Revelation (64 page)

It’s the summons. You’ve used it hundreds of times. You know its effects. We can’t resist it, and it locks us to the place of combat chosen by the yddrass. I never understood why, and thought it was the most bitter irony that the
pandye gash
had discovered some magical word that we could not escape, when we didn’t even know it ourselves. But you . . . your theories . . . if we are two parts of a whole, then it isn’t magic at all. Perhaps we hear the summons of a human spirit . . . the voice of our own selves, one might say . . . and that is what we can’t resist. I don’t like the thought that I am nothing but a discarded scrap of something else.

Gradually, as the one-sided conversation continued, the cool wind of the upper airs began to clear my head. I looked down on charred desolation. An endless forest of blackened trees, gaunt, brittle, broken, some fallen, many still upright, pointing accusingly at the gray sky. No leaf, no blade of grass, no hint of green relieved the palette of gray and black. The earth was deep in ash, the protruding stones like a dirty skeleton in a grave, smudged and stained with its own disintegrated flesh. A gaping scar creased the land between two hills, the seared bed of a dead river, its smaller tributaries like the dried wrinkles in an old desert woman’s face. Even the sky was the same dismal gray. A dreadful place.

Not to push, but you’re going to have to decide soon what to do about these yddrassi. There are at least three of them
. The matter-of-fact tone belied the urgency of the message.

I tried to think.
Yddrassi . . . Wardens. Summoning
. Why would I worry about three Wardens? I looked down at the ruined landscape that had no relation to any geography I knew, and the first piece fell into place. I was beyond a portal. How in the name of sense had someone gotten me beyond a portal without my knowing it? Vague memories of a nighttime confrontation, of ropes, enchantments, potions . . .
Gods of night! What am I? Where am I? Dreaming? Oh, sweet Verdonne, let me be dreaming.

Rai-kirah do not dream. Did you know that?
The inner voice twined itself in my thoughts like a snake.

Again I surveyed the smoke-stained sky and the charred forest.
This is my own soul.

Even after everything, I had not really believed we were inseparable. One being. Inside, outside, now and forever . . . as long as forever was going to last with Ysanne bent on ripping us apart. I had assumed that Denas would be the one to fight this battle, using my knowledge and skill. He was the demon. The invader. In my deepest self had lingered the faint hope that somehow, someday, this nightmare would be done with, and I would go back to being only Seyonne. After all, I had survived the death of hope that was slavery when it seemed impossible, and surely this was something the same. I was a warrior who had surrendered only for the moment, believing that somehow I would strike down my enemy and win free. But once I knew myself as my own demon, there was no possibility of self-deception. As had happened each time I thought I had discovered the true depth of despair, I turned another corner and found the way still pointed downward.
Gods have mercy . . . what have I done?

I circled one more time and landed atop the rocky prominence that sheltered the cave where Denas had hidden me, and with a thought, I shed the dragon shape and took my own winged form.

“Three Wardens, you say.” I shook off the chill of such a massive change in size and tried to regain my inner balance. “And is one of them Merryt?” If I was to be this horror, then at least let my flimsy ruse succeed.

“Begone, rai-kirah. You take human form—a familiar form—but I will not be deceived. Come fight me or abandon this place. Hyssad!” A tall young man with light brown hair and wearing a red cloak had climbed up the rocks beside me and stood brandishing his sword. Tegyr. The boy had always been a bit pompous. Had I not taught him to stay silent once the summons had drawn the demon? Perhaps he was just nervous at facing a demon who happened to know his habits and his weaknesses.

I wondered for a moment how a demon produced its weapons . . . considered what I would choose . . . and instantly found a broadsword in my hand. No. That was wrong. Too likely to produce serious damage. I only wanted to tire the boy and scare him away. To use up time. The weapon shifted form. Better. I whipped the slender blade a bit to get its feel, adjusted its balance with a thought, then tried again. Good enough.

“Go away, Tegyr.”

The youth turned pale at my voicing of his name, but he did not retreat. His sword was at the ready. “I’ll not listen to your treacherous tongue, demon. Fight me, and we’ll see who survives.”

“I don’t want to hurt you. I have more important things to do.”

“More important than survival? Because I plan to kill you. Hyssad! Begone!”

I sighed and stepped up, and in less time than he could blink, I had ripped a long tear in his shirt. Not his skin. Only the shirt. Then I stepped back again. “Are you sure you want to fight?”

Perhaps the lesson brought his other lessons back. He wasn’t supposed to chatter with a demon. And he didn’t anymore. He attacked. I furled my wings tightly and responded.

Tegyr thought he was doing well, for he remained the aggressor. I did not attack, even when he left me an opening. Instead I kept my guard low and let him come after me, leading him across the rocks, making sure he had to go up and down a thousand times, testing his footing and balance, while I stayed on reasonably level ground. He had improved in his year of warding—obvious, since he was still alive—and he was young and very strong. But his eagerness would be his downfall—he made five strokes for every one of mine—and I had taught him his most sophisticated moves, so I could counter them almost before he began. He wasn’t going to make much progress before he got very tired. As soon as that happened, I would bash him in the head and send him home.

But my plan was complicated by his companions. I had hoped Denas was wrong about there being three. I wanted only Merryt. A slight movement to my left caught the corner of my eye, and I leaped backward. A young Warden from southern Ezzaria had sneaked up the steepest side of the little ridge and almost caught me in the back.

“Welcome, Emrys.” A wiry, coarse-skinned young man tossed his short dark hair out of his eyes and slashed hard at my legs. I skipped out of the way, and he struck rock. Probably numbed his elbow with the power of his blow. “So the two of you are going to take me together? Have you ever practiced it?” I parried Emrys’s next cut, then whirled and kicked Tegyr’s descending sword out of the way. It made things a little more complicated, but soon I had them stumbling over each other. Tegyr drew first blood—not mine, but Emrys’s. Once they realized what I was doing—and what they were doing—at least they were intelligent enough to adjust. They would alternate, and make sure they weren’t coming at me from opposite directions, where I could step out of the way and let them hurt each other. It kept me busy, but it was manageable. I still took fewer steps than either of them. So when would I see the third?

Fortunately for me, a tired Emrys stumbled off a rock and broke his leg before the third Warden found us. The snap of bone was unmistakable. I circled until Tegyr was between me and his fallen comrade. The light-haired youth, heaving in great gulps of air, dropped to his knees to make sure Emrys was living. He never took his eyes from me for more than a second, but his sword point was wavering.

“Take him out,” I said. “Tell Mistress Catrin to send men instead of boys.”

“We’re not finished here yet,” he said. Brave, but stupid. I could have walked up to him and cut his throat.

“Never be so foolhardy with a real rai-kirah,” I said, then turned to greet the third Warden who had slipped up the promontory almost unnoticed. Almost. Drych, dark-eyed and sturdy, a nasty scar across one cheek hinting of hard experience, slashed at me with a long-sword. I quickly switched my own weapon and adjusted my grip to counter his heavy blow, discovering that Catrin’s most promising student had indeed come into his prime. I forced his weapon back, but, unlike sparring with Tegyr and Emrys, it took a great deal of effort.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Drych. Step away.” Damn the coward Merryt—letting these boys fight this battle for him, while he was off into the gateway, no doubt. Damn my own foolish self to risk everything on this kind of stupid game. Surely I could have thought of something else.

Drych did not step away. He kept coming. Doggedly. Furiously, keeping his blade close, his movements tight and efficient. Drych would not be so easy to tire. I led him across the rocks, but he had better judgment than the others and picked his positions, letting up on his attack rather than pursuing over unsteady ground. But he did not relent. He just slipped around the obstacles and came at me from another direction. I gathered in my concentration. I could not afford to take this young man anything but seriously.

