ARC: Sunstone (32 page)

III

Comminor followed Geve and Sarra’s horrified gazes and saw the horizon spread with scarlet as the firebird rose in the sky.

It was too far away for him to see in which direction it was flying. It was coming vaguely towards them, but he couldn’t be sure if it had seen them yet. Despair filled him. How could he protect her and the new shoot against something so powerful? If the firebird flew directly over them, he had no hope of stopping it from turning them all to ash with one blast of fiery breath.

“We have to get her back to the Broken Room,” yelled Josse.

Comminor hesitated, wishing he had made that decision earlier. He had thought he was doing the right thing, but now he realised he had just put all their lives in danger. He looked up the slope of the mountain, wondering if they could make it back there if they ran. But even as the thought entered his head, he knew the answer. “We would never make it in time,” he said. “It is too far.”

The hope faded from everyone’s eyes, and frustration filled him. He had led them all for so long in the Embers, for years and years. Even though many had hated him, they had trusted him to keep them safe.

In the distance, the firebird blasted the landscape with scorching heat. Dry dust rose in a sandstorm and swept over them, choking him, searing his lungs and stinging his eyes. He closed them against both the dust and the fear, his hand moving automatically to cover the pendant on his chest.

What was he to do? Had he travelled this far, worked so hard, only to fall right at the end?

Sarra’s cries filled his ears as she became gripped with another contraction. He wanted to move, to be at her side to comfort her and help her through this, but something made him remain where he was. His head was spinning. At first he’d thought it was panic confusing his senses, but as pressure built on his ears and the noises around him faded, he realised something was happening.

He held his breath, holding one hand out in front of him as his balance failed and he swayed. He was vaguely aware of the dust blowing across his skin, of the faint cries of Sarra as if from far off in the distance, of the voices of the others rising as they argued about what to do. The world went quiet. His pulse echoed in his ears.

Or was it his pulse? It was not just in his ears, he could
feel
it, like when he’d stood near the Magna Cataracta and felt the thunder of the water as it cascaded down the rockface. The regular, rhythmic beat pounded against his feet, shooting up through his legs and knees, into his hips and spine, until his bones seemed to vibrate with it, and his heart slowed to match the beat.

He felt himself expand, his consciousness scatter like a handful of blown dust. For a brief moment, he became aware of the passage of time, of history, of the whole timeline of the world stretching back into the past. Suddenly he knew what the Arbor had seen when it was alive – how it had stretched through time and space, how it had
known
everything there was to see and hear and taste and smell.

It is time
, a voice whispered in his ear.

He opened his eyes.

The dust in the air before him shimmered silver the way it had in the ceremonial room. Those around him didn’t seem to notice. Betune and Amabil knelt by Sarra, holding her hands as she grimaced in pain. Geve stood arguing with Josse, looking like he was about to punch him at any moment. Nele, Paronel and Viel looked nervously through the dusty wind at the approaching firebird, seemingly unaware of anything else.

Comminor blinked. Someone was singing. Above the rising bellow of the whirling wind, he could hear voices raised in song. He caught his breath at the beauty of it, not understanding the words, but the melody brought tears to his eyes. The mouths of those around him weren’t moving – at least certainly not in song. Who was it?

The air glittered, glimmered. As in the ceremonial room, figures flickered, the barrier between times thinning, parting. He saw the faces he had seen before loom out of the darkness, then disappear again, the moment not quite ready, the time not quite right. He wanted to yell, to tear apart the fabric of time and let them through, but he couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything but stand there like a useless statue, his head spinning.

He looked at his feet, his mouth opening as he stared at the green shoot. It had risen by a foot and now reached almost to his knee. The ground around it crumpled as its roots spread. The shoot waved in the breeze, growing even as he watched, trying so hard to establish itself.

And then he glanced up at the horizon, and the hope faded, and his heart sank. It did not matter – the firebird loomed above the ground, approaching them at a fast pace. It had seen them. It would turn them all to cinders before the shoot could grow its first leaves.

They were too late. The Apex wasn’t going to happen. Through time, everyone was coming together, trying to save the world, to save Anguis, and he was going to be the one who’d let them all down. A sob tore from his lips, but still he could not move.

It was only gradually that he became aware that the pendant in his hand was growing hot. He glanced down at it, confused. The wood remained untouched, the faded deep brown it had always been. But inside it, the oval sunstone glowed as if it had been placed in a fire. He frowned, lifting it up before him, startled as the glow intensified. It burned red, then orange, then a bright yellow-gold, the light hurting his eyes so much that he had to avert his gaze as it brightened.

