he peered past the hovering Sha’ree who stared at him with their pink eyes.

His own eyes grew wide. Not more than ten horse length’s from where he sat, a small, charred and blackened hill rose up to five feet from the crystalline, obsidian earth. Tendrils of glistening green ooze ran down its sides as tiny sparks exploded in the air around it as if in celebration of its passage. At its base was a shimmering pool that encircled it, fed from the rivulets that spilled from the hill’s yawning mouth. The emerald liquid wavered as though possessed of life, bubbles stretching the surface only to pop an instant later in a lick of red flame. Though he had never seen one, he knew from the stories his father told that what lay before him was one of the ruptures in the goddess’ flesh that spewed forth the pure essence of magic; a font.

Excitement prickled his skin as the air was filled with the scent of melted iron and the tang of fire. It settled thick in Cael’s nose with every breath, setting his lungs alight. While the woods had held the heat of the day, locking it beneath the lid of its canopy, the clearing seemed much warmer despite it being open to the sky. Cael glanced up to see the bright, red-orange eye of A’ree above, its sister, Nu’ree swinging through the heavens above it. Soon A’ree would swallow its sibling and the Great Tumult would be upon them.

“If you would eat, come,” Uthul held his gloved hand out to Cael.

At the thought of food, Cael grasped the Sha’ree’s hand and let the man pull him to his feet. “Food would be great.” His stomach grumbled in agreement.

Uthul broke the contact quickly, but didn’t shy away. He gestured toward a nearby tree that grew small and alone out of the barren dirt, a few feet from the darkness of the woods. Eyeball-sized, deep purple fruit hung in over-abundance upon its thin, dark branches that were covered in tiny, scythe-like red thorns.

Uthul walked to the tree. Cael left the orb where it lay, for between it, the light of A’ree, and the glimmers of the font, he could see clearly as he followed Uthul.

“This is Ah Zer oh Ree: The Succor of Ree.” He plucked one of the small fruits, careful to avoid the thorny branches, and passed it to Cael.

It sat heavy in his hand like a stone, and felt strange against his skin. Its flesh was soft, but furred like a beast, and warm to the touch. Cael looked at it a moment, unsure, its appearance unappetizing. His hunger far less picky, pressed for appeasement and Cael lifted the fruit to his mouth.

“A moment, Cael,” Uthul said as he held up a warning hand. He drew his sword as Cael took a step back. “Hold the Succor out, in your palm.”

His hand shaking, Cael did as he was asked, his eyes on the gleaming edge of the weapon. With the gentlest of touches, Uthul set the sharpened blade against the skin of the fruit and pressed. The sword cut the slightest groove in the fruit and Uthul pulled his blade away quick.

“Hold it tight and way from you, and give it a gentle squeeze,” the Sha’ree told him.

Not knowing what to expect, Cael leaned his face away as he complied. The fruit split as though seamed, and wisps of greenish smoke billowed out from inside the Succor. A honeyed smell wafted up thick, tinged with the vague scent of rot, fading away as the cloud dispersed.

“Pluck the seed from inside and cast it beside the tree.” Uthul mimed the motion. “The fruit is edible, but you must never devour the seed of the Succor.”

“What would happen?” Cael wasn’t sure he wanted to know, but he asked anyway, plucking the seed from within the moist cavity of the fruit.

“You would die slow, in horrible agony.”

Cael tossed the seed aside as though it were poison.

“The seed of the Succor knows not the dirt in which it is buried; it knows only that it must grow. Were you to swallow such a seed, it would germinate within you, its spiny branches emerging from the seed to skewer your innards. It would grow until its tendrils were so knotted up inside you that your body could contain it no more. It would then burst from your flesh, branches creeping through your eyes and nose and ears, seeking the easiest routes from within, until it split you apart. There where you fell, the Succor would take root once more and grow another of its kind, feeding its new life on your blood and entrails.”

Cael held the fruit at arm’s length, the rumbling of his stomach silenced by Uthul’s tale. He felt he could make it another day or two, before his hunger hindered him too greatly.

Uthul smiled in his bland way, taking another fruit from the tree. He did the same as he had with the one Cael held, slicing the skin open to free the stench before plucking the seed and tossing it to the tree. He nodded to Cael and devoured the fruit whole, purple juice running down his chin.

Cael looked to the fruit again and drew in a deep breath. He closed his eyes and shoved it into his mouth. The moment it touched his tongue, Uthul’s warning was cast aside.

Succulent like no fruit he’d ever tasted before, the Succor seemed to melt in his mouth. The best of his people’s grapes were nothing compared to the rich flavor that set his tongue alight with pleasure. He looked to Uthul as his tongue flickered at his lips to ensure none of the fruit remained wasted on his cheeks or chin, his eyes pleading for another.

Uthul plucked one more from the tree and prepared it before handing it over. “It is best if you eat no more than two your first time. A delicacy such as the Succor will sicken you in ways you would not like to experience, should you overindulge.”

Cael shoved the second fruit into his mouth and moaned as its juice flooded his senses. The morsel gone too soon, he looked to the tree.

Uthul laughed. “They are intoxicating, are they not?”

Cael had to agree.

The Sha’ree plucked several more of the fruit and slipped them inside a small bag he wore, hidden beneath the shadows of his cloak. “For our journey.”

Cael sighed as Uthul set a gloved hand on his shoulder and led him away from the Succor tree.

“Worry not, Cael, two will suffice to temper your hunger, if not your appetite.” He took him back to where Zalee waited, sitting cross-legged on the dirt. “We have need of your assistance.”

Cael cast a sideways glance at the tree and licked his lips once more, before turning back to look at the Sha’ree. “Of course.”

Uthul dropped beside Zalee, casting off his cloak, both sitting to face the mystical font. He pulled the small bag from his back and set it before him. He dug inside a moment, pulling forth a short crystal phial. Cael could see a pinkish fluid inside. Obviously thick, it shifted only slightly as Uthul handed it up to him.

Cael accepted the crystal, its surface cold to the touch. He held it with a gentle grip, fearful of breaking it.

“We must spend a few moments communing with the goddess, so that she might favor us on our journey.” He gestured to the phial. “Once we lower our heads and begin our prayer, you must take the crystal and cast it into the font. It is our sacrifice to Ree.”

Cael glanced at the hill running rife with the flowing essence of magic and felt his legs tremble.

“You must be careful to not touch the blood of Ree, for it is virulent and dangerous for one not versed in its proper handling.”

“Thanks,” Cael replied, the word dragged out. He looked back to the font as a spark flickered to life at the pool, casting a tongue of fire several feet into the air. “Ready when you are, I suppose.” His voice lacked confidence.

“Thank you,” Uthul told him before bending over to place his forehead against the sandy ground.

Zalee did so as well, in unison. After a moment, the pair began to speak as though they were one, their voices a lilting cadence, which Cael understood none of.

Believing it best to simply get the task over with, Cael urged his feet forward and walked toward the font. He plotted his route as he went, looking to walk where the least amount of pure magic soaked the ground. He could feel the heat growing as he drew closer, beads of sweat forming at his brow. His tunic clung to him as he neared and he grasped the crystal with both hands, fearful he might lose his grip.

As he neared the edge of the pool, a burst of fire sprung up before him. His heart roared to a gallop and he nearly fell as he stumbled to be away from the gout. The flame flickered and died as he righted himself, the voices of the Sha’ree rising behind him as though in encouragement.

He tightened his grip on the crystal once more, letting it sit in one hand only, as he inched to the edge of the pool. It flowed out close to fifteen feet from the base of the hill, further than he’d pictured it from where he started, at the side of the Sha’ree. His aim would have to be true.

He held his breath and leaned over the bubbling pool to get as close as he could to the hill. Sweat dripped from his forehead and sizzled when it struck the glowing essence beneath him. He could smell the fiery tang as though he were drawing breath in a forge. Worried another spark would explode and sear his face from his skull he drew back his arm and let the crystal fly.

He staggered away from the pool, his eyes on the tiny phial. It flipped end over end as it arched into the air. His breath stagnant in his lungs, he exhaled as the offering began to drop, letting the last loose as it careened over the lip of the mouth and disappeared inside the font.

The earth rumbled beneath his feet like thunder, jets of iridescent fire roared out of the mouth, searing their colors onto his eyes. Cael stumbled away from the font as waves of heat buffered him, its force instantly drying the sweat that had clung to his face. Pressed by the whipping winds, which rose up from nowhere, Cael turned and ran flat out across the trembling earth. He didn’t dare to look back.

The Sha’ree met him a short distance away, Uthul pulling him behind the shelter of his cloak, the heat suddenly dissipated, blocked by the silvery material. The ground settling, he peered out from behind Uthul’s shoulder to watch the fire sputter, and then fade away altogether.

Uthul pulled his cloak away and gave Cael his awkward smile. “Thank you.” He gestured to the font. “Ree is quite pleased.”

Cael stared at the Sha’ree. “You knew that would happen?”

“We had hoped,” Zalee answered. “The goddess sleeps below and cannot always hear us through the murky haze of her eternal slumber. The sacrifice calls to her, pleads for her attention, parting the veils of sleep for but a moment so that she might once again hear the voices of her children and feel our love. It comforts her to know she is not alone.”

Cael had heard tale of the ancient Sha’ree’s spiritual connection to the goddess, but had believed it to be nothing more than old tales built upon more old tales, which had at some point grown into myth. “You can speak to Ree?”

“Certainly, as can all of her children. It is not as you and I are speaking, though it once was.” Zalee knelt and ran her hand through the soft dirt at her feet, seeming to caress the ground. Her sadness was clear even in the blankness of her features, but she went on. “The goddess has fallen into herself and now exists within her own dreams. Hers is a dark existence, numb and cold and ever lonely. She knows not what transpires upon the surface of her flesh or in the sky of her spirit, but she once did.” Crimson tears slipped from Zalee’s eyes as she climbed to her feet, a handful of dirt clenched tight in her fist.

Uthul set a hand on her shoulder and squeezed gently, taking up where she left off. “Awoken in terror, the heavens raining agony down atop her in a fiery bombardment that lasted for a thousand years, Ree suffered like no other. And when the storm of fire passed, the goddess found herself alone. Time went on and she grew lonely.

“As the pain receded, slow like the wind wears upon the mountains, she felt the sense of herself slipping back into the darkness. Desperate to retain some small piece of her essence, a part of her consciousness she so feared losing, she drew us up out of the dirt, bringing the Sha’ree to life so that she might live on through us.”

Zalee wiped the tears away and did her best to smile at Cael. “Firstborn of her flesh, we are a true part of the goddess as no other race can claim.” Cael saw the pride in her sad eyes. “Before the darkness enveloped her and drew her back down into the abyss of herself, she spoke to us with what would become the words of our people. Her voice could be heard upon the wind and in the rumble of the clouds.” The tears came again. “Now she may only speak to us through the tremble of bones and the fury of her blood, and only fleetingly when we can draw her out of her darkened slumber.”

“I helped you speak to the goddess.” It was more a statement than a question. Cael felt the immensity of what he’d done, though it seemed so little at the time, settle over him.

Zalee set a gloved hand against his cheek. “You did, young Cael, and we thank you for it.”

Cael beamed as Uthul patted him on the back. “You did well, but we must continue on.” He looked up to the sky. “A’ree lurks, and soon the Great Tumult shall be upon us. There may well be storms if Ree still stirs in her bed. It would be best if we did not test her mood.”

Zalee nodded and glanced to the trees. Without a word, she strode once more into the woods.

Uthul gave Cael a gentle push. “Retrieve your light and let us be on our way.”

Cael ran and snatched the crystalline orb from the ground. Uthul had already begun to walk, so he hurried to catch up. As they made their way through the thick brambles and low-hanging branches of the Dead Lands, the night noises returning to haunt his ears, Cael realized he was no longer hungry or tired.

The meat of the Succor sat full, but comfortable, in his stomach, and he felt a sense of energy he hadn’t since the morning he fled the burning ruins of his village. He thought of his father, his body likely consumed by the flames and gone to the sky, and wondered what he’d think if he could see his boy now.

On the heels of the Sha’ree, long thought to be dust by his people, and helping them to speak to the goddess, he hoped his father would be proud that his sacrifice had not been in vain.

Tears came to his eyes, but Cael did not wipe them away. He let them fall in silvery tribute to his father as he walked in the wake of legends. The terror of the last day tempered by the presence of the Sha’ree and the knowledge that he strode upon the back of Ree, comforted him as he had not known he’d needed.

At last, Cael mourned.

Chapter Fifteen

Dawn had come like the birth of a beloved firstborn daughter; sweet and beautiful amidst the streaks of red and amber. It illuminated Domor’s face in passing shimmers. Though the shadows still clung thick to the river, morning had arrived at last.

He stared up at the canopy of trees as the last of the creatures screeched and cried and fled the day, seeking shelter within the gnarled branches. Domor glanced about to see the lightening skies around them free of enemies for the first time since dark fell, and collapsed onto his side. His wrist throbbed, the blood pounding in his ears.

Jerul stood for a few moments longer, the wooden shaft of the oar still clutched tight in his bloodstained hands as he surveyed their surroundings. He returned the oar to its place, locked it down, and crumbled to the deck beside Domor.

The purple veins of his body, what little could be seen past the crust of dried blood, appeared dim as though they’d been nearly bled out. Jerul huffed at each breath, his chest trembling with every exhalation. His blue eyes found Domor’s and the slightest of smiles stretched his lips.

“We are still alive, Velen.” He eased back against the wooden bench and sighed as though it were the finest of pillows. “I thank you for your courage.”

Domor nodded in reply, the effort nearly more than he could muster. “And I yours, friend, but it was your strength that brought us through the night. As ever, I am in your debt.”

“You are too humble. I had thought too little of the beasts, and had not expected such ferocity. Were it not for your quick wit, our bones would lie on the floor of the river.”

Domor shook the waterskin that was still clutched in his hands, and passed it to Jerul so that he might drink its last swallow. “We are of the same blood, remember? Let us share in the glory as brothers.”

Jerul’s smile grew wider. “As warriors.” A quiet chuckle rumbled from him after he’d downed the last of the water. “You are not like the rest of your people.”

Domor pulled himself up by the rail, suppressing a groan as he sat to face Jerul. “We cannot cower behind the warriors of Y’Vel for all eternity. There will come a day when the Velen must learn to fight their own battles. With the Grol having come unto power, that day may be sooner than any of us might have predicted.”

“Then you must show your people the way.” Jerul stretched out and drew the bloody remnants of Domor’s robes between them, his eyebrows raised.

Suddenly reminded of his nakedness, Domor pulled his travel bag to him and set it upon his lap. He felt his cheeks grow warm, heating further still when Jerul laughed, bold despite his tiredness.

“There is no modesty in battle, Velen.” He poked at the bag. “Dress if you must and let us have a look at your kill.”

His face still burning, Domor got his feet and spun about as he dug inside his bag. He pulled out a fresh set of robes and slipped them over his shoulders, ignoring the twinges that shot through his wrist. The inhibitions of his lifetime clothed and hidden from the world once more, he pulled the wineskin out and flooded his mouth with its sharp tang. He drank it down and sipped at it once more before returning it his pack. The wine warming its way to his belly, he stood to look over Jerul’s bloodied shoulder. The warrior peeled back the clinging material to reveal the creature.

Domor took a quick step back, his hand over his mouth. “The beast is hideous.”

Jerul nodded. “It’s a Bulrath, but I’ve never seen one so large.”

Domor steadied his hands, his adrenaline stirred by seeing the creature they’d battled all night there before him, and moved a little closer. He looked down on the beast and felt a sense of pride that he had brought it down alone.

Leathered, dark brown wings hung limp at its sides, their span something close to three feet when spread, Domor imagined. Rigid talons were hooked at their ends, stained in the wet darkness of Jerul’s life. Its own blood had crusted black upon its wounds. The stubby snout of its nose protruded just a little from beneath the wide, yellow ovals of its four main eyes. In the center of them was another, which was the color of old milk, pale and muddy with clouds.

Jerul poked at it, a trickle of oily liquid ran from the corner, pushed out by the warrior’s touch. “The Eye of the Night. It was how it could see us so easily despite the dark.” The warrior pried at its closed mouth.

A multitude of sharpened fangs sat in three rows inside its mouth, its jaw stretching under Jerul’s relentless pressure to reveal them all.

He whistled as he released the jaw, only to have it snap shut like a trap. “I’m grateful to have only felt its claws.”

Domor agreed as Jerul flipped the beast onto its belly. A carpet of short quills covered its back, each sharpened end tipped with the ooze of red. Jerul leaned close and sniffed, pulling away quick, his nose scrunched.

“Poison.” Jerul grasped the corner of its shroud of robes and tugged the entirety of it off the edge of the raft. The bundle sunk fast and drifted out of sight beneath the glassy surface. “Its barbs are a defense against anything that might try to make it prey. We’ll find no sustenance in its meat.”

Domor stared at the water, then back to the canopy above. If such a beast needed to be wary that it be made a meal, he hoped to never see what might feed upon it, for the Bulraths alone had been frightening enough. His eyes flickered back and forth along the twisted branches as he searched for some sign, a measure of assurance their battles were over, for the moment at least. Though the branches trembled and shook with the movements of unseen creatures, the forest sounds echoing off in the distance, he saw no threat emerge.

He stood rigid, afraid to turn his gaze away. Jerul tugged at his robes and drew his attention. He turned to look at the warrior and Jerul pointed to the river, without a word. His face spoke volumes.

Tiny bubbles fluttered in the water, bursting open with whispered hisses as they reached the surface. Nearly invisible tendrils of steam wafted just above the river. Domor looked a little closer and felt gentle waves of heat flutter against his cheeks and brow. As they watched, the bubbles grew bigger. The wisps of steam coalesced into a low-lying fog that hugged the water. Domor turned to look at his blood-companion.

Jerul drew in a timid breath. “The Tumult has come.”

Chapter Sixteen

For fifteen years, Arrin had dreamt of his return to his homeland. He’d traveled far, selling his sword wherever he could to earn enough coins to get by and to keep his mind active, but each night, whether it was the starry sky of a distant battlefield or the thatched roof of a raucous inn that hung over his head, his thoughts were always on Lathah.

For the first time in all of those long years, the towering walls of the city surrounded him once more, the smells of his people invaded his nose as they had long ago, and there was the clank of Lathahn soldiers at his back as had been so common when his life had meaning, but now, he could only wish to be gone.

The prince had ruined him with his news of Malya. The sorrow which burdened him now eclipsed that of his first lonely walk to the gate toward exile. Malya had married and borne sons that were not his. The thought circled inside his skull like the ravens over a field of war, picking at the carcass of his desiccated heart.

He felt the first spark of anger ignite inside him, its light shimmering in the deep well of his despair. For the first time since he’d left the Crown, having just passed the gate of the Sixth, he raised his eyes.

Maltis walked at his side and matched Arrin’s torpid pace, spewing venom at the lieutenant and his royal guards any time they dared to hurry Arrin or draw too close. Arrin glanced over to catch the commander’s gaze and gave him a nod of thanks before turning his stare forward.

His life outside the walls had been wasted on a fool’s dream. How could he ever have imagined that Malya yearned for their reunion as he did? It was clear now his existence had been a lie, their relationship a dalliance to be cast aside when it best suited her. Their child had been taken from its rightful parents for that lie. His stomach roiled and he felt fury fluttering through his veins.

Ahead of him, though his mind failed to grasp the truth of what his eyes saw, a woman in a dark cloak stood in their path. At her sides were two men in gold, armored as were the prince’s royal guard.

Arrin’s escorts came to a sudden halt, Maltis staying close at his side, grasping vainly for his sword that had not yet been returned.

“I would speak with Arrin Urrael,” the woman said without waiting to be addressed, her voice drifting clear into the wells of Arrin’s ears.

He focused his eyes and pushed away the anger and sorrow that clouded his vision. There Malya stood before him, not in a dream as she had for years, but in the flesh.

“By order of the prince, he is to be escorted from our land without delay,” Lieutenant Santos answered with graveled insistence, he and his men stepping forward.

“Prince Olenn is not yet king, might I remind you. While my father, your true monarch, yet lives, you will acknowledge my authority as princess of the Lathahn people, and you will obey my orders, as given.”

Santos set his jaw and came to stand just feet before her, staring into her eyes with contempt. Though his anger at Malya still stoked the fires in his breast, Arrin felt a fury coming over him at the audacity of the lieutenant. No matter their history and woes, Arrin would have no one mistreat Malya; no one.

He willed the collar to life, but a flash of gold and the shuffle of boots around him stayed his wrath. From the darkened alleys nearby, a score of men in golden chain stepped from the shadows, silver blades in their hand, though held without obvious menace. Their bare steel was sufficient to convey their meaning.

Santos, who’d dared challenge Malya, looked at the newcomers. A snarl curled his lip. He glared and gave her the barest of nods at the realization he’d lost the upper hand. “As you wish, my lady, but be assured the prince shall hear of your ill-advised visit.”

“Of that, I have no doubt. So sayeth, do as you must, soldier, but clear the path first.” She waved him away.

Her men closed upon the prince’s personal guard, reinforcing the edict by sheer dint of numbers. Arrin’s escort drew back a ways at Santos’s insistence, but hovered in the streets, their faces twisted in frustration and anger. They muttered quiet amongst themselves. There would be a reckoning, no doubt.

Malya’s guard moved away as well, giving her as much privacy as they dared. She looked to Maltis, the hint of a smile gracing her full lips. “I thank you for your loyal service to the rightful rulers of Lathah, Commander Maltis. Might I have a moment alone with Arrin?”

Maltis bowed. “Thank you, my lady. Of course.” He stepped to the side, casting a quizzical look to Arrin before he would move any further.

Arrin drew himself up and nodded to his friend. The commander backed away a short distance to linger with Malya’s men. Arrin’s attention fully on Malya, he met her gaze. His emotions exploded into a savage war within him, his thoughts roiling tumultuous inside his mind, a thunderhead of contradictions.

Malya stepped forward, coming to stand but a foot from his turbulent chest, her crystal green eyes locked upon his. “Though I know what you must think of the value of my words, given what my brother has no doubt told you, I am truly sorry; for everything.”

His own eyes filling with tears, Arrin clenched his jaw and said nothing, worried his voice might betray him. He knew not what emotion might battle its way through the chaos and take hold of his tongue. He feared its revolt.

“You must know I did not marry for love; not initially. You were my heart.”

“ Were,” he repeated as he reined in his tongue and found his voice. The word tasted bitter.

“I had thought you dead, Arrin,” she confessed. “Men of my father’s, whose loyalty I had no cause to doubt, claimed to have found your body in the hills to the south, just months after your exile.” She silenced a sob. “I demanded he bring your body home, but he refused. He would not have you return, neither dead nor dust. He commissioned soldiers to give you an honorable burial, but it was all he could be moved to do.” She laid a tiny hand on his chest. “And now you are here, fifteen years later; alive.” She sniffed quietly. “What would you have of me?”

He shivered at the contact, even though their flesh was separated by the thick leather of his cuirass. He shook his head, hoping to clear his mind, but could not fault her. Deep inside though, he had a need for answers, to know if all Olenn had told him was true.

“You have sons?” Disappointment flooded the question against his wishes.

She lowered her eyes. “Aye, I have two, by my husband, Falen. He is a good man, and I have grown to care for him.” She coughed quiet. “My father arranged our marriage, for the good of Lathah. He did not want Olenn to reign for long.”

Arrin stood trembling, his heart and mind divorced from one another as he listened to Malya’s words. He met her eyes once more when she lifted her face, and he saw the truth swimming in their teary depths. It was yet another wound inflicted upon him.

She had believed him dead these long years and had been a faithful daughter to her father’s wishes to depose a foul son to whom he was honor-bound to pass the crown. As she had her entire life, she had been true to herself, doing what she thought best for her people she was destined to never rule. In his absence, she had lived as she knew best, for her land and king, and had moved on as Arrin had never been able to.

He turned away as the tears leaked bold down his cheeks. The strands of his world unraveled in the span of moments, there was but one thing left between them. “What of our child?”

Malya sighed. Arrin saw her shoulders slump from out of the corner of his eye. He turned to stare at her, his heart slow in his chest, fearful of the worst.

“That is a secret my father guards well within the shrouded depths of his addled mind.” Anger and sadness, in equal parts, seemed to glitter in her eyes. “He alone knows to whom our child went, but even burdened beneath the full weight of dementia, his mind unclear for many years, he has spoken no names. I have done everything in my power since that day to find our baby. My threats and bribes have turned up nothing, my father’s willful command of secrecy overruling my attempts.”

Arrin turned to face her. “And your brother? Does he know?”

“My father kept it a secret from him as well, trusting the less Olenn knew, the safer our child was. He has…had,” she corrected, “No faith in my brother’s sense of justice. Of that, at least, I concur.”

A sour grin crept to Arrin’s lips. “To which I too agree.”

Their eyes met once more and she gave him a somber smile. He felt a pang of jealousy stab at his heart as he longed to embrace her, but knew it was no longer his place to do so. Though her explanation stung his pride and thrust hardened steel deep inside the very essence of his being, they had brought back his purpose.

“You must leave Lathah,” he told her, hoping she would hear the seriousness in his tone.

“I cannot. These are my people.”

Arrin had expected no less, an argument to challenge her unflinching loyalty prepared during his long walk from Fhen. “Then rally them to you and warn them disaster comes at the hands of the Grol.” He could see the doubt, even in her eyes.

“We have battled the Grol for centuries-”

Arrin cut her off. Heat colored his voice. “Do you not think I know this?” Maltis and several of Malya’s guard inched closer. “I would not have come, would not have dared to put you or our child at risk of Olenn’s wrath for such a lowly menace as the Grol were it not a true threat. The beasts have come unto magic.” He leaned close and whispered, “They are armed with the same magic as the gift you gave me on the day of my exile.”

Her eyes went to his throat, growing wide. “You speak true?”

“Aye. As ever so true as when I fell to my knees and told you of my love for you.”

Her tears spilled free. She placed her hand beneath his wild hair and set it upon the collar. He could feel the warmth of her fingers pulsing against his throat. “It was meant to be my brother’s, but my father could never bring himself to pass on such a powerful relic to a man like Olenn. He feared what he might do with it so instead, he gave it to me in hopes I would bear the land a legitimate heir one day.” She gave Arrin an apologetic look. “My father believed a man might need its power to unseat Olenn once he had become comfortable upon the throne. I passed it to you, for I believed you needed it more than any speculative unborn heir.”

Arrin could hardly catch his breath. “For that, I am forever grateful.” He bit back the satisfaction that Olenn had been robbed of the gift and stared deep into the emeralds of her eyes. “But I know its true power, am fearful of it even. I am doubly so for that which the Grol now wield. There is conquest in their heart; murder, revenge.”

He waved her to silence as she began to speak. “They do not possess but one or two of such relics, which would be terror enough, but hundreds. I watched as they rained fire down over Fhenahr, blasting the walls to rubble and burning their people alive in a fiery conflagration from which there was no escape; not alive, least ways.” The memories flickered to the fore in shades of blood and ash. “And when the walls fell, the beasts stormed into Fhen and murdered all without mercy.” His voice grew low. “They come next to Lathah. They will not be satisfied with simple victory.”

Malya let her trembling hand slip from his neck. “What would you have me do, Arrin?”

“If your brother will not listen to reason, as we know is his wont, then come away with me. If I cannot save everyone, I would save you…and your family.” He added the last with effort, the words reluctant to form upon his tongue. “The great walls will be no protection when they come this time. They will only trap the people inside, a sarcophagus of stone made for all of Lathah. Our beloved homeland will be a cemetery.”

“I cannot leave my people behind.”

“If you would see your sons live, your husband, father, then you have little choice.” He hated the cruelty of his words but knew he spoke only truth. The Grol would not spare the nobles any more than they would spare the poor. They were all meat as far as the beasts were concerned.

He stood silent as Malya mulled his words. The difficulty of the task was clear in the worry lines carved into her face.

At long last, she spoke, her voice barely above a whispered breath. “Though I would not have my family fall prey to Grol cruelty, I will not abandon my people. They must have one leader who understands compassion.” She grasped Arrin’s wrist and squeezed. “Carry a message to Pathrale and ask sanctuary of Warlord Quaii for all the people of Lathah. Bring me his word of refuge and we will march as one to Pathrale.”

“We are short on time, Malya. I know not how soon the Grol will come. Please, do not delay with politics.”

She shook her head. “It is enough I contemplate fleeing my home with my tail between my legs, but I will not do so without assurance of safe asylum. I would rather we all die fighting for our nation than creep away to live landless, like our forefathers before Lathah was founded.”

Arrin sighed. The fire he’d loved in her still burned as bright as it ever had. He knew she would not be swayed from her course. For all his strength, it was a battle he would not win. “Then it shall be done.”

She graced him with a smile and pulled him to her so that she could plant a soft kiss on his cheek. The gentle scent of her was like a fresh breeze in spring, her kiss a touch of the sun. He warmed to her closeness, a lifetime of loneliness brushed away in an instant, but he set his mind against the impulses that surged through his veins. Her kiss was all he could hope for.

She pulled away with what seemed to him as deliberate slowness and bowed her head. “Thank you, Arrin, for your loyalty, and your love. It is, and shall always be, a treasure to me.” She lingered a moment and then turned to the prince’s men, her look stolid once more. “My guard shall assist you to escort Arrin Urrael to the gates. Be warned, should any harm come to him or my men, you will pay most dearly, my brother’s will be damned.” She waited until they acknowledged her threat, her gaze tempered with steel, before looking to Maltis. Her expression softened. “I would appreciate your continued supervision to their escort, commander.”

Maltis smiled. “Certainly, my lady.”

Malya cast one last glance at Arrin, whispered her thanks, and strode back toward the Crown, five of her men close at her side. Lieutenant Santos glared after their backs, fury undisguised in his eyes.

Arrin growled and drew the lieutenant’s attention. The collar glimmered and Arrin snapped the chain of the shackles without effort. Before the wide eyes of everyone, he tore the manacle cuffs from his wrists, bending the iron with obvious ease, and threw them at the feet of the lieutenant.

“If you even deign to cause Malya harm, now or ever, I will find you and tear your still beating heart from your chest as you watch.” He turned and gestured toward the main gate. “Now, let us be about my second exiling before I’m forced to see myself out.”

Maltis choked back a laugh and strode to Lieutenant Santos. “I’d have our swords.”

The man’s wide eyes dropped to look at the crumpled iron of the shackles at his feet. Without further hesitation, he handed Maltis his sword and Arrin’s as well. The commander smiled and returned to Arrin’s side as Malya’s men formed a loose circle around the pair.

Not waiting, Arrin strode forward. Malya’s guard kept pace, while those of the prince hurried to stay close; but not too close. They traveled the rest of the way in silence. Arrin’s eyes were locked straight ahead, his mind in a trance of thoughts and memories until the squeal of the main gate drew his head back to the present.

He turned to the commander as the gate swung open, extending his hand. “Thank you.”

Maltis clasped Arrin’s hand in his, a sly smile still on his face. “You’ve grown strong in the wilderness.”

Arrin grinned, sweeping aside his unkempt hair so Maltis could see the collar. “I’ve the help of the goddess, my friend,” He grew grim as he spoke. “As do the Grol that march upon Lathah. If I do not return before you see the dust of our old enemy nearing the border, drag the princess and her family, bodily if you must, to Pathrale. To engage the Grol is suicide; to sit behind the walls is to accept genocide.” He released the commander’s hand and collected his sword before turning to stride, chin held high, through the gates of Lathah, out once more into the wilderness.

“Mark my words, Maltis,” he said over his shoulder as he cleared the gate. “There is only one certain chance for survival: you must run.”

Chapter Seventeen

Commander Feragh stared at the ruins of Fhenahr through the narrowed slits of his eyes. Fires still danced unattended within its walls, having yet to consume the city in its entirety, though it was close. It was a haunting sight, the leaping flames flickering into the sky to be swallowed by the glowing face of A’ree. The light of both cast a reddish pallor over the land as though the morning had been born of crimson’s womb.

There were none of the expected screams of the dying in the air, only the thick scent of charred flesh and burning wood that clung as a sour passenger on the wind. Other than the gentle crackle of the flames and the occasional rustle and crash as a support was devoured and a structure collapsed in its wake, there was no sound of life from Fhenahr.

The men at his back were silent, as well. Not even their mounts dared to make a sound. The devastation was so complete as to defy logical description.

The walls had been laid open in several places, blackened char surrounding their crumbled foundations. What could be seen of the building inside was the same, fire having come to cleanse the town of its history and memory.

Unlike the battlefields that Feragh had seen, his feet having trod many in his time, there were no bodies scattered about, no pieces. No crows circled overhead in search of a fallen feast, for there seemed to be nothing left to feed upon.

Though this was often the way with the Grol, their enemy but living fuel for the beasts, Feragh had never seen such complete and utter destruction. The people of Fhenahr had never made it out from behind their walls, save for those led out in chains. No defensive force had struck at the Grol as they laid siege. Feragh knew this for no blood stained the open field before the city, no pieces of fur or flesh of any kind, no fragments of bone, lay strewn about in the dirt. While the Grol were notorious for their appetites, not even they could scour a battlefield so clean as to leave no trace of war.

The people of Fhenahr had been butchered in their homes in a way Feragh had never seen. They met their end quick and with brutal violence. Had the Grol been any other force, Feragh felt he would have found much of the population still in their beds; dead where they lay.

Feragh drew in a thick breath and licked his lips with a dry tongue as General Wulvren pulled his horse alongside the commander.

“They are days ahead of us still. Given the multitude of tracks, they easily number in the thousands, perhaps over ten. The prisoners’ tracks make it hard to be certain.” He gestured toward the wall of the Fortress Mountains just visible in the distance. “Their path confirms that they are headed toward Lathah. They could be headed nowhere else.”

