Six Celestial Swords (45 page)

THEY HAD ONE more bridge to cross before they arrived at another staircase. It curved gradually, and after more than an hour’s travel, they emerged into the freezing night air. A second gateway stood at the edge of a wide, shallow ledge near the top of the mountain they’d been climbing on the inside. A wide, ice-covered bridge with a solid stone balustrade spanned to the next mountain, northward, where another gate awaited, along with a road of steps leading to a walled conglomeration of grand, frost-rimed buildings at the top.

Tristus’ mouth literally fell open at the sight of Vilciel. Every structure, every detail was beyond natural scale. Icicles as long as trees were tall adorned immaculate colonnades. Smooth stone edifices were supported by fantastic columns big enough to mount the entire Eristan Citadel on the top of just one. Torches seemed as small suns hovering about the mountaintop. Windows were wide enough to line armies across. It was without question the most awesome setting Tristus had ever looked upon. He didn’t even consider that he would see its equal, not anywhere in Dryth.

“Dragons lived here,” Tarfan said, sounding breathless himself.

Tristus tried to picture it, but in the moment he required all of his imagination just to take in the city itself. Its former inhabitants would have to be envisioned later. “It must have been glorious,” he managed to say.

No one answered. His companions were all speechless.

“Come,” Shirisae instructed, and led them across the wide, mountain-spanning bridge.

A depthless drop into cloudy blackness lay to either side. Flecks of ice swirled about in the air, a permanent dusting of snow fanning across the bridge, accumulating along the balustrades. The chill wind lifted strands of Xu Liang’s extremely long hair, brushing them across Tristus’ face. Balancing
Dawnfire
across his lap, he smoothed the dark locks back down and held them in place with the weight of his freed hand so that he could see. It occurred to him in passing that the mystic must have been quite proud of his mane to have grown it so long and kept it at such a length. The ends of Tristus’ hair just reached his jaw bone and he’d been thinking a trim was in order.

Behind him, Taya suddenly squealed. “What is that?”

Tristus looked up from Xu Liang’s silken mantel at something else as black as night; the pelt and feathers of a griffin.

“
V
ILCIEL SPANS SEVERAl mountaintops,” Shirisae explained, stroking the great raptor head of the griffin as it lowered before her.

The rider atop the fantastic beast regarded the lady elf as reverently, having come down from a watch tower to greet her.

“As well,” Shirisae continued, “the greater walls and towers are difficult to climb quickly. The griffins are an indispensable asset to us.”

None of the companions were bold enough to approach the amalgamation of lion and bird of prey, but—after Taya had stopped screaming—they all looked upon it with respect.

“Tristus Edainien,” Shirisae beckoned. “Bring your friend here.”

Fu Ran grabbed his arm, unsure.

Tristus did his best to reassure with a calm, determined voice. “It will be all right,” he said, and when the large man relinquished his hold, Tristus guided Blue Crane forward, regarding the griffin with caution now, more out of respect for its sharp talons and beak than its majesty in the moment.

“It will be quickest to bring Xu Liang to the Temple of Healing by griffin’s back. It rests high above us. Preparations can begin while I guide the rest of your party to a place where you can rest and be replenished.”

“I want to be there,” Tristus said at once. “I want to witness the healing.”

“Is it that you do not trust us?” Shirisae asked, neither surprised nor upset.

Tristus looked at the griffin and its armored rider, then at Shirisae, whose golden eyes seemed to secretly smile at him. He was slow accepting her reassurance, but finally shook his head. “No. It isn’t that, lady. It is only that...” He thought fast and said convincingly. “...I am a Knight of Andaria, who has pledged his services to this man, to guide and protect him on his travels. I must stay at his side until I have fulfilled my duty, or until he commands otherwise.”

“He can scarcely do so while unconscious,” Shirisae said. “However, it is not customary...”

He didn’t let her finish. “I must!” She looked at him sharply just then and though he inclined his head as a gesture of apology for raising his voice, he maintained his stern tone. “I am honor bound, my lady. By the Holy City of Eris and my God, I cannot leave his side. It is not an issue of trust.”

Shirisae watched him silently for several moments, long enough that D’mitri came forward to see what the matter was. The siblings exchanged words briefly. Shirisae’s eyes never left Tristus.

Finally, she nodded once and said, “Very well, Knight of Andaria. You may accompany him, but no others. This is a delicate ritual and must not be corrupted by the presence of too many outsiders, lest the subject be lost to us.”

Tristus almost regretted his insistence, fearing that he would somehow ruin a sacred healing ceremony, but he couldn’t let Xu Liang disappear into the hands of strangers while they all sat in wonder. At least, he hoped, the others could be provided with some comfort knowing that the mystic was not alone. He looked back at Fu Ran, telling him silently to explain matters to Xu Liang’s remaining bodyguards so they wouldn’t try to kill anyone in their confusion and concern over their master’s departure.

Fu Ran nodded, almost imperceptibly, and turned to face the others.

In front of Tristus, the griffin rider waited. D’mitri dismounted from his horse and Tristus allowed the elf to assist in the moving of Xu Liang from the back of one graceful creature to that of another.

“You will not require your weapons,” Shirisae told him when he climbed down from Blue Crane. “Perhaps you’d like to leave them with one of your companions.”

Pearl Moon
was already in the custody of Gai Ping. When Tarfan came to take Blue Crane’s bridle, Tristus handed him
Dawnfire
as well, along with his father’s sword. “Please, will you guard these for me, Master Fairwind?”

While at first the dwarf looked awkward holding such a long spear, he mustered a proud expression, then consoled Tristus with a warm smile. “Don’t you worry, lad. There’s no one better to entrust a weapon with than a dwarf. This war hammer has been in my family for more than two hundred years. Not a scratch on it.”

While that wasn’t entirely true—the weapon was heavily battle worn—Tristus trusted the old dwarf, who stated with his eyes on Xu Liang and his smile slowly fading that he was placing a heavy trust in Tristus as well. Tristus briefly clasped Tarfan’s shoulder to offer reassurance, then climbed onto the griffin. The creature abandoned the bridge almost immediately, sending a current of terror coursing through Tristus, who’d never flown on the back of anything. He’d actually never even dreamed of it.

SHORTLY AFTER THE first griffin made off with Tristus and Xu Liang, Shirisae summoned her own griffin, and was gone faster than Taya could glare. She took her precious spear with her and in her absence, D’mitri turned to the others, looking as if he were trying to decide which one of them to hurl off the bridge first. He must have decided Fu Ran would be too much trouble.

In a moment, without anyone going over the edge, he said tersely, “Come with me.”

They went…across the bridge and into the city, through streets wide enough to sustain great rivers and into buildings that could house thousands and still have room for more. Surprisingly, the fire elves managed to make an otherwise uninhabitable city look inhabited. While the streets weren’t terribly full in the cold—and possibly due to the hour—indoors they had converted large halls meant for dragons to comfortably occupy into enormous residences and marketplaces. Elves in armor walked alongside elves wearing the fine clothes of the gentry or the more common—although still well-kept—attire of the workers among them; the artisans, merchants, and even entertainers. Children ran through the inner streets, playing with wolf pups and sometimes young griffins. It was a city, just as anyplace else, and at the same time like no place else in Dryth.

Food and supplies came from sections of the city designated to handling such affairs. According to D’mitri, on a mountaintop housing what he called the Crystal Dome, plants and vegetables were grown. In the lower regions of the city where the furnaces didn’t dominate, the elves cultivated spider farms, spinning the silk from a rare breed of rodent-sized arachnids. Also in the caves beneath the city, mushrooms grew in abundance and were harvested for food as well as for medicinal purposes, as were certain other fungi. Vast mineral ores, some of which possessed very unique properties, were found in the underground caverns. While in the past they’d been mined by dwarves, the elves brought them to life once again, and by doing so were able to craft swords and armor, among other useful things.

The elves of a ruined land had found a ‘New Home’ in the ruins of this land. They kept very much to themselves and flourished, their only true enemy being the living shadows that infested the inner parts of the mountains. They found ways to deal with them.

“The hunter elf would like to believe that his people are the only ones who suffered at the hands of the Keirveshen,” D’mitri was saying while he led the companions up a staircase several yards wide. “While it was true, the Verres Mountains were attacked by unusually large groups, they were not attacked exclusively. We live with demons in our cellars and do not blame or seek help from other elves. We didn’t, when an army of men invaded our homeland. We accepted our fate and the gods admired our courage in the face of circumstances we could not alter. Our ancestors were resurrected and given the chance to begin anew in a different land. By the time we settled in this land, the time of the Verresi was already at an end. Many of their own had already left them.”

Fu Ran smiled as Taya marched behind the conceited elf, miming his mannerisms while he harangued on about the differences between his people and Alere’s. The flame-haired, yellow-skinned elf had an opinion of himself that was actually quite comical, even considering his strong, athletic frame and regal features. He simply took himself too seriously, and expected everyone else to as well. Fu Ran had spent much of the incidental tour sizing him up, plotting the different ways he would put him down if it proved necessary, or if it seemed like something fun to do that he could get away with. He didn’t want to get the others into trouble, but what he wouldn’t give for just a few minutes alone with this elf. And all this time he’d been thinking Alere was an imperial pain. At least Fu Ran and the white elf had been properly introduced.

When it became clear that D’mitri was ignoring the dwarves because they were dwarves and the bodyguards because they clearly didn’t understand a word he said, and that he was actually speaking almost directly to Fu Ran, he decided to nod a few times and make sounds of acknowledgment while his eyes took in the scenery. Occasionally he grinned at the curious youngsters, scaring the life out of them after they thumbed their perfect little noses at him when the adults weren’t watching.