“You’ve progressed fairly, lad. I knew you would.” I led him down a steep hillside, leaving him stumbling and off balance while I used my wings instead of feet. But he compensated well and left a bloody streak on one of my shoulders. If I hadn’t been quick, he would have severed my arm. Every once in a while, I pressed him hard, to show him that I could—left him a few cuts that could have been more severe—and then I let off again. “I won’t kill you,” I said. “But you need to get out of here before we do something we’ll both regret.”

After several more engagements, I considered stopping the fight altogether—taking wing perhaps—and trying to explain to him what I had done and why, trying to salvage something from this debacle. But Drych was trained not to listen even to the most reasonable blandishments of a rai-kirah, and I had no reason to believe his discipline in that area was any less mature than his fighting skills. I had to stay focused. “I won’t let you kill me, either. I have a number of things I need to do. We could have a very long night, and I can’t let you use up all my time.”

“You’ve taken my teacher.” His scarred face—so very young—was sculpted of steel. “I’ll have you out of him.”

“You have no idea how it cheers him to hear that,” I said, smiling. “But it’s truly not possible. I’ve just come to see it clearly for myself.”

I needed to stop Drych before I got too tired, just in case some sudden realignment of the stars brought Merryt to face me. So I began to drive the young man hard, through ankle-deep ash, down into the dry riverbed, on and on until his movements became erratic. I slashed and cut, changing stances often to keep him off balance, pushing him harder until he was staggering and fell backward onto a charred stump, his heavy sword jarred from his hands. Yet even when I pressed the edge of my weapon to his throat in position to take his life, he glared at me in defiance.

“You remember my lessons well,” I said. “Never forget the victim. I thank you and bless you for that, Drych. Now remember another lesson I taught you. I once killed a demon and the victim together, and I told you it was a mistake. Some Ezzarians don’t believe a Warden could regret such a mistake; they don’t understand caring for another human that is not kin or friend. But you know I did care—even though that victim was a horror who should have been executed for his crimes. I’ll not allow you to make a similar mistake. If you kill me, you’ll kill the one you’re trying to save. Believe me, I wish it could be different.” Then I whacked the boy in the head with the hilt of my sword and hefted him in my arms.

Tegyr was shoving the grimacing Emrys through a portal. At the sight of me, he dropped his friend and raised his weapon.

I dumped Drych in front of him, then took wing. “Take them back, Tegyr. I won’t fight children. Tell the Queen to send someone else. Tell her that I’m waiting, and that the one she’s trying to save suffers more every minute she refuses to send the murderous coward Merryt.”
Tell her that I love her more than life, but I’ll not allow her to destroy her people. Any of them. Even the ones she does not know.

Astonished, disbelieving, the nervous, exhausted youth dragged his fellows through the portal. I circled the desolate hill as the gray rectangle faded into the gloom. Then the sky began to spin and the charred forest to dissolve, and I unshaped my wings and fell into the darkness.

 

“Seyonne?” The whisper from behind my back reverberated in my aching head like a bull’s bellowing.

The only answer I could seem to come up with was a moan. Perhaps because my lips were numb. Or maybe they were bound with spell-wrapped ropes like every other finger’s breadth of my person. I had been laid on my side, my head on a bundled cloth, and it was a race to see which was going to make me return to oblivion sooner: the pain in my head or the burning laceration in my right eye. Every breath I took was like an earthquake, threatening to crumble the world. I was drooling, and it was such a grotesquely difficult endeavor to breath, I would have sworn the pillars of Dasiet Homol lay across my ribs.

“Can he hear me, Nevya?”

“Unlikely. They’ve put enough spells on him and in him, he’ll never wake up. I’m just trying to ease the pain of his eye. Can’t bear to see it left, no matter they said not to heal him.” Nevya, the healer, was spreading some cold, thick substance on my eye.

I couldn’t quite place the other woman’s voice. “They’ll be ready for him again soon,” she said softly.