Feragh turned to look at his general. “Do you see the walls?”

Wulvren nodded with a grim face.

“When did the Grol become capable of this?” He swept his arm in the direction of Fhenahr, the fires flickering over the city. “What could they have found in Ah Uto Ree to have empowered them so?” He shook his head, his eyes drawn once more by the burning city. “This is no longer a simple hunt as I’d believed. The Grol intend war and our legion can no longer stand against them as could the Fhen, though it sickens me to speak such foul words.”

Wulvren spit on the dirt. “It would seem the Sha’ree truly are dead. The Grol must have learned of their secrets when they invaded their land. I can see no other way for the beasts to have caused such damage on their own.”

Feragh agreed in silence. The Grol had pierced the ancient lands of the Sha’ree and had returned alive and unharried, a miracle indeed, bearing burdened palanquins that must have contained the fury of the ancient Sha’ree people.

Before him stood proof that the Grol that strode the lands today were not the enemy he had long battled, defeating at every turn. Whatever they had found stoked the fires of their courage, and given the flaming downfall of Fhenahr, rightly so. A shudder crept down Feragh’s spine as he imagined the Grol given the means to assuage their cruel appetites, their hunger for flesh and destruction.

For the first time in his life, Commander Feragh knew fear. He’d crawled from his mother’s womb into the warrior’s life of the Tolen, raised since he’d opened his eyes to rule and wage war. Since he was just a pup he’d known the thrill of battle, his claws blooded upon the Grol before they’d even grown their full length.

Yet in the ruin of Fhenahr, he saw a new world, one where all he’d believed had been cast aside to make room for the miraculous. Never more than a nuisance, the Grol had suddenly become a true threat; one not just to the Tolen, but to the whole of Ahreele.

“We must warn our people,” Feragh told Wulvren. “Send a runner home with orders to rally. I want our forces on the move the day they receive our warning. Have them skirt the inside border of Gurhtol and slice through the heart of Nurin with all haste. I would have them ready at the backs of the Grol should Lathah manage to hold them to a standstill.”

The general glanced to the city. “Do you truly believe the Lathahns capable of such?” He waved a soldier over as he waited on the commander’s answer.

Feragh shook his head. “They are fierce in defense of their homes, and smart in their tactics, but no, I don’t believe they will fare much better than the people of Fhen.” He sat in silence a moment as Wulvren passed his order onto the messenger, continuing once the soldier had been sent away. “My only hope is that they will take their toll upon the beasts and perhaps slow them enough so that we might strike at their backs unaware as they lay siege.”

“Pardon my tongue, but it is a weak hope, commander, if what we see before us is a true representation of the Grol’s newfound strength.”

“We’ve little else to take faith in, general. We’ve no messengers fast enough to take word of preparation to Lathah, or even to their Pathran allies, no doubt next upon the list of Grol victims. Unable to coordinate a plan of attack, we must make do with what few options are available to us.”

Wulvren shifted in his saddle. “Is this truly our fight to so risk our people? We owe no claims to Lathah or to Pathrale.”

“True.” Feragh met his general’s eyes. “However, if the Grol have grown so powerful as to slaughter the Lathahns behind their great walls, what certainty is there that we will prevail against them?”

“They cannot possibly break our fortifications. We are no farmer folk to be caught by surprise and trampled in our homes.”

“No, of course not, general, but would we be so different under the circumstances?” Once more he gestured to the smoldering wreckage of Fhenahr. “This city was brought down from outside its walls, by a force that could reach inside and cause chaos without risk to itself. This was no simple siege with fired arrows and stones hurled over the walls. The Grol killed them from a distance and likely only engaged on foot for the sport of it. Would we fare any better as fire and fury rained down on us while we awaited a force of men to cross our lines that would never come.”

Wulvren sat back in his saddle, his eyes narrowed, his fangs bared, but he said nothing.

“We know not what we face, so I would rather take the fight to the Grol, on our terms, than wait for them to come for us at a time of their choosing. Do you not agree?”

The general snarled. “I do, but the taste of it sickens me. To think the Grol present a threat to us is foul meal to swallow.”

Feragh smiled. “It is the same for me, but I would rather credit the beasts as worthy adversaries and live to skewer them upon my sword than to die upon their fangs because I was too much of a fool to feel threatened.” Feragh spurred his horse and waved his general on. “Let us be on their trail. I would know what we face, once and for all.”

Feragh turned his mount into the trail of ruined earth left in the wake of the Grol army and charged ahead. He heard Wulvren call out orders behind him. The sudden sounds of a thousand horses trampling forward sent a shiver of excitement down his spine.

Though he knew not what fate lay before them, the thrill of battle filled his loins with a lust for blood. Were this to be his final conflict, sent to earth by the unknown power the Grol had come into, he would go to it with glory and honor at the head of his legion.

Were he to fall, his body would find the comfort of dead flesh beneath him for he vowed his path would be littered with the corpses of his enemies.

Chapter Eighteen

The weather-beaten shore that loomed before her like a growing wall of brown and smattered green was the greatest sight Braelyn had ever seen. Though she longed to rejoice, she buried her hope deep inside for she knew death still clutched tight to her cloak.

Lashed to a chunk of wreckage from her sunken ship to keep her from being tossed into the boiling water that whipped around her, Braelyn fought to get to her knees as land approached. Carried as she was on a giant wave of frothing violence, she managed to get her feet beneath her. The lash held her tight and lent her a measure of balance as she drew one of her blades from the sheath at her hip. A sudden chill filled the air as the short sword shimmered in her hand, wisps of steam roiling up as droplets of water met the ice-blue steel of the blade.

She set the tip of her sword near the restraining lash and waited with her heart in her throat as her makeshift raft hurtled toward shore. She waited as the wave she rode began to plummet downward, and then waited an instant longer before slicing the leather restraint that bound her other wrist. Her loose arm held out for balance, she sheathed her blade and made ready.

Momentum beneath her, she hunched and focused the whole of her remaining strength into her legs. Before the wreckage rolled too far and sent her tumbling, she jumped free, diving forward over the fast approaching ground.

The furious water lapped at her as she flew ahead of it, laying her arms close to her side to further her distance. The wave crashed behind her with a deafening roar, the wreckage of her ship driven into the shore by the power of the water. The sharp crack of its destruction was but a murmur in the echoes of the wave as she soared above.

After what seemed a lifetime in the air, Braelyn felt the reins of the earth take hold once more, tugging her toward the ground as it had the water. Her breath like stones within her lungs, she ducked her head at the last moment and curled small, crashing into the sandy beach.

The soft sand was made rigid by her momentum, the impact knocking the sense from her skull. Tucked for a roll, she did just that, though under no direction of her own. Her body flipped and flew through the air, bouncing off the sand, over and over, each jarring blow like a stone cast from a catapult.

Her vision whitened in a blur of agony, she tumbled to a stop in an aching heap. The cloth she had worn over her face had been ripped away and sand filled her mouth and throat. She gagged and spit to clear it away, the gritty bite of it grinding between her teeth. She struggled to rise and every muscle came alive in a searing fury.

Heated splashes struck her exposed cheek as the ocean continued to storm. She bit back a scream and turned her face away, scrambling up the beach. The painful throb of her body was forgotten for a moment as she fled the searing touch of the water. Once she was certain she’d gone far enough to escape its wrath, she took a few minutes to catch her breath.

Everything hurt.

Trembling beneath the thick layers of her cloak and clothes, Braelyn watched as the ocean she’d rode in on tore apart the beach. Deep hisses filled her ears as though she were surrounded by serpents, billows of steam shrouding the shore behind a hazy gray wall.

The sun just creeping above the horizon at her back, Braelyn spent a moment getting to her feet, adding her own hisses to those of the sizzling ocean as she turned to survey her surroundings. Her weary eyes shielded from the bright morning light, her optimism at having made it to dry land alive withered to dust.

Nothing but sand sprawled out before her.

As far as she could see, there was nothing but the golden hills that blurred into the distance. No other color broke the hold of the yellow desert that reigned supreme before her eyes. The few instances of green that sprouted near the water’s edge were little more than an illusion of life, which was quickly being washed away by the fury of the ocean.

She could feel the heat of the morning coming even though her soaked clothing. Before too long, she would bake beneath their sweltering weight. Unprepared for a desert journey, having been caught at sea on a trip north, she had little confidence in her luck continuing to play in her favor.

While those she served with had met their end in the churning depths, their drowning voices punctuated with terror, and she alone having made it to shore, there was little doubt in her mind that she had simply delayed the inevitable.

The defeatist thought angered her. She was no victim.

Her breath still in her lungs, steel snug at her hip, Braelyn growled her fury at the desert sand and lumbered forward. If death were coming for her, she would meet it halfway.

She hoped it would walk fast.

The muscles in her legs thrummed like bow strings as each step was its own little agony. She had clutched to her makeshift raft through the night, battling to keep it upright against the rage of the ocean. It had been a difficult fight she had nearly lost, many times over, and every part of her body hurt. Sharp pangs stabbed at her knees and hips. Her back felt as though it were buttressed with strips of cold steel, the muscles rigid beyond anything she had felt before.

She gritted her teeth against her numerous pains and strode forward, mindful to pull the waterlogged hood of her cloak over her head. The short crop of her hair stung as the material ran rough across it, and she laughed at the additional misery. The gods had no pity.

The soft sand shifted beneath her tired heels and added yet another complaint to Braelyn’s tongue. Forced to lift her feet higher to clear the earth that grasped at her ankles, she cursed aloud.

She clung as close to the shore as she dare, both for the nearness of water, as she had lost all of her supplies aboard her ship, and in the hope it might lead her to a sheltered grotto of some sort that might provide her with some form of food and protection from the sun.

The heat of the desert too much for her northern blood, Braelyn knew it would wear on her. So thinking, she drew her sword from its scabbard and sighed as a waft of cold air drifted from its steel. The blade shimmered in the morning light. Its tint reacted to the heat and seemed to glow a deeper shade of blue as though in challenge to the bright beat of the sun.

She let the blade hang loose from her hand, tip down as she traipsed across the golden sand. The ocean foamed and howled to her left as she headed north, the waft of cool energy from her sword keeping the worst of the heat from her flesh.

For hours she walked with no change to the world around her; the sand continued its reign. She’d drifted further from the water as it grew increasingly fitful, casting burning spray at her feet. The sound had become infuriating. She stayed just close enough so that its roar was a gentle moan in the distance, but it was little more than that.

Her limbs cried out for rest and at long last she ran out of excuses to ignore it. She dropped to the earth with a groan. Once down, she feared she might not get back to her feet.

Her breath ragged in her chest, she lay back with her face turned from the sun, and rested her head against a pile of soft sand she gathered together. She pulled her blade out, which she had strung to the inside of her cloak as she walked, and laid it bare across her chest. Its insistent cold was felt first by her breasts, their tips hardening in surprised rebellion against the rough material of her tunic, but its cool touch was a pleasure. She stretched her arms away from her sides, luxuriating in the surprising comfort of the sand.

The weariness of her journey having caught up to her, she lay in the sand’s embrace as the gray haze of sleep threatened to steal over her. Her vision swam and the ground beneath her seemed to sway as if she were still aboard the deck of her ship. The distant rumble of the ocean was a quiet song that lulled her toward the darkness, which crept from the corners of her eyes.

Braelyn’s eyes flickered, having closed without her notice, then opened into tiny slits as her sword tumbled from her chest. She lay staring at it, the sand appearing to shift beneath its blue blade. Her head filled with the thick clouds of exhaustion, it took her a moment to notice her sword appeared to be sinking.

Her thoughts slow, she slid her arm across the ground and grasped the pommel, feeling the tinge of familiar cold pierce the thickness of her leather glove. She gripped it tight to keep it from sliding into the sand as puffs of gold showered her arm.

The ground trembled and a gentle vibration skittered along her back like phantom ants. She blinked her eyes clear of sleep and focused them on her breasts, noticing them rising out of sync with her breath.

Awareness flooded her veins with adrenaline.

Braelyn rolled away from the explosions of sand and leapt to her feet, surprise and fear dulling her pain to a tolerable level. Her blue blade held before her, she drew her second sword with her left hand. The brightness of the day seemed to dim as the obsidian blade cleared its sheath.

Her eyes locked on the desert floor, the small puffs of sand came to a sudden halt. For several minutes she stood poised, no sound reaching her ears but the distant call of the ocean. Her breath slow, each exhalation eased out to be silent, she wondered after a while if she’d simply imagined the motion. Nothing marred the surface of the sand where she had lain, save for the slight impression where her body had nestled into the golden earth.

After several more minutes, she drew a deep breath and let the muscles of her arms relax, her swords drooping to his sides. She looked about to get her bearings, having lost track during her rest, when she felt another vibration at her feet. Its tremble shifted the sand beneath her boots.

She leapt to the side just as the ground beneath her burst upward in a great volcano of golden dust.

Her balance challenged by the shifting sand, she landed awkward, wasting a precious moment to stay on her feet before spinning to face back the direction she’d come. Her pulse thudded in her throat at what she saw.

Right where she had just stood, a motley brown creature that vaguely resembled a snake, rose from the sand. Its squirming body drew itself up, what was visible writhing to hover nearly ten feet above her. Six bulbous eyes extended three feet from its head on spindly stalks. They swiveled to lock their rheumy gaze upon her. Another eye set in the center, three times the size of the others and filled with a putrid green slime that sloshed within its circled depths as it moved, twisted so that it too came to rest its sight on her.

Multiple mouths ran down its length on all sides of it, each filled with sharpened teeth of black. Each maw opened and closed in what seemed random order, the motion and clack of its teeth mesmerizing. The air was filled with its chittering voices, a chorus of ear-rattling screeches.

Braelyn cast a quick glance about to assure herself no more of the beasts had sprung up behind her while she’d been distracted, before backing away. She kept her blades at the ready as the creature continued to emerge from the sand, its snapping body coiling over itself as foot after foot of it continued to emerge from the ground, swirling dirt stirred to a small maelstrom in its wake.

Its serpentine length loose of the dirt, it turned its attention to Braelyn. The green glow of its central eye shifted back and forth as though daring her to run, its stalks swaying about its head. All of its mouths flew open at once and it loosed a horrid wall of shrieks. The sound assailed her ears, so piercing that it nearly drove the sight from her eyes.

She stumbled back as her head swam under the sonic assault, fighting the urge to drop her swords and cover her ears. She blinked away the sudden tears that blurred her starred vision, just in time to see the creature lunging toward her.

She dove to the side as a handful of the beast’s slashing mouths crashed into the stand where she had just stood. She rolled away and jumped to her feet, turning to face her opponent. She squeezed the tears from her eyes as the creature’s shrieks became muffled, its mouths spitting out the dirt it had bitten down upon in place of her flesh.

Braelyn moved forward, hoping to take advantage of the creature’s distraction, but its stalked eyes swiveled to glare at her. Its tail lashed out like a screaming whip, sharpened teeth snapping just inches before her face as she retreated. The scent of rotten flesh struck her full in the face, her stomach churning, as she scrambled to put some distance between her and the beast.

It had no intention of letting her flee.

The creature reared up and struck at her, using its length like a coiled spring to speed its approach. Her hands trembling, Braelyn pushed her full weight into her feet, assuring her footing was stable. She held her ground as the creature neared, waiting until the very last moment before springing away. Her blue blade flashed in an arc behind her.

Committed to its charge, the beast’s central eye closed and crashed into the sand, throwing up a cloud as it burrowed deep. Braelyn’s blade sunk into the open gape of one of its mouths as it passed, jagged teeth shattering against steel.

The beast shrieked as its tail lashed out frantic in an attempt to strike her down. Its head, and all its eyes, still buried in the sand, Braelyn dodged the snapping lengths of its tail as it slashed about without direction and closed the distance. No more than a foot from its thrashing torso, she spun her sword in her hand to reverse her grip, and drove the tip of her obsidian blade into the maw nearest the head. Her downward thrust pierced the gaping mouth and skewered the flapping black tongue that wavered inside, sinking into the depths of its throat.

The serpent went rigid at the dark blade’s touch, before its other mouths exploded in agonized wails. Her ears under assault once more, Braelyn clenched her jaw and narrowed her eyes, tearing the blade free of the creature’s flesh. Yellowed pus and blood spewed from the wound to splatter her chest in its putrid warmth. Its smell brought more tears to her eyes as the beast began to burrow.

Braelyn could feel vomit rising in her throat and choked it back as she was showered by an upheaval of sand. She closed her eyes against it, blocked out any thought of the odors that gnawed at her nose, and lashed out with both of her sword.

So close, both blades bit deep. She felt more of the thick warmth splash against her hands and arms, but ignored it as he pulled her swords free to keep them from being wrenched loose by the serpent’s efforts to return to the sand.

Fearful the creature might rise to come at her again should she not do enough to discourage it, Braelyn continued to lash out at its passing body. Each strike drew more screams and gallons of the sickening fluid until she whipped her swords before her to feel nothing but air.

Her eyes still closed against the taint that had covered her from head to toe, she darted sideways, keeping her position affixed in her mind. Ten feet from where the creature had gone under the ground, she sheathed her blades and pulled the cloak from her shoulders. She used the part that had hung directly behind her back to wipe her eyes clean, opening them once she was sure they were free of the viscous nastiness.

A dark burrow sat but a short distance from her, fluid-stained sand piled about is abysmal entrance. She could neither see nor hear any sign of the serpent from within its depths, though that brought her no relief. Adrenaline still burned through her body, but only barely. Braelyn knew she must find sanctuary before it ran its course, for when it did, she had no doubt she would collapse where she stood and not even the sharpened teeth of serpentine death would bring her to her senses.

Her cloak clutched in her hands, she wiped at the fluids as she stumbled across the sandy floor, away from the serpent’s burrow. Every muscle sore beyond anything she had ever experienced, she began to rethink her earlier bout of stubborn optimism. Exhaustion lurked in her limbs and shoulders as though the world pressed down upon her. Her steps were burdened by the grasping sand and her quick-fading strength.

She cast her eyes to the desolate wasteland that sprawled before her. Once more, only gold met her stare. She would not want for dirt at her funeral. She sighed at the thought, her throat raw and ragged. She lowered her chin to her chest as she ordered her feet to continue on with little conviction in her command. Like both food and water, hope had been lost at sea.

A flash in the corner of her eye drew her head up in an instant.

Her head swiveled to the right and she saw it again, a glistening shimmer in the distance, standing out amidst the expanse of sand. She stared for several minutes to assure herself that what she saw was true and not some falsehood conjured up by her desperate mind or the ominous touch of the heat. She swayed back and forth and the flickers of reflected light continued. There was something there.

Reluctant to give in to shameless optimism, Braelyn turned on her heels and headed toward the flickering light. She had no idea what it might be, or what might be waiting for her when she arrived, but she was content enough to have direction.

Given what little else she had, it would have to do.

Chapter Nineteen

Fueled by his worry and thoughts of the Grol army that approached his homeland, Arrin pushed the collar’s magic to its fullest and made the trip from the city of Lathah to the border of Pathrale in but a third of the time it would take a horsed and determined messenger.

He stopped only once in his day long travel, to catch a couple of rabbits and put sufficient fire to their meat so as to not make him sick, before he was back on his way. He sipped at the Lake of Lathah as he passed its lifeless glitter, but spent no more than a few moments at its shore. He had no time to lose.

Only when he neared the invisible line that separated the plains of Lathah from the thick jungle of Pathrale did he slow his pace. Though allied to the Lathahns, the Pathra were extremely protective of their land and it would do him no favors to burst into their realm like a frothing lunatic.

As he neared the start of their jungle domain, he made a show of peace-tying his sword into its sheath with a thick strip of leather. He let the length of it hang to be certain the Pathra saw it. He knew they would.

Even from where he stood outside of their land, he felt their eyes upon him. At one with their surroundings, the Pathra would have scores of their people hidden within the clustered branches high above the jungle floor. Word of his presence would already be passed.

His hands spread wide in a gesture of peace and held far from his blade, he walked slowly into Pathrale, letting all know he intended no harm. His senses enhanced by the will of the collar, he could hear the Pathra shifting in the trees about him, the sound little more than the slightest of whispers.

Arrin repressed a smile, for it would serve him best to show respect to the Pathran people by appearing at their mercy. Warriors all, they would be offended were they to learn he could so easily spot their movements in the sway of the branches or scent their fur long before they even came close. He knew they drew comfort in the certainty of their skills, the advantage of their homeland terrain, and felt it better to let them cling to their beliefs.

If they thought him a threat, the Pathra would waste no time casting his corpse from their boundaries. Not nearly as fast as Arrin, the power of the collar magnifying his speed, the Pathra were still a definite danger. Their tactic of leaping in an out of the trees, their warriors coming from all sides at once, was a guarantee of death alone as he was.

So thinking, he continued his slow pace as he headed toward the depths of the jungle where the Pathra congregated. Hardly a village, for it had no true homes or buildings, the people of Pathrale had built a world within the cluttered tops of the jungle’s great trees.

Arrin had seen it but once in his travels, when he helped battle a horde of wandering Grol when he had still been a soldier in the army of Lathah. Caught off guard by the Grol’s daring move to skirt the edge of the Dead Lands, they had crossed deep into the Pathran lands to catch the cat-people unprepared.

Having just won through a minor skirmish against the Korme, in upper Nurin, Arrin and his men had caught the trail of the Grol and followed behind. They arrived before the Pathra had begun to mobilize their forces, Arrin and his men catching the Grol by surprise, from behind. It was a short and bloody battle, the Grol losing the will to fight early. They broke and scattered, only a few winning free to escape Pathrale alive.

In appreciation of their help, the Pathra brought the Lathahns to their home to celebrate. It was a raucous night that Arrin still recalled vividly, though it was the beauty of the canopy above that he remembered most. Despite the looming battle ahead and the frustration of Malya’s self-imposed politics, he found himself looking forward to seeing the Pathran home once more.

His face showed no sign of his thoughts as he continued on, the whispers in the trees growing closer. He knew soon they would make a decision and close upon him, either in greeting or in protective fury. He suspected the former, his Lathahn heritage obvious.

His suspicion was proven true a moment later. There was a rustle in the thick foliage a ways before him, its sound made purposely to draw his eyes. He did as he was expected and turned to face the noise. He heard the patter of feet nearing behind him but did nothing to let them know he had heard.

“State your business in Pathrale,” a calm, leathered voice spoke over his shoulder.

He didn’t carry on the act as far as to pretend surprised when the voice sounded in his ear, but he did wait just an instant before turning to face the speaker with deliberate slowness.

“Greetings, Pathran allies. I am Arrin Urrael of Lathah.” He knew they would not know his lie, but despite its expedience, it tasted bitter all the same. “I come with a message from Princess Malya, daughter of King Orrick; a matter of grave importance.”

All around him stood close to thirty of the Pathra, scattered amongst the trees, their lithe forms swaying in casual, yet ready postures. Sharp wooden javelins were in their hands, and more were nestled in loose slings upon their backs, while the short silver daggers they favored hung in abundance from the vine-woven belts at their waists.

Always awed by the Pathran beauty, Arrin looked at the warrior who’d spoken, as he in turn appraised Arrin.

Short furred ears sat flat against the Pathran’s head in apparent wariness. They were surrounded by a short-haired, dark gray mane that encircled his flattened face and emphasized his gentle features. His piercing yellow eyes, contrary to the calm of his expression, stared feral, like a beast. However, Arrin knew from experience the Pathra were as quick-witted as they were quick-footed. He realized he stared and bowed his head to the warrior.

“I am Waeri, third born to the litter of Quaii, Warlord of Pathra.” He stepped gracefully around to Arrin’s side, staying just within javelin range, his eyes appraising. His tail flickered with agitation. He glanced at Arrin’s wild locks and then to his sword, the well-worn pommel still tied in peace. “You have the look of a warrior about you, not a messenger. How did it fall to you to bring such a missive to my father?”

Arrin sighed as the gathered Pathra drew closer. He had not expected resistance. “It seems I was destined to be the bearer of grim tidings, of late.” He smiled at Waeri in the hopes of offsetting the undercurrent of hostility he sensed in their motions. “It is true that I am no messenger by trade, but a warrior, like you and your kind.” He gestured to his sword. “However, it is still my duty to bear your warlord a message I would beg to have him hear. I offer no violence and would gladly hand over my blade to prove my intentions.”

Waeri crossed his arms over his narrow, furred chest and loosed a quiet grunt. “It would seem a good day for a spy, would it not, brothers?” Grunts of agreement erupted behind him.

Arrin felt his pulse sputter, unsure of why they would suspect him as a spy. “I-” he began as another of the Pathra warriors came to stand before him.

Despite the hissed warning of Waeri, she leaned her white speckled face in close and sniffed at Arrin. He held still, his hands far from his weapon as she circled him slow, her mouth open as she inhaled his scent, her long black tail held rigid in the air at her back.

“I know your smell, warrior,” she told him, coming around to stand before him.

Waeri made a low rumbling sound in the back of his throat, a clear warning, but the female Pathra ignored him.

“It has been long since I’ve tasted your scent, but I remember it. You have been here before?”

Arrin nodded. “Once, many summers ago, when I was but a young officer in the Lathahn army. The Grol had made their way into the jungle through the Dead Lands and my men and I were near. We helped to slaughter the beasts and send them running. Your people threw a great feast in our honor for our help that day, beneath the great canopy.”

The female Pathra smiled, Waeri seeming to relax a little at her side.

“I am Kirah. I too was there at that battle, young in tail, but I remember the fierceness with which you Lathahns fought for our sake.” She bowed graceful, her purple eyes locked on Arrin’s. “My people are grateful to yours and honor our word of friendship.” She gestured to Waeri. “You must forgive my little brother his brusqueness. He does only as my father wishes in his effort to guard our borders.”

Waeri glanced at Kirah and seemed to further calm when she gave him a gentle smile. He looked to Arrin. “Forgive me, Lathahn. My sister has a good memory for scents, so I trust her judgment that you are as you say.” He pointed toward Nurin. “As of this moment, the Korme mass at our southern border, just across the bank of the River Nur. They are armed for war, their horses restless at the rein. We thought you one of them.”

“The Korme?” The words were like stones cast at him. Could their uprising be coincidence? Allies of the Grol, in the loosest of senses, both dedicated to causing chaos and carnage, it seemed unlikely both nations would mass with no knowledge of the other doing so. “It seems I am not the only bearer of bad tidings, this day. I truly must see Warlord Quaii.”

Waeri’s eyes narrowed as he seemed to sense the agitation in Arrin. He hesitated, but Kirah took the lead.

“Come then, warrior. If you have news my father must know, let us be on our way.” She waved the rest of the warriors back to their positions, turning to Waeri when they scattered to the trees. “You should stay here, brother. I will lead the Lathahn to father.”

Waeri glanced at Arrin, then to Kirah. He nodded. “Be quick, sister…and be safe.”

Arrin caught the subtle warning in the Pathra’s voice and eased his hand to his belt. He undid the clasp and swung his belt free, offering his sword to Waeri. “These are dark times and trust must be earned through action. I would have you assured I mean no ill to your family or to your people.”

Waeri took the blade after a moment’s hesitation, his eyes on Arrin’s. “Well met, Lathahn. Have my sister send word once you’ve spoken with my father and I will have your blade returned. Perhaps you might even get the opportunity to set its edge against the Korme, alongside my brethren.”

Arrin gave the warrior a smile. “It would be an honor.”

Waeri gave a short bow and turned away, leaping gracefully into the nearest tree to disappear within its clustered foliage.

“Can you run?” Kirah asked when her brother was gone.

“I can. Lead the way and I shall be upon the shadow of your heels.”

Kirah laughed, as though taking it as a challenge, before darting off into the jungle. Arrin willed the collar to life and chased after. True to his word, he stayed close behind her without falling behind, his breath easy in his lungs.

After running for nearly an hour in a north-easterly direction, away from the great canopy Arrin noted with pity, Kirah slowed and began a measured stroll. If she was surprised he had kept pace with her, it did not show on her sleek face.

“Just ahead.” She waved him on through the jungle, casting out howling cries to the surrounding jungle as she approached

Arrin could hear the shuffle of many soft-padded feet all around and was grateful for Kirah’s presence. Though he could not see them, it was as if the whole of Pathrale lurked within yards of where they walked.

As they drew closer to a natural clearing that broke apart the dense huddle of foliage, Arrin could see more of the cat-people, milling about near its center, their eyes on him and his guide. Kirah led the way toward the largest of the groups, a number of the Pathra drawing their javelins up and standing in a loose semi-circle before another of their kind whose fur shone a brilliant orange.

“Father, I bring a messenger from Lathah. He speaks of urgency.” Kirah stopped short of the wall of soldiers, looking past them.

The great orange warlord waved his warriors aside and came to stand beside his daughter, his whirling gray eyes on Arrin. While the vast majority of his race was lean and lithe, their deceptive strength hidden beneath the shine of their soft coats, Warlord Quaii was the exception. Thick with muscle, the Pathra moved with grace and power.

Though dressed as all his kind, in nothing more than the fur they were born with and the few accoutrements of war that hung on his belt of woven vine, the warlord cast off an air of regal dignity. While the Pathra people might be no less animalistic in the flesh, they were far from beasts like the Grol.

“Welcome, warrior,” Warlord Quaii told Arrin as he moved to stand before him.

Arrin gave a shallow bow to the Pathran leader. Though he remembered the great cat from his battle with the Grol, his presence unforgettable, he had not been leader when last Arrin had been here.

“Greetings, Warlord of Pathra. I am Arrin Urrael. Forgive my intrusion, but I was tasked to bring you a request from Princess Malya of Lathah. I bring grave news of the world, as well. I would tell you the news first, given your leave.”

Quaii motioned for him to continue.

“As I myself have just learned the Korme have gone on the offensive at your borders, I must warn you that the Grol too have begun a campaign of war.”

The warlord’s eyes grew narrow, his people closing to hear more.

“They have come upon a form of magic not seen in our world since the days of the ancient Sha’ree. The land of Fhen has been razed whole by the Grol army. I watched as they destroyed Fhenahr with pitiful ease, magical fire cleansing the city of life without regard.”

Snarled chatter broke out amongst the Pathra in the clearing, their voices clearly tinged with uncertainty despite Arrin’s inability to speak their language.

“You say you witnessed this magic at work at Fhenahr?”

Arrin nodded. “Aye. They brought down the walls in but minutes. They now march on Lathah and I have no doubt the same fate awaits my homeland. That is why I have come.”

The warlord waved him soldiers to silence. “Continue, Arrin Urrael.”

“Princess Malya asks for sanctuary amongst the Pathran people, for her, her family, and for all the people of Lathah before the Grol cross our borders.”

The warlord scratched at the fur of his chin, his white whiskers pulled back tight against his cheeks. He stood in silence, his contemplation plain across his face. After a long moment, he spoke. “Why does the princess come to me with this? Is it not Prince Olenn who speaks for the Lathahns and for the ailing King Orrick?”

Kirah went to cut in, but the warlord quieted her before she could speak.

“Brother and sister though they may be, equals under our rule, it is by their own laws that the prince holds the throne in their father’s absence. If we are to be true allies to the Lathahns, I cannot step between them should this not be the will of Prince Olenn.”

Arrin sighed. It was as he thought it would be when Malya made her request of him, the game of politics standing in the way of what was best for the people of his homeland. “You are a loyal friend to Lathah, Warlord Quaii, and I respect your position. However, the prince chooses to ignore the threat to his people because of his personal dislike of me. He puts his people in danger for the sake of a petty feud born some fifteen years in the past.”

“And what does this tell me of you, that he should hold such a grudge for so long?”

“Father,” Kirah howled. “This Lathahn has shed Grol blood to protect our land. He is an honored friend of the Pathra. You should not question his motives.”

“I do not question his cause, daughter. I can smell his desperation thick in the air and can hear the honesty of his words, see the conviction in the depths of his eyes. I question only his right to carry this message to me. By his own confession, he has not the prince’s leave to speak for his nation.” Quaii turned to look at Arrin, a hint of pity in his eyes. “I am honor bound to speak only to a rightful delegate of your land, Arrin Urrael. I mean you no disrespect, warrior, but soldier’s creed aside, I cannot grant you what you ask.”

Arrin felt the rejection heavy on his shoulders. He doubted the warlord would turn aside the Lathahn people were they to come streaming into his land with the Grol at their heels, but that was an unlikely scenario. With no place to run to, Malya would not leave Lathah and there would be no people left to seek asylum in Pathrale should the Grol find them still within the walls when they arrived.

He was at a crossroads, with no path clear of sorrow for his people. “Is there nothing you can do?”

Kirah drew closer. “If what he says is true, we will need the Lathahns help to battle the Grol. We cannot simply abandon them.”

Warlord Quaii hissed at his daughter. Kirah backed away, her chin down. “My daughter speaks true, if out of turn.” He sighed as he met Arrin’s gaze. “My decision stands; I can offer no official word of asylum at this time. However, it is in the best interests of the Pathran people to know the truth of this warning you deliver.”

Arrin fought back a grateful smile and nodded solemn at the warlord.

“I will send a delegation of my people with you back to Lathah, where they will judge the nature of the threat Pathrale faces from the approaching Grol horde. Should it be warranted, we will provide a safe haven for the people of Lathah who would rather flee than face the Grol, regardless should the prince ask it of us or not.”

“I wish to go with the Lathahn, father,” Kirah told him, her stare boring into the warlord.

An easy smile broke across his face. “I had expected no less of you, my child. Gather a cadre of warriors to accompany you, and take your brother, as well. I would have one representative who speaks with the words of his mind and not only those of his heart.”

Kirah laughed and stepped to the side, calling out in the Pathran tongue for what Arrin believed was for volunteers for their trip to Lathah. As she did that, the warlord drew Arrin’s attention.

“I pity you your position, warrior. Bound as I am by the leash of politics, and with the Korme scurrying about our borders, I am sorry I cannot offer you more than a pittance of my people in your quest to defend your homeland. I hope you understand and that it is enough.”

“I do understand, Warlord Quaii. I too hope it is enough, but I have little faith. It would take Nu’ree falling from the sky at my behest to convince the prince I speak true, but perhaps Kirah can succeed where I fail.”

Quaii smiled. “My daughter is quite the persistent one, though I believe my son to be more gifted in tongue.” The warlord leaned in close as Kirah rallied her forces. “Free Kirah to speak only if Waeri has failed, unless it is a fight you seek with your prince.” He grinned broad, the sharpened points of his teeth glistening in his mouth.

Arrin laughed. “I thank you for your kindness, and your honesty.”

“Do not thank me yet, warrior.” He gestured toward his daughter as she came to stand beside them. “You have yet to suffer the journey ahead, trapped as you will be with the two youngest of my brood.”

Kirah hissed at her father as he laughed.

“Travel well, all of you, and be safe.” Quaii ruffled the fur at his daughter’s neck, his face turning serious. “I would see my children again.”

Kirah smiled and hugged her father.

“I will protect them with my life,” Arrin vowed, adding, “Even against each other.” He smiled as Kirah broke her embrace with a chuckle.

“Let us go, Lathahn. You ran well earlier, but the true test will be your endurance.”

Arrin huffed. “It’s to be a challenge then?” He winked at Warlord Quaii and then looked back to Kirah. “I will try not to let you fall too far behind.”

Kirah grinned feral and darted off. The cadre of warriors she assembled was quick to keep pace, shooting after her through the foliage. Arrin let them run until they disappeared into the cluster of the jungle. He glanced to Warlord Quaii.

“To be young again. I shall bring your children home to you, whole and hale. Fear not.” He bowed to the warlord and willed the collar to life.

As fast as he dared, Arrin ran to where Waeri had confronted him, the passing trees a blur. He would need his sword in the coming days and felt no desire to tire himself out before they’d reached Lathah. Nevertheless, the lesson in humility he’d teach the young Pathra would satisfy him indeed.

Chapter Twenty

The river’s fury timid in comparison to that of the oceans of Ahreele during the Great Tumult, Domor could not find it in himself to be pleased by that fact.

He clung breathless to the wooden bench as the water bubbled a frenzy just beneath. Though he had covered himself from head to toe in extra clothing, and had strapped a piece of cloth over his face to keep the searing splashes of river from tearing at his skin, he was soaked to the bone. The hot water sat uncomfortable against his flesh, a constant reminder of the danger should he slip free of the bench.

Jerul had taken a moment to strap Domor’s wrist to the wooden supports, but the wild ride of the River Vel threatened to tear him loose every few minutes regardless. Domor was grateful that he had convinced Jerul to tie his good wrist to the bench as the raft bucked and rocked beneath him. He would have welcomed the boiling water’s embrace had he to endure the agony of his weight, however slight, constantly wearing against his injury. It was bad enough against the good one, the horse-hide rope sawing away layers of flesh as he was bounced about, barely able to keep the slightest control over his movement with his other hand.

Infinitely worse than the pain at his wrist and the scalding heat that boiled him in his clothes, was the nausea caused by the bone-jarring ride. It had begun shortly after they Tumult had begun. Domor clutched to the bench for dear life as the raft was lifted nearly five feet in the air by the tumbling waves, only to be dropped a moment later. His stomach followed the motion an instant later.

With only water, and a bit of wine, in his belly, for which Domor was just as grateful for as he was about which wrist was tied, he coughed and hacked a mouthful of bile into the mask that still clung rancid to his face. Despite the constant barrage of water to douse him, the material at his nose held the scent of his vomit, spurring more bouts in concert with the wild waves.

Jerul had fared much better through the turbulence, or so Domor believed, having little energy for a prolonged examination of his blood-companion. What he had seen as he flopped about the deck, all in quick and blurred glances, was Jerul crouched low at the front of the raft, his own arm tied to the restraining wall. Beneath him sat their meager belongings, upon which Jerul sat to keep them from being swept overboard.

Through the chaos, his thoughts jarred and rattled loose from his skull with every wave, Domor believed he had seen Jerul smiling as the warrior looked out over the violent river. His bond made even dimmer by his pain and discomfort, Domor couldn’t be certain, but he wouldn’t bet against what he’d seen. It would be just like Jerul to enjoy such a thing as a ride upon the Great Tumult, the sanity of the Yvir a tenuous concept at best.

Though, given the current circumstance, clutched as he was to a few pieces of fragile wood on the same adventure as the smiling warrior, he could hardly question his own sanity. Worse still, it had been his choice as to how they would travel, Domor having decided upon the river course. It would be just another regret to reflect on later and curse his stupidity, should they survive.

His stomach embedded in his throat, deep gags rattled Domor as the raft continued on its journey. They’d long ago given up any attempt at conversation, the words lost in Domor’s retching or against the howling wind and the sibilant whistle of the tumultuous river. It had been the better part of the day since he had heard Jerul’s voice, though he often felt the touch of his blood-companion’s hand on his ankle. Its gentle pressure was a consistent reminder that the warrior was still there with him and that they both still lived.

He felt it there then, the grip almost painful in its insistence. Domor though he could hear Jerul’s voice trying to shout over the roaring of the Tumult, but he wasn’t certain. So against the riotous complaints of his stomach, he forced himself over onto his side, loosing a pained grunt as his wrist bore his weight, and looked to the warrior.

This time for certain he saw the man’s smile. As their eyes locked, Jerul released his leg and pointed out past the front of the raft. Domor could see nothing through the wall of hissing steam that swirled like mountain fog before the raft. Motivated by Jerul’s excited motions, Domor propped his shoulder against the edge of the bench and drew himself up even further, the wood grinding uncomfortably into his arm.

Over-stimulated by the assault of the river’s constant hiss and spray, and frustrated by the aches and pains and inconveniences that seemed to weigh on him in layers, Domor growled as he squinted and glared out into the fog. All of his complaints were washed away by what he saw.

There, just beyond the swirling miasma, he could see the mouth of the river growing wider as they hurtled forward, the darkened mass of the woods at each side moving quickly away from them. Though he couldn’t see the Barren Lake beyond, he knew it was there. Their journey was coming to an end.

As they were flung headlong toward the lake, Jerul unraveled the rope from his arm, waiting for a moment of relative calm, before sliding the bags and his swords over by the bench. Domor grasped at them and slid them underneath him as the warrior had done, securing them as best he could beneath his weight.

The raft jumped and dropped, Jerul clutching at the rail until the climb began again. As it did, he leapt to the rear of the raft and settled heavy on the wooden bench, locking his hands on the secured oars.

Unlike Domor, Jerul hadn’t any extra clothes to ward against the river’s fury. The purple of his veins were drowned in the reddish-pink sting of the water’s touch. Wrinkled from its exposure, his pale skin had blistered in places where Jerul had been unable to avoid prolonged exposure. The ribs on his left side bubbled slightly, the flesh peeled away in tiny strips that flapped in the breeze. The softer skin beneath was a deep red. Much of the warrior’s left leg was the same, the battered skin rubbed raw against the wooden rail he’d been crouched against.

Though his face showed no sign of his pain, Domor knew it would wear upon his blood-companion, no matter his strength. The journey had taken its toll upon them both, but the most difficult of it was drawing to a close.

Domor felt a smile creep onto his lips at the thought, its relief matching the one on Jerul’s face.

Both were wiped away as the raft cleared the mouth of the River Vel and sailed onto the Barren Lake.

The raging water calmed appreciably as they left the crowded lake mouth behind, but it brought them no comfort. What lay beyond set Domor’s heart to pounding. Like ants upon an earthen mound, the surface of the lake was dotted with a flotilla of wooden rafts similar to the one they rode upon. On the backs of the rafts were amassed men, clustered thick upon the crowded decks. The sheen of steel flashed in the late afternoon light.

His eyes blurred by spray and the motion of the rolling deck, Domor stared at the rafts as they sped toward them, his eyes coming to light on the men. He exhaled loudly as their details came into focus.

“It’s your people,” he crowed to Jerul, with only a passing wonder as to why the Yvir would be so far west.

Jerul shook his head as he reached for his blades buried beneath Jerul. “They’re not my people.” The venom in his words rang clear even over the noise.

Domor stared at his blood-companion a moment before returning his eyes to the rafts they were fast approaching. The men aboard so familiar, their hugely muscled, pale bodies dressed in nothing but loincloths and bearing the jagged swords so common among the Yvir, they could be no one else. Certain Jerul was mistaken he let his gaze linger as the men stared back with broad smiles on their faces.

It was then he saw the difference that Jerul had clearly spotted first off. Against their water-reddened skin, the distinctive veins of the Yvir stood out, though not the bright purple of Jerul’s; theirs were black as the night. These were the men of Y’var.

No friend to the Velen, or to the Yvir of Y’Vel, Domor realized that he and Jerul had slipped from the boiling pot to fall directly into the flame. As the churning current pushed their raft forward, he saw the malice in the smiles of the men crowded aboard the other rafts. Domor saw something else, too.

The entire fleet of Yviri boats were lashed together to keep them from separating in the uncertain eddies of the lake. In tying them as such, the mass of rafts were a floating wall that blocked their path. With no control over the direction of their movement, Domor and Jerul would soon run full into the flotilla with no way past. The Yvir knew it all too well.

Domor set his blades at his feet and freed an oar. He’d apparently learned the lesson of ranged weapons, Domor thought with little humor. He could tell by the look on the warrior’s face he expected little hope of success against the horde of Yvir that awaited them. For once, the two agreed on a matter of combat.

Domor looked out across their mass and estimated there were well over one hundred men traversing the river. Those closest to where he and Jerul would collide with them, twirled ropes with metal hooks tied at their ends. He expected soon they would be lashed as tightly to the group as the rest of the rafts were.

“When we close, Velen, stay behind me,” Jerul told him as they drew ever closer.

Domor looked wide-eyed at his blood-companion. “You intend to fight all of them?” He knew the man’s courage to be unflagging, but Domor could see no point in his blood-companion throwing away his life against such overwhelming odds. “Can we not reason with them?”

Jerul snorted. “There is no reasoning with fools.”

Domor resisted the urge to point out the irony in the warrior’s statement.

“We fight or we die.”

“Or we fight and we die,” Domor amended.

Jerul shrugged. “You know my choice, Velen.” He gave Domor a soft smile as he rose to his feet, the oar clutched in one hand. “If this is the last we speak, then I would have words of honor spoken.” He set his free hand upon Domor’s shoulder and squeezed. “Our journey has been a good one, blood-of-my-blood. If I am to breathe my last, it is only just that I do so at your side.”

Domor busied himself with untying his wrist. Finished, he put his hand on the warrior’s and rose to his feet with his dagger in his other hand. “If we’re to die together, then let us do it in battle, my friend.”

Jerul embraced him, pulling Domor against him tight with his one powerful arm, nearly squeezing the air from his lungs. “As warriors.”

Domor gasped for breath as his blood-companion let go. He nodded at Jerul, his tongue thick inside his mouth. Jerul clapped him on the back and strode to the front of the raft as they came to within twenty feet of the Yviri rafts. Domor was glad the big warrior couldn’t see him, squirreled away as he was behind him, his eyes brimming with tears.

His cheeks warm, he wiped his eyes with a quick swipe and growled low in his throat, raising his dagger before him. He would not give the bastards the satisfaction of seeing his fear. Only his blood, an errant thought spoke inside his head. It sickened him to think so, the dagger trembling in his hand.

Fortunately, he was given no more time to worry about his fate for it was upon him.

At once, several hooks flew across the watery gap and crashed onto the deck of their raft. The metal spikes at their tip scratched grooves in the wood floor and bit deep into the wooden rails. Domor had thought Jerul might try to bat the hooks away, but he stood rigid at the front of the raft, moving only to keep one of the hooks from coming down on top of him.

The warriors ahead grinned in fierce welcome, though they kept their voices locked inside, much to Domor’s surprise. He had seen the Yvir at battle and knew it to be a noisy affair, voices raised in fury and bloodlust, colorful taunts filling the air as thickly as martial commands. But these men were silent.

He could see their emotions displayed clear upon their tattooed faces, the black lines of their veins emphasizing their morbid enjoyment, but they said absolutely nothing, not even to each other. They simply waited with their blades in their hands as their companions reeled the raft in closer.

Still outside the range of their swords, Jerul lashed out with his oar. Its flattened head crashed into the closest of the Yviri warriors with a brutal thump. The man collapsed, but hung limp where he stood.

As the other warriors slashed at Jerul’s weapon, cutting away pieces of slivered wood from it, Domor spied the coil of rope that encircled the gathered men. Wrapped tight about their waists, the warriors were tied together as were their rafts, keeping the fallen man from tumbling into the water. He danced like a marionette as the men around him moved.

The Yviri only smiled wider as Jerul lashed out again, the rafts bumping against one another as they were pulled together. Another Yviri felt the sting of the oar and dropped limp against his restraints, but sharpened blades sang out and cut chunks from the shaft of it. Only five feet from the other rafts, Jerul pulled the damaged oar away and stepped back to use it one last time, swinging it in a wide arc, his voice shouting his effort.

The oar crashed into a wall of swords and the head was hacked free, spinning away into the turbulent river. With no hesitation, Jerul pulled the shaft back and drove the sharpened point of it into the gut of the nearest enemy. Its splintered tip sunk deep into pale flesh that exploded with gushing blood. At this, the warrior cried out, clutching to the shaft as one of his brethren cleaved it through, leaving Jerul with only four feet still in his hands, the end tacky with blood. Another of the Yvir drew his blade across the screaming warrior’s throat, the man going silent as his life spewed crimson from his wound.

Jerul just laughed, throwing the broken oar shaft at the Yvir before collecting his swords and resuming his place at the fore of the raft. Steel rang out as each side took non-committed swipes at the other, the distance between the two rafts just enough that someone would have to lean out over the water to come within range to do any real harm. None were willing to do so, it appeared.

Jerul clashed with the other Yviri for several minutes, neither side gaining any advantage, and Domor began to believe they might do so forever. A silvered blur disabused him of that thought.

Jerul cried out as a roped hook, flung from another of the rafts, sailed over the retaining wall and wrapped about his leg, the steel point sinking into the muscle of his calf. The man at the end of the rope tugged and Jerul tumbled, his leg pulled from beneath him. He fell onto the deck with a grunt, the rope being yanked maliciously.

Domor remembered the dagger in his hand and reached out to cut the rope free, but another hurled grapple forced him back. He stumbled against the bench and nearly fell over it, dropping the dagger to grasp frantically at the wooden seat. The hook crashed into the deck at his feet as he righted himself, just inches from his splayed out foot.

He moved to stand but the deck was suddenly flooded with the leering faces of Yviri warriors who had jumped aboard the moment Jerul had gone down. Sandaled feet pinned Jerul’s blades to the deck as the Yviri warriors stood over him and pummeled his back and head with fists and sword hilts.

Before Domor could think to help, another warrior leapt across the breach and set the jagged tip of his sword at Domor’s neck.

“Stay quiet and live,” the man told him as the cold steel settled against his throat without wavering.

Domor did as he was told, not even daring to swallow as the realization they didn’t intend to kill them pierced the murky depths of his reason and gave him hope they might still survive. He cast his eyes to Jerul and watched as his blood-companion succumbed to the beating and slip into merciful unconsciousness. Already battered from his battle against the Bulraths and the Tumult’s ride, he was in no shape to fight the crush of warriors that crowded around him.

As Domor watched wide-eyed, his stomach roiling at the sight, the men beat Jerul for a moment more before a loud whistle sounded across the rafts. The men stopped instantly. The bulk of them returned to their own raft, leaving but three behind; the one at Domor’s throat and two more who went about binding Jerul.

The sword wielder smiled at Domor. “You choose a strange time to brave the water, Velen. What brings you so far from home?”

Domor said nothing, meeting the man’s lurid gaze with as much courage as he could muster. It was little indeed.

The warrior just laughed. “Hold your tongue if it suits you, dark one, but soon you will be brought before Erdor. He will have the truth of it, or he’ll have your tongue.”

A tremble rattled through Domor’s body and he dug inside for a wellspring of strength. It laid buried deep, but for Jerul, he would be strong. He remembered his blood-companion’s words and promised the unconscious warrior he would respect them. If they were to die, it would be together; with honor. Once more, he said nothing.

The warrior shrugged, unmoved by Domor’s defiance. “Have it your way while you still can, Velen. We’ll land soon enough.”

Domor cast his eyes to the shore and true to the warrior’s words the flotilla drew nearer and nearer the sandy beach. The gnarled trees and dark shadows of the Dead Lands were drifting out of sight behind them. They had slipped away from the terrifying woods nearly without notice.

Despite the circumstances, Domor felt a surge of relief wash over him, though it was quickly tempered by the sharp point of the cold steel pressed against his throat. They had escaped the Dead Lands, but they were not free from danger.

Domor drew in a shallow breath and watched as the shore grew closer. The Yvir silence suddenly became a flurry of activity. They worked to cut each other free of their restrictive binds, those at the front of the tethered rafts readying more of the roped hooks, aimed no doubt to catch the trees along the shoreline.

Their nation bordering the far side of the lake, the men armed for war, it was clear to Domor they intended ill as they approached the shore of Pathrale. He cast his eyes to the jungle that sprouted just a short way from the Barren Lake as the Yvir warriors cast their ropes to snare the mass of trees.

As the collective rafts began to slow, the violent eddies easing as they closed on the beach, Domor was surprised he saw no Pathran resistance emerging from the trees. Though not a warrior, it took hardly any sense at all to realize the best time to repel the invading Yvir would be while they stood clustered thick on the decks of the rafts before they even set foot upon the shore.

But no attack came.

The Yviri men grounded the lead rafts and leapt to the sand, moving up the beach with weapons in hand to clear the way for the rest of their men. Those behind them did the same, spreading out along the shore and moving cautiously toward the edge of the jungle-again, all without sound.

Once the rest of the Yvir were off the rafts, the man who held his blade at Domor’s throat drew it away and gestured toward the shore. “Unless you wish to dive into the boiling waters to escape, you must know there is no escape for you. Accept your position with grace and walk yourself to land.”

Domor glanced at the water behind him and gave the man a somber nod. As the warrior said, his choices were finite; all grim. He watched as the other two soldiers lifted Jerul, now bound in swaths of thick cord, and carried him limp toward the shore. Domor followed behind, his chin at his chest.

His thoughts whirled in his head as he plotted how best to escape their predicament, but his endless questions had no answers. They had been spared, but he didn’t know why. He likely wouldn’t until they were taken before the Yviri leader. Domor recognized that time had come when the men around him stiffened. He glanced up to see a bull of a man strolling toward him. Clothed with the traditional loincloth of the Yvir, the man wore wide metal bracers at his wrists and ankles, their smooth silver surfaces shining in the light. The hilt of his sharp-toothed blade protruded over his back.

A bright smile sat carved upon his flips, so at odds amidst the silent procession of stoic-faced warriors that surrounded them. He came to stand before Domor, his thick-knuckled fingers looped about the braided belt at his waist. His bright blue eyes, encircled by the thorny black of his tattooed veins, met Domor’s without a trace of enmity.

“It has been many long years since I’ve seen a Velen, certainly one so far from the comforts of Vel. Have you a name, traveler?”

Domor cleared his throat. “Domor.”

“And is this your blood-companion?” He gestured at Jerul, who lay upon the sand, still deep within his dreamless slumber.

“He is my friend.” Domor drew himself up.

The warrior smiled. “I am Erdor, Warlord of Y’var. What purpose brings you and your bloo-your friend, to such far-flung shores?”

Domor took a moment to collect his thoughts, knowing he dare not mention his true cause. “I heard rumors of battle in Fhen and sought only to convince my brother in Nurin to return to Vel with me.”

Erdor glanced at the swordsman who had held Domor hostage. “Rumors, is it?” The men laughed as the warlord returned his gaze to Domor. “Well, Velen, let me assure you, they are certainly not rumors.” He gestured to his men who stood pensive at the jungle tree line, their weapons in hand. “A storm has come over Ahreele and blood shall soon rain from the sky. There will be war.”

Domor trembled as the warlord’s eyes seemed to flicker at the mention of war.

“I wonder still, with word of upheaval reaching such distant lands as Vel, if you do not have another purpose for your travels that you have chosen not to give voice to.”

Domor swallowed hard and scrambled to find the right words to assuage the warlord’s suspicion. “I-”

Erdor raised a hand, cutting him off. “Do not worry, Velen. Not yet, at least. I’ve no time to dig for your truths, but I know of one who may well wish to speak to you about them when we are done about our business.”

Warlord Erdor motioned to his men. “Bind the Velen and keep him silent. Bring his pet along, as well. Their words shall prove interesting, no doubt, when we return to Y’var in glory.”

Domor watched the warlord walk away, heading toward the jungle and his men. He grunted in pain as the Yviri warriors wrapped cords of rope about his arms and torso, pulling them tight with little mercy. Domor trembled, but not entirely in fear for himself or for Jerul.

Erdor had confirmed what the Sha’ree had said, that war had come to the world and it was not just the Grol who chomped at the bit to be a part of the bloodshed. The Yvir too wanted their share.

He glanced up as a cold shadow settled over him, the sun sagging behind the horizon of trees. A’ree stared down angrily from the sky as though in encouragement of the violence to come.

Like or not, Domor was now a part of it all.

Chapter Twenty-One

Close on his heels, the Pathran warriors kept stride and Arrin was amazed by their perseverance. After he’d reclaimed his blade from Waeri, moments before Kirah and her warriors arrived, much to her surprise, the siblings raced off toward Lathah. Their own rivalry pushed the pace beyond what Arrin’s jibes had stirred.

They had run long and hard, for nearly half the night, before tiring and finally slowing. After finding a small clearing amidst the swaths of massive oaks that dotted the Lathahn soil, Arrin called a halt to let them rest. Worried their competitiveness might wear them down too greatly, he decided it best to find game and cool the ardor of their familial contest over a warm meal. He left them behind to catch their breath.

He returned from his hunt with a deer hung limp over his shoulders. His left hand was entangled in its antlers and the tail was wrapped about his right hand to keep it steady. The assembled Pathra grinned with hunger in their eyes as he set his burden down beside the small, comfortable fire they’d built. Kirah came alongside him to examine his catch.

Her eyes narrowed as she sniffed at the air. “There’s no blood.” She grasped an antler and pulled the dear’s head up to peer beneath it. The subtle crackle of broken bones caused her to drop it, her purple eyes wide. “You ran this down with only your hands?”

Waeri came up behind Kirah, the rest of the cadre suddenly more interested in the conversation than the deer, their voices falling into a quiet hush.

Arrin nodded. “Blood draws predators.”

Kirah stepped closer, her pink nose just inches from Arrin’s. “You are not like any Lathahn I have ever seen. You run faster than the Pathra, and it would seem you are at least as strong as the Ruhr, judging by how cleanly the creature’s neck was broken.” She met Arrin’s eyes, questions whirling there by the dozens. She voiced only one. “What are you?”

“I’m but a pale shade of the terror that rides toward Lathah under the guise of the Grol.” He drew a deep breath and stepped away from Kirah. His movement slow, he drew his short blade and passed it to one of the Pathra, hilt first. “Cut us some flanks so we may eat and be on our way, before too long.”

The warrior took the blade and went about his business, but his ears flickered alongside his furry head, his focus clearly still on Arrin. Kirah and Waeri waited until he began again.

Arrin lifted the matted lengths of his hair to clear their view of the collar. Their gazes were drawn to it as he willed it to life, the runes glowing green.

“It is a gift from times past, a relic imbued with magic by the ancient hands of the Sha’ree.” He tugged at the silvery collar as all of the Pathran eyes watched. “Bound to my flesh, and much deeper still in ways I do not truly understand, it fills me with the strength and endurance of the great oaks, and makes me quick like the lightning that is cast likes spears from the clouds. It succors me when I cannot feed and dulls even the most dire of wounds, letting me fight on when all else have fallen around me.” He loosed a quiet sigh. “Despite all that, it is but one relic and I am but one man. The Grol march with hundreds of such relics.”

“And they come for Lathah?” Waeri asked.

“Today they advance upon my homeland with savage intent. Perhaps tomorrow it will be yours, and the day after…all of Ahreele.” He strode to the fire and warmed his hands before it, a sudden chill settling upon him at his words. “This is why I came to your father. I thought at first only of the safety of my fam-my people,” he corrected, “but there is no safe haven from the power I saw devastate Fhenahr. None of our people are safe as long as the Grol remain alive.”

“Were the warriors of Pathrale and Lathah to combine forces, we would far outnumber the beasts. Surely they cannot stand against our nations united,” Waeri said, his voice strong with certainty.

Arrin loosed a sickly laugh. “If only it were that easy. Our armies would be halved by the time we even closed to arrow range, our soldiers naught but ash on the wind and bitter memories in our soon-to-be-stilled hearts. We might well claim a few Grol lives in our attempt, but it would be upon us the crows fed. And they would feed well.”

“What if we harried them along their course, picking them apart in raids focused upon the power-wielders?” Kirah asked.

“That may well be the trick of it, but it isn’t entirely an issue of numbers. The relics can simply be passed onto the next Grol soldier, and though we might claim a number of their lives, the power yet remains.” He shook his head as he turned to face the siblings. “Our action must be so decisive it lays waste to the Grol in a single blow, or we run, striking out at them until such time that we might pick them apart, down to the last beast. Neither tactic is likely to succeed, made unlikelier still by Prince Olenn’s unwillingness to ride out to meet the beasts, let alone acknowledge they are a threat.”

“Then it would seem we are doomed?” Waeri shook his head, his ears flat.

“I can’t believe that,” Kirah said. “The answer has simply yet to avail itself to us.”

“I would hope true, sister, but if what the Lat-”

Arrin raised a hand to silence the brother. The Pathra went quiet and stared as Arrin focused his senses. A subtle scent wafted to his nose.

“To arms!”

Arrin grasped the Pathran siblings and pulled them bodily alongside their brethren as though they were but children. He spun past the deer carcass and reclaimed his sword from the wide-eyed warrior that had been cutting steaks from its rump. Blade in hand, he circled around to the front of the group just as five Grol strolled from the trees. He knew instantly they were possessed of power. Even if he hadn’t realized the stealth of their approach, or the confidence of their swagger, he would have known. His collar resonated at his throat as it sensed the kindred spirits carried by the Grol.

“Stand your ground or die, beasts. You’ll not find us easy prey.” Arrin kept his uncertainty from his voice as he heard the clatter of weapons being readied behind him. It would do the Pathra no good to believe he feared for all of their lives.

One of the Grol bared its jagged teeth and growled a command, though Arrin could make no sense of it. The warriors at its side began to slowly spread out, moving away from each other by degrees while they closed on Arrin with short steps.

Arrin could see the bronze that ringed their wrists, the glimmers of green that flickered at the symbols set upon their bracers. He knew not the measure of power the beasts wielded, but he did know the savage nature of the Grol well enough to guess.

Selfish and vain, born of a society where the biggest and strongest ruled by force, the beasts’ leader would share as little of his power as possible. He would not want to arm prospective challengers to his rule.

Arrin gathered a little confidence from that thought, though the numbers still worried him, but he showed none of it. “Your pack must despise you to have sent you against me.” He brushed the hair from his neck to expose his collar. He willed it to shine. “Your bracers are but morsels to the meal I wear about my neck.” He saw them hesitate, their advance slowing, and twisted the blade of his words harder. “For fifteen years I’ve worn my relic and battled from the Funeral Sands to the Stone Hills, my sword stained in the graveled blood of the Hull and all manner of the twisted beasts that lurk in the Dead Lands. Do you think the pittance of power your master lent you an equal to mine?”

Confusion and uncertainty in equal measure painted the faces of the Grol, save for one; a mottled gray and black with patches of white decorating its stubby snout.

“You fight well with your tongue, wall-dweller,” the brave Grol said in the Lathahn tongue, the words thick and coated with phlegm, “but I scent a braggart, nothing more. The Hull cannot be brought down, neither with steel nor magic. You speak false for the sake of the cats that cower behind you.”

Arrin shrugged and smiled, knowing the truth of his boast. “Then let us see.”

He leapt toward the Grol who’d called him out, then changed direction at the last moment to barrel toward the one beside him. Speeded by the bracers, both reacted quickly, the other Grol moving off in an effort to surround him.

Arrin feinted with a thrust to the Grol’s face, the beast pulling away without problem. He launched two more attacks, his blade snapping serpent-like as the beast dodged both. He smiled as the Grol moved to return to its defensive posture, Arrin’s kick catching its knee the moment it touched the ground.

Giving way like a wintered bough, the knee snapped with a sharp crack. The Grol’s howls had only just begun to well up in its mouth when Arrin drew his blade across its throat, cutting so deep his blade grated against the bone of its spine.

Warm blood struck his shoulder and splattered wet as he shifted around the dead Grol. He grasped a handful of fur and heaved the beast at its companions that closed behind him. They stumbled to a halt and shoved the Grol aside, taking an instant to look for him. Arrin smiled at their reaction, his confidence growing.

“Spears,” he called out to the Pathra, who responded without hesitation.

Javelins hissed through the air toward the stalled Grol. Arrin knew they would do the beasts no harm, the bracers enhancing their perception along with their physical reactions, but he hadn’t expected the Pathra to bring the Grol down. He hoped only for a distraction.

The Grol nearest Arrin, batted the spears aside with a growled laugh, baring its teeth at the Pathra. Its grin fell from its wolfish face as Arrin came at it low beneath the second volley. It lashed out at him only to be struck by one of the spears, the tip sinking into the meat of its shoulder. It flinched, its claws swiping past Arrin as he closed.

Arrin thrust his sword upward as he drew in close. The blade slid into the Grol’s torso, just beneath the ribcage, the tip coming to a stop as it broke through the beast’s jaw and cut its tongue in twain. It opened its mouth to cry out and Arrin could see the shimmering steel of his sword between its jagged teeth before he yanked it free, the Grol’s mouth exploding in a geyser of blood.

At his back he heard another Grol and spun to meet it. He was too slow. Strips of fire seared to life at his lower back, claws tearing clean through the leather of his cuirass. He was knocked forward, crashing into the Grol he’d just killed. Entangled in a mass of twitching limbs slick with fluids, Arrin went down in a twisted heap.

The mottled Grol hovered over him as its companions raced to his side. “Kill the cats,” it shouted to one of its men, the red glare of its eyes never leaving Arrin. “This one is ours.”

The brave Grol sunk its claws in Arrin’s leg as he squirmed to be loose of the corpse that slowed him. Arrin bit back a scream as he felt the sharpened tips sink into his flesh and settle against the bone of his shin.

The Grol yanked hard and spun him over, the beast’s fingers digging into his other leg to hold him still with fierce strength. Both he and the corpse were flipped sideways to slam into the ground with a wet thud. Arrin groaned and went to lash out, but his sword arm was pinned immediately by the second Grol, the claws of both its hands sunk deep into the meat of his forearm, up to the first knuckle. Arrin felt the muscles of his arm spasm and the joint of his elbow strain, but he held onto his sword with sheer desperation. He felt the power of the bracers as they overwhelmed his own considerable strength and his face flushed with the heat of despair.

Arrin caught a quick glimpse of the Pathra through blurry eyes as he was rolled over once more, back onto his stomach, the empowered Grol making quick work of the feline warriors. He saw two taken down in the space of a heartbeat. They wouldn’t last long, he knew. He didn’t suspect he would either.

He felt the sting of claws once more, their sharpness ripping through the back of his leg, and clenched his teeth to keep from letting the Grol hear his screams. They might take his life, but he wouldn’t give them the pleasure of his pain.

His sword arm immobilized, Arrin’s free hand grasped for something he could use as a weapon. His fingers felt only the dead flesh of the Grol beneath him, grasping reflexively around the beast’s wrist as more flesh was torn from his leg.

His pain-addled gaze drifted to the Pathra as he struggled and he saw another die, a handful of them already crumpled at the feet of the Grol warrior. Another scrape of claws across his shoulder blades drew his focus back to his own troubles, the two Grol above him tearing him apart in slow slashes, his cuirass shredded and useless.

He struggled against their hold, but was held fast, unable to break loose, his left arm pinned beneath him, clasped tight to the corpse in impotence. He heard Kirah cry out in fury, her voice cut short mid-shout. He heard the dull slap of a body hitting the ground. Arrin’s stomach lurched at the sound.

He’d led Warlord Quaii’s children to their deaths. The thought soured in his gut as yet another trailing of claws set his leg on fire. He bit back his pain and loosed a furious howl as he willed his collar to draw power beyond any he’d ever dared. He felt it respond, bolts of lightning storming through his veins.

His mind cleared in an instant, his thoughts crystalline. He glanced over to see another Pathra die, nearly a dozen since he’d been pinned, and yet he still lived. He suddenly understood why.

Able to rationalize his position more clearly, Arrin knew he couldn’t fight the strength of the Grol, their bracers empowered of a more singular purpose than his collar. He could outwit them though.

Arrin thrashed and fought against the Grol that held his arm, pushing his elbow upward until he felt the beast fight back to hold him still. The instant it did, Arrin changed directions and pulled his arm forward with all of his might.

Its weight positioned to keep Arrin down, the Grol was yanked forward without resistance. It tumbled over and tore its hands loose from Arrin’s arms in an effort to keep from falling. Its effort failed, the Grol crashing face first into the ground.