He looked back up and saw Viel, Josse and Paronel staring at their own pendants, which also glowed a bright red-gold.

Something rushed through him, not quite heat, not quite light, making his spine stiffen, his head tip back, his heart pound along with the beat that vibrated through his feet. A shaft of light shot out of the sunstone at the same time that the other three also ejected a beam, and the four rays joined and brightened, spreading above their heads in an arc of golden light.

Everyone exclaimed, even Sarra, and they all stared in wonder at the dome above their heads. Comminor’s chest heaved, and he tried to keep calm, knowing this was meant to be – this
was
the Apex, happening exactly when it was supposed to happen.

Above them, the firebird loomed, and it exhaled a wall of fire that swept over them. Heat scorched his skin, hot dust flurried around his face, but when it had passed, they all remained standing, protected by the dome of light.

The firebird bellowed, its frustrated screech ringing out above the sound of the singing, and the dome above them flickered, although it didn’t break.

“It is not enough,” Josse yelled. “It will not hold.”

Comminor looked down at Sarra in despair. Her baby had led her here, and she had followed, full of hope that it was leading her to a better life. This couldn’t be the end of them all.

He glanced at the seedling still growing by his side. It was a miracle – a new Arbor, born in this land of fire and darkness with the belief that it could grow and conquer the Incendi elementals. He couldn’t bear to think he had failed it. He had dreamed for so long of its shining leaves, of the sun and the sky.

But what could he do about it?

The singing grew louder, insistent, haunting, distracting him from the view, in spite of the imminent danger.

He closed his eyes, and in his mind, a picture formed of his room in the Embers. In the middle, on the table, rested the
Quercetum
, open to reveal the stories of the past, of Teague and Tahir and all the others, of those who had died to give the Arbor life.

He remembered the paragraph written all those years ago by Oculus, the man who had begun the
Quercetum
, who had been responsible for originally building the Temple around the Arbor in the ancient town of Heartwood.

“‘The Arbor brings life, but it also brings death. Because essentially life is about balance. What is given in one way has to be taken in another. It is all a cycle – everything lives, and dies, and lives again. For there to be light, there has to be darkness. For there to be day, so equally there has to be night. And to create, we have to destroy. This and this alone lies at the heart of the Arbor’s place in the world.’”

Yes…
whispered the tree, the singing dying away.

Comminor opened his eyes. “A sacrifice,” he whispered.

It barely sounded above the noise of the flapping firebird, the howling wind and the cries of Sarra, who strained again with another contraction. He clenched his hands in frustration, knowing what had to be done, urging himself to move. But he seemed frozen in place, his feet nailed to the ground, unable to do anything but let the sunstone draw energy from him to cast the dome above their heads.

And then he looked up and met Geve’s eyes. He saw immediately that Geve had heard him, and that he understood.

Josse continued to argue, but Geve fell silent, and he nodded.

“I am sorry,” Comminor said, meaning it, but Geve shook his head.

“We all have a part to play,” he said.

Josse stared at him in confusion. “What?”

Geve ignored him and came forward to stand by the seedling, in the middle of the rays of light beaming from the four sunstones.

Sarra stared at him. “What are you doing?” she demanded.

He looked down at her and smiled. “Good luck with the baby.”

Sarra’s eyes widened. She looked up and met Comminor’s gaze and tried to struggle to her feet, but at the same time a contraction gripped her and she doubled over, crying out in physical and emotional pain. “Do not go,” she sobbed, reaching out towards him, but he turned away.

Instead, he met Comminor’s gaze. “Look after her,” Geve said, and Comminor nodded.

Geve raised his arm, took a deep breath and plunged his hand into the dome of fire above their heads.

PART FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

I

The Heartwood Council were deep in consultation, seated around the large round wooden table in the meeting room in the main building.

Horada hovered in the doorway, uneasy and distracted. She had been offered a place at the table along with her mother, brother and the other visitors, but she had declined, feeling awkward placing herself amongst those who clearly knew much more about the matter than herself.

Strangely, the one person who seemed to be missing was the mysterious Cinereo. Julen had asked Gravis where he was, but Gravis and Nitesco had just exchanged a glance and said he would appear later, and they had to be content with that.

Now, they were all discