Shadows of Destiny
A little smile curled one corner of her mouth. Only her gown for the wedding had been a different color, and now that the wedding was past, she had no excuse to wear it. It was as if some silent conspiracy existed, insisting she wear only the color of the white wolves, the White Lady, the Weaver.
Shod once again, her feet numbed enough that she did not feel the mild irritation of her new boots, she resumed her hike, now heading toward Anahar. The quiet and solitude had allowed her to relax, a luxury she rarely knew. For a little while she had stopped worrying at the temple for more information, she had escaped councils of war, and the cacophony of voices that accompanied the crowding of the city of Anahar by Anari summoned from far and wide to battle.
A snatch of music danced across her mind, and she recalled the day that Anahar had sung. The rainbow-hued city had gleamed from within its every stone as the music had emerged from them, sending out a call to every Anari, a call that could be heard nearby with the ears, but elsewhere with the heart, according to the Anari.
And the Anari had come from far and wide, dropping every task to answer the summons. They had become the army that had defeated Tuzza’s legion.
Now Tess wondered if Anahar would sing again, for it seemed they were about to march again, this time toward Bozandar.
The chill that passed through her then had nothing to do with the weather. She could not imagine that the remains of the Anari army, even allied with the remnants of Tuzza’s legion, could withstand the might of Bozandar, be it only one fresh legion strong.
Yet march they must, for more than their own lives hung in the balance. It was a somber, sober burden, one which weighed more heavily with each step toward the city.
Again the snatch of music danced across her mind, as if trying to tell her something, but before she could reach for its meaning, it was gone again.
Perhaps Anahar was calling her, telling her it was time. Even as the thought crossed her mind, she realized this was not Anahar calling her. No, this was something else, something far darker than Anahar could ever be, even in the silence of the blackest night.
Yes, Tess. You will come. But not for their sake. You will come for me!
Tess slammed down the walls within her mind, even as she began to run toward the city. Blisters bedamned. She knew she had not the strength to withstand this attack alone. She needed her sisters.
She needed them now.
Archer had been looking for Tess, to confer with her about the army’s departure. She was, whether she knew it or not, the only true unifying point for the two groups who would march toward Bozandar. Not even his own birthright, Firstborn Son to Firstborn King, would unify in the way the Lady Tess’s mere presence seemed to.
Nor did he begrudge her that, though he still wondered about her origins. For his part, he had no desire to be the rallying point for what was to come. He would simply do his duty and use his expertise as needed. Having once heard his name used as a rallying cry, and having seen what followed, he never wanted to hear it that way again.
’Twas then that he spied Tess hurrying out of the wood at the far end of town. The way she was racing and stumbling concerned him, and he spurred his mount toward her, his heart suddenly hammering.
When he reached her, he saw terror on her face. He slipped at once from his saddle and reached for her, swinging his cloak around her to cover her even as he assumed a protective stance, hand on his sword hilt.
“Are you pursued?” he demanded roughly. “Has someone hurt you?”
“No…no…”
He relaxed, but only a little, as he felt a shudder rip through her.
“It’s him,” she whispered hoarsely. “It’s him.”
“Him?” In the deepest part of his heart he knew who she meant, but he didn’t want to accept it.
“Him,” she whispered again, as if afraid to speak his name. “I feel him again. He is near in my thoughts, his touch so cold…colder than ice. He wants me.”
At once he wrapped his other arm around her, as if he could shield her from the assault. As if anything could. “Tess,” he said. “Tess…” It was all he could say. He had no idea how an Ilduin might fight such an assault on her mind. No idea how to protect her. All he could do was give her the sound of his voice and the touch of his arms for her to cling to lest she be swept away.
She shuddered against him, as if from great cold or great effort. “He knows,” she said, her voice trembling.
“Knows what?”
“He knows you are here. He knows we are coming. And he wants me.”
He hesitated only a moment, then with one easy movement lifted her onto his saddle. An instant later he was behind her and they galloped toward the city.
“Take me to my sisters,” Tess begged. “He wants all of the Ilduin! And none of us can withstand him alone.”
I could have, Archer thought grimly as his mount devoured the distance in hungry strides. He had had countless opportunities to deal with Ardred, when they were children or even young men, before the evil had taken root and transformed his brother into his enemy. He had missed them all. But not again. I could have, and this time, I will.
Chapter Eight
Ratha looked at Cilla, uncertain of what to say. She had been with him for two days now, though she had yet to speak a word beyond their brief opening greeting. Nor had he. The initial stage of the telzehten was observed in silence, apart from the customary prayers, and in silence they had remained. But now they had completed that stage, and were supposed to move on to the celebration of a life well lived. And while Ratha knew his brother had lived life well, he also knew that in the end of Giri’s days, an awful bloodlust had consumed him.
Worse, Ratha knew that he, too, had fallen victim to that bloodlust before his sojourn in the desert, and now was perilously close to succumbing again. To openly discuss these things risked falling into the pit that yawned beneath him like a gaping maw. And yet he knew he must face his demons eventually whether alone or not.
Even so, his tongue felt leaden in his mouth, and the concerns he most needed to share were the very things of which he must not speak.
Still, as the closest blood relative, it fell upon Ratha to speak first. At last the silence grew too oppressive to bear, and he drew a breath. “Giri was a man of honor.”
“Aye, cousin,” Cilla said quietly.
“More than once did he risk his life for those whom he loved, and in the end he gave his life for the freedom of the Anari,” Ratha continued.
Cilla nodded. “He spared nothing.”
“Not even his own soul,” Ratha said, tears forming in his eyes. “I have prayed that the gods will forgive him for what he became.”
“He became hardened,” Cilla said gently. “War is a cruel undertaking, cousin.”
“That it is,” Ratha said. “Perhaps if we Anari had been more suited for it…”
“I fear that no one can be truly suited for it,” she replied. “Or perhaps that no one should. I fear that any people truly suited to war would be too cruel and horrible to bear imagining.”
“Perhaps that is true.”
Cilla let a moment pass before speaking. “Giri was a man of laughter.”
“Oh, yes,” Ratha said. “And some of the stories he told…I could not repeat in the presence of a woman, not even my cousin.”
Cilla smiled. “Of that I am certain. There was nothing about which Giri could not laugh, even those things at which most of us would blush.”
Ratha closed his eyes, recalling the long days riding with Archer, when he and Giri had often passed the time with jokes and songs.
“He liked to tell a story of a woman who was out in the field gathering wheat when she came upon a red desert adder. The woman asked of the adder, ‘Why do you have fangs, and venom that kills?’ The adder replied, ‘It is only to defend myself, or to kill prey that I may eat.’ The woman was unconvinced, and said, ‘I would never use venom to defend myself!’ The adder simply smiled. ‘Why must you lie, woman? For I have heard you speak to your husband!’”
Cilla laughed, a rich, hearty laugh that seemed to unlock something within Ratha. His own laughter and tears burst forth in equal measure, each riding upon the waves of Cilla’s laughter, but continuing long after as he recalled the times that he and Giri had combined to make even Archer turn red and cover his mouth.
This was the Giri that Ratha could celebrate. The brother who, no matter how long the days or how rocky the journey, could bring even the stones to laugh. The brother who had hidden pebbles in Archer’s boots, so tiny and placed so well that with every step Archer felt a tickle between his toes.
It had taken Archer half a day to find the pebbles, and three days more to plot his revenge on Giri, carefully weaving a string of nettles into Giri’s breeches that left him hopping and howling until he could find and break open a soothing reed.
For his part, Ratha had laughed along with Archer at his brother’s discomfort, for such were the just desserts of the prank Giri had played, and he knew the nettles were as harmless as the pebbles Giri had employed for his own amusement.
As he told Cilla of these times, and many others besides, her peals of laughter echoed through the rocks below, and the stones themselves seemed to respond with a quiet glow that spoke their approval. She told him of one of her cousins who had been the happy, if unsatisfied, host of Giri’s first clumsy kiss. Her description, doubtless embellished in the telling, left Ratha holding his sides and wiping the tears from his eyes.
“Giri was a gift to us all,” Ratha finally said, when he could catch his breath.
“Yes, he was,” Cilla said. “And whatever he became, dear cousin, he became it only because he never lived by half measures.”
Ratha nodded. “That he did not. Whatever he was, in whatever moment he lived, he lived it fully. And if he lived war no less fully than he lived all else, I pray he did so not from malice but from the same completeness with which he gave every day of his life.”
Cilla reached out and took his hand. “If we can see him thus, my cousin, how could any just and merciful god not see him likewise?”
Ratha did not withdraw his hand, for in that simple touch he felt the beginning of something he would not have imagined possible only days ago. He felt the beginning of healing.
“I will always miss him,” Ratha said.
“As will I,” Cilla said. “But he lives on in our hearts, and in our memories. And I dare say with surety that he lives on beyond the veil, and even now plots his mischief with the gods.”
“If that be,” Ratha said, “then I pity the gods.”
“Share a meal with me, cousin,” Cilla said. “You have fasted enough.”
Something in the quietness of her voice, in the softness of her touch, in the laughter they had shared, and even more, in her having come to share his grief, reached through the anguish that had plagued his soul from the moment he had seen Giri fall. To spend time alone was an honorable thing. But to return to his people, and his duty, was no less honorable, and all the more so in this time of need.
“Yes, cousin,” he said. “Let us return to Anahar and eat together. For duty weighs upon us both, and to duty we must return. But first let us feast in honor of Giri.”
“Long have I waited to hear those words,” Cilla said, rising with him.
“And others that I cannot yet say,” Ratha added, a wry smile on his face.
Cilla laughed. “Tease me not, cousin! Come, strike your tent before I smite your heart!”
Ratha joined in the laughter as they made their way back to Anahar.
Many days and hours of sorrow still lay ahead, but a glimmer of acceptance had at last eased Ratha’s heart.
It was terrible, thought Tess, to rip Sara from the arms of her groom yet again, but it could not be avoided. Come, she cried to her sister in her mind. Come to the temple at once and bring Cilla!
The answer was not one of words, but one of feeling. She felt Sara’s startlement, followed by a burst of fear. Then: Cilla is in the mountains, with Ratha.
Then summon her now!
Archer continued his gallop through the streets of Anahar, his mount’s hooves striking fire from the cobbles, though it was forbidden to ride this way in the city. As people scattered before them, they were recognized, and their haste awoke fear.
He drew his steed to a skittering halt in the square before the temple. “I will find your sisters,” he said as he slid down from the saddle, then set Tess on her own feet.
“I summoned Sara already. She says Cilla is still with Ratha, but she will call for her to come.”
“Then Cilla will find her way back swiftly.” For a moment he looked deep into her eyes while giving a squeeze to her upper arms. “Fight hard, my lady. I will seek what help I may find.”
Inside the temple, Tess found no comfort, but then comfort had been a stranger to her since wakening alone in this land. Nor had the temple itself ever offered her anything beyond grief and warnings of her destiny.
Still, thinking the early Ilduin who had directed and supervised the construction of this place might have had protection in mind as well as teaching, she sought the very center of it, the very heart of the temple. There she sat on the stone floor and waited.
Whether her fear and anger had driven him back, or whether the temple provided psychic shelter, Tess could no longer feel the oily, icy touch in her mind, nor hear the snatches of music that had heralded it.
She closed her eyes, chilled to the bone from her time outside, although the winter’s fury seemed unable to penetrate these walls. The music, she thought. The music. Had it been meant to enchant her? To open a way to her deepest mind? Or had it been something other?
It had certainly been beautiful. As beautiful as the singing of Anahar. Hadn’t Archer once said that his brother had been fair and beautiful, and had used that beauty to bring about strife?
Her mind whirled in circles, unable to settle on any particular thing, almost as if she feared that if her thoughts slowed he might find his way in again. Where was Sara? And why could she not warm up, even when every part of her was burrowed into her cloak?
She thought of a fire, thought how nice it would be to be sitting before one right now. The flames seemed to dance before her eyes, and almost as if by magic, she felt the heat of them stinging her cold cheeks.
Her eyes popped open and she gasped. Before her, on the stone floor with no fuel to feed it, a fire burned, emitting heat. Did she need only to visualize something to have it occur? The thought terrified her.
But then she saw Sara sitting across from her on the other side of the fire. How long had she been distracted? How had Sara come without being heard?
Fearing that she was imagining everything, she opened her mouth to speak Sara’s name, when a chant began to emerge from the shadows around the fire. Tess’s head snapped up, and all of a sudden she saw the clan mothers, every one of them, in a circle around the fire and the two Ilduin. Their hands were joined as if to make an unbroken ring, and they intoned a prayer that sounded as if it were as old as time, chanting words Tess could not understand.
Sara smiled at her. “Cilla is on her way. She will be here soon. Archer said the Enemy is assaulting you.”
Tess nodded jerkily. She felt stiff, as if she had been sitting here for hours, not just minutes. But given what she saw around her, she must have dozed off…or gone somewhere else for a time. Some place she could not now remember. Too much time had elapsed.
She drew a frightened breath. Was she still losing her memory? Was she about to forget these past months as she had forgotten her earlier life? The terror that pierced her then had no equal.
How could she go forward if she could not trust her mind not to forget?
All of sudden, Sara slipped into her mind. He is attacking you now, sister. He seeks to make you doubt yourself.
He was certainly succeeding, Tess thought.
If you doubt yourself, he will find you easier prey. Seek your strength.
What strength? She felt cold, frightened and very much alone, as alone and frightened as when she had wakened among the gore of the slaughtered caravan.
Still she felt no touch in her mind. That was a good thing, because if there was anything she was certain of, it was that the Enemy wouldn’t be able to reside within her mind without being detected. His presence was too alien to be missed, as recognizable as a fingerprint.
A fingerprint? Where had that come from?
For an instant she feared she might simply dissolve into hopeless tears, unable to cope any longer with the weight of things forgotten and the weight of things to come.
But then her spine stiffened, and she drove away the despairing thoughts. Those, she thought angrily, would only serve him.
A whisper passed through the room, and the circle of clan mothers parted, allowing Cilla to enter. She looked cold and windblown, but in her hands she carried a tray of food.
“I am sorry that I was delayed, sister, but tradition dictated that Ratha and I feast in Giri’s honor,” she said, placing the tray between Sara and Tess. Then she squeezed Tess’s shoulder. “I ate quickly and brought the rest for you. Eat and rest, sister. You are guarded now.”
Tess looked around at the ring of aged faces, at her two Ilduin sisters, and finally understood.
She was not alone.
Chapter Nine
Archer joined Jenah and Tuzza in the large tent that served as a temporary headquarters for both armies. As it was set on neutral ground between the two camps, no one could see a purpose in raising a building here yet, because they were planning to march very soon. The work on a camp and buildings for the Bozandari had been born of an effort to establish a sense of purpose and permanence for the erstwhile captives, and to help build relationships between them and the Anari.
So far there had been few problems. It had helped greatly when the Anari army had sprouted banners sporting the white wolf as well. Just as helpful had been the amazing gifts of the Anari stoneworkers who assisted their former foes in building the camp.
But now the real dangers approached, ones that might not be so easily solved. Would Tuzza’s men be able to stand against another Bozandari legion if necessary? Or would they lay down their swords?
No one could say for certain, oaths aside. All had sworn fealty to Tess, but that did not necessarily mean they would kill their own comrades-in-arms.
Tuzza grew more uneasy about the difficulties ahead with each passing day. So did Jenah, who often had a nightmare vision of the Bozandari troops laying down their weapons, leaving the Anari who marched beside them to be slaughtered and taken into slavery. Both men were wary, even as the friendship between them appeared to grow.
Archer was acutely aware of the tensions, though he seldom mentioned them. “Time,” he had said to both Jenah and Tuzza. “Time is needed. This is all new to our peoples. We must gently carry them along with us for as long as we possibly can.”