The second its claws ripped free of his flesh, Arrin reversed his direction and swung his sword at the Grol at his feet. The blade caught the mottled beast at the wrist, its bite viciously enhanced by the power of his collar. The Grol’s bracer gave way with a crunch of metal. Though it held against the cutting edge of Arrin’s blade, the bracer collapsed beneath the force of the blow, crushing the Grol’s bones within. Its hand sprung open, blood bubbling from the wounds left behind.

To its howled shriek of pain, Arrin again reversed his momentum and drove the point of his sword into the spine of the Grol beside him as it moved to rise. Silenced instantly, the Grol was slammed to the ground by the impact, the blade cutting clean through the bone of its spine and sinking cross-guard deep into the oozing flesh and the stiff ground.

Before he could free it, he was yanked backward, the blood-slick hilt slipping free of his hand as he was dragged away. The mottled Grol spun him about and released Arrin’s leg. Arrin rolled to the side and felt the Grol at his back. The bitter scent of its breath warmed his ear as it sunk its claws into his armpit.

“Vorrul will have to settle for your corpse, Lathahn,” the Grol growled as its fingers dug at his flesh, seeking a way to his heart. Frothy spittle showered warm across Arrin’s face, its smell that of rancid meat.

Arrin felt the collar tremble, its power fading in his burning veins. His arms and legs began to shake with weakness as he barely held the Grol back from digging any deeper inside his armor. His vision began to blur, the edges darkening as the magic retreated. He felt the beast gaining ground.

A shadow flickered over Arrin’s face, lit by firelight. The mottled Grol suddenly released its hold and stumbled away. Arrin watched the beast as it fell to its knees, the sharp point of a javelin protruding from its eye socket. The ruined eye had burst like a rotten egg and dribbled in wet pieces down the Grol’s cheek. A river of scarlet gave chase behind.

The beast loosed one last grunted bark, its good eye locked malicious on Arrin, and tore the spear free. A gush of blood erupted as the beast cast the javelin away and darted into the trees, to disappear.

Too battered to give chase, Arrin cast his eyes to the last of the Grol. The remaining seven Pathra stabbed it relentlessly with their daggers, Waeri more vicious than the rest. Several javelins wavered at the beast’s back, their points driven deep as the Pathra vented their fury on the Grol, rattling the body with every blow. Beside them stood Kirah, the left side of her face a pitiable mess of ripped skin and torn fur, all colored in the deep red of her blood.

Arrin gave her a grateful, if weak, smile and fell to his back, his thoughts swirling in a clouded haze. Stars swam before his eyes and he was unsure if he was losing consciousness or he was simply seeing the night sky that sprawled above the clearing. Right then, he didn’t care either way. His entire body tingled and he felt as though stones ran in his veins. He couldn’t lift his head when Kirah came to kneel beside him.

“Can you stand?” she asked.

He shook his head, barely able to manage even that. Kirah propped him up and sat behind, settling his head in her lap. She peeled away his ruined cuirass and cast it aside. Arrin spied her face as she examined him, reminded of her wounds.

“You’re hurt,” he said, unable to speak more than the plainly obvious.

“It will heal.” She dabbed at the blood that ran from his shoulder. “And you, warrior? Will you heal?”

“Soon enough.” He tried to coat his words with strength, but could muster little. He looked to Waeri and the rest of the Pathra. They stood over their dead, sorrow a deep shadow cast over their bruised and battered faces. “I’m sorry for your people. I had believed us days ahead of the Grol army and had expected no resistance this far beyond Lathah.”

Kirah ran her hand over his matted hair. “We are a warrior people, Arrin. We understand death comes in its own time. Our people died fierce…we can ask for nothing more.”

Arrin sank deeper in her lap as Waeri came to stand before them.

“You spoke true of the threat to our peoples,” he told Arrin, giving him a shallow nod. “Like you, the Grol travel far and fast to be so near our border. Could they have taken Lathah so soon?”

Arrin sat up slow, instantly regretting leaving the comfort of Kirah’s lap. His body ached and felt sluggish, his skull pounding as if great drums were being played inside its depths. He knew the collar would close his wounds and return his strength soon enough, most of them superficial, but he had yet to have his vigor restored. “I think not, though their army must be growing close.” He gestured to the nearby Grol. “I believe these beasts came for me.”

Waeri stood silent as Kirah motioned for him to continue.

“The Grol that escaped spoke of a Vorrul in his anger. It seems as though I was not to be killed, but rather captured.”

Waeri spit. “The warlord scum of Gurhtol. He leads the Grol, for now, until another of his kind usurps his place; such is their way.”

“Why would he be seeking you?” Kirah asked.

Arrin tapped the collar at his neck. “Though I cannot be certain, I believe the warlord seeks to learn of my relic, though it is perhaps more likely, he wishes to learn of his own.”

“Had he not used such magic to destroy Fhenahr?”

“He did, but destruction is easy; it comes as natural as thought.” Arrin got to his feet, Waeri helping him up. Kirah stood beside him, ready to catch him as he took a moment to gather his breath, unsteady on his feet. “You need do nothing more than think on violence than the relic bows to your wishes, but there is much more to these creations than that. I have discovered little in my time with the collar, the process subtle and difficult, but I know there is more than I can comprehend; it whispers it to me through my blood, but I cannot understand the fullness of its secrets. I have no doubt the beasts understand even less.”

“Should they learn of it?”

Arrin gave the siblings a sickened smile. “Then all that we love shall be devoured without hope of redemption.” He motioned to the Grol. “But for now, the beasts can be killed, as difficult as it may be.”

Arrin steadied his legs and went to retrieve his sword. The wave of weariness and weakness had begun to subside somewhat, though he still struggled to free his blade. From the corner of his eye, he could see Kirah and Waeri watching as he bent over the Grol corpse and set his foot upon its hand. He bore down with weary malice, the fingers snapping with satisfying cracks.

“I would not have these returned to the Grol.”

His sword scythed down, cutting the Grol’s hand loose from its arm, just above the bracer. He did the same at the other hand, sheathing his blade to pull the bracers from the severed hands. They came loose with a wet ripping sound. Vein-like tendrils of bronze were revealed beneath, tearing free of the beast’s dead flesh to dissolve into the metal whole of the relic, its surface smooth a moment after

Arrin repeated the process with all of the Grol, slipping the recovered bracers into a bag provided by one of the Pathra. Once he was done, he held the bag up for the warriors to see.

“When we return to Pathrale, I will provide you each with a single bracer and explain its use. The next Grol you cross will rue their short, miserable existence.” He smiled, though he doubted it did little to ease the tiredness from his face. He turned to look at the dead Pathra that had been laid together beneath the trees. “I know not your funeral rituals and pray I do not offend you with my words, but we must continue on. We’ve no time for the dead if we are to save the living.”

Waeri looked to his brethren and growled low in his throat. “It is our custom to raise our brothers high into the trees for the birds will carry their spirits into the sky so that they might look down upon us as we still walk the earth. They would see only dirt from where they lay.”

“We’ve no time, brother,” Kirah argued. “We must-”

Waeri flung his hands in the air. “We cannot just leave them. I will not-”

Arrin waved them to silence. “There is little enough time for respect, but there is none for such arguments. Place your people in the trees, as is your custom, but hurry. Every moment we spend here, the more death your warriors will see from their post on high.” He left it at that.

Kirah stayed quiet as Waeri gave Arrin a nod. The Pathra gathered their dead and carried them to the tops of the trees in pairs, lashing the bodies to the highest branches using the vines of their belts.

Arrin watched from below as the Pathra hurried above in the cloister of green, mournful cries accompanying the somber ritual. He turned away from the melancholy sights and sounds of the Pathran funeral and cast his eyes toward Lathah.

However selfish the thought that wormed uncomfortable into his head, he hoped his companions would not have to stand witness the burial rituals of the Lathahns.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Despite the long journey, and perhaps because of it, Cael’s thoughts still swirled inside his head. All through the night he had clung to the heels of the Sha’ree as they made their way through the trees of the Dead Lands. The barking cries and haunting whistles of hidden creatures continued as they traveled, but the beasts kept their distance and Cael found himself at ease, in defiance of his circumstances. He had put away the glowing orb as dawn had come, its light dimming to nothingness at the rising of the sun. The day well underway, it furthered his sense of safety.

He’d thought all night of the Goddess Ree, dwelling in darkness so deep she could barely be reached by the voices of her children. It was a sad tale to learn of her decline, to even imagine that a god may suffer and fade from the world, destined to be forgotten like all those who have passed to dust.

To have been a small part of the ritual that drew her attention, however faint, Cael felt honored beyond words. He wallowed in the glory of it. It was as if the goddess had turned her eyes upon him, for just an instant, and knew he existed, knew who he was amongst all the insignificant specks of life that dotted her flesh. He had awakened a god and the Sha’ree had said she was pleased for his doing so. It was a heady thought.

Caught up in his ruminations, he nearly stumbled into the backs of the Sha’ree, who had come to a halt ahead of him. He stopped right behind them and scampered back a few steps to keep from standing too close. While the pair had come to relax around him somewhat, both still kept a short distance from the relic he carried.

“Why are-” Cael started, but Zalee raised a warning hand. He went silent as he followed their eyes through the trees.

Like a silver serpent making its way through the undergrowth, Cael saw the glimmer of a river off in the distance and suddenly noticed the hiss of its frothing motion. Beyond its tossed and bubbled surface he could see the stripe of golden sand that led up the beach to be swallowed by trees. Broad-leafed and emerald green, Cael could tell at a glance the foliage was different on the other side of the river. The monstrous oaks and towering evergreens gave way to the drooping palm and rubber trees, their branches so intertwined as to appear as one. Thick vines encircled the trunks, giving off the appearance that a wall of uninterrupted greenery loomed before them.

Curious as to why the Sha’ree had stopped, for Cael saw nothing but the brilliant greens of the jungle, he went to ask, but was hushed once more. Uthul laid his hand on Cael’s shoulder and shook his head. For several long minutes they stood there, making not a sound. Both the Sha’ree kept their gaze on the jungle ahead, sweeping their vision back and forth. The pink of their eyes whirled within their angled sockets. After a while, the pair turned to face each other, and though they spoke no words Cael could hear, he was certain they had communicated something between them.

Uthul turned to him, his voice low. “Across the river lies Pathrale. A number of its people lurk in the trees, watching us to see what we intend. We have no wish to harm them, so we must approach with caution to keep from vexing them.” Uthul laid a hand on Cael’s shoulder. “You must remain behind us, but stay close, no more than a few feet, and stay calm. Given the scent of battle in the air, they may well interpret any sudden moves as an attack.”

Cael swallowed hard. The fear he’d managed to put away, nipped at his heels once more. He had never pictured the Pathra as dangerous, safely living in Nurin, far from any regular contact with the cat people, but he was suddenly reminded how far from home he truly was. It was one thing to see the occasional Pathran entourage that had come to trade for Nurin’s famous Red, but it was another thing entirely to attempt to cross their border unannounced. Cael nodded his agreement.

Uthul smiled and motioned for Zalee to take the lead. She did with quiet grace, sliding the hood from her head to display her narrow face. Uthul did the same, falling into line behind her as she headed for the river. Cael found his place in the line and worked to stay there, his excitement infusing his feet with the urge to fly.

As they reached the shore, the twisted and rotten limbs and branches of the Dead Lands at their backs, Zalee halted at the bank. She held out her arms, her cloak slipping behind her shoulders. She stood there quiet, and Cael thought he heard her whispered voice, though he could not hear what was said, or see her face to know for certain she’d even spoken.

He stood rigid behind the two Sha’ree, his eyes darting to the trees of Pathrale, and then back to Zalee. A cold sweat dotted his brow as he waited, his hands shaking in anticipation, though of what he was unsure. It was as if every eye in the world had suddenly turned to stare at him, the weight of their gaze prickling his skin, setting his legs to tremble beneath him. He felt uncomfortable in his own flesh, as though he were being judged, weighed.

It was then he saw the shape in the river. The water lashed out with foamy white tendrils, but beneath its boiling surface Cael could see two glowing orbs that looked as though they were staring straight through him. The one on the left was a fiery red, the right a gentle blue-green, both swirling with the tumultuous current.

His vision clearing, Cael recognized the staring red eye as the reflection of A’ree, and looked up to the sky to see the great moon overhead, looming monstrous in the sky. He looked for Nu’ree, remembering it was hidden behind the angry moon that churned the waters. He glanced once more to the river surface, only to see the second moon’s reflection still, its glow shimmering beside that of A’ree, where it could not be.

His gaze flitted back and forth between the sky and the water, his trembles only increasing as he confirmed that Nu’ree was not visible from where he stood. What he saw in the river could only be the work of the goddess herself.

As though motivated by his recognition, a swath of water, ten feet across and reaching all the way to the far shore, began to settle. The thrashing bubbles that boiled underneath slowed and came to a halt. The frantic white caps sank back into the water, the surface becoming a calm sheet of glass with not a ripple disturbing its face. Yet just ten feet from the narrow path, the water raged on, its spray turned away from the calm waters before them, somehow restrained from marring the placid beauty.

Once the water had settled, Zalee walked forward and stepped onto the river. Cael waited for her to sink, but the calm water gave but inches, her feet buoyed by it, holding her above the surface.

Uthul whispered over his shoulder. “Come, Cael. We must hurry. Follow me close and do not stray from the path.” The Sha’ree strode forward, and like Zalee, he walked across the water, his steps leaving no ripples in their wake.

Cael cast a quick glance to the glowing orbs that still floated below the surface and forced his legs forward. Ree had seen him and had acknowledged him; she would not let him fall. He drew in a deep breath and scrambled to stay close to Uthul.

He stepped onto the river and felt the strange power of the water pressing upward against his foot, cradling it as though it were a child. He took another step to find the same. Emboldened, he hurried his pace and made for the far shore. He dared a glance down and regretted it instantly.

Beneath the layer that held him afloat, the river was a maelstrom of uncontrolled fury. The water seethed and thrashed. The reflected eyes of Ree were distorted and wavering, and their glare filled Cael with terror.

He drew his eyes away and nearly ran across the surface of the river, slowing only when he drew too close to Uthul, who held a hand out to slow him. Cael felt the heat of the water seeping through the soft leather soles of his boots, seeming to grow warmer at every step.

When at last Uthul cleared the river and strolled onto the shore, Cael rushed to follow him, nearly falling as his feet sunk into the sand. He righted himself and moved behind the shield of Uthul’s body once more. He let his breath out, not having realized he’d held it, and cast a quick glance at the water.

Behind him, the calm bridge was no longer. Where he had just walked but instants before, the water hissed and fumed once more, drops of spray peppering his skin. He turned away from the river, wiped the sweat from his forehead and walked on shaking legs into the jungle at the heels of Uthul.

A short way into the cluster of trees, Zalee stopped and raised her arms out to her side once more. Uthul did the same, motioning for Cael to do so as well. He did, matching their measured pace, his eyes on the gently swaying branches.

“People of Pathrale, know we wish you no ill will. I implore you, take heed of my words,” Zalee called out, turning in a slow half-circle. “Look upon my face. I am Zalee, first of the children of the great Goddess Ree. My companions are Uthul and Cael.” She gestured to each in turn. “We seek the ear of your lord, our words most urgent.”

Cael heard no response. He saw no motion in the trees nor heard any voices call out in answer. Zalee and Uthul seemed not to care. They stood as they were without a sound, for several minutes. Cael felt his arms tire and he fought to keep them in the air. Several more minutes passed and Cael’s arms trembled as he glared at the trees, imploring the Pathra to show themselves.

Only but a moment after his plea, he spied movement in the foliage ahead. Uthul and Zalee lowered their arms to their sides and Cael let his drop with a grunt, gentle tingles running their lengths, pecking at his fingertips. He resisted the urge to shake the feeling away as the Pathra made their way through the jungle and came to stand before them.

Cael, having never seen the Pathra so close before, or in such great numbers, couldn’t help but stare. More than fifty of the cat people emerged from the jungle, the wooden spears they carried conspicuously ready in their hands. They stared at Cael and the Sha’ree through a multitude of colored eyes, most ranging from yellow to green, with a few hitting the darker spectrums of purple and black. Their covering coats of fur also varied, only a select few shaded in a single color, the vast majority a patchwork of grays and blacks and whites, in stripes and spots.

But it was the Pathra who walked at the head of the group that drew Cael’s eyes. Different in both size and color from the rest, the orange Pathran dwarfed the others as he strode forward, his hands out to his sides as the Sha’ree and he had done just moments before. His gray eyes flitted between Zalee and Uthul, never once alighting upon Cael.

“I am Quaii, warlord of the Pathran people.” He sniffed at the air as he came to stand before them, offering them the barest of nods. “You are Sha’ree?” There was surprise and awe in the great cat’s voice, the sound so at odds with the confidence his stance portrayed.

Zalee gave a shallow bow and smiled. “We are, though our companion is of Nurin.” She pointed at Cael.

All of the Pathra turned their gaze upon him and Cael felt his face warming at their unabashed perusal. He smiled as best he could and gave a tentative wave, lowering his eyes until he felt the weight of their stares lift.

“We would speak with you of urgent matters,” Zalee told him.

“Speak free. I would have no secrets from my people,” Quaii replied.

Uthul nodded as he came to stand beside Zalee. “So be it. War has come once more to Ahreele, but it is not one of steel and courage, but one of magic.”

Warlord Quaii’s eyes narrowed, the voices of the Pathra gathered about him rising up in breathless whispers. “You speak true, ancient one?”

Uthul nodded. “I do. The Grol defiled the sanctity of Ah Uto Ree. They stole items of great power from within the sepulchers of our dead. They use these items for ill, lashing out at their enemies and spilling innocent blood upon the sacred flesh of Ree.” He gestured toward the south. “The nation of Fhen is no more, having fallen prey to the Grol in their ruthless conquest, Fhenahr crumbling but days past. It shall not be the only victim, we are certain.”

Cael stared at Uthul, not certain he truly heard the Sha’ree’s words. He stood numb.

Quaii tried to silence the growing chatter of his people with a hiss, but they continued on, their voices only slightly lower. “Can not the Sha’ree bring the beasts to heel, as your people had done so long ago?”

A quiet sigh slipped from Uthul. He glanced at Zalee and the two seemed to come to an instant agreement. He turned back and met Quaii’s gaze. “Long have the Sha’ree been gone from your world, Pathran. Our absence was not by choice, and many things are not as they once were. Our people have suffered under a virulent sickness and been laid low. We number in the hundreds, and no more.” Uthul’s words did what the warlord could not; the Pathrans went as silent as the grave.

The great orange cat seemed to shrink upon hearing Uthul’s words, his shoulders slumping. “That is dire news indeed. Then there is no hope?”

“There is always hope,” Zalee answered, her voice lined with steel. “But it must be the other races of Ahreele who bear its burden, for my people can do little more than advise.”

Warlord Quaii’s gray eyes grew bright. “Tell me then: what can we do to bring the Grol to their knees?”

“The hope we offer, however disheartening it may be to speak so truly, is but a glimmer in the distance. For it to bloom upon the vine, we must find the bearers of the ancient O’hra we left behind in our haste, so many centuries ago.”

Cael felt a sense of worry settle over him. He unconsciously felt for the rod, tucked safely against his waist, and drew a little closer to the Sha’ree. If his inheritance of the relic had committed him to some Sha’ree quest, he would know of it now.

Quaii turned to his people and spoke to them in low tones, a spattering of yowls and hisses drifting to Cael’s ears, the Pathran faces providing all the translation he needed; they knew nothing of the other relics.

The Warlord turned back to the Sha’ree pair. “Neither I nor my people have possession of any such relics, much to our great chagrin.”

While their expressions showed little, Cael believed he saw disappointment on the faces of the Sha’ree.

“Then we must continue on in our quest,” Uthul said, his voice betraying nothing. “Thank you for your audience.” He nodded to Quaii and then gestured to Cael as he and Zalee turned to leave.

The warlord halted them. “A moment, please.” The Sha’ree paused. “Though I know nothing for certain, perhaps another may provide you with answers.”

“Go on,” Zalee encouraged.

“You say Fhenahr has only just fallen?”

Uthul nodded.

“Then mayhap I believe true, though I was unsure when he stood before me.” The warlord swallowed hard. “A messenger from Lathah, one Arrin Urrael, came to me with news of the Grol attack upon Fhen, just this day past. He came on the wind, having told me of the fall of Fhenahr, witnessed by his own eyes, he said. Light of foot is my daughter, Kirah, but this Lathahn was faster still. My people watched as he ran to best her, arriving with my son with breath enough to speak calm, minutes before my daughter.” He gestured south. “Had he come from Fhen, your words proving the truth of his, then to Lathah before coming here, he would have to be bred of lightning.”

Zalee seemed to smile. “What of this messenger? Would you know to where he went?”

Quaii nodded. “His heart lies in Lathah. He came to ask of sanctuary for its people, and returns to the walled city with some of my own to urge its prince to act upon his words. He claims the Grol march upon his homeland, but said nothing of magic.”

“Then it is to Lathah we must go.”

Cael’s pulse raced at the thought of marching headlong toward the Grol army, having only just fled that of the Korme days before. He was no warrior. His hands trembled and he clenched them to fists to ease their shakes. His knuckles turned white as he stared, willing them to peace, afraid to raise his eyes should the Sha’ree mistake his wide-eyed shock for concession to their plan.

The sound of foliage shoved aside roughly and the furious howls of the Pathra drew his attention back to the present. He looked up to see a dark brown Pathran warrior tearing through the trees. He came to a halt before Warlord Quaii, his breath panting, the fur at his neck and chest matted thick with blood. His cheek was seared black, the skin around his eye blistered, the fur burned away to the skin beneath.

“We are under attack,” he told the warlord in stuttered gasps.

A great roar went up amongst the gathered Pathra. Cael strained to hear more.

“The Yvir have struck at our border, just below the shores of the Barren Lake.” The warrior touched his hand to his face, his pain obvious, but he continued on, his one good eye closed. “There are like no Yvir I have ever faced. They fight as though they are possessed of the Tolen spirit, and they call fire to aid them, their blades sheathed in flames.”

Uthul was at the warlord’s side before the Pathra could even speak. “It would seem that the Yvir also wield some of the O’hra. You must not approach them head on or many of your people will die.”

Quaii nodded, asking the wounded warrior, “How many?”

“Perhaps one hundred, maybe more, but I cannot be certain. They struck fast, sailing across the lake under cover of the Tumult. They were upon us before we could take to the trees.”

“Gather our people, save for what holds the southern lines against the Korme,” Quaii told his advisors. “We must meet the Yvir before they travel too far inland and reach our villages.” Several of his warriors ran to relay his commands.

“I can help you with tactics, to counter the power they wield,” Uthul said.

The warlord paused, before nodding to the Sha’ree.

Uthul turned to Zalee. “Take Cael and travel to Lathah. You must find this Arrin Urrael and learn if he possesses one of the O’hra. I will meet you there once the Yvir have been repelled.”

Zalee stared at him in silence and Cael believed he saw fear lurking in the pinkish depths of her eyes.

“Go, child, you must not hesitate,” Uthul urged. “If we are to win through, we must do as we have discussed. There is no other way.” He waved her on. “Now go, Zalee. Go.” He cast his awkward smile at Cael, and then turned to speak with the warlord, the plans of battle on his tongue.

Zalee grasped Cael’s arm and led him away before he could hear more. For an instant, he thought about rebelling, pulling his arm free to stay with the Pathra as his father had wanted him to, but he knew there was no point. Violence was exploding all over Ahreele, and no place was anymore safe than any other. If he could know fear at the side of the Sha’ree, he could know no peace.

He let her lead him through the trees. Her hand slipped away after a short time, as if she’d remembered the relic he still carried. They walked for a while saying nothing as the angered howls and Pathran battle cries faded into the jungle behind them. When they were gone, the quiet of the trees closing around them once more, Cael hurried to come alongside Zalee.

“This Sha’ree plan: what do you expect of me?” He could think of no more subtle a way to ask.

Zalee smiled, though it bore no humor or warmth. “That is a complicated question, young Cael.” She slowed a little so that he could keep pace easier. “These are grave times and it saddens us that we cannot rein in the violence wrought by our carelessness. We are a humbled race, the Sha’ree, our naive ignorance the fuel that feeds the conflict we now face.” Her eyes glanced quick to his. “Ahreele has come to war, and the only way to end it is to repeat the mistakes of our past, and hope for a better outcome.”

Cael shook his head, baffled by the seemingly inane logic of what Zalee had said.

A quiet chuckle escaped her. “I know your thoughts, Cael. Were there a better description of insanity than the path we have laid before ourselves, I would not know of it. Our circumstances, however, deprive us of more rational options.” She set her hand upon his shoulder as they walked. “And so, to answer your question, what we expect of you is to make a choice. Will you trust in our insanity and risk your life to help put right my people’s wrongs? Or will you wait for our failures to hunt you down in the dark of night and slaughter you and all you hold dear?”

“Is that all you expect?” he heard himself say before he could rein in his tongue.

Zalee laughed and clapped him on the back. “Pray, do not lose your humor, child. For all the darkness of our world, it would be a bleak place indeed if we could not still laugh.”

Cael did his best to smile, but he couldn’t bring himself to laugh. He had lost his father, his home, and everyone he knew to the flames of Korme cruelty. He knew not the challenges ahead, but he knew those that trailed in rotten misery behind. If there was a chance to save someone from having to suffer the same fate as he, to save a boy’s father, like he could not save his own, Cael knew what he must do.

Peace was worth his life.

Chapter Twenty-Three

The Pathran dead raised to the sky behind them, Arrin was certain he could still feel their spirit weighing over those that traveled at his side. The almost casual nature of the cat people that had been present when they’d begun the journey, their voices so quick to rise in friendly challenge or easy jest, had since sobered. Since the funerals in the trees, they had spoken only when necessary, and even then in little more than clipped phrases, as though their sorrow had stolen their voices.

Worse still than the guilt Arrin felt at having led the warriors to their deaths, was the silence of those who’d survived. He had so long been alone in the wilderness, so few souls with whom he could relate, to be amongst the Pathra and to feel their closeness and camaraderie, and to be a part of it, staunched a wound he hadn’t known he’d borne. To have their companionable presence for such a short time, and to have it ripped away so soon, was a suffering he couldn’t explain.

He knew the Pathra didn’t blame the deaths on him, they’d told him so much, but their muted personalities were like a sentence all its own. He’d lived too long blocking out the world, content to wallow in his own misery, in his dreams of one day returning to Lathah to be with Malya and his child, only to learn he’d been a fool. His contrived purpose was gone, nothing but an empty void where it once thrived. It left him ill-prepared for normal life, no matter how much he craved it.

Sickened by his thoughts, which had haunted him since the ambush, he brought the party to a halt. Lathah was only a short way down the road, and the burden of his evasiveness ate at him.

Waeri and Kirah came to stand beside him, their breath thick in their chests.

“Something wrong?” Kirah asked. The blood at her face had been cleaned, but he could see the jagged wound that would forever mar her cheek.

“No…yes,” he admitted, the words slow to come as he tore his eyes from her injury. “Though I did not speak untrue to your father, I did not speak wholly true. I would have you hear it from me first.”

The siblings stared at him, Waeri’s ears sliding back against the sides of his head.

“My mission to your people was one of truth. Princess Malya did send me to ask your father for sanctuary for the Lathahn people, the prince discarding my warning of the Grol threat. However, I am not of Lathah, at least no longer. I am an exile, fifteen years past, cast out for daring to love the princess and getting her with child.” He drew in a sharp breath, pushing away the memories that threatened to rise. “Prince Olenn would rather have my skull upon a spit that grant me entry to the city. So saying, I think it best you carry the warning of the Grol to the prince without him knowing its source. My name is poison to his ears.”

Waeri shook his head and laughed. The sound was bitter. “To be exiled for love. Your people have strange ways, Lathahn.”

Kirah gave a gentle purr. “We will carry the message, for we will not speak untrue. All of us have seen the power of the beasts with our own eyes and know the rightness of your quest.”

The Pathran warriors gathered behind gave grunts of assent, nodding their heads as Arrin thanked them in turn.

“Then let us continue on. I would have the prince’s answer.”

Arrin moved off, the Pathra close behind. They ran for nearly thirty minutes, Arrin coming to a halt once more at the edge of the forest. Before him lay the last of the trees that blocked Lathah from their sight. He could see no spires of smoke rising above the trees, could smell no ash on the breeze. Though subtle, he felt some small measure of his tension melt away. He hadn’t returned to a ruin.

He turned to Waeri and Kirah. “I’ll remain here so I do not prejudice the watch against you. When you approach the gate, ask for Commander Maltis and tell him of your mission. He will know to find the princess to help sway Olenn. Be certain you pass on your father’s message to the commander, that he would shelter those Lathahns who came to him in need, regardless the prince’s determination.”

Kirah growled. “Politics.”

“It is as it must be, sister,” Waeri told her, his voice filled with amusement.

“It’s nothing but games for boys grown in body, but still small in mind.”

Arrin was set to agree when the sharp cry of horns split the air. He listened as they blurted out their frantic code, the sound so ingrained in Arrin’s memory that its message registered as though it had been spoken with words.

“The Grol have come.” Arrin bolted for the city, the arrival of the beasts negating their plans.

The Pathra behind him, struggling to match his stride, Arrin ran for the gates. As he emerged from the trees and entered the killing field before the walls, he saw the army of the Grol. The vastness of it gave pause to his feet and he stumbled to a halt,

Still in the distance, skirting the line of the Fortress Mountains, the Grol rumbled forward like a great river of fur and claw. Their sounds carried, echoed off the stone walls. They marched without fear, their voices raised in sniping growls and barks, challenges cast forth with cruel confidence.

The Pathra now beside him, he glanced at the walls to see the watch scrambling along their top, horns still singing out at the approach. He was almost certain that he and the Pathran entourage hadn’t been seen, all eyes on the Grol army.

He knew he needed to reach the gates before all hope of entry was lost. It no longer mattered who he was or what he’d done, the men of the watch would allow them through, but only as long as the beasts were still on the horizon. If the Grol drew much closer, the gates would open for no one, not even the Goddess Ree herself.

“We must go,” he called out, bolting for the wall, but holding back to allow the Pathra to remain alongside him.

As they closed upon the gates, men of the watch cried out, the deadly silver points of arrows appearing beside the crenellations and through the nearest murder holes. Arrin cried out in coded shouts, hoping the codes hadn’t changed. He raised his hands as he neared the gate, making certain the men knew they fled the army’s approach, and were not a part of it.

He saw the men hesitate, the Pathra with him most certainly obvious to those above once they’d come closer to the wall. With no real battles to test the watch since before Arrin had gone into the wilderness, he hoped the green soldiers on the wall kept their calm and held their arms.

“Arrin!” Maltis cried from the gate, its massive weight pulled aside just wide enough to allow them passage.

Commander Maltis eyed the Pathra curiously as they slipped through the gate. Once they were all inside, he called out for the gates to be shut, and moved aside to speak with Arrin.

Maltis breathed a weary sigh. “I had hoped you’d become a lunatic, your words a delusion.”

“If only it were that simple, my friend. I would welcome lunacy to keep us from what is yet to come.” He gestured toward the approaching army. “The Grol need not close upon the city to do us harm. Keep your men mobile and in loose groups.” He could see the commander’s doubt in his eyes, and hurried to explain. “The Grol will cast their fire from far outside of arrow range and it will fall upon us as though from the heavens. Men gathered in tight formations will only increase our casualties. Those upon the walls will be trapped when those same walls come down, and they most certainly will long before any Grol approaches close enough to return fire upon.”

Maltis stood silent as he cast his gaze over his men who scrambled to man the defenses. After a moment, he looked back to Arrin. “Then you were correct in saying our only chance was to run?”

Arrin nodded. “The Pathran Warlord has offered haven to any Lathahn who would flee ahead of the Grol, though he would have his emissaries speak to Olenn before he would officially declare his nation a sanctuary for our people.” He grasped his friend by the shoulder. “You must find Malya and tell her of this. She must gather her family and flee before the Grol surround the city.”

Maltis nodded, calling out for one of his men. The commander dispensed a number of orders to the soldier, laying out the nature of their defense, and then sent the man to relay them. Maltis barely glanced at Arrin, his eyes loose in his sockets. “I shall find the princess. Take the Pathrans to the prince and let them speak their peace, for all the good it will do.” Another soldier came running to stand before them, huffing for breath. Maltis gestured to him and Arrin recognized Barold. “The Sergeant will escort you to the Crown. Be quick about it, Arrin. I’ll send word when I have the princess.” Maltis left them with Barold.

The dark soldier gave Arrin a grim nod. “It seems you were right.” He waved them forward, saying nothing else, as a handful of soldiers joined their cavalcade.

The horn’s blare in his ears, Arrin knew they had little time left to them before the fire fell from the sky. The soldiers on the wall tracked the army’s progress, reporting on it every few moments. The Grol would soon halt their advance and turn loose the relics, and then it would be too late for flight; for any of them.

~

The trip to the Crown seemed eternal, the chaos of the city slowing their progress at every turn. When they reached the Great Hall, they were met by open doors. Lieutenant Santos and thirty of the prince’s guard stood out in the courtyard before them, their golden armor shining. The lieutenant would not meet his eyes. Lord Xilth stood behind them with a fiery glare aimed at Arrin, Prince Olenn stood close at his side, his face a stoic mask. Arrin drew back and let the Pathra take the lead.

The prince ignored them, speaking over their heads to Arrin. “It would appear that some of your ravings were true, exile. I know not what to make of it.”

“Make of it what you will, but free your people to run while you ponder. They should be clear of danger by the time you’ve come to the right of it.”

“Hold your tongue,” Xilth barked, the guard brought their shields to bear as one.

“I’ll hold nothing, worm,” Arrin replied, sweeping his hair from his collar. The cold green glimmer drew all of their eyes. Lieutenant Santos took a step back, his men shifting about with little discipline. “Mind your place as I speak to your master.” He turned his gaze upon Olenn. “I bring emissaries from Pathra, the son and daughter of Warlord Quaii: Waeri and Kirah.” Arrin gestured to each in turn.

Waeri stepped forward. He gave a shallow bow. “It is an honor, Prince Olenn, but it is also with trepidation that I bring the truth of Arrin’s words before you. The Grol army that encroaches upon your land is like none assembled before. Our own envoy was attacked by such beasts, twelve of our warriors dead at the hand of a single Grol before we could bring it down.”

Arrin resisted the smile that begged to set fire to his lips at the uncertainty that shadowed Olenn’s face. The prince knew the fighting prowess of his Pathran allies, and Waeri’s words a far better warning than Arrin could have hoped to deliver.

“My father has offered sanctuary for you and your people, should you so desire. He would be certain his allies are safe and well cared for.”

Olenn ran his hand across his shaven chin, shifting his gaze from Waeri to Arrin, then back. Lord Xilth whispered at his ear, the prince nodding. “Though I do not doubt the veracity of your tale, the Lathahn people have long stood against the Grol, victorious in every conflict since we raised the city’s walls.” He smiled at Waeri, though it held no warmth. “I thank your father for his loyalty, and for his kind and generous offer, and I mourn for your dead, but I must refuse the need for sanctuary. Our people will repel the beasts, as we always have.”

“What of their magic, brother?”

Arrin swung about to see Malya walking toward them, her cloak flaring out behind her.

Maltis walked uncomfortable at her side. He cast a sorry glance at Arrin.

“And thusly does the exile’s savior take to the stage. Welcome, my dear sister. I was wondering when you would show.”

Malya put her hands on her hips, coming to stand before the prince’s guard. “You’re a fool, Olenn. With proof of Arrin’s claims marching outside our walls, you refuse to bend an ear to the truth. Our Pathran allies speak of the Grol power that approaches, clearly bearing the wounds of their encounter upon their flesh, but still you are wont to stand your ground. Do you not care for your people?”

Olenn strode forward, his guards making way in haste so that he could stand before his sister. Arrin drew up closer. He wanted nothing more than a reason to defend her, to lay his hands upon the prince’s throat and throttle the life from him. Maltis and Barold came to stand at his side. The prince’s guard closed about after Olenn passed through their ranks.

“It is you who would make the people suffer. You would have us flee the protection of our walls so that we could be hunted down in the wild like animals, our land and homes razed behind us? You would have us all exiles.”

“I would have us flee so that our people might live. There is no glory to be had in this battle, only death.”

“Then run if you would, but when our people win through, for all the faith you have in them, know that you will not be welcomed back.” He looked up at Arrin. “She can join you in your landless adventures, exile; her husband and children as well.”

Arrin spit on the cobblestones. “A reckoning has come to your gates, Olenn, and though it is not wrought by my hand, its lesson will be no less harsh.”

As if on cue, an ear-piercing screech drew their attention. All eyes turned upward as a fiery ball of shimmering red energy arced through the sky. Arrin assessed its range, its burning tracer easy to track. He shook his head. There was no satisfaction in his righteousness.

He turned back to Olenn who stood wide-eyed as he watched the magical fire descend. “Do not worry, my prince, it will land near the Ninth. Only peasants and the men of the watch will die with the first blow, the fires contained far from your throne…for now.”

The prince glared, but said nothing as the ball of fire struck its mark, near to where Arrin predicted. The ground rumbled beneath their feet, flames leaping into the sky. The horizon was illuminated in an orange glow, showing the walls still standing. Arrin was sadly grateful for the distance between them and the Ninth. From where he stood, he could not hear the screams of the wounded and dying.

He knew it was but a temporary reprieve. Soon their voices would be everywhere, death the only comfort left to them.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Ellora and the gathered orphans watched as a great ball of fire streaked toward Lathah. All around her, people sobbed and wailed. Mothers called their children to heel as they too saw the flaming missile’s approach. It took but an instant to determine where it would come down; the Ninth.

Rooted in place, Ellora stared with wide eyes as the fire struck. It exploded between the outer wall and the Eighth, near the main gates. Its impact knocked her legs out from beneath her. She fell, but barely noticed, scrabbling back to her feet once the ground settled. Those around her did the same. Panic followed as heavy-booted soldiers streamed past, racing toward the gates.

Her ears rang and dust rose up around her. The scent of fire wafted to her nose, the shouts of men filling the air with fury and fear. Children loosed their cries as terror settled in. The mournful wails of the dying and bereaved added their voices a moment later, the dirge of war sung loud upon the backs of signal horns and drums.

She could see the flickering shadows of the flames on the walls and realization drew her up cold. She turned to no one, to everyone, and shouted. “To the Eighth. Run to the Eighth.” She grabbed at the tearful orphans about her and shoved them toward the inner gates. “Run, damn you. If the watch closes the level we’ll be left here to burn.”

Stirred by her words, the orphans shook off their lethargy and darted off. Her own fear a spur at her flank, she too ran. Their ragtag group sprinted through the level, gaining in numbers as their frightful passage infected those who stood about frozen, with direction.

The shriek of another incoming missile stole the speed from their steps. Drawn to track its progress, for fear of blindly stumbling under it, Ellora came to halt and set her eyes to the sky once more. Nearly blinded by its brilliance, its screech deafening, she knew it would land close; too close. It was coming down atop them. She could feel the wind of its passage, the air sucked from her lungs, its heat drying the tears she hadn’t known she’d shed.

Her heart thunderous, she looked for the rest of the orphans but they ran on without heed. She shouted but could not be heard above the whining keen of the fireball. They barreled on, too far ahead for her to reach in time. Her stomach lurched as she realized what she must do.

She changed direction and ran for the outer wall with long-legged strides. Her voice cried out in futile warning, but she felt it only right to try. As the fire roared at her back, she darted for the cover of a nearby alley. Seeing a mother stood rigid in her path, the woman staring fearful at the sky as he infant child bawled and clung to her breast, Ellora bulled by, pulling the woman and child along with her.

Just as the fireball struck, Ellora wrapped her arms about the pair and dove for the piled trash that littered the dark alley. They landed on their sides with a huff, Ellora rolling to shield the baby from the impact. The world went silent as a wave of heat lapped at their backs. Detritus was flung about, frenzied lashes on the wind that followed. She ducked her head and clutched tight to the child as she was pelted with stones, and trash, and shards of wood, the thin material of her tunic no protection against their blows. She felt each, the crack of the whip at her back.

When the trash ceased its rain, Ellora got to her feet, helping the woman up. The baby was bright-eyed as it loosed a petulant cry, its reddened face shining with silver and encrusted with phlegm. Grateful the child was unharmed, Ellora ushered the woman from the alley and back onto the street. The alley would be no shelter from what was to come.

She could hear the sizzle of burning wood as they turned the corner, the homes just ten yards from where they stood but moments ago, were engulfed in fire. Flames danced along the roofs. She glanced just beyond the burning homes to see a smoldering crater that sunk a foot into the ground, the hole easily ten feet across. Its bottom was charred, crystal shards scattered about like shattered ice. All around the crater lay sodden chunks of red and black. She thought for a moment she recognized the scraps that wrapped about some of the bloody pieces, but she could not bring herself to examine them closer. Ellora turned away, but the images clung to her eyes.

The red lumps had once been bodies, their pieces now strewn about like the trash that layered the alley behind her. She felt her stomach tighten in revolt, and forced her nausea down. Now was not the time to be sick. She had been little help to the living, but she could do nothing for the dead.

Every breath stung her lungs as Ellora pushed the woman ahead, herding her toward the upper gates as fast as they could travel. As she heard yet another missile scream from the sky to crash into the city, somewhere further up the levels, she couldn’t shake the feeling she was marching toward her death, that it would soon be her broken pieces in the dirt; unattended, unmourned.

Just an orphan, every step she took toward the Eighth took her further from her kind. Though everyone who lived in the city was Lathahn by right of birth, she had seen the kindness of those that lived above her, both in position and status. Should the city fall, Ree forbid, Ellora would never find herself amongst the privileged few to be led into the mountain fortress, given refuge from the flames that would eat at each level in turn, until nothing but blackened ash remained. There would be no safety at the Crown for people like her.

Her thoughts leadened her feet and she stumbled as they neared the Eighth. She urged the woman toward the still open gates, their thick metal warped and singed from yet another fireball that had fallen, and turned to look back at her home. The woman and her child slipped from her mind as quickly as they did from the level.

Fires colored the walls with orange and black. Shadows like ghosts swayed in rhythm to the flicker of the flames. Another fiery sphere arced into the sky and chased the darkness away, replacing it with a sanguine shimmer. She watched as it flew over her, to crash near the Third. The ground shook as she saw licking flames leaping toward the heavens, their tongues well above the towering walls.

Two more spheres plummeted from the sky behind the last, their rumbling impacts scarring the upper levels. Her panicked heart urged Ellora to flee toward the strength of the mountain that stood watch over Lathah, but her mind, strangely sharp amidst the chaos, held her fast.

The enemy that pummeled them with fire seemed to have no care for class and status. Its missiles rained down indiscriminate, their flame and fury dispersed in equal shares. The upper levels burning no less furious than the Ninth, she could die just as easily where she stood as she could anywhere above. It wasn’t a comforting thought.

No certainty of anything, she chose to stay on the Ninth, her home. She prowled near the battered gates of the Eighth, scavenging a small pack, which she filled with the bruised fruits and vegetables from the abandoned and overturned carts of the market. She found a waterskin, half-full, and added it to her bag, packing the pack tight with loose clothing that lay scattered about.

With more spheres screaming toward the city, Ellora knew the walls would crumble soon and there were no soldiers massed upon their tops to hold back an invasion. She no longer saw any in the streets; none living, at least. It was only a matter of time until the city fell. She had no intention of being there when it did.

Her parents gone to dust, the orphanage burning, there was nothing left for Ellora. When the moment appeared, she would flee the city and its cruelties, and make her way in the wilds. Her fate no more certain there, she could at least go to her grave knowing the decision was hers.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Warlord Vorrul watched Lathah burn, his snout turned up in a wicked smile. Though too far away to smell the seared flesh and bubbling fat of his arrogant enemy that now cooked within an oven of their own making, his tongue savored the victory to come. The women of Lathah were succulent, grown thick and meaty upon the back of the hardy mountain, the children even more so. He would feed well.

Vorrul laughed deep in his throat as General Morgron came to stand beside him. “Have you ever seen such beauty, general?”

“Not since Fhenahr.”

The warlord glanced over at the general and laughed even louder. “Too true, but nothing can compare to the humbling of Lathah.” He gestured to the soldiers that wielded the golden staves. “I would enjoy this moment a little longer. Have the pack slow their pace and keep their aim from the outer wall. I want them to stew in their own piss.”

Morgron nodded and went to the staff-bearers to relay the message as Vorrul stared off into the distance, the horizon shaded in crimson. His soldiers cheered around him, flooding his ears with their howls. He could hear the hunger in them, but not for meat…for battle.

Though his forces had run hard since Fhenahr, they had eaten well upon the people of Fhen. His soldiers were ready to fight. The slave train trod slow, well behind the main army, but they would not need its sustenance just yet. Another feast lay before the Grol, and soon they would feed again.

He would relish this victory as none other. He would shit on the throne of Lathah and mount the heads of its rulers upon its ruined walls. When its people were chained to the line as slaves, he would be revered amongst the Grol. He would-

The sudden change in the tone of his soldiers’ voices drew his attention, their cheers fading into silence. He glanced at the lines to see them parting, Morgron racing to find the cause of the disturbance. A moment later, Vorrul saw one of his Bloodpack stumbling between the ranks, Morgron grabbing ahold of him and half-carrying the warrior to the warlord’s side.

Vorrul felt his anger rising as he stared at the warrior. His right eye was gone. Gore and blood was crusted about his cheek and neck. One of the relics he’d been given was crushed, the soldier’s wrist still inside. His arm swung limp at his side as he raised his remaining eye to meet the warlord’s glare.

“Report,” Morgron growled.

“The Lathahn is a true warrior.” His voice was raw with pain and exertion, the sound graveled.

“You have failed,” Vorrul said, his rage sharpening his words.

The warrior did not deny the warlord’s statement. “We killed many of the Pathra that stood with him, and nearly brought him down, but he fought fierce. Only I won free.” He drew himself up, baring his stained throat.

Vorrul resisted the urge to tear the warrior’s throat out, turning his words over in his head. “He traveled with Pathra?”

The Grol nodded. “Twenty of them, by my count; all warriors.”

“He had gone to Pathrale and not Lathah?” Morgron asked.

“We followed him to Lathah, but he had already moved on to Pathrale. We caught his scent and found him with a cadre of Pathrans, headed once more toward Lathah. Forced as I was to skirt the border, he should be back among them already.”

Morgron’s eyes narrowed as Vorrul glanced at his general. The warlord drew in a deep breath, and waved the warrior away. “The Bloodpack will determine your fate.”

He watched as the soldier made his way back to the Pack, his head down. The warriors howled and set upon him, burying the soldier under a pile of tearing claws and sharpened teeth. Vorrul looked away, meeting his general’s eyes.

“The meat has returned to Lathah.” He looked over as a fiery ball of fire was launched toward the city. “Cease the attack,” he shrieked at his soldiers, his warriors responding instantly, setting their staves aside. He turned to Morgron. “Send a messenger to Lathah.” He broke into a wide grin. “Tell them I will grant them peace and retire from the field if they surrender the magic-wielding Lathahn to me. Give them an hour to make their choice.”

“And if they refuse?”

“Then we kill them, as I intend either way.” Vorrul shrugged. “If the Lathahn truly knows the secrets of his magic, he will survive to meet our forces inside the walls. We will take him then. It would simply be easier were he delivered to us without fight.” He glanced at the lines. “Have the men pull back into the trees and keep the peace until told otherwise. I would have the Lathahns believe I intend to keep my word.”

Morgron grinned and moved off down the lines.

Vorrul looked back to Lathah. Flames still flickered over the city, but he knew he’d done no lasting harm. He’d proven his might, however, and had only to wait until the Lathahns gave up the warrior. Once he had the secrets of the relics, and Lathah was dust on his heels, he would see to the bitch.

She would rue her arrogance, Vorrul swore. Soon, he would answer only to himself.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Uthul sat silent in the branches, his perch well above the jungle floor. Pathran warriors clung to the trees spread out before him, almost invisible amidst the leaves and vines. Beside him sat a number of young Pathra, assigned to him by Warlord Quaii, should he need to pass along any messages to the fighting force. They were but children, and here he sat amongst them, isolated from the battle that would soon take place.

He bit back his anger, knowing full well what he must do, but it settled ill. It was not the place of the younger races to fight the Sha’ree’s battles for them. He should be leading the charge, not cowering at the rear with children. His people were the first, brought to life by the Goddess Ree herself, and blessed with her sacred power. They should not need the others, but he knew the truth of it. The Sha’ree had fallen far.

He shook his head and cursed the weakness that had beset him and his people. He should not know fear, but there it was, coiled deep inside his bowels like a serpent, hissing its challenge. The feeling was foreign, alien. It wounded his pride. He had lived for over ten thousand summers without fear of death, but the plague had taken more from him than just his people; it had stolen his certainty.

No longer was his immortality assured, or that of his few remaining people. The magic that had once empowered his race had become its downfall, its touch becoming virulent, spreading without mercy. Now he faced enemies armed with the very tools his people had created to ease their burdens. Death was no longer an abstract concept reserved for the lesser races. It had become a reality of his own life, laying waste to the Sha’ree as nothing ever had before.

The serpent hissed inside and he growled in response, the children shifting uneasily beside him. He ignored them and cast his eyes to the jungle where the Pathran warriors would soon lead the Yviri invaders, the ambush set. He prayed to Ree the Pathra could handle the Yvir, for there were too few of his people tasked to the mission of reclaiming the stolen O’hra. To lose any would be tragic. More so still, Uthul did not wish to die.

He thought of Ree, slipping ever deeper into the darkness of her own essence, losing touch as she faded away. He could not fathom such an end, cold chills prickling his skin at the thought.

He sighed grateful as the cries of battle sounded through the trees. He turned his focus to the jungle and waited, resisting the urge to leap down from the trees and rush to aid of the handful of Pathran warriors who had volunteered to lead the Yvir into the trap. Their pained shouts called to Uthul, setting his blood alight with fury.

The remaining Pathran appeared between the branches, bloody and stumbling, as he drew the Yvir in with the last breath in his lungs. The warrior collapsed as the invaders streamed through the jungle just behind.

Uthul felt his heart flutter as the mass of Yviri warriors strode through the trees, confidence carved into the grim smiles upon their pale faces. From where he clung, Uthul could not see the whole of their force, but he knew by their sound there must be near a hundred. They stormed through the trees without fear of reprisal, with brashness born of their numbers and the power at their side.

He could sense the magic they bore, and cast his eyes about as they drew closer. There seemed but five that bore the flaming blades the Pathra had witnessed, their fires casting fearsome shadows up among the trees. Uthul looked past the sword-wielders, and scanned the crowd for more signs of the O’hra.

It was an easy task. The Yvir, dressed only in their traditional loincloths, could hide nothing from his eyes. Like the blackened lines of their veins, the few tools they possessed stood out against their pale flesh. He counted no more than a dozen warriors armed with Sha’ree magic. While still a grave threat against an unprepared force, he felt a surge of confidence the Pathra could overwhelm the Yvir with so few of the O’hra in evidence.

As the Yviri crossed into the killing field, he would soon know for certain.

Wild cries filled the air, hisses and howls echoing through the branches as though the Pathra had come a million strong. The Yvir cast their eyes to the trees as the cat people swarmed reckless through their clustered boughs.

Uthul smiled as the trap was loosed.

All about the Yviri, Pathran warriors burst free of the camouflaging foliage to their front and sides, and lashed out. Spears darkened the jungle air and the Yvir, their eyes still on the trees, felt their sting. The cries of the cat people were joined by those of the invaders, both in pain and rage. Soldiers fell with sharpened spears sunk deep into their flesh. Crimson stained the dirt floor of the clearing, the first blood of the battle to Pathrale.

As the Yvir turned their focus to the spear-casters, nooses made of woven vines dropped silent from the trees above. They looped indiscriminately about limb and throat. Dozens of Yviri warriors were pulled from the ground to dangle helpless at the end of a rope. Their thrashing ceased just moments later, brought to a violent end by a barrage of javelins.

Surprise and numbers on the Pathran side, the first wave of the attack cost the Yvir heavily, but it failed to quell their spirit. The flame-wielders pulled together and began to cut a swath through the feline defenders who clustered thick at the front rank. With no concern for the jungle, they set the trees alight as they drove forward, batting spears from the air and paving their path with fallen Pathra. The empowered warriors closed and formed a wall about the sword-bearers, keeping the Pathrans from exploiting their flank

Uthul watched helpless as the Yvir battled their way through the jungle toward his position, more and more of the cat people falling victim with each passing moment. The chaos wrought by the burning trees, and the tight formations of the Pathra worked against them, their brethren unable to cast spears for fear of harming their own. The Yvir had no such concerns, armed as they were with swords and squeezed tight amidst the enemy that shielded them from ranged attack.

In tight, the spears and daggers of the Pathra met stiff resistance. The jagged blades of the empowered Yvir won out, carving reddened arcs before them. Pathran warriors fell away with blank stares, their places filled by another only to meet the same fate.

The trees above the invaders burning, the cat people could not come down atop them and press the advantage of numbers. Instead, they were forced into a battle of attrition that favored the Yvir. The smiles on the invaders’ faces made it clear they knew where they stood.

As the battle grew closer, Uthul shooed the children from the branch, chasing them toward home. He would not have their deaths on his conscience. He drew his blade as the slaughter continued below, the Pathra dying for no cause other than Sha’ree failure. He could sit back and watch no more, the Yvir needing to be put on the defensive, no matter the cost to him.

Less hindered by the fires that raged through the trees than the furred Pathra, Uthul drew himself up and pulled his cloak tight about him. He sprung from the branch and soared graceful through the tangle of branches, poised to come down atop the sword-bearers. An orange glimpse out of the corner of his eye told him he had not been alone in his hope to catch the Yviri warriors off guard.

Much as he was, Uthul saw Warlord Quaii hurtling through the air toward the battle, daggers held at the ready in both of his hands. Their two gazes met for an instant, Uthul spying the resolution that whirled angry in the warlord’s eyes. Committed to his course of action, he could do nothing more but see it through to the end.

Uthul stiffened as he and the warlord drew close to the fight. He saw the brilliant blue of Yviri eyes as the invaders glanced up at their movement and realized they were there. It was too late.

The silver trail of his sword leading the way, Uthul let his weight and momentum bury his blade in the cheek of the nearest flame-wielder. It slid in easy, the point shattering teeth as it slid through the warrior’s jaw, running through his mouth to sever the spine, right at the base of the Yvir’s neck. The flames at the warrior’s blade turned to smoky wisps, snuffed out at the instant of his death.

Uthul tucked his head and rolled as he came down on top of the dead Yvir, tearing his sword free as he continued forward to crash through the gathered Yviri ranks. Invaders were scattered at the impact, knocked from their feet and sent sprawling. As Uthul redirected his motion and jumped to his feet, he saw the orange streak of Warlord Quaii coming to the ready just a short distance away. Sprawled out behind him was the body of yet another of the flame-wielders, his sword dim. The warrior stared sightless, his eyes replaced by the twin hilts of Quaii’s daggers that protruded from his ruined sockets.

The Yviri ranks scattered by the assault from above, the Pathran forces surged forward in the open gaps. Uthul sent two of the empowered Yvir to the grave with quick slashes of his sword, their throats laid open from ear to ear. He stepped past their falling corpses to engage one of the remaining flame-wielders who charged toward him.

His pulse raced as the warrior closed, slashing wild in an effort to overwhelm Uthul. It nearly worked. Uthul stumbled back from the warrior’s ferocity, the searing heat of the blade blistering his face. He dared not bring his own blade to bear in a parry, for all its value-the steel folded by expert hands-it would be little more than kindling before the fiery sword.

Uthul dodged and retreated, his free hand grasping at the clasp of his cloak as the Yviri warrior advanced, the single-mindedness of his intent engraved in the fury of his expression. All around them, the battle raged, but Uthul dared not let his eyes wander. He fell back to the nearest tree and motioned as though he intended to step behind the bulk of its trunk.

Blinded by his obvious rage, the Yvir moved to block him, committing himself to his counter. Uthul shifted his weight and sprang back the way he’d come, circling on the man before the warrior caught on. His cloak free of its clasp, Uthul pulled it loose and wrapped it about the Yvir’s sword arm, flaming blade and all, snapping it out like a whip. The cloak burst into flames, casting off burning embers that rose up hostile, seeking the eyes of the warrior.

Before the cloak burned away, Uthul yanked it hard toward him, dragging the Yvir along with it; directly into Uthul’s extended sword.

The blade pierced the tattooed rigidness of the man’s stomach, slicing through the muscle without resistance. The warrior only grunted as he attempted to free his sword, but the cloak held fast. Blood gushed thick and black from the wound as Uthul tugged his sword free and spun it about, the sharpened edge severing the Yvir’s sword arm at the elbow. At this, the warrior screamed, his pain resounding through the jungle as he collapsed beside his rent and flaming arm.

Though the sword cast fire no more, the cloak continued to burn. Its infectious touch leapt to consume the thrashing warrior, catching aflame the wild patch of hair on his head. The Yvir’s screams renewed, Uthul silenced the man by sinking the point of his blade into the warrior’s ear to the crunch of bone. He went still in an instant.

Having lost track of the battle, Uthul looked about as he withdrew his sword. He spied another of the flame-wielders barreling toward him from behind just as his sword cleared the fallen warrior’s skull.

Uthul leapt away, spinning to throw his sword up in a desperate parry. It did him little good. The two swords collided, but it was like trying to block lightning. The fiery blade cleaved through, shattering Uthul’s like so much glass, its fury continuing on.

Uthul’s chest exploded with agony as the blade cut into him, its magical touch setting the whole of his body alight in waves of searing misery. He stumbled and fell to his back, his legs lacking the strength to hold him. His vision swam as the warrior came to stand over him, the dark lines at his face wavering as he held his burning blade above his head, ready to fall. At the warrior’s wrists were bands of silver.

Uthul attempted to pull away, but his arms rebelled, his fingers scratching numbly at the ground.

“You’re Sha’ree,” he heard the warrior say, surprise thick in his voice.

Though his eyes were blurred, Uthul could barely make out the warrior’s expression. It seemed to carry no malice now, only a hint of uncertainty. Uthul opened his mouth to speak, but the warrior spun about and darted into the trees, the hiss of Pathra coming close on his heels.

The warrior gone, Uthul laid his head back and stared up into the canopy, dots of white light dancing before his eyes. He felt the heat of his wound, but couldn’t muster the strength to bring his hands to it. As though they were disconnected, they twitched at his sides as the darkness closed in about him. The sounds of battle retreated from his ears to be replaced by a quiet hum.

~

“Sha’ree?”

Uthul knew not how long he laid there before he heard the insistent voice, but when he opened his eyes, he was greeted by a great mass of swirling orange. He blinked and the color resolved into the worried expression of Warlord Quaii.

“We thought you lost.”

Though his body felt stiff, and he felt pressure at his chest, the agony that had assailed him when he was struck by the mystical blade had receded. He moved to sit, noticing the pressure at his chest was the hand of the warlord, a mass of bloody material held tight against his wound.

“As did I.” He glanced about to see dozens of Pathran faces staring at him from amongst the trees. “Your people-”

A flicker of a smile colored Quaii’s lips. “We lost many, but we would have lost many more had we not heeded your advice.” He pulled the bloody rags gently from Uthul’s chest. “And you? Are you well?”

Uthul looked to the wound. The flesh was blackened and blistered about the edges, but it no longer bled. Bubbled red meat was interspersed with yellowed fluid and dark ash throughout the six inch gash, but Uthul felt none of the weakness he had when first struck by the blow. His arms and legs, though weary, responded and he climbed to his feet with the help of the warlord.

“It would seem so.” He glanced once more to the wound, running his finger about its puckered perimeter. Though jagged with the ruin of his flesh, the meat beneath showing through charred and dark, he could see no signs of infection. He felt no heat about it.

“You seem surprised.”

Uthul met Quaii’s gaze. “It was magic that laid my people low; our own.” He gestured to his chest. “Shallow though this wound may be, it is only by the hand of Ree that I still live and am not possessed of the burning plague. The virulence should have taken me as I dreamt dark. So yes, I am perhaps surprised to still remain among the living.”

“Then today is twice blessed, Sha’ree, for my people’s homes still stand.”

Uthul glanced to the jungle to see the fires raging in the distance, kept in check by a vast swath of cleared ground. He suddenly realized he had been moved at some point since he’d fallen, the sprawling canopy woven thick with vines and filled with the faces of the Pathra that smiled down upon him from catwalks hidden amongst the trees.

Uthul smiled back before turning to face the warlord. “I would see the tools the Yvir used against your people.” With little time during the battle to assess the magical O’hra and weapons, his excitement and fear clouding his judgment, Uthul could now look back upon the encounter with clearer eyes.

“They’re here. Come.” Warlord Quaii led him further under the Pathran village, to a wide clearing filled with milling Pathran children with wide eyes. Near the center of it stood a handful of warriors who tried valiant to shoo the children away, the tools piled between the guards, under steady watch.

The warlord waved the warriors to the side so he could see the O’hra more clearly. Uthul glanced at them from a distance, and what he noticed but failed to register during the assault, was the obvious difference between them and missing Sha’ree items. The three blades that had been recovered were crafted of platinum, their silvery sheen undiminished by the blood and ash that crusted the blades. The bracers were made of the same metal. Sha’ree symbols were etched along the lengths of the blades, as well as about the bracers, but their order and manner of assignment were like none he’d ever seen.

Uthul drew closer to examine the swords. His people had never crafted such jagged blades, preferring the quickness of a slim, lighter weapon to the hacking brutality of those that lay before him. His pulse fluttered at his throat as he knelt down beside the pile. He could feel waves of magic wafting from the items, but its touch left him cold, so unlike the gentle warmth that permeated the O’hra he’d used before the plague set in.

He reached out with a tentative hand and ran a finger along the length of the blade. There was none of the squirming sickness in his stomach that had come to be associated with his use of the Sha’ree tools. He pulled his hand away and sat for a moment, examining the symbols raised upon the metal.

He recognized their uses, the language clearly Sha’ree, but the order confounded him. It was so unlike the pattern his people used to imbue metals with magic. It clearly worked, but it would take time to decipher the relationship of each symbol to the power it generated. He had no such time.

He wondered who might.

A cold chill prickled his skin at the thought. The O’hra bore the marks of Sha’ree knowledge, but he knew of none of his people who would dare to handle Ree’s blood for fear of perpetuating the plague. What afflicted one, would afflict them all, in time. The risk was too great. But if the O’hra were not crafted by Sha’ree hands, then there must be another race that had happened upon the secrets of Ree. Uthul’s stomach roiled.

He stood and turned to the warlord. “I would ask that you protect these tools, hide them from sight and let no one know of their existence. I shall return to collect them soon, but they are dangerous. Use them not, for the consequences of such may well be too dire to imagine.”

“Should the Yvir return with more of your magic?”

Uthul shook his head. “The manner of these tools is unknown, their use unpredictable. I would not have your enemies empowered further at the cost of your people’s lives. Hide the tools well and stay strong. My people seek the means of ending the war. We will not fail.” Though he spoke the words with steel, he felt none of their confidence.

Warlord Quaii nodded. “I will do as you ask, but know I cannot abide my people being harmed. The Korme gather to the south and the Yvir peck at us from the north, my forces split. I will use the tools to defend my home if I must, and beg pardon after.”

Still uncertain of their nature, and fearful he bring about a return of the plague, Uthul chose not to challenge the warlord’s determination. He also dared not carry any of the O’hra with him, no matter their source. “Until such time, keep them safe. Agreed?”

Quaii agreed with a grin. “I have no-”

A sudden outburst of hisses and growls from the Pathra perched above, drew their attention. Uthul glanced to the edge of the clearing where a cluster of Pathran warriors roughly dragged a bound Yvir into the circle, casting him to the dirt. The Pathra led another behind, a tall man dressed in brown robes. They pushed him down alongside the Yvir. Uthul knew the man to be Velen, his skin near obsidian, his limbs too long and gangly to be anything else. The Velen looked up at him, his wide white eyes filled with uncertainty.

“We found these two lashed to a tree where the Yvir crossed the lake,” one of the Pathra told the warlord.

Quaii stepped forward, a snarl at his lips. “More Yvir scum and a servant.” He growled at the bound pair. “I know not what you’ve done to offend your own, but you deserve no less than they for invading our land.” He gestured to his warriors. “Cast them to the fire.”

The Pathra grinned and howled, pulling the pair to their feet.

“No!” the Velen shouted. “We’re no-”

The rest of the Velen’s sentence was cut short by a Pathran warrior who slid his hand over the man’s mouth. His eyes were wide and pleading, and they locked upon Uthul.

“Wait,” Uthul called out, moving to stand before the Velen. He glanced to the Yviri warrior who hung limp in the arms of the Pathra, and noticed the distinct purple of his veins. He looked to Quaii. “I’d have a word first.”

The warlord’s eyes narrowed, but he nodded, signaling for his warrior to release the Velen.

“Who are you?” Uthul asked.

“I am Domor, of Vel.” He motioned to the unconscious warrior. “He is Jerul, of Y’Vel, not Y’var,” he said the last with venom. “The warriors caught us upon the lake and we could do nothing to avoid them. They battered my blood-companion and bound us to await their return.”

Though Uthul sensed no dishonesty from the Velen, there was an uncertainty in what he’d said. Of all the other races, the Sha’ree knew the Velen nature closest. “What would tempt a Velen so that you would risk passage upon the water during the Tumult?”

Warlord Quaii stepped closer, his great orange face intense.

Domor looked away. “I had heard word of the unrest in Fhen, so we traveled to Nurin, where my brother and his son make their home. I would see them safe.”

“Long way for a peaceful Velen to travel in times of war,” Quaii said. Accusation was thick in his voice.

Domor shuffled his feet as Uthul drew up right before him.

“I think perhaps the warlord is correct. You speak in half-truths, your words elusive.” Uthul raised a hand to ward the Velen off as he started to answer. “Before you speak again, know that Nurin has fallen to the Korme, days past. Nurale is naught but smoke and ash and memory.”

Domor went limp, the Pathran warriors grasping at his arms to hold him on his feet as he threatened to tumble. His worried eyes stared at Uthul. “You speak true?” His voice crackled like a wintered leaf.

Uthul nodded.

The Velen pulled free of the Pathra and sank to his knees. The Yvir beside him stirred and dragged his face along the dirt to look at his blood-companion. Sorrow was visible in the warrior’s blue eyes, despite the deep shadows of his own physical pain. He struggled to go to the Velen, his binds holding him in place.

Domor fell forward, his head cradled in his arms. “Crahill. I’m sorry, my brother,” he sobbed. “I have failed you once more. Cael.” The last was little more than a muffled whisper.

Uthul reach down and pulled the Velen to his feet, staring up at him. Domor’s wet eyes went wide.

“What name did you just speak?”

Domor stiffened as he met Uthul’s gaze. “My nephew: Cael,” he choked out.

Uthul turned to the warlord, his grip still tight upon the Velen’s arms. “Free them both. They would have my protection.”

Quaii stood silent for a moment, his face a stoic mask, before motioning for his warriors to do as Uthul asked. With grumbled complaint drawn short by a fearsome glare from Quaii, the Pathra cut both loose.

“See to the warrior’s wounds. I must speak with his companion,” Uthul said, leading Domor away from the Pathra. He motioned for Quaii to join them, turning Domor to face him once more. “Though I believe your brother was killed during the invasion, Cael yet lives.”

Domor stared at him a moment without expression. “How do you know?”

“Cael fled the Korme invasion and I and my companion happened upon him in the Dead Lands. He travels now toward Lathah, in safe arms.”

The Velen’s shoulders sunk low, his arms trembling in Uthul’s grasp. “He lives, Crahill, he lives.”

Uthul nodded. “He does, but I must ask, is it your nephew you seek, or the ancient tool he carries?”

Domor’s gaze slipped away, silver marring his cheeks. “In truth, Sha’ree, I seek both.” He breathed a weary sigh. “I failed my brother once and it cost him his wife. I would not see it happen with his son, so I came to bring them back to Vel with me, that I might know them safe. It was my hope to bring the relic home, as well, for I had heard of your quest.”

“Know you how to make the rod work?”

Domor nodded.

“Then I would have you and your companion travel with me, for our quest is not to reclaim the ancient tools, the O’hra, lost to time, but to train those we find in possession of them, in their use.”

“Why would you do that?” Domor’s eyes narrowed and he looked down upon Uthul with suspicion.

“As the Sha’ree cannot confront the Grol, we must build a force capable of doing so. Those who have wielded the O’hra are best suited for our purpose.”

“You would have me fight the Grol?”

“Perhaps, but there is much more that must be done before that time comes.”

“Such as?”

Uthul met Domor’s bright white eyes. “We have little time to waste on lengthy explanations, Velen. Will you travel with me, or would you prefer to remain in the care of the Pathra?”

Warlord Quaii grinned, the sharpness of his teeth glistening in his mouth. Domor looked to the Pathra and then back to Uthul, his shoulders hunched.

“It seems I would be traveling with you.” A hint of fire glimmered in his eyes as he gestured to the Yviri warrior. “My blood-companion will be, as well, if you expect my assistance.”

Uthul gave a shallow bow, a smile on his face. “Certainly.” He pulled a Succor from his bag and handed it to the Velen. “Feed your companion this, but return the seed to me. We will travel as soon as he is on his feet.”

Domor took the Succor, his eyes nearly as round as the fruit as he examined it before scurrying off to the Yvir’s side. Uthul turned to Quaii. “I would have two of the tools to help speed us on our way, but the rest will remain here, Warlord Quaii. Hold fierce until I return. I fear the Lathahns will be close at my heels, the Grol but steps behind.”

Uthul gave his thanks and turned to look toward Lathah. Once the warlord had moved away to collect the O’hra for his traveling companions, Uthul grew tense. As much as he wished to deny it, he had little confidence in the path ahead. The discovery of the new O’hra had changed everything. He knew not how many had been crafted, or to what purpose they had been set, or even how or why they’d been made, but their existence was a complication his people had not expected. There was no longer any certainty as to how to proceed.

Uthul glanced back to see the Yviri warrior on his feet, a flush of color at his lined cheeks. The warrior would soon be able to travel. Uthul was grateful, for he felt the weight of urgency settling over him. He needed to find Zalee and send her to warn their people of what he’d found. He only hoped, in his impatience to deliver his warning, he was not condemning his people by exposing himself to the use of the unknown O’hra.

It was a risk he needed to take. There was far more at work than they had previously believed when they’d set out to find the O’hra-wielders. It was no longer just the Grol army to be dealt with, but now the Yvir, as well, and perhaps even more. If the Sha’ree were to have any hope of ending the war that threatened to engulf Ahreele, they needed to know more.

Uthul prayed there was enough time.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

His bones sore, every muscle cramped and aching, Cael stifled a groan as Zalee loosed his hands and legs and set him down. His legs trembled and he latched onto a nearby tree to remain standing, pinpricks of agony searing at his knees and wrists as the blood began to flow free once more. He felt his stomach lurch at the sudden steadiness of the ground beneath him, having grown accustomed to the rocking motion of Zalee’s run.

He glanced over at the Sha’ree to see her staring off through the trees. Though she breathed a little heavy, she seemed to show no ill effects for their hurried journey from Pathrale, despite her effort. Cael did not feel so fortunate. He willed his stomach to settle and praying it listened.

Unable to keep pace with the Sha’ree, Cael fell behind early in their run. Zalee, unwilling to leave him or let him slow her down, snatched him up like a baby and carried him in her arms for most of the day. Cael was jostled and jarred about until his vision blurred and his bowels threatened to give way. Vomit rising volcanic in his throat, he convinced Zalee to let him ride upon her back.

It proved to be little better. At some point during the journey, the world flying past him in a blur, Zalee had tied his legs about her waist and his arms around her shoulders to keep him in place. Cael secure upon her back, in body if not in spirit, Zalee had run even faster. It was like breaking a mount, the experience drawn out in a misery that lasted the course of a day.

“We are too late,” Zalee told him, her voice without emotion.

His head filled with clouds, Cael tried to shake them free as he stumbled over to where Zalee stood. His eyes followed hers and he saw the great spires of Lathah that stood majestic in the distance against the backdrop of the Fortress Mountains. He could see the great outer wall still stood strong. Though wisps of dark smoke rose up from behinds its sprawling whiteness, he could spy no obvious damage. He could hear no commotion rising from the city, no horns or the clatter of men at battle, nor did he see any forces laying siege.

“Too late?”

Zalee nodded, her finger tracing the line of the trees on the far side of the city. “The Grol are here, lurking in the woods, though they do not hide.”

Cael narrowed his eyes and stared hard across the barren killing field, but he could see nothing moving amidst the distant woods. He cast his sight to the walls and blocked his eyes against the sun that crept low in the western sky, hovering above the mountains and the city below. He could see a number of shadows flitting along the wall top, but nothing that confirmed Zalee’s statement. Despite that, he knew to trust the Sha’ree’s judgment.

“What do we do?”

Zalee stood quiet a moment, her pink eyes flitting back and forth along the edge of the trees. “Grol soldiers are moving slowly through the woods, likely in an attempt to cut off the city to ensure no one flees. That gives us little time. We must go now if we are to collect the warrior and flee before the city is surrounded.”

Cael glanced at the open field before them, knowing full well it existed to keep intruders from doing exactly what they were intent upon doing. “They’ll see us.”

Zalee smiled in her way, an expression that Cael had come to recognize, despite its lack of warmth. “I am not without my tricks.” She held out her hand.

Cael breathed deep and took her gloved hand in his own, wondering what she had in mind. She gripped him tight.

“For this, we must travel slowly, but do not let loose of my hand. We must remain in contact and stay quiet; our voices will carry if we are not mindful.”

Cael tightened his own grip and nodded. Zalee wasted no time, pulling him forward and walking them directly onto the killing field. His eyes darted about as they walked, almost casually, across the soft dirt of the field. Any moment he expected a shout to come from Lathah, arrows to follow, or worse still, for the Grol to notice them. He shuddered as he remembered the horrid tales his father had told him about the beasts. The thought of his pieces warming their bellies as the rest of him waited in a cage to join them, turned his stomach. He’d welcome an arrow any day.

Despite his fear, the possibility of death all around, there were no shouts of discovery, no whistle of arrows, nor any angered growls rumbling from the woods. Against all sense of their open passage, they continued forward without notice. The shadows on the walls loomed larger, until taking shape as men when Zalee and he drew closer. Still they approached unnoticed.

Cael cast a glance over his shoulder and nearly stumbled, clasping tightly to Zalee’s hand to keep from falling. The Sha’ree glared at him and tugged him on. Cael mouthed an apology and kept pace, casting one last look behind to confirm what he had noticed. Despite the soft dirt of the killing field he felt crunch and shift beneath his feet, they left no trail behind, the dirt unmarred by their passage.

He had believed he had experienced the greatest wonder he could ever witness as he helped the Sha’ree contact the Goddess Ree, but Zalee continued to prove him wrong. The calming of the river bolstered his awe of the ancient race, their current venture only adding to that amazement. He had known wonder at the golden rod he carried, understanding it was only a piece of the Sha’ree magic, but he could never have imagined what Zalee’s people were capable of before having come to be in their presence. It was humbling.

A gentle tap on his shoulder drew him from his thoughts. He glanced to Zalee as they came about on the near side of the great wall that kept the residents of Lathah safe from harm and them from entering. The look up at the summit set his eyes to swimming.

Zalee leaned in close, her breath warm against his ear. “Stay here, tight against the wall, and hold your tongue. The Grol have yet to come about far enough to spy you and the Lathahns would never think to look down this close to the wall. You will be safe until I retrieve you.”

Cael nodded, hoping his face reflected more confidence than he felt. Zalee paused and smiled at him, dispelling his hope. He’d come this far, he saw no reason not to see it further. Cael waved her on, pressing his back against the cold stone of the wall.

Zalee nodded in return and set about removing her gloves and boots. Once done, the items held fast beneath her sword belt, she set her hands upon the wall, her arms stretched out over her head. Once more she gave Cael reason to wonder.

Like a spider, Zalee pulled herself up the wall, her hands and feet seemingly able to latch onto tiny holds that were invisible to him. She climbed with the same smooth grace she displayed when walking or running, her body moving as though it knew not the impossibility of what it attempted.

In but a few moments, Zalee had reached the top of the wall and disappeared between the shadowed crenellations. Cael’s wonderment was overshadowed only by the feeling of aloneness that he felt when slipped from his view. Despite her assurance he would not be seen, Cael felt exposed sitting against the great white wall, the Grol army circling around the city.

His pulse raced and he could feel its energy at his throat, each beat causing the skin to dance. He worked to slow his breathing certain Zalee would not have left him had it not been safe to do so. He kept his eyes on the trees and willed his chest to ease its thunderous beat, almost assured it could be heard on the walls above.

Though he knew not how long he’d waited, each beat of his heart was like a lifetime, every sound, no matter how distant, set him to jump. While he heard no cries from inside the city, he had just about given up home of Zalee returning when a line of silvery rope dropped to the ground beside.

His pulse went still as he spun about, resuming its beat once more as his eyes followed the trail of rope up the top of the wall where Zalee perched, waving to him. He grasped the edge of the line in trembling hands and noticed the small loop that was tied at its end. Certain Zalee did not expect him to scale the wall as she had he slid his foot into the loop and grasped ahold of the knot that sat roughly at the level of his chest.

The moment his hands locked about the knot, Zalee began to haul him up. She pulled him up with ease, the rope gliding smoothly as she pulled it through her grasp, hand over hand. Cael felt the wall at his shoulder, its cold touch scraping lightly along the sleeve of his tunic, its closeness keeping him from swaying as he rose.

Before Cael had time to grow nervous about the height, his eyes focused rigid upon the rope clasped in his hands, he was there beside Zalee. She helped him onto the comforting ledge of the wall top and he loosed the breath he’d been holding the entire ascent. He cast his eyes about, but saw no soldiers on their side of the wall. Zalee waved him forward, and motioned down the inside of the wall, the sudden realization dawning on Cael that they could not simply stroll down the stairs without meeting resistance, as he had hoped.

He nodded and let Zalee help to dangle him over the inside edge. He held tight as she lowered him to the ground, slipping into an alley formed by the tight cluster of tiny buildings that littered the base of the wall. Once he was down, the rope dropped beside him and Zalee slithered down just a moment later. She tugged gentle upon it and the silvery line pulled loose and fell in a pile beside them. Zalee coiled it and returned it to the bag she wore at her back.

She replaced her gloves and boots and turned to look at Cael, as if to gauge his readiness. He shrugged and motioned for her to continue on. He held his hand out.

Zalee waved it off and whispered, “We risk stirring Lathahn anger if we should penetrate too far into their city unnoticed. Though there may well be questions as to how we came about being within their walls, we are better served by traveling openly and doing nothing that would make them think we wish to avoid notice.”

Cael groaned, but could find no fault with her logic despite his own wish to avoid notice. “Then let’s be about it.”

Zalee wasted no time, strolling boldly from the alley and out into the streets of Lathah. Cael followed close at her heels, giving her none of the space he’d grown accustomed to as they traveled through the Dead Lands. There he was sure the beasts were intelligent enough to steer clear of the Sha’ree and those they’d taken under their protection. He wasn’t certain the Lathahns could be counted on to have such sense.

He needed have worried. All around was chaos. Amidst the thick odor of sewage gone awry, was proof that the Grol had been set upon the city. Smoke billowed in dark spirals toward the sky as many of the small wooden buildings that cluttered the streets were bathed in flames, flickers of red and orange feeding into the black. He could feel the heat of their presence warm upon his face.

Zalee led him from the building conflagration and they strode in the center of the dirt street, veering off only to avoid the overturned market carts and debris that cluttered the way forward. There seemed to be few people still about, Cael imagining the rest having migrated upward through the levels to find safety far from the outer wall.

As they neared what appeared to be the gate to the next level, Cael noticed the charred metal and ash that stained the white wall black. The gate hung open on warped hinges. Zalee waved him toward them. Still lingering close, Cael spied movement out of the corner of his eye and cast a quick glance.

A disheveled young girl, her brown hair as wild as the look on her dirty face, dug amongst the trash that spilled out onto the street from a nearby alley. She looked up at him as he slowed. The steely hardness of her stare was unnerving. Dressed in tattered clothing that seemed sizes too big, and stained in soot and dirt, prowling as she was, hunched low to the ground, she reminded Cael of the skeletal wolves. There was something feral about the girl that made him pull his eyes away.

Zalee a short distance ahead, Cael raced to catch up. He drew up alongside her as she continued on, making her way through the damaged gate.

They continued on a ways until they encountered a small group of soldiers. Their silvered chain reflected the dying light and they marched with purpose down the dirt road, their boots kicking up dust in their haste. Zalee waved to them and stopped bold in their path. Cael positioned himself behind her as the soldiers called out and drew arms.

The Lathahn soldiers spread into a half-circle, closing upon them with careful slowness. As they drew up closer, Cael peering over Zalee’s shoulder, he could see their eyes widening as they examined Zalee. Though they stood just feet away, the soldiers seemed at a loss as to what to do.

Zalee took advantage of their pause. “I am Zalee, of Ah Uto Ree. These are grave times and I seek the council of your ruler, as well as a moment with another who is rumored to be amongst you, a warrior named Arrin Urrael.”

The soldiers cast uncertain glances back and forth amongst their number, each shaking their head in turn, until one of the men stepped forward. He stared at Zalee a moment longer and then sheathed his sword, the soldiers behind following his lead. Relief flooded their faces. He bowed short.

“Come with us.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Arrin stood quiet behind the rigid backs of Maltis and Barold, the Pathra siblings and their entourage at his side. He listened as a soldier passed a breathless message to the prince. The words out in a jumbled rush, Arrin felt the weight of every eye upon him. The smile that had been shorn from the prince’s face in the wake of the bombardment once more returned to its former glory. Its malice was plain for all to see.

“While it pains me to admit your wild tale has been proven true, exile, it would seem you play a far greater role in the Grol coming here than you would have us believe. You led them to us.”

Arrin felt a cold chill settle over him at the prince’s words. Though everyone in the hall had heard what the messenger had said, Olenn had twisted the words like a serpent-tongued, master bard. The message unexpected, Arrin could only stare, his own tongue too tied to come to his defense. His eyes drifted to Malya to see disappointment lurking in their emerald depths. Its weight was like the lid of a casket, sealing him in darkness.

Olenn followed his gaze. “Do you see, my sister? He has brought nothing but grief to your life and now he brings ruin down upon our people.” He spun and pointed at Arrin. “He is far worse than just an exile that escaped justice upon the gallows, he is a traitor.”

The words struck him as though they were a physical blow. Arrin stood in rigid disbelief, his hand shifting to the hilt of his blade without thought. The prince’s guard drew steel at his movement and crowded closer, their voices raised in anger. Malya was pushed aside by the mass of warriors as they closed, a handful of men at the rear keeping her from fighting her way through.

Only the dark-glared defiance of Maltis and Barold kept the men from attacking Arrin, despite the insistence from Lord Xilth who crowed from behind their armored ranks. Kirah set her hand upon Arrin’s arm, gentle reassurance in her touch.

Olenn called for silence. “The Grol offer us renewed peace in exchange for the exile and I see no reason to deny their request.”

“You cannot believe the Grol,” Arrin shouted, his tongue coming loose at last. Kirah’s grip tightened and he was glad for the restraint.

“But we can believe an exile that would conspire to steal the throne?”

Arrin felt his anger at his cheeks, the collar growing warm about his neck. “I never-” he started.

“You never bed the princess? Never hid your affair from the crown? Got her with child?” Olenn grinned, baring his teeth. “If only to yourself, admit that you intended to claim my sister as your patron and use her influence to remove me from my throne so that you might sit in my place. You are a traitor, Arrin, as surely as if you had dared to stick a blade between my ribs.”

“That is untrue.” Malya practically spit the words at her brother.

He turned his razored smile upon her. “Is it now, sister? And you would have us believe you did not bed the exile and bear him a child?”

Malya’s cheeks reddened, though Arrin could not tell if it was from anger or from shame. “However our relationship appeared to you, brother, it was never one of collusion against my father’s kingdom.”

“Perhaps in your eyes it never was, but I have no faith in a man that would sneak about like a snake to sway a princess into his bed.” He waved Malya off, Lord Xilth coming to stand between her and the prince. “He stands before us an exile, not as a member of our populace. I would gladly be rid of him again, his worthless life gaining a measure of value for his sacrifice for our people.” He turned to his guards. “Take him to this Vorrul. Let the beast decide his fate.”

The prince’s guard inched forward as Maltis and Barold drew their own steel. The Pathran emissaries drew about, uncertain. Malya screamed at her brother for reason, the narrow courtyard walls reflecting the cluster of sounds in a maelstrom that rang in his ears. Arrin tightened his grip upon his blade and willed the collar to life.

A single, scything voice cut through the noise and silenced the room.

All eyes turned to see who had spoken, the anger on their faces washed away in surprise. Hesitant to turn away from the crowd, Arrin gave in and cast his eyes behind him.

Surrounded by Lathahn soldiers, an unkempt boy close alongside, was a being long thought to have been gone from the earthly face of Ahreele. For all his doubt, Arrin could not find it in himself to question what he saw before him. There outside the Great Hall of Lathah stood one of the ancients; a Sha’ree.

The attention of everyone upon her, the Sha’ree spoke. “I am Zalee of Ah Uto Ree. I would have urgent words with the ruler of Lathah.” Her pink gaze swept the courtyard seeming to pause in acknowledgment of Olenn, but her eyes settled on Arrin.

“I am Prince Olenn, honored Zalee. If I might have but a moment to clear the refuse from the yard,” he gestured to Arrin and those gathered around him, “We may speak in peace.”

“I would have them stay.” She drew closer, the way parting before her as she came to stand beside Arrin. The dark-skinned boy was at her heels. Of the Pathra, only Kirah stayed close. Zalee met Olenn’s gaze without fear. “My people seek the bearers of the magical gifts we Sha’ree imparted so long ago.” She motioned to Arrin. “Of which, this warrior is one. If we are to end the war that has descended upon Ahreele, he must come with me.”

Arrin’s thoughts spinning wildly in his head, he looked to the Sha’ree as Olenn blustered.

“I know not your need of the exile, but if we are to have peace in the here and now, I must graciously refuse your request. He is to be given to the Grol in exchange for their withdrawal.”

The Sha’ree shook her head. “This cannot be. The Grol seek only to further assure their dominance by robbing us of yet another piece of our magic that can be used against them. I cannot allow you to surrender this warrior.”

Arrin growled and stamped his foot. “I am owned by neither of you. You do not decide my fate.” He stepped away from the Sha’ree, pulling his arm from Kirah’s grasp. “I have returned to Lathah for no reason other than to find my child and help the people escape to safety ahead of the Grol invasion. Your will and desires be damned, the both of you.”

The Sha’ree looked at him, her pink eyes narrow, but she said nothing. Olenn filled the void with fury.

“You are nothing if I do not allow it, Arrin Urrael,” he screamed as he waved his guard on. “Seize him.” Olenn drew back out of his men’s way.

Lieutenant Santos and the men at the front ranks that had seen Arrin crumple the irons, hesitated for but an instant. It was all Arrin needed. Adrenaline complimented by the magical energy that screamed in his veins, he pulled Maltis and Barold from before him and sent them tumbling back into the Pathra, the whole of them falling to the ground in a tangle of limbs.

Arrin had his sword in his hand and leapt at the men of the guard before they had even begun to shake off the thrall of uncertainty. For his disrespect of Malya, Arrin went for Santos first. Though he regretted he did not have the time to make the lieutenant suffer, he drew grim satisfaction, however diminished, from knowing the man would die at his hands.

He ducked low and drove his blade beneath the chin of the lieutenant. Its edge bit through the soldier’s throat and slipped deep inside without resistance, the tip breaking through the skull near the top of his head. Arrin met the man’s terrified gaze as he yanked his sword free, Santos’s life draining from his head as quickly as the blood that gushed pungent down his neck and chest.

Arrin delivered a kick to the next closest man, sending him flying backwards into the ranks. The clash of chain and bodies colliding rang out in the courtyard as a number of soldiers went down in a heap.

Fifteen years of sorrow and anger fueled his rampage as he went after the next soldier. A vicious thrust shattered the chain links of the man’s hauberk, the point of the blade bursting his heart. Arrin was gone before the man even fell. The blur of his sword slashed open the throat of another soldier and was sunk deep into the bowels of yet another, the latter two slumping to the ground at roughly the same time as the first.

The prince’s guard, urged on by Olenn’s shrieking tirade, moved forward but with cowed uncertainty, discipline gone from their ranks. Arrin came at them with no such reservations. He swept his blade before him, severing the wrist of the first soldier to come within range. Crimson exploded from the man’s arm and Arrin spun him about, the spray of his blood blinding the soldiers at his back, their faces awash in red.

They went to clear their eyes and were rewarded with cold steel, Arrin whipping past. His blade cut clean through their stomachs, their guts uncoiling and spilling wet and noxious at their feet.

Though he felt a pang of regret as he cut his way through the guard, having once been among their number, his rage would not be contained. He glanced past the men that cowered before him to see the prince, Olenn’s back to him as he ran for the Great Hall, Xilth scrambling behind him to keep up.

In that instant, his fury knew its target.

Arrin plowed through the loose rank of soldiers, hacking past them and leaving a pile of dead and dying in his wake. If any of the men had dealt him a blow in return, he had not felt it. He knew naught but his desire to kill the prince.

On Olenn’s heels long before he reached the safety of the hall, Arrin snapped his wrist and hamstrung Xilth as he passed him. The old man went down in a screaming heap as Arrin grabbed Olenn by the back of his tunic and spun him about. The prince stumbled and fell, landing hard upon his back.

Arrin drew himself up a few feet away. “You would decide my fate again?” he screamed at him. “Then do so with your blade. Get to your feet.”

Olenn stared back, his face wan under a glistening sheen of sweat. He stayed where he laid, his hand far from his sword.

Arrin drew closer. “Craven. You would rule the lives of men from the safety of your throne, earned not by your deeds, but only through the illness that laid your father low. You are not a man, but a boy who plays king, the blood of soldiers and patriots upon your hands.”

Arrin reached down and set his hand about Olenn’s throat, his grip keeping the air from the prince’s lungs. He set the tip of his blade at Olenn’s flickering eye. “You have stolen from me everything I have ever loved. For fifteen long years I have let you live with that victory, but no longer. Your time has come, little prince.”

“No!” Malya screamed.

She raced to his side and set her hand upon Arrin’s arm. Through his rage he felt the warmth of it, and against his wishes her touch began to thaw the ice-cold determination that would see the prince dead. Arrin stared into Olenn’s dark and bulging eyes and saw the terror that swam in their shadows. He willed his sword forward, imagining it finding its home deep inside Olenn’s skull, but it resisted, seemingly bound by Malya’s gentle hand.

He drew in a deep breath, the scent of blood and death filling his nose, and released his grip upon the prince. Olenn fell back and laid still, his whirling eyes staring hateful at Arrin. He trembled so violently that he seemed possessed of a seizure. Arrin straightened and spit upon the prince before he turned away, shaking Malya free from his arm. He sheathed his sword and looked back at the carnage he’d created.

The soldiers spared the bite of his steel had either fled or stopped to care for their brothers in arms. Blood stained the cobblestones of the courtyard, golden-clad bodies strewn about like so much detritus. He was sickened by what he saw, his stomach roiling as what he’d done slipped past the shield of his anger and settled into his thoughts.

He looked over at the gathered Pathra that stared back at him through wide eyes, their uneasiness plain upon their faces. He could not meet Kirah’s expressionless stare, shifting his own instead to that of Maltis. He and Barold seemed more awed than disturbed, but Arrin knew that would not last.

As the thought sunk in that he had made them all a part of his crime, he knew they too would come to realize it. In a moment of his fury he had condemned the last of those he would call friend. Now, more so than ever, he truly was the exile.

He looked to Malya, unable to read her feelings upon the stoic mask she wore. He cleared his throat, reasserting his purpose. “Even if I were to give myself to the Grol, they would not leave Lathah standing.” He gestured to the bag of collected relics that hung at the waist of one of the Pathra emissaries. “With the help of the ancient tools, I intend to take the fight to the beasts. You must gather your family and flee. The Pathra will protect you.”

Malya glanced at Olenn, who remained where he had fallen, then over at Kirah. The Pathra nodded. Malya turned her cool gaze back to Arrin. “If I am to flee, it will be all of my people.”

“Then make arrangements. The Grol will not stay true to their peace for long. I will hold them for as long as I can.”

“You will not hold them at all, warrior,” Zalee told him as she came alongside. She motioned to the fallen guard. “For all your skill, you would be little more than a flea upon the back of the Grol army.”

“I have spent fifteen years in possession of the collar at my throat and have learned far more than the beasts could have in a hundred years, let alone the short time they’ve wielded the relics.”

Zalee nodded. “I do not doubt your word, but the O’hra you hold was never intended as a weapon. However, most of those stolen by the Grol were crafted for the sole purpose of warfare and made for Sha’ree use, making their function far more dangerous in spite of your experience.” Her voice grew softer. “I would beg you reconsider. My people would train you to use the O’hra far more effectively, along with others, so that you might truly make a difference rather than casting your life away in a glorious failure.”

“What would your offer do for my homeland, for the people here and now who face extinction by the Grol?”

The Sha’ree lowered her eyes. “It would do little.”

“And that is why I must refuse.” Arrin turned to face Olenn, who had crawled to his feet and now stood with his eyes focused on the horizon.

Arrin followed the prince’s stare, his stomach tightening. There against the backdrop of the darkening sky burned another of the Grol’s magical spheres of fire, streaking red toward Lathah. As it crashed into the city, exploding in the Fourth, Arrin knew the time had come.

He turned to Malya. “The moment is upon us. Have your people flee.” He took her hand in his and pressed his lips to it. He held it a fleeting instant, before letting her slip away. “I go to face the Grol.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Sultae looked out across the bleak, black land of Hespayr and marveled at how anyone could call its barren soil home. Jagged hillocks appeared to tumble down from the mountainous Stone Hills that resided to the north. Their gathered sharpness lessened as they ran further south. The land below the hills ran flat all the way until it reached the western border of Ah Uto Ree, where the land once more came alive.

Though she had seen the whole of Ahreele in her time, the desolate nature of Hespayr had always intrigued her. Made of the flesh of Ree, as was the whole of the world, there seemed a symmetry missing in the fallow country, which appeared across the breadth of the other lands. It was as if Hespayr were a cancer upon the goddess, eating away at her.

Sultae walked steady across the dark sand, toward the base of the hills. As she grew nearer, the shapes of cavernous openings began to resolve against the backdrop of the even darker earth. As if they sensed her presence, she spotted a number of Hespayrins emerging from the caves to meet her. She smiled behind her veil, certain they could have divined her approach, she being the only living being that dared tread upon the blighted land.

She waved in greeting as she came upon the gathering Hespayrins, their shapes easily defined even in the growing night. As if in defiance of the land’s utter blackness, the people of Hespayr were like spirits, the color of their skin so faded as to glisten in its whiteness. Their homes deep beneath the surface, within the very body of the Goddess Ree herself, they had come to shun the light of day.

The milky pink of their eyes looked upon her as she came to stand before them. Sultae gave a shallow bow to the stocky people that crowded about her.

Their world made of stone, the Hespayrins were easily as strong as the realm in which they dwelled. Stood alongside the Yvir, the people of Hespayr would make the warrior race seem little more than twigs. While of average height, most meeting Sultae eye-to-eye, they were great walls of muscle, many easily as wide as they were tall. Even the women of the race were layered in hardened slabs that rippled with power, so much so as to blur the determination between the genders under anything less than intensive scrutiny. The thick leather of their tunics that hung stiff made it even more difficult. Their graveled voices, roughened by a lifetime inhaling the dust and soot of the mines, only added to the confusion.

Sultae drew back her veil and smiled at the hulking woman that stood slightly out from the rest of the people, the reddish worm of scar below her left cheek making her easy to recognize. Though the Hespayrins had no true singular leader, their nature communal, the scarred woman had proven to be influential.

“Greetings, Forger Illraine.”

The woman bowed shallow, her bulk allowing her to descend no further. “Welcome back, Sultae. We are pleased to see you have returned whole and hale.” Her voice grated in Sultae’s ears like two stones rubbed together, despite the graciousness of its message.

“I too am pleased to be among you once again.” Sultae spread her smile to the rest of the Hespayrins that lurked about, each beaming as she met their eyes. Simple courtesy was a treat they reveled in, so few visitors daring to enter their realm.

Illraine motioned for Sultae to follow, waving her pale hand to clear the others from her path. “Do come inside. We have done as you have asked and our preparations are complete. You would see?”

Sultae nodded and followed the woman into the mouth of the cave. To appease the Hespayrins’ pride, she strolled past the warriors set to guard the opening without even glancing in their direction. Their naked skin was blackened by layer upon layer of thick soot so they might blend into the darkness. Once she was past, she let a tiny smile slip, its shine hidden from view behind her hand.

While their disguise might surprise an unsuspecting invader with lesser vision than her own, Sultae was certain it would be the desolate plains that sprawled out before the caverns that would repel a force far swifter than naked men colored in ashen dust.

Her mood lightened by her thoughts, Sultae followed the Forger through the catacomb of tunnels that ran like lines of a spider’s web within the murky depths of the hills. She could feel the downward slope of the earth as they walked, the essence of Ree fluttering delicate against her skin, growing more distinct as they delved deeper. Her quest aside, Sultae’s visits to Hespayr were a joyous occasion for it brought her ever closer to her goddess.

Forger Illraine seemed to understand Sultae’s silence as they made their way downward, saying nothing as she led her through the darkness with a grace that defied her bulk. The mass of Hespayrins having scattered behind them, disappearing about their own business, there was nothing to distract Sultae from her thoughts but the quiet scuff of Illraine’s feet against the stone floor.

For what seemed like miles they traveled, until at last Illraine turned down a wide corridor where a distant light illuminated the far darkness in dancing flickers. The light grew brighter as they closed upon it, the woman gesturing for Sultae to enter a cavernous entrance at the end of the long tunnel. The glimmer turned into a steady glow.

Sultae stepped inside and felt the warmth of the goddess wash over her. Despite herself, she felt a smile spread across her face. The Hespayrins had done everything she’d asked of them, and more. If there were a race worthy of her admiration, it would be the mine-dwellers.

The room inside had been hollowed out, the walls smooth to the touch, the roof arching up over her head nearly a dozen horse lengths to its apex. The chamber stretched on for at least ten times that. Nestled by the far wall was the source of Ree’s presence; a bubbling font that dribbled pure magic from its spout.

The stone of the wall beside the font had been carved into a trough to contain the flow of the Goddess’ blood and to route it in a circular course so that it filled a small basin set within a deep recess. A similar trough curved away from the opposite side of the pool and returned to the source, feeding the magical essence back into the font to begin its journey around the circuit once more. Tiny flickers sparked above the fluid as it traveled, but the thick stone and deep groove of its path kept it contained without fueling its volatility.

To the left of the makeshift forge stood a stone table, a part of its long face covered in gray stone implements, shaped in a variety of blacksmithing tools. The rest of the surface remained clear, its position perfect to work the metals in relation to the pool of gathered magic.

Though reluctant to take her eyes from the glory that was the tiny forge of Ree’s essence, Sultae let her gaze wander the room. Within easy reach of the table, stacked higher than she stood, were polished plates of platinum ready to be shaped and crafted. Beside them, their mass covering most of the back wall was an array of formed platinum items of all shapes and sizes.

Sultae strode to these and lifted a piece from the collection. Many times her width, its mass belying its weight, she hefted the rigid belt with ease. She examined its edges and polished finish and smiled, the metal reflecting the glow of her eyes. It was perfectly crafted. She set it aside and let her gaze wander over the rest of the items.

There was a variety of collars that were gathered together, the largest of them, easily thrice the width of her waist, encircled a stack of more reasonably sized ones. Beside them sat piles of gauntlets and greaves, bracers and helms in a variety of sizes, all crafted with the same meticulous beauty and skill as the belt she had examined. She quickly looked over the rest, admiring the blades and shields and the massive hammers whose graven heads were as wide as she was tall. They looked more like the trunks of ancient trees than any weapon she had ever seen.

“Is it all to your liking?” Illraine asked from behind her, the grate of her voice nearly startling Sultae in its unexpected gruffness, the sound echoing throughout the chamber.

She spun on the woman, unable to contain her glee. “It is perfect, Forger Illraine; perfect. Your craftsmanship is beyond reproach. I-we, could have wished for nothing greater. We thank you.” Sultae bowed low, the woman’s beaming smile challenging the forge in brightness.

“Would you join us in feast? My people would celebrate your company.”

Sultae bit back her impatience, eager to set to work. It would not do to offend her host. “Of course. I would be honored.”

Illraine’s smile grew by degrees as she waved Sultae on, turning on her heel and leading the way back into the darkness of the corridor. Sultae glanced at the marvel of the forge once more, letting her sight linger a moment before following behind Illraine. As much as she longed to work the magic of the goddess’ blood, there was time enough to extol the creators of her gift.

Soon enough, she would have nothing but time.

Chapter Thirty

“It would appear the Lathahns do not intend to turn the warrior over,” General Morgron said, turning to look at the warlord. “They must not have taken your threat seriously enough.”

Vorrul nodded, his long snout pulled into a toothy snarl. “Resume the attack and have the pack return to the field. I want the Lathahns to see the whole of what they have wrought with their refusal. Perhaps it will spur them to rethink their choice.” He waited until his general signaled the staff-bearers and the host began to march clear of the trees, before continuing. “Have our troops reached the Pathrale side?”

“They should cut the city off shortly.”

“What of Rolff?”

“There’s been no word. Our messenger from Nurin has not returned.”

The warlord paced with short, rigid strides, his eyes locked on Lathah. “Send another. I would know what that piece of dung is up to. He had better be dead.”

“If he doesn’t show? Do we simply raze the city from range?”

Vorrul stood silent for a moment, watching as the first of fiery spheres of energy roared into the air, illuminating the night in a reddish glow. “I would rather spend Rolff’s men in the labyrinth of the Lathahn streets than our own, but I think we will be forced to storm the city if that fool does not show soon. We would lose much in the way of meat if we wait until Lathah has fallen.”

“We could forego the risk and simply eat the Korme.”

A smile slipped onto Vorrul’s snout. “There is good reason you have risen so far in the ranks, Morgron.” He set a hand upon the general’s shoulder and gave it a hearty shake, a harsh laugh bubbling up in his throat. “Should Rolff not find his way here in time to fulfill his meager role, I may well heed your advice the next we see the Korme bastard.” He gestured toward the city. “But for now, have the staff-bearers focus upon the wall. I would have a clear path through the city so as to minimize our losses. However assured our victory, we cannot afford to throw our numbers away on needless infighting. I would have us strong come whatever eventuality.”

Morgron nodded and strode off to set the warlord’s commands in motion. Vorrul growled at the Korme incompetence. He had hoped to use their forces as a spearhead, letting them run into any Lathahn surprises that might still lurk within the great walls. That option now unlikely, he knew he must put his pack at risk to ensure proper food supplies for his campaign.

While the Lathahns had once posed the greatest threat to Grol existence and advancement, it was now the Pathra that worried him. Unlike the Lathahns, the cats were not a stationary target to simply be burned out as they hid behind their walls. The Pathra would whittle at his forces, hit and run tactics taking their toll as Vorrul was forced to march through vast swaths of unfriendly territory to ensure any kind of victory. Were his army short on food, it would only compound his losses, ensuring he would have to commit to an advance before he had properly softened the cats’ resistance with fire. Even with the magic, he feared a loss were he to be drawn into the Pathran’s territory before taking a toll upon their numbers.

He growled once more as he contemplated his options. He could only hope the Lathahn warrior could be found and made to give up his secrets. Understanding the full power of the relics, Vorrul was certain he could sway the odds in his favor. There was much of Ahreele left to overthrow, and he would need every advantage were he to be its conqueror.

Chapter Thirty-One

When they’d set out from Pathrale, Domor had felt as though a storm churned inside him, its raging power urging him on like the furious wind. That feeling pushed him for the vast majority of their arduous run, but now, as they neared the city of Lathah, Domor felt as though the storm was spent, his body the ruin left after its passing.

His breath burning in his lungs, he was glad to see the Sha’ree come to a halt, at last. He stumbled to a stop behind him and bent double as gasped to draw in air, his hands on his knees. He looked to the bracer Uthul had lent him, the symbols casting off a dull green glow that flickered wanly.

Jerul came to stand alongside him. Domor didn’t need to look up at the warrior to know he was smiling. His feelings of joy were so intense, even Domor could read him across their bond. He believed the whole of Vel could, given the warrior’s radiance.

“This is amazing,” Jerul said as he shifted back and forth in place, as though his feet were unable to remain still.

Domor stretched to his full height with a groan and glared at his blood-companion. “So you’ve announced nearly every twenty feet since our departure from Pathrale. I begin to think you may well be telling the truth of your feelings, having doubted your statement the first hundred times.”

Jerul laughed. “Am I to share in your misery then, Velen? Would that set your heart at ease?”

Domor nodded. “Yes, it would.” A smile slipped to his lips in spite of his weariness.

Although exhaustion had settled into his marrow, Domor truly could find little to complain of. It had been but moments after he had donned the bracer that the pain in his wrist disappeared, its use unimpeded. Though they had run without pause from the far borders of Pathrale to those of Lathah, he felt no pain or hunger. Were it not for his tiredness, a state he attributed more to his own physical failings than to those of the magic that powered the relic he wore, he imagined he would be grinning as foolishly as Jerul.

He looked at the restless warrior and his smile grew broader. His blood-companion’s wounds had healed completely, the purple of his veins standing out bright against his pale skin. It had only been yesterday that Jerul had hung limply at death’s door, brutalized by the Yviri invaders. But today, the warrior bounced on the balls of his feet, an endless font of youthful energy that Domor wished he could siphon from to relieve his own fatigue. He hoped the Sha’ree did not expect much from him, for there was little left to give.

As though he had heard Domor’s thoughts, the Sha’ree turned from his distant stare and looked to him and Jerul. He raised a hand for their silence as he moved to their side. He spoke in whispers. “We have come at a dire time. The invasion of Lathah has already begun.” He gestured to the shadows of the woods ahead. “Several of the Grol stand in our path and must be removed without alerting the whole of their forces. We must strike at the same moment so as to allow no time for them to call out.” The Sha’ree’s eyes landed squarely on Domor. “Will this be a concern for you?”

While Domor believed he would have no qualms against ending the life of a Grol, he had no confidence he could pull it off, even if he weren’t so weary. He started to shake his head, to refuse.

“He’ll do fine,” Jerul answered for him.

Domor’s mind whirled and he remembered his bag had been left behind. He scrambled for an excuse. “But I have no weapon.”

Jerul pulled one of the blades from the harness at his back, having thought to find replacements for his lost swords from amidst the Yviri dead. He passed it to Domor, who took it with reluctance. To his surprise, the sword felt light in his hand, the bracer at his wrist glimmering. He cursed under his breath as he examined the jagged blade, it being so different from his dagger. He wasn’t even certain he knew how to wield the sword well enough to take a life. He began to raise another argument against his involvement, but Uthul waved them on and moved away.

Jerul stepped to where the Sha’ree pointed and Domor was obliged to do the same, moving a few paces further down the tree line so that the three of them were spread out across a twenty foot space. He drew in a deep breath as Uthul counted down with his fingers, pointing the direction they each needed to go.

The Sha’ree and Jerul slipped through the foliage without a sound and Domor did as best he could, fearful that the gentle creak of the limbs he slid past and the leaves beneath his feet would give him away. They traveled only a short distance before he could hear the Grol moving about, snarling and grumbling in the trees. He glanced to his side for reassurance, the others difficult to see despite him knowing where they were. It was clear both were far more adept at stealthy approaches. Each nodded at him in turn.

Domor nodded back, his inner voice begging him to reconsider. The Grol were no Bulrath to be laid low by the likes of him, but once he spied the first of the beasts, he knew it was too late to back down; he was committed.

To his side, Jerul and Uthul slowed their pace to a crawl, Domor copying their movements, even down to imitating how Jerul carried his sword low before him. Though the weight of it was no bother, it felt as though he were readying to take an axe to a tree. He glanced up at the Grol warrior that paced between the trees, its muscled back turned to him, and thought the similarity apt.

He saw Uthul halt and raise his hand for them to wait. Domor followed suit and stood rigid, lifting his sword up as Jerul did. His hands trembled and he could hear the beat of his heart pounding its quickened rhythm in his ears. He waited, certain the Grol would scent them despite them facing away, seemingly intent upon Lathah, which lay just beyond the woods.

He’d heard rumor of the beasts’ amazing sense of smell and tracking abilities, blessed to have never had occasion to experience it firsthand, but as he stood there less than twelve feet from one, he began to doubt the veracity of such tales. Between the muck and dirt of travel and the blood of Bulrath and Yvir that coated his robes, the smell wafting up into his own nose, he wondered how the Grol couldn’t know they were there behind them.

The dull glimmer of the bracer at his wrist shined steady, though its light seemed contained by its source, no flicker of it illuminating the cold steel in his hands. His thoughts jumbled and possessed of a life of their own, he figured it likely the ancient magic of the bracer had subdued his scent as it had its light, and perhaps even the noise of his travel. It would explain how he’d managed to sneak up behind a Grol, against all reason.

Uthul gave him no chance to ponder further, the assembled Grol all having turned away from their positions. The Sha’ree met his eyes and made it clear Domor was expected to carry through with his part of the attack. The Sha’ree began to tick off fingers. Jerul too glanced over at him during the countdown, miming a sword strike and nodding. Domor could feel the muted waves of Jerul’s encouragement through their bond and nodded back. He held his breath as Uthul’s last finger folded into his palm, the Sha’ree motioning for them to move.

No more than blurs in his peripheral vision, Jerul and Uthul shot forward. His mind screamed a thousand reasons to stay where he stood and let the warriors handle the killing, but a single voice broke through the cowardly shouts and demanded he move. The voice so like that of his long-dead father, he swallowed hard at its infuriating sound and charged.

The furred back of the Grol was before him in an instant. The beast snapped its head about to look toward where Uthul and Jerul were set upon his companions. The lives of its companions ended in a heartbeat, Domor raised his sword to do the same to it. The Grol spied him and spun just as the jagged blade dropped.

Domor felt a tug of resistance as the edge bit deep of the Grol’s side, the blade sliding through the meat above its hip and cutting downward toward its groin. Having missed the bone the sword cleaved clean through the meat, leaving behind a ragged furrow, crimson spray showering the undergrowth like the patter of rain.

The Grol grunted and stumbled, nearly falling in its effort to escape the wrath of Domor’s sword. Its yellowed eyes glared at him for just an instant before it reared back its head and drew in a raspy breath.

Domor felt his heart grow still in his chest as he realized the beast intended to loose a howl to warn its brethren. Cold sweat stinging his eyes, he darted forward, spun the sword about, and drove the point of the blade down into the Grol’s open mouth with all of his strength.

The first resonating note was cut short as the wide blade split the beast’s mouth in half at its jaw before sinking into its throat. The tip and several reddened inches of blade burst through at its nape. A gurgle of dark blood bubbled up around the steel as the Grol grasped frantic at the sword. Domor looked into its widened red eyes as it sunk to the ground in violent spasms. His hands slid from the hilt, his fingers cold and numb.

He watched a moment longer as the Grol gave one last shudder before a river of black spilled from its split mouth, running unrestrained down the Grol’s chest and stomach. Its dead eyes held Domor’s gaze fast, his guilt reflected in their sightless pools. He could look no more.

He stumbled away from the body and felt his stomach churn, sickness crowded thick in his throat. His mind replayed the Grol’s death and he buckled and fell to his knees as vomit spewed into the undergrowth. He fought to stay quiet against the roiling tides of nausea, but he knew not if he succeeded, the sounds loud in his head.

Jerul was at his back. He felt his blood-companion’s concern through the muddy link of their bond before he felt his hand on his shoulder, but he could do nothing to acknowledge the warrior’s presence, caught up as he was in his fit.

As hard as it was to slay the Bulrath, he knew its death had been a necessity. Had he not put his knife to it, Jerul would have been killed, but the beast was different. Domor knew in his mind he’d done what was right, the entirety of the Grol race nothing more than savage animals that murder for pleasure and eat the flesh of their victims without remorse. But however cruel and destructive they may be, Domor couldn’t help but wonder if he was any different than they.

He hadn’t killed the beast in self-defense but had snuck up behind it and tried to take its head off for no reason other than it stood in his path. It had been no less than murder. He vomited again at the thought, his head spinning in a haze of guilt and disgust at what he’d done. Perhaps his people had been right about labeling him an outcast, believing he could not be led from the ways of the barbarian races and into the glory of Ree’s light. Domor could hear their condemning words in his head as he clutched to the spittle-covered tree trunk.

He had never been able to truly abide by the Velen ways, but he could not forget their message. It sat heavy on his shoulders like the weight of an axe.

He did not know how long he clung there before his stomach settled, but it seemed an eternity when Jerul helped him to his feet. The warrior handed him a piece of cloth to wipe his face. Domor saw the concern in his companion’s eyes, but he felt compelled to look away as he dabbed at the crust that encircled his mouth and chin.

The Sha’ree came to stand before him, the lines of his lips twisted into what Domor presumed was a smile. “Can you continue?”

Domor felt his stomach roil once more, but he nodded. As sick as he felt, he knew it best to go on. The cruelties of war looming before him, he could not hide away in the trees and hope they passed him by. He gathered himself up and wiped his hands clean on his robes.

Jerul at his side, they made their way past the dead Grol, Domor’s eyes averted, and continued on. After a short while, the intermittent blare of horns broke the silence, a shrieking whistle sounding overtop of them. Explosions shook the ground as they emerged from the woods and stared out at the hazy spires of Lathah, the night sky lighted by spheres of fire that hovered over the city. Flames flickered all about within Lathah, a great number of the inner levels missing huge swaths of the protective stone walls. Black smoke rose up in thick billows to disappear against the backdrop of the mountains.

Before their eyes, the flaming spheres dropped down upon the outer wall, fury and fire laying it low. Stones flying amidst the maelstrom, the wall toppled in giant crash that shook the ground beneath their feet. Domor saw Jerul stiffen beside him, his hand going to the only remaining blade in his harness. Uthul waved him to calm as the spirited howls of the Grol filled the air. As though a dam had been released, the army of beasts broke from their ranks and charged toward Lathah in a wave of growling fury.

“We must help them,” Jerul cried, no concern for the shrill loudness of his voice.

“No,” Uthul told him, the word reinforced in steel. “You would not make it out alive. I will find Zalee and Cael, as well as our O’hra-bearer, and ensure they make it safely out.”

Jerul growled, but the Sha’ree stood his ground. “The cause of our people is better served if you remain alive, warrior. Throw your life away to save a pitiful few and you damn all of Ahreele, not just yourself.” He pointed to the city wreathed in flames, the Grol streaming through the shattered wall like ants upon a corpse. “They are already dead.”

Jerul stood rigid for a moment and then his shoulders slumped, his hand coming free of his sword hilt. His chin hung to his chest and he loosed a defeated breath.

Uthul set a hand on his arm. “The time for revenge will come when we are certain of victory.”

“Go,” Domor told the Sha’ree. “Bring my nephew out safe.”

Uthul nodded and dashed away, only to disappear from sight just feet from where they stood. Domor cast his gaze about but could see nothing of the Sha’ree. He looked to the burning city and felt his heart go out to those trapped inside, the Grol army inside its walls.

Unable to watch any longer, Domor pulled Jerul back to the relative safety of the trees. While he knew they stood no chance of remaining undiscovered should the Grol truly wish to find them, he would rather wait for them in the woods, if they would come.

At least from within the shadows of the great oaks and evergreens, he would not have to bear witness to the ruin of a nation.

Chapter Thirty-Two

The explosions that shattered the front wall of Lathah shook the mountain at their backs. Arrin stared as gouts of fire and dust sprung up at the Ninth in the wake of the fireballs, obscuring his vision for a moment in its swirling chaos. As it began to clear, he spied the ruin of the wall as its destruction spread. The weight of the stones no longer supported, the wall crumbled to the sides, clearing a path to the field outside.

He knew the Grol were coming before he heard the horns. He could hear their raised voices even above the rumbling of the falling wall and the panic in the streets. Maltis and Barold stood rigid at his side as they too heard the warning, Kirah and Waeri and their people were gathered about him with wide eyes. He looked to see Malya alongside the Sha’ree, the young boy nearly on the hem of her cloak. The prince had fled at some point, but Lord Xilth still squirmed upon the cobblestones, having been abandoned by his liege and the royal guard. His cries were pitiful.

“We must go,” the Sha’ree told him, the tone of her voice demanding.

Arrin waggled a finger at her. “I’m not going anywhere. The wall to the Crown still stands and I intend to hold it for as long as it takes so that at least some of my people might make it to safety.” He turned to Malya. “Go, damn you. Go.” He grasped Maltis by the shoulder and shoved him toward the princess. “Get her and her family to the tunnels.”

Maltis met Arrin’s cold stare and nodded. He motioned for Malya to follow him, but she resisted. The commander latched onto her arm and pulled her away toward the streets that led to the royal quarters. Barold raced to his side to assist as Malya shouted her disapproval.

Arrin ignored her and turned to Kirah. “Take your people and go with the commander. I promised your father to see you safely home, and I would keep my word.”

Kirah shook her head, the fur of her mane dancing wild. “No. Show us how to use the relics. We would fight alongside you.”

“No, sister, we cannot,” Waeri shouted. “Lathah is lost. Our people will need every warrior to defend Pathrale against the Grol horde once they are done here. This is a losing battle.”

“You must all flee,” Zalee growled, moving between them. “There is more at stake than just Lathah or Pathrale. The whole of Ahreele stands to be lost if we hesitate here.”

Arrin spun on her. “The Grol take Ahreele and you as well.” The collar at his neck cast off a brilliant green, its heat warming his throat. “I care not for your war save for the suffering it has brought upon those I care for. I came only to see my family away from here, my people safe, but that has been cast to the wind by the machinations of fools.” He stepped in close to the Sha’ree, meeting her glaring pink gaze. Despite his fury, tears ran free from his eyes. “It is enough that I must give up hope for my unknown child that lives somewhere in the chaos below, but I will not surrender its mother to the cruel mercies of the Grol, as well.” He spit. “Do as you will, Sha’ree, but my stand is here.”

Zalee stood her ground. Her stare bore into Arrin’s skull, but he would not be moved. After a tense moment, she gave him an acquiescent nod and gestured toward the bodies of the royal guard as she drew back a few paces. “I will not disguise our need for one such as you, Arrin Urrael. The path ahead requires a warrior of great skill to win through and time is against us. We need your sword. If you would but agree to help, I would see to it myself that the princess and her family are carried from this place, as far away as Ah Uto Ree, if necessary, so as to assure you of their safety. I give you the word of my people.”

Arrin looked out over the burning walls of his homeland, the smoke whirling before his eyes, the vicious growls of the Grol thick in his ears. No matter how hard he tried, he could see no hope in what he intended. His child was gone from the world amidst the fall of Lathah and there would be no peace for his guilt and shame. He had failed, once more. All that he loved was gone. He had only the sour memories of what once was to sustain him. They were but weak embers against the blizzard of despair that wailed in his heart.

Despite it all, there was a single coal that simmered inside him. Its burning heat spoke its fury amidst the sorrow, pleading to be set loose upon the world to salve the ruin of his love. He looked out at the Grol army once more as it ran through the streets of his beloved city. He knew somewhere in its wake was his child, either dead by fire, or tooth and claw, but dead nevertheless. He would never know his offspring, would never be given the closure of commending its body to the ground, to know its name so that he might honor its memory in truth.

He had given his life to the dream that he would one day hold his child in his arms and now that dream was naught but ash, its memory bitter in his mouth. For all that Olenn had kept him from it was the Grol that buried the last vestiges of his hope. All that remained of his child was Malya. If he could do nothing else with his life, he would be certain she survived.

His vision blurred by tears, he turned to face the Sha’ree. “See the princess and her family, Maltis and Barold, along with the Pathran emissaries, to safety in Pathrale and my sword is yours. I will hold the Grol for as long as is feasible to give you more time, and then follow behind, on my word.”

Zalee bowed deep. “Then we are agreed, Arrin Urrael.” She turned to the Pathra. “If we are to be free, we must go now.”

Kirah shook her head. “I would stay.” She looked to Waeri. “Take our people home, brother. I will follow soon.”

Waeri growled but moved to embrace his sister. “You are a fool, Kirah, but you are our father’s fool, and I would expect no less of you. It would serve me better to wish a mountain to stand aside than to convince you of the folly of what you choose. Come home to us, sister.” He broke away and went to stand alongside the Sha’ree.

Arrin went to the Pathra and pulled a pair of bracers from within the bag that held them. He gave his thanks to the warriors and bid them farewell. “We will seek you out soon, Waeri, your sister and I.”

The Pathra each embraced Kirah as they passed, the Sha’ree urging them to hurry. Moments later, they were gone, following in the path of Malya and the commander. Only Arrin and Kirah stood amidst the bodies that littered the courtyard, Lord Xilth having succumbed to his wound and gone silent.

Arrin handed the bracers to Kirah. “There is little time to teach you their use, but what comes naturally should be sufficient for our needs.”

He watched as she slid them onto her wrists, the metal seeming to shrink so that they fit her snug. Her eyes went wide, Arrin understanding her awe as the tendrils of the Sha’ree magic burrowed inside her to make the bracers one with her flesh. She wobbled and threatened to fall as Arrin grasped her arm to keep her standing. After a moment, he felt her strengthen and released his hold.

She looked at him with wonder on her face. He could see the wound at her cheek knitting itself together. She seemed not to notice, her eyes having dropped to look upon the glow of the bronze bracers.

“I feel as though the sun burns within my veins.”

Arrin watched her, remembering the moment he first donned the collar. “You will grow accustomed to it soon enough.”

“I would have it linger,” she said, her eyes drifting up to meet his, a broad smile gracing her lips.

“For all the magic’s glory, Kirah, it is but a tool. It will not keep those you love from harm or keep the demons from your dreams. Mark these words, if you would remember nothing else.”

Arrin glanced back to the city below, the Grol eating at it from within. “We have but a short while to prepare. Pay heed so that we might both be true to our pledges.”

The sounds of battle echoing through the blood-stained streets, the cries of the dying thick on the fetid breeze, Arrin did what he could to ready Kirah for what was to come. He feared it would not be enough.

For all his courage, he felt the weight of his promise upon his shoulders. He had sworn to defend Ahreele, giving his life to the Sha’ree, and to return Kirah safely home to the arms of her father, but as the masses of Grol made their way through the fallen city, he knew no certainty.

Dread had cast its shadow over him and he felt its chill. He drew his sword and loosed a scream at the gathered Grol that battered at the gates to the Crown. If death had chosen this day for him to die, Arrin swore it would cost the beasts dearly.

Chapter Thirty-Three

The roar of the ocean long lost to the haze of the desert sand, Braelyn came upon the source of the flickering light that had lured her into the golden depths. Even when night had blanketed the sky in darkness, there had been a glimmer of illumination that drew her on until dawn had lighted her beacon once more. For all its willingness to be found, it had not been an easy journey.

The serpent-beast had been only the start of the terror that had followed her along her desperate path. Where once thick rivulets of sweat soaked her clothing as fully as the ocean had at her arrival, she stood now as dry as the unidentifiable bones that littered the sand. Not even the cool whispers of her blade could ease the sweltering heat that clung to her in lecherous embrace, its touch sparing no part of her flesh, no matter how sacred.

Her protective cloak had been torn away, leaving her head exposed, and dragged into the depths of the earth by a creature she could not even begin to describe, its deformities so bizarre as to defy the clarity of words.

Dozens of others, more closely related to the serpent, had struck at her as she trudged across the desert terrain, bursting from the ground with little warning, each determined to end her life. She battled through, drawing blood on each, leaving only one dead in the sand behind her despite her effort.

Though none had been so fortunate to sink tooth or spine into her flesh, they had still taken their toll upon her. As she closed upon the glimmer of reflected light, she could no longer do so much as lift the heft of her blade. Its point left a wavering trail in the sand behind her, its hilt held in her hand solely by the long strip of cloth that wound its way around her wrist and hand, tying the sword in place.

Her mind a haze of dust and melted thought, it took her several moments to realize she no longer walked upon the shifting sands of the desert, the quiet crunch of broken glass beneath her heels. She glanced down to see the land had transformed from soft gold to a crystalline blackness that cracked under her weight.

Almost too weary to lift her chin, she forced her head upright. Where the desert had once filled her sight, it was now a field of black glass that stretched into the distant horizon. The whistle of the desert wind, the only sound she’d heard for miles back besides her panted breaths and the whisper of the sand under her feet, had been replaced by an eerie creak. Like a frozen lake, the obsidian crystal moaned under its own weight, tiny cries of its suffering calling out to her.

Nowhere but forward to go, a sentence of death at her back, Braelyn continued without pause. She made an effort to keep her sword from dragging along the crystalline floor as she pushed on, forcing her feet to move ahead one step at a time.

Though she had no sense of time and knew not how long she traveled over the glass, the obsidian desert only became a different kind of torture as the heat was reflected upward to bake her from both top and bottom. She willed her feet forward, each step more arduous than the last until the came to a muddled realization.

She stood in shadow.

She raised her eyes only to find the once unfathomable distance that had sprawled out before her to have been cut short to little more than a couple of horse lengths. A wall of black glass towered before her. It rose up over a hundred feet into the bright morning sky. Its walls ran hundreds of feet in each direction, and at the building’s center loomed a massive portal flanked by obsidian columns, its archway set at close to thrice Braelyn’s height. The smooth perfection of its crystalline exterior was unmarred by either beast or the wearing hand of time.

Just beyond the great building was the source of the eerie glow that had drawn her on during the dark night. A great, bubbling lake of greenish fluid churned and frothed, whispered sparks flickering above its surface. It seemed to go on forever, a hazy blur of steam obscuring the length of it. The scent of it filled her nose, its odor bitter and sharp. She could taste a hint of something metallic in it, a subtle film coating her throat. Her skin prickled as she examined the lake as though a murky breeze had washed over her and had left behind a gritty residue, but the air was still. She didn’t like the feeling.

Her body too taxed to move with any real purpose, she shuffled forward as quickly as she was able. Little more than a dry husk, drained of nearly all her fluid, she reveled in the coolness of the shade that settled over her. Chills prickled her skin and she felt almost cold with the addition of her sword’s energy, but she could not bring herself to sheath the blade. It felt too much like home.

As she neared the gaping entryway, she muscled her sword up and held it out before her unsure of what she might encounter in the dim light beyond. She had no confidence she could ward off an attack should it come, her hand blurring the tip of her sword in its spasms, but she would not go to the earth without resistance. She felt relieved when she slipped inside, finding nothing waiting there to test her resolve.

The air inside the great obsidian construct was even colder than that outside in its shadow. Braelyn could see each breath as she exhaled, the adjustment tying her stomach in knots. Her sight wavered as she pushed forward into the chamber that opened up before her. Other than the gentle glow that seemed to emanate from the crystalline substance itself, the whole of the building was cast in a shade of black.

Crafted entirely of the obsidian stone, the walls, floor, and arched ceiling of the small room ran seamless, no color or feature marring the singularly dark creation. Only the lighter shapes of open portals running at the compass points broke up the overwhelming shimmer of blackness. Nothing to mark the paths from each other, Braelyn went left and strode through the thick-walled archway into the next chamber. Her eyes went wide at what awaited her. She knew then the purpose of the dark construct.

It was a mausoleum.

Unlike the entry chamber, this room rose up to the full height she had seen outside. The walls to the roof were lined ten high with deep-set alcoves, each with a rounded platform at their base, which jutted about a foot into the room. The dark canvass of the walls were broken up by the mass of bodies that stood rigid in nearly every alcove, each dressed in luxurious silver robes whose material seemed to shimmer in the dim light.

Braelyn drew closer for a better look.

Though open to the air, the beings in the alcove showed no obvious signs of deterioration despite their flesh being a pale yellowish-green. She could scent no decay nor see any rot upon the fine material of the robes. Their angular faces were almost abstract in design, large, closed eyes running almost perpendicular above the tiny dot of a nose. The straight line of their mouth was nearly smooth, with no lips to speak of. All were dressed in the same robes, only the slightly sharper features and the gentle swell of breasts gave any indication as to the gender of the deceased.

There was a striking unity to the presentation of the bodies. She glanced down the line to see that each wore a silvered collar about their neck, a thin metal harness that ran in straps crisscrossed over the chests and ending in a belt that encircled their waists, and bracers of the same bronze material at their wrists and ankles. Engraved along the entirety of the metal apparel were symbols she knew not, which were raised slightly above the metal surfaces.

Also housed alongside each, set in a clasp to the left of the body, was a silvered spear and a long, thin blade propped to their right. Every pommel was set with a round, iridescent stone at its tip.

Braelyn examined the alcove closely and could see no obvious attempt at defense. She unwound the wrap from her hand and sheathed her sword, casting a glance about the room. Her breath cold in her lungs, she reached out and ran her finger along the hilt of one of the dead being’s swords. The tip of her finger tingled at its touch and she could feel the gentle warmth that emanated from the metal, though no pain accompanied it.

Encouraged, she grasped the hilt and pulled the blade to her. Only silence greeted her pilferage.

She turned the unexpectedly light sword over in her hand and once more felt the subtle prickle of energy as she clasped her fingers tight about the hilt. The stone at the pommel glimmered to life at her grip, a greenish hue flickering in its depths. The glow seemed to infuse the symbols drawn down its length, each lighting up in turn.

Intense surges of power, stopping just short of painful, traveled down the length of her arm where it seemed to settle in her chest and radiate from there throughout the rest of her body. She felt her weariness retreat at its touch, a sudden feeling of vigor overcoming her that chased at the tail of her aches and pains.

She glanced at the hand that wielded the blade and saw the sun-tortured skin beginning to heal, the raised blisters draining and sinking back into the flesh, the reddened skin paling to its normal shade. She felt the bloody cracks at her lips knitting together and ran her tongue over them, the skin soft and supple after but a few minutes.

The hunger and thirst in her belly had calmed and she felt oddly sated despite how long it had been since she had last consumed either food or drink. Though she knew not the why of it, Braelyn celebrated the feeling, only then realizing how close she’d come to death before she’d picked up the blade.

She felt renewed and clutched tighter to the strange sword, fearful of letting it go lest the wonder of its touch fade with its release. The murderous desert surrounding her, this was not the place for weakness.

Her body regenerated and her spirit drifting amongst the clouds, she explored the great halls of the dead. The touch of a single sword restoring her flesh and drive, she wondered what other wonders she might find within its hallowed chambers.

An alien world awaited her outside and Braelyn was determined she would not face it unprepared.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Hard on the heels of Zalee, the clustered Pathran emissaries all about, Cael felt lost. They had caught up to the watch commander and the princess and had run to her home to find her family. The boys’ eyes were as wide as the moon as they were led outside, their voices raised in excited chatter. Cael could see the wonder on their faces. Oblivious to the worry that weighed heavy upon their mother, it was as if they’d started off on a grand adventure.

Cael understood how they felt, but he’d seen too much to share in their excitement. With the howls and cries of the Grol reverberating through the city, he wanted only to be gone. He moved closer to the princess’ children, forcing a smile for their sake.

With an angry shout that rivaled the beasts, the princess tore her arm free from the commander’s hold. “I know what’s expected of me, commander.” She called her husband and children to her. “I can find my way to the tunnels without your lead.”

Maltis bowed as the princess spun on her heels and ushered her family before her, men of the guard carrying her senseless father carefully in their arms. Despite her anger, the commander stayed close, Barold right beside her, as well. Zalee kept a measure of distance, her pink eyes in constant motion. Her head swiveled to look everywhere. The Pathra surrounded the party at the rear, their weapons at the ready.

The insistent Grol noises spurred the group on and they moved quickly, the princess leading them back to the courtyard they had only recently left. It was empty save for the corpses of those killed by the Lathahn warrior. The princess chastised her children’s as they gawked and steered them into the Great Hall, her husband at her side, a short blade ready in his hand. The men who carried her father came close behind.

Cael couldn’t help but admire the beauty of the hall as they hurried through it, slipping through a curtained alcove that sat hidden behind a great tapestry on the wall behind the throne. After moving through a short corridor that split three ways at its end, the princess led them to the right, into a long hall. After twenty paces, she stopped suddenly.

“Give me your sword, Falen,” she said to her husband.

He did so, passing it over by the hilt. The princess grasped it in both hands and slid the point into a slot in the ceiling, Cael had not noticed. She pressed it upward until there was a quiet click. Falen set his hand upon the wall to her left and pushed. A portion of the wall swung open without a sound revealing a dark corridor beyond. She withdrew the blade and passed it back to her husband.

Falen went in first, calling out from the darkness a moment later for them to follow. The sergeant went in after, pulling a torch from the sconce set just inside. The princess ushered her sons inside and waved for the rest to follow. At Zalee’s urging, Cael went in before her and made room for the rest.

The corridor dark, he could see little of its design. Behind him, the party fully inside, the princess closed the hidden door. It shut without sound. A sudden flash of light blinded him for a moment as the sergeant lighted the torch, its flickering brightness chasing the darkness away. His vision cleared and he saw they stood within a narrow hallway hewn from natural stone. It ran straight into the darkness beyond the orb’s reach.

The sergeant ahead, the party moved down the hall for what seemed an eternity, coming to stop at a metal gate that sat closed before a steel door. The sergeant grasped the bars of the gate, each as thick as Cael’s arm, and growled. He reached through the bars to strike the door with his fist, only the muffled slap of meat sounding out.