But tonight, as he stood at the fore of the tent beside Tuzza and Jenah, he noted that the Anari and Bozandari officers stood apart from one another, almost as if there were an invisible wall between them. Denza Grundan, the quarter-Anari soldier who had recently been promoted to rearmark, alone stood between them like a bridge. Archer was relieved to note that neither side seemed bothered by his presence so near them.
When everyone had settled, Tuzza stepped to the fore and held up his hand. “The time approaches,” he said. “We have received word from both Anari and Bozandari scouts.” He paused then, weighing the import of his words. He paused to choose more carefully. “Let me say that otherwise. Our scouts have returned with information.”
Throughout the tent, heads nodded, noting the distinction he was making. Faces, however, offered no clue as to what lay behind them.
“A legion has marched into Anari lands presumably to rescue us.” This with a nod toward the Bozandari officers. “We must go forth to meet them, but we must try at all costs to meet them peacefully.”
Murmurs of agreement from the light-skinned officers, no sound whatever from the dark-hued faces of the Anari.
Jenah stepped forward then and looked directly at his fellow Anari. “The same applies to us all. We must win allies, not alienate them. All of us face a threat bigger than our past problems. We face a threat to our entire world, as my lord Annuvil can well tell you.”
“Annuvil…” The whisper passed among the Bozandari who had not yet heard Archer’s true identity. The Anari, who had long known, remained stoic. Archer, however, did not speak. Standing with his arms folded, he merely lowered his head and looked downward.
Finally, someone called out, “Where is the lady? It is to her that we have sworn our fealty.”
Only then did Archer lift his head. “She is at the temple,” he said heavily. “The Enemy assaults her. Thus, her sister Ilduin stand guard at her side, as do the clan mothers.”
The silence grew profound at that, and men shifted uneasily.
Archer tilted his head a little to one side and scanned all the faces before him with his gray eyes. “I am sorry,” he said, “that it has come to this. And yet, awful though the days ahead may be, none of you ever would have been born had not we Firstborn made so many mistakes. Learn from our sins. Do not repeat them.”
After a few moments during which men murmured and then stilled, Tuzza spoke again. “From the banners our scouts have observed, it is my cousin Alezzi who comes to us. He is a good man, my cousin, and close to my heart. If for no other reason, we must do all we can to avoid a clash. I will speak with him.”
A Bozandari officer called out, “Are you certain you can persuade him to join us, Topmark?”
“I must,” Tuzza answered simply. “I must. Still, we have but tomorrow to complete our exercise, and not even all of the one day. We do not want to fight, but we will have to when we find Ardred’s force, if not before. Anari and Bozandari must be able to fight together, or his army will defeat us in detail.”
“And this will be difficult,” Jenah said, continuing their prepared remarks. “We Anari prefer night action. It caused confusion among you, which multiplied our numbers.”
“The Anari never had even a full legion arrayed against us. And the column that harassed us on our march was less than one thousand strong,” Tuzza said. Murmurs of surprise spread through the Bozandari officers, but he silenced them with an upraised hand. “It is true. The harassing column steered us into that canyon, where we could not deploy our full strength and would be forced to frontally assault their prepared defenses.”
The memory of that bitter defeat darkened their faces. Archer could see that this could quickly transform into something else: resentment of the Anari who had defeated them, and the commander who had led them into that defeat.
“However, remember that the Anari had many advantages in that campaign,” Archer said.
“This is true,” Jenah said. “We had Ilduin to help our communications, and we were fighting in our own lands, among the rocky hills and mountains. It was not difficult to find terrain that favored us, and Topmark Tuzza had few choices as to his route of advance. While we will still have Ilduin among us in the next campaign, our Enemy will as well. And we will not be fighting in Anari lands, but in the open spaces of the Deder desert. That which we have done before will not avail us twice.”
This seemed to mollify the Bozandari somewhat.
“Our tactics are also different,” Tuzza continued. “The Anari threshing lines are better suited for attacking an enemy. They maneuver more quickly than we do, but the threshing line also gives way to exhaustion more quickly. Our tactics are more stable in defense, and if we are less mobile in attack, we can sustain the action longer.”