“The prince has sealed the tunnels,” Barold said as he spun about. His eyes seemed to glow against his dark face. There was worry in its lines.

“That bastard,” Falen said, turning to face his wife. “He would abandon his own family?” he asked, as though he thought even the prince above such callousness.

The princess bowed her head and Cael swore he could see tears welling in her eyes. Her husband pulled her close as Barold and Maltis stared at each other, saying nothing.

Zalee slipped past to the gate and set her hand upon it, and then the door in turn. She shook her head. “There is no way past. Is there another route to these tunnels of yours?”

Maltis shook his head. “None that would lead us beyond the walls.”

A growl bubbled low in her throat. “Then we must return the way we came and pray we have not lost our opportunity.”

Without waiting, she stormed off down the corridor. Cael ran to keep up, the shuffle of hurried feet at his back. Zalee led them back to the secret door and through the Great Hall, back out once more into the courtyard. Only there did she stop, raising a hand. The sounds of battle rang in their ears.

Cael could see no fighting, the cluster of tall homes and buildings leaving only the view of the cobblestone streets unimpeded, but he knew it was fierce. Zalee urged them on, winding her way back toward the gate they had come through earlier. The clash of steel and groans of the dying grew louder as they traveled on. He wondered why Zalee had chosen this route, knowing full well the Grol would likely have reached the level by then. The answer was there before him just a moment later.

Just beyond the open gate that led to the level below was the battle he had heard. Grol bodies littered the streets in lifeless piles. The cobblestones beneath them ran red, rivers of blood filling the cracks between the stones. Little more than a blur of movement above the carpet of dead, the Lathahn weaved his way amidst the clustered Grol, beasts dropping in crumpled heaps in his furious wake. The Pathran warrior at his side, she too waded through the invaders with graceful motions, leaving no Grol alive behind her. Neither fighter seemed to see anything but the enemy that stood in their path.

Though they kept their peace, Cael could see the pride on the faces of the Pathran emissaries. Sharpened smiles stretched their mouths. The princess reached out and pulled her children behind her by their collars, both having crowded in front of her as though to shield her from the battle. Falen took their place, but the princess’ eyes never left the fight before her. Cael could not read her thoughts as he could the Pathra’s, her expression guarded.

At his side, Zalee looked about a moment, seeming to come to a decision. She drew close to Maltis, pointing to the wall that loomed just behind the battle. “Keep the party together and make your way to the wall.”

The commander nodded and brought everyone in tight. Barold leading the way once more with Falen just behind, the group sprinted as best they could across the slick cobblestones, dodging bodies until they reached a narrow alley. The sergeant pushed on, the sounds of fighting dimmed somewhat by the nearby homes, and ran until he reached the great wall. As they clustered about, Zalee drew up from behind and came to stand beside the wall.

“As we cannot flee through the streets, the Grol army far too numerous to avoid, there is only one other path for us.” She pointed to the top of the wall. “We must travel above the streets.”

The commander looked at her with narrow, disbelieving eyes. “There is no way above them save for upon the walls, but even that leads us only from one side of the city to the other, with no way across to the next wall.”

“No way for you,” Zalee said. She pulled her boots and gloves off and handed them to Cael as the party stared at her, uncertainty thick in the air. “When it is time, send the children first,” she said, without explaining. She latched onto the wall and crawled up its side, disappearing at the top.

A moment later, the looped end of the silvery rope they’d used to sneak into Lathah dropped beside them. No one moved. Cael growled and motioned to the princess’ youngest child. He was reluctant to leave his mother’s side.

“Put your foot in the loop and grab ahold of the knot. Zalee will pull you up.” Malya stood by her son, protectiveness burning in her green eyes. Cael raised his hands, but persisted. “I have seen the miraculous take shape before my eyes, and have even witnessed the Sha’ree speaking with the Goddess Ree. If you would see your sons borne safe from here, you must have faith in Zalee.”

Malya stood a moment, saying nothing as she stared into Cael’s eyes. Finally her reluctance broke and she ruffled her son’s hair. “Go to the rope, Kylle. We will be right behind.”

The boy nodded and Malya watched as her youngest slid his foot into the loop and grasped the knot. Zalee wasted no time and pulled him up, the princess’ stare locked upon her son the entire time. He waved from above before moving away from the edge. The rope dropped down an instant after he was gone from sight. Malya sent her second son up, and followed behind, the limp king being hauled up next. Cael followed behind him.

On the roof, as Zalee pulled the rest of the party up, Cael looked out over the city. Fires burned wild, filling the air with swirls of thick black smoke. The Grol army still spilled through the shattered front wall, scattering without discipline once inside Lathah. Horrible sounds drifted to his ears: the clang of swords colliding, the sound of the butcher’s block as meat met steel, and the cries of men dying filled his head with horror.

The streets ran thick with furred bodies, a maelstrom of claw and tooth that tore its way through the paltry resistance that still stood. The twang of bows sounded in dim echoes, raining death upon the Grol, but with the walls down, the trade of lives was far from even. Cael could see a number of beasts dead on the ground, feathered with shafts, but alongside them lay a far greater number of Lathahns, their bodies torn apart. He turned away, his stomach churning at the cruelty so blatantly on display. He felt sorry for the people down below. He could see no chance of victory.

The last of the party on the wall, Zalee inched to the far edge and glanced over. Cael followed her gaze, steeling it against what he knew he’d see. Down below, the streets were strangely calm, the masses of Grol spilling in through the center of the city where the walls had been taken down. Here where they still stood, the labyrinth of the levels keeping the battle from reaching the far corners. Stragglers scrambled about and soldiers hunkered down in preparation for the coming onslaught, but Cael could see no Grol among them.

Zalee cleared some space around her and began to whisper, her words little more than breaths amidst the chaos of the war around them. She stood rigid, her pink eyes staring off into the distance.

The princess, chiding her sons for standing too close to the edge of the wall, glanced to Cael. Unsure of what Zalee intended, he forced a smile that spoke of patience. He hoped it hid his uncertainty. Malya would know when they all did. One of the Pathra gasped and Cael spun to see why, his own breath catching in his lungs when he spied what the warrior had.

The dark smoke that rose up from the city around them had begun to drift toward them, gathering into what looked like roiling storm clouds. It no longer floated toward the sky, but seemed to hover thick at the apex of the wall. More and more of it came together, the murky darkness blotting out the ground below.

As Cael watched the clouds coalesce, he thought of the river at Pathrale and realized what Zalee intended. He glanced down again and was grateful the churning smoke blocked his view. Waeri and his people stared wide-eyed at the building clouds that stretched between the walls, seeming delighted. The princess seemed quite the opposite. Her expression was as dark as the smoke. The boys stared with broad grins stretching their faces, marveling at the whirling darkness. Malya’s husband stood near his sons as he too watched the smoke gather. There was the slightest glimmer of a smile upon his lips.

As the clouds compressed, their shifting softness beginning to take on the appearance of solidness, Cael thought he saw the shifting eyes of the goddess amidst the smoke, a reddened glint shimmering in the darkness. Cael smiled, hoping she could see him.

“We must hurry,” Zalee called out, a subtle rawness to her words. “Cael, go first and lead the princess and her children across.”

Called out on his words of trust, Cael knew he couldn’t hesitate. His experience at the river gave him a measure of confidence, but he couldn’t stop the trembles that rattled his body as he stepped out onto the clouds. His breath was frozen in his lungs until his foot settled, the smoke bearing his weight. Glad once more he couldn’t see through to the ground far below, he reached out his hand to the princess, his smile genuine.

With the fearless face only a mother could maintain, the princess stepped out onto the makeshift bridge before she allowed her children. Once she was sure it would hold them, she waved the boys forward. Smiles lighted their faces as they walked on the clouds. Malya, allowing no time for curiosity, walked as quickly as she dared. Her husband followed close behind, urging his sons on. At Falen’s back, the worried-eyed soldiers bore the king across, their steps exaggerated and cautious.

Cael stifled a laugh and hurried to the far wall as the rest of the party followed, Zalee coming last. As soon as she stepped onto the wall, the bridge at her back broke apart as though caught in a swift wind. The smoke churned and whirled, no longer bound to its unnatural form, and rose up once more into the sky.

Cael looked to Zalee to see her brow glistening with tiny drops of sweat. Her eyes seemed dim, their normal radiance subdued. She glanced at him, but looked away as their eyes met, stepping once more to the edge of the wall. He turned away to hide his concern amidst the awed faces of the party.

As before, Zalee whispered to the goddess and the smoke came at her call, forming the dark bridge across the open spaces between the walls. Cael watched at each crossing as Zalee grew more and more weary, frustrated that he could do nothing to help her. For her part, she weathered the effort in silence, but there was no hiding the suffering in her eyes, their pink having faded nearly to white by the time they reached the last wall.

Below them, the movement of Grol and Lathahn grew steadier the closer they came to the final level, a smattering of conflicts playing out in the crowded streets. Despite that, the walkways at the top of the walls set so far above the bedlam of the streets, they had not been noticed, despite the oddity of their travel. Cael gave thanks to Ree for that, hoping to one day learn the Sha’ree secrets so that he might tell her directly.

Zalee drew herself up and began her whispers once more. The clouds were slower to gather, but they did not refuse her summons. As she built her bridge of smoke, Cael noticed a sudden flurry of motion just below where they stood. He moved down the walkway to see more clearly past the smoke, leaning over the edge. The deep-throated growl of a Grol reached his ears just as his vision focused. His heart grew thunderous in his chest.

There in the maze of alleys between the houses, he spied the brown-haired girl he’d seen when he and Zalee had first come to Lathah. She ran parallel to the wall, heading in his direction, as she darted through the narrow alleys, swerving left and right to avoid the detritus that stood piled in her path. At her heels was a dark-furred Grol, scrabbling on all fours and howling. Despite the girl’s speed, Cael could see the beast was closing on her.

He looked to Zalee. Her face twisted in concentration, he knew he would find no help there. All eyes on the gathering smoke there was no time to plead for the party’s assistance. He darted to Zalee’s side and dug his hands beneath her cloak. If she noticed, she gave no sign. Her glazed focus was on the forming darkness.

He fumbled with the bag at her back and yanked the silvery rope out. With no time to tie it, he tossed the looped end around the nearest crenellation and ran the far end through the hole to keep it in place, dropping the rest down alongside the wall. He sucked in a quick breath and pulled his tunic up to protect his hands before slipping over the wall. He heard panicked voices call out to him as he went, their words lost in the wind of his descent.

He slid quickly down the rope, the heat of his passage burning at his hands despite the material of his tunic. The ground rushed toward him and he bit back a cry, wincing as he felt the rope tear at his palms. He gritted his teeth. It was too late to turn back.

He hit the ground hard and tumbled backward into the trash that littered the alley, the fetid piles buffering his fall. It exploded all around him, tumbling overtop as though a funeral of debris. Cael swept the garbage away just as the smell hit, and scrambled to his feet, grateful he had only a gentle throb at his knees in reward for his graceless landing. His eyes darted about to gather his bearings. He heard the snarling Grol approaching, the slap of the girl’s bare feet leading the way.

A thought was thrust into his mind right then, as sharp as a dagger through his eye. He had brought no weapon with which to challenge the Grol.

Already pounding its quickened rhythm, his heart grew even more tempestuous. He glanced about as he heard the girl approaching around the corner, his eyes landing on the rope. He dashed across the alley and snatched up the rope’s silvery end, running back to the corner. There was just enough slack so that the rope lay flat across the trash-strewn ground. He could see its silvery sheen, but there was no time to cover it up. His course had been set. He prayed to Ree he had made the right choice.

His plea barely formed, the young girl bolted around the corner and stepped lithely through the collected debris. She missed the rope by inches and Cael whispered thanks to Ree as she flew past. She glanced over her shoulder a few feet beyond the trap, perhaps spying him as she went by, and stumbled to a stop. The dark pits of her eyes stared at him, her cheeks flush with fear and the silver of her tears. She stood still as if stunned by his appearance.

Cael waved her on as he heard the grunted snarl of the Grol, almost upon them. She stared for an instant longer before she seemed to realize what he intended. Her lead having fallen away in just that short time, she dove for the meager cover of the trash.

Cael had no time to second-guess his plan because the Grol appeared around the corner, jagged yellow teeth and fiery red eyes leading the charge. It loped with fury, coming fast. Cael did his best to time the beast’s movement, pulling hard on the rope just before it reached the line.

A cold terror washed over him up as the rope snapped upward. He bore down, ignoring the stripped flesh of his palms, when he felt the first tug, the rope drawing a line across the Grol’s throat. Its eyes went wide and its clawed hands reached for the rope as it realized what had happened. It was too late.

Cael crouched low and dug his heels into the sodden ground as the Grol’s weight pulled hard against the rope. The beast’s head was snapped back by its sudden shift in momentum, its feet taking the lead as its hind quarters were flung into the air. Head over heels it spun, hurtling through the air like the acrobatic bards he’d seen in Nurin as a child. Only there was no graceful landing at the end of its spin.

Tossed upright, the Grol crashed face first into the white stone of the wall. A muffled crack resounded as its snout was bend downward at an odd angle, its weight only contorting it more as the rest of its body collided with the wall. It loosed a wet grunt at impact and fell backward. Showers of dark blood and yellowed teeth spewed volcanic from its mouth as it landed hard on its back. Its red eyes whirled in its head as though it were blind before coming to rest on Cael.

Despite the viciousness of its fall, the Grol rolled over onto its belly and pulled its limbs beneath it into a crouch. Blood spilled from its broken-toothed snarl and it hunched low, ready to launch at Cael.

Frozen by fear, his arms and legs in rebellion, he stared at the beast, unable to flee. An ear-piercing scream drew his eyes and he saw the girl hurl a fist-sized stone at the Grol. The rock slammed into the side of its head with a solid thud, bouncing away to disappear in the mounds of trash. Seeming more angered than hurt, the Grol spun and leapt at the girl who scrambled away with a shriek.

Cael knew she stood no chance. Her courage having ignited his own, he flung himself at the beast. Without conscious thought, he reached into his waistband and dug inside the bag stashed inside. His fingers closed about the rod and he dismissed it, digging deeper until he felt the cool surface of the crystal orb, remembering what the Sha’ree had told him of it. He pulled it free as he dove at the Grol.

The beast saw him coming and turned to face him, giving him a feral grin of ruined teeth. Despite the tremors that rattled his body and the voices inside his pounding skull that screamed of the stupidity of what he intended, there was no turning back. He ducked low as he barreled forward, stepping beneath the sharpened claws that waited to tear his flesh from bone. As he did, he whipped his arm overhand, his fist and the orb crashing into the cheek of the Grol.

The crystal orb shattered as it struck and he could feel the razored shards wreaking havoc upon his palm, hundreds of tiny wounds opened all at once. His knuckles sang out, the stout skull of the beast like punching stone.

Unable to slow his charge, Cael slammed into the Grol. Through the blur of his thoughts, he imagined he knew how the beast had felt when it had crashed into the wall.

He being the smaller of the two, Cael was bounced backward, falling away from the beast. As he fell, he spied the sharp claws that hurtled toward him, their tips striping the flesh at his chest, just below his collarbone. He hit the ground, his head snapping back into the trash, agony burning at his hand and torso.

A horrible, inhuman screech tore at his ears and drew his attention from his wounds.

Cael looked up at the beast through eyes that refused to focus and wondered at the flickering red and orange halo that seemed to flutter about the Grol. He blinked away his tears as the young girl appeared at his side, tugging at his arm to pull him up.

The shriek continued as the Grol thrashed about, swatting at itself as though covered in wasps. Cael blinked once more as he was hauled to his feet, his vision clearing.

The beast was engulfed in fire. At his cheek clung a tiny, crimson beetle that shimmered brightly. The licking tongues of flame that seemed to spew from the beetle’s pincers, flickered with malevolence as it tore at the Grol. Flesh seared to black beneath its touch. Cael was assailed by the foul stench of burnt fur as the girl pulled him down the alley.

As if realizing the creator of its torment intended escape, the Grol leapt forward seeming intent upon sharing its fiery demise. Its scream grew more ragged, sharper as it set its sights upon them. Cael and the girl stumbled backward into a wall, having lost sense of their direction when the flaming beast charged. Their backs against the unyielding stone, their arms entwined, there was nowhere to go. It loomed before them, enshrouded in dancing flames. The fury in its boiling glare was a palpable heat that struck in advance of its claws. Cael stared into its eyes and saw only death reflected there.

A heartbeat later, he saw nothing in its eyes.

Just feet from where they stood, the beast went rigid, its eyes rolling in their sockets. It twitched and crumpled into a burning heap. Out of the back of its skull a javelin protruded, its tail still trembling from the force of its throw.

Cael looked up to see bright yellow eyes staring at him from a smiling face encircled in dark gray fur. At the Pathra’s back stood Zalee, the awkward expression of her face clearly one of fury.

“You are a fool, Cael.” She strode rigid to his side, each step made with certain effort. “The fate of Ahreele rests in the hands of the relic-wielders; in your hands. What would we have done had you been slain?”

Cael met her weary glare, angry at her chastisement but yet he could understand her point, one he hadn’t taken into account when he’d rushed off to save the girl. He glanced at her as she clung to his arm in wide-eyed wonder, dirt smeared across her face. He looked back to Zalee. “I’m sorry,” he told her in an attempt to soothe her anger, though his tongue would not stop there, “but what purpose is there in saving Ahreele if we only intend to stand by and let its people die?”

Zalee drew herself up and stared at Cael. The Pathran emissary chuckled behind her. After a quiet moment, the Sha’ree shook her head, the slightest glimmer of a smile gracing her narrow mouth. “There is much to learn in this world, young Cael. I must keep in mind that I will not always be the one to teach.” She turned away. “Come. We must see the princess to safety.”

“I would have her come with us,” Cael said, gesturing to the girl.

Zalee glanced over her shoulder at her and then back to Cael. “Then be quick, the both of you.” She strode toward the street.

The Pathra waved them on. “Waeri,” he said, introducing himself. “Your courage has made this warrior proud.” He put his arms about their shoulders and ushered them away from the rank scent of the fallen Grol.

“I’m Ellora,” the young girl said, her voice cracking. She spared a grateful glance at the Pathra, then another for Cael. “Thank you.”

Cael could only nod, his voice having suddenly deserted him. They were at the wall a silent moment later, Zalee having found another rope to haul them up with.

Within just minutes they were over the wall and moving fast toward the sheltering shadows of the forest. Lathah burned at their backs, the sounds of battle growing ever dimmer. Cael cast a glance back just as one of the great spires came tumbling down, adding its dust to the whirls of black smoke that shrouded the city. He looked to the princess and her family, Ellora, and felt a pang of sorrow on their behalf, for he knew what it meant to lose his people and his home.

He whispered a prayer to Ree for all those that who remained behind. They would need the goddess now.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Lost in the fugue of battle, Arrin knew only the rhythm of his sword and dying cries of the enemy that fell about him.

He had meant only to delay the Grol as the Sha’ree ferried the princess and her family to safety, but the beasts seemed intent upon bringing him down, their eyes only on him. As they had on his return to Lathah, they seemed to hold back, as though they still intended to capture him, rather than kill. However, that hesitance did not stop their advance. There were far more than Arrin had imagined.

They flowed from the streets and alleyways and hurled themselves with fervor upon the merciless death of his sword. For every two he laid low, three burst from the murky smoke to claim their place. When a section of the Eighth’s wall crumbled without warning, the Grol spilled through en masse, filling the spaces to Arrin’s rear, cutting off their route of escape.

Kirah remained behind him to keep the beasts from his back. Unsure of her skills when they’d first engaged, Arrin had grown comfortable with her prowess. Aided by the power of the ancient Sha’ree bracers, she had added her own fair share of corpses to the growing mounds of dead Grol that lay in the streets about them.

He could hear her snarled grunts as she sunk the point of her spear into the furred flesh of yet another Grol that had slipped past. Her happy trills, which had emphasized each kill at the start, had faded, the excitement long worn into a mundane grind as the beasts continued to advance upon them.

Where there had initially been short lulls in the waves, the growing numbers of beasts in the ranks had stolen such pauses from them. Arrin swept left, certain Kirah would fill the gap, and set his blade upon the closest Grol. The gape of its throat cast but another coat of warm blood over Arrin’s arm and chest. He dripped crimson, the blood of the beasts a thick, wet blanket that hung upon him. The tart scent of bile and body fluids, the Grol coating the street in as much shit as blood, was stirred about him. It was a stench he could not quite ignore. He snorted it from his nose as he battled. Reddened streamers trailed over his mouth and chin.

His hilt slick with claret, he held his sword in a white-knuckled grip to keep it from slipping from his grasp. He cleaved the guts from another Grol as it closed, and set the point of his sword to work at the eyes of another. His ears rang with the effort, the sound of his breath loud inside his head.

He fought and fought, taking the head of a beast and neutering another, leaving the last behind to howl its loss until Kirah sent it to the grave. Severed hands spun in the air about Arrin, casting off reddened trails that whirled in their wake, their owners dead before their lost appendages struck the ground.

Arrin flowed under the song of the collar. The sting of its magic that flowed thick through his veins, drove him on, giving him the strength to carry on.

With no thoughts for anything but the destruction of his enemy arrayed before him, Arrin suddenly realized it was there no longer. He slowed his heart and brought his body to a halt. He stared out at the mass of Grol that snarled and snapped from a distance, their lines having drawn back beyond the reach of his sword. He heard Kirah at his back as he wondered at the beasts’ sudden loss of temerity.

They had not fled, but they had pulled back and now stood their ground, more of their number piling up in the ranks at their backs, but not advancing.

“Look,” Kirah spoke into his ear, her voice raw with exertion.

Arrin glanced over the heads of the gathered Grol and spied their ranks splitting at the rear. More of the Grol pushed their way through the lines, and even without seeing what threat they brought to bear, Arrin knew they were possessed of the Sha’ree relics. He could feel the energy of them.

He glanced over his shoulder at Kirah and could see that she too knew what approached. Her expression was one of weariness, its pall not hidden by the rebellious sneer plastered in red across her lips. She would not last much longer.

Arrin looked back to the empowered Grol that marched toward them and knew he too grew close to the end of his energy. Soon his arm would slow, his sword would slip, and then they would be buried under the furious wave of tooth and claw. It was inevitable.

He glanced about to see Grol still lurking at every turn. There would be no flight for them. He let a tired sigh slip loose. In his carelessness, his overconfidence in the beasts wanting him alive that he’d led Kirah to her death. He had betrayed her trust, her father’s, and even that of the Sha’ree. He had sworn much to them that he had no certainty in, speaking only hollow words. Perhaps he had meant them when they slipped from his tongue, but here amidst the crush of the Grol army, he could but laugh at their obvious emptiness.

“I’m sorry,” he told Kirah as he stared at the wall of beasts ahead.

She set her hand upon his shoulder. “If I am to die today, then it is with much glory. Only honor and peace await me after, Arrin Urrael, as it does you. I am without fear.”

“Then you are a fool, Kirah, as your brother said.” He turned his head to smile at her. “But then what am I to have led such a fool?” He looked back to the Grol. “If this is to be our last, let us at least take upon them such a toll as to live on forever in legend.” He would not let them take him. He raised his sword, quelling the trembles that shook his hand. “Come and die, beasts. If you would have our flesh this day, you would earn it at the cost of thousands of your brethren.”

Kirah howled at his back. He felt his skin prickle at the determination in her roughened voice. Their time had come, but they would make the most of it. They would not be buried in the earth, but in a sea of Grol blood. It would have to be enough.

The front rank split before them and dozens of long-snouted Grol separated from the lines, confidence apparent in their gaits and sharpened smiles. Like the beasts that had ambushed them in the woods, each of these wore the bronze bracers at their wrists and each glimmered green. They stood without weapons, their clawed hands held ready before them.

Though he had not known what to expect when he first fought their kind, he now had their measure, but that brought him no comfort. Even had he been fresh, Kirah at his side, he could not win through. He had been bested by four of the beasts that had held back in hopes of capturing him. He saw no mercy in the eyes of the empowered Grol that stood before them. They had come to end their resistance and Arrin could see no way of stopping them.

They drew closer, the Grol spreading out only slightly to keep Arrin and Kirah from lashing out at more than one at a time, but yet close enough for all of them to strike. These were the true warriors of the Grol, not the chattel that bled out upon the cobblestones.

“It was an honor,” he said, willing the last vestiges of the collar to furious life. Her reply was lost to the wind as he leapt at the Grol.

He darted in high, only to drop low. He had learned his lesson the last time, for all its value now. His blade crashed into the bronze of the first Grol’s bracer, crushing it about its wrist. The beast reared back and howled as Arrin moved for another. He pressed the advantage while it was still his; he armed with cold steel, they with only flesh, no matter how enchanted.

The Grol lashed out at him and he shifted right, cleaving the sharpened tips of its fingers off as he swept by. Kirah came from behind and landed her spear in its throat. In her off hand she bore a short sword shaded in wet red, clearly scavenged from the dead at their feet.

Arrin launched himself at another beast as Kirah veered off the opposite direction. He heard the clang of metal and the pained cry of a Grol behind him as he skewered the red eye of one before. The beasts closed about him.

The advantage had gone.

He felt the sharp burn of claws at his back, their line searing from his shoulder to his hip. The blow staggered him and he spun to keep the Grol in sight. He snapped his blade out to catch one of the charging beasts in the shoulder, the point sinking in but doing little to slow its advance. Before he even struck the ground, he felt his hand ripped from the hilt of his sword, the muscle at his forearm torn from the bone. He stared at it in disbelief as he crashed onto his back, blood spilling from the wound like wine from a shattered goblet. Tendrils of skin and muscle flapped in the wind of his fall.

The collar did its best to mute the pain but the Grol gave it no chance. A beast shredded the meat at his ribs and Arrin threw his uninjured arm in front of his face, narrowly diverting the claws that sought his eyes. They instead tore at his elbow, several dripping flaps of skin left in their wake.

Against his will, Arrin cried out as jagged teeth sunk into the meat at his side. His vision tunneled, encroaching black swallowing the world around him. The tuneless hum in his ears grew louder as he wallowed in the overwhelming pit of agony. The remnants of his sight were blocked by the furred bodies of the Grol as they swarmed over him like hounds fighting over a bone, grasping at him, pinning him down. Unable to see if Kirah had fallen, he hoped her death was swift.

A guttural cry slipped through the haze that had settled over him and he was suddenly aware he was laying still upon the hard cobblestones, the jostling hands and jaws of the Grol no longer tearing at him. He felt overly warm, as though he sat too close to a campfire, waves of heat wafting over him.

All around him he heard the sounds of battle, the dull impact of dead flesh hitting the ground. Steel clattered on stone and the dying cried out. The voices could only be Grol. He couldn’t help but smile for it must be Kirah set upon the beasts.

He heard her voice calling his name, the syllables drawn out serpentine by the hum at his ears. He opened his eyes to see a blur dotted with white hovering before him. He heard Kirah’s voice again and blinked his eyes, the wavering image before him slowly coalescing into Kirah’s speckled face. Worry crowded thick in her purple eyes. A narrow smile brightened her lips.

The sounds of war continued to ring inside his ears.

A glimmer of sense returning to pay momentary visit to his mind, Arrin lifted his head to see furred bodies flung past. Despite the limitations of his vision and the speed at which they traveled, it was clear the beasts little resembled the Grol Arrin had come to know, most so mangled as to be nearly unrecognizable.

Kirah hunched beside him and slid her arms beneath his back. He felt her ministrations as dull pressure, his flesh too battered to feel pain.

“Come, Arrin. We must move,” she spoke in his ear.

He cast his eyes past her, his wavering gaze alighting on the gate to the Crown. He stared for a moment, realizing no Grol were amassed before it, the street clear save for the piled dead. Kirah jostled him about as she drew him up into her arms, but he felt no pain. A cold numbness was about him.

He looked in the direction the flying beast parts had come to see a yellow-green ghost striding toward him. Its whitened eyes settled on him, its expression unclear. It reached over and lifted his chin, glancing at his throat before meeting his eyes. Arrin saw a glimmer of green and silver at its wrist and he could feel the subtle waft of power as it reacted with that of his collar.

“You are Arrin Urrael?” the ghost asked, Arrin at last recognizing him as Sha’ree.

Kirah answered for Arrin when he could not, his tongue too thick inside his mouth.

“Zalee speaks true of you.” He glanced at the bodies that littered the streets. “If you would see Ahreele saved, you must travel to Ah Uto Ree and tell them Uthul would have them train you in our ways.” The slits of his eyes shifted to Kirah. “Take him and flee. I will keep the Grol from your backs.” A trickle of crimson fluid oozed from his eyes. “If I do not meet you upon the road, tell my daughter I have gone to Ree.”

Without another word, the Sha’ree turned away and strode toward the howling Grol that advanced at a run, their numbers too many for Arrin to count.

Kirah wasted no time, dashing away down the clear street opposite the Grol army, and toward the open gate. Arrin was bounced about as she carried him, his vision blurring at the motion. He cast a hurried glance over Kirah’s shoulder to see the Sha’ree amidst the swarm of beasts. Green glimmered at his wrists as he plowed into their ranks. The beasts closed upon him, trading blow for blow. The Sha’ree faded from sight behind the crush of Grol bodies.

Arrin could see him no more.

Darkness closed about him.

He could see nothing.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Arrin watched as the land of his birth fell to the savage horde of the Grol, the last of the glorious spires tumbling to the earth before his eyes. Too far from the city to hear the howls of the beasts or the cries of his people, he felt the rumble of the collapsing tower, but he could see little beside the flames that fluttered in the growing light and the billows of dark smoke that enshrouded the mountains. Though he had often dreamed of Lathah, the city a beacon of hope in his darkest of hours, it would be this view that would haunt his sleep from this day forward.

It had stood for fifteen years in his absence, but on the day of his return, it had all gone to ash. He could not help but wonder if the prince had been right, that Lathah’s fall was upon his shoulders. Had he truly brought the Grol down upon them?

He shook the thought away, his head knowing the truth of it, even if his heart did not. The Grol would have set upon Lathah regardless of Arrin, but the belief he might well have done something to save the city would not be chased away so easily. His child had been lost in its ashes without ever knowing the truth of its mother and father. It would never know of his love.

That alone would torment his every moment until the earth was shoveled overtop.

He could feel the eyes of those that waited at the trees behind him. They had been gracious enough to grant him a moment to say his farewells, but he could feel their impatience, their desire to be as far from the stench of the Grol as they could manage. He turned to see Kirah standing near his side. She set her warm hand upon his newly healed arm, the flesh and muscle weaved together once more as it had always been. The rest of his wounds had been repaired, as well, leaving only the scars that burdened his thoughts.

He looked up to meet her somber eyes. “I have seen all I can bear.” He ushered her toward the rest of the gathered refugees who milled about with anxious energy, their numbers having grown somewhat since he was last among them. The Pathran warriors hovered about Waeri, who looked off toward the nation of Pathrale. He no doubt feared what was to come.

Off to the side of them sat the young, Nurin boy that had ridden the hem of the Sha’ree’s cloak when they’d arrived at Lathah. Beside him sat a quiet young girl covered in the dust and grime of the streets, her unkempt hair hiding her face behind its wild locks. She seemed to weep, though he could not be certain. To the boy’s other side sat a gangly Velen, his dark face cast in brooding shadows. He had only eyes for the boy who bore a vague resemblance to the Velen. Behind him hovered a pale warrior, the purple line of his veins marking him as Yvir. The warrior’s blue eyes met his and Arrin nodded in reply.

And then there was Malya. She sat quiet in the midst of the group. Though her children sat close at her side, there was sorrow on her face, her eyes on Lathah. Arrin knew she mourned her people, but he could only believe she mourned the loss of their child, as well.

Her father’s prone body was laid out on the grass before her, covered in a dark cloak. He stared without sight toward the cloudless sky. Malya’s husband stood at her back, his hand upon the hilt of his sword as he too looked to Lathah. As if he felt Arrin’s stare upon him, he shifted his gaze. There was steel in his eyes, but also sorrow. He nodded grateful to Arrin.

Arrin looked away as he felt his cheeks grow warm. He could not hate the man, for all he wished to. He was a part of Malya’s life now, her love, the father of her living children. Arrin would simply have to accept that fact. His love of Malya and their life was in the past.

He glanced to the Sha’ree who stood apart from the rest, the hood of her silvered cloak pulled low about her shadowed face. There was nothing left there for either of them. “If you are ready, then I am as well.”

She gave a shallow nod and strode slow toward the woods. The silence was broken by the shuffle of feet and whispered words, the refugees gathering their meager belongings and shambling off after the Sha’ree.

The boy, Cael, smiled at Arrin as he rose. Arrin returned the gesture, thankful for the healing touch of the boy’s relic. For his kindness, Arrin would know the chance to revenge himself upon the Grol.

Kirah tugged at his arm, pulling him toward the rest of the group. “Come, Arrin. Soon we will be in Pathrale. We will feast in the village of my people and share pleasant company before the dark of war comes to steal our smiles away.”

He looked into her purple eyes as she stretched her face into a toothy grin, her whiskers pulled forward and fluttering. He pulled her in closer, glad of her presence, and fell in line behind the rest of the travelers.

Though he would never be free of the sorrow that weighed upon his heart, he yet lived to draw steel across the throats of the Grol. It was a hollow victory amidst the tragic whole of his losses, but it was all that had been left to him. If he did nothing else with his life, he would spend it ridding Ahreele of the plague of beasts, once and for all.

His steps lightened by purpose, however grim, he clutched to Kirah and set his feet on the path before him. The war had come upon him unexpectedly, but he knew its face now. When next it came, Arrin would be ready.

This he swore.

Content

Dawn of War

Tim Marquitz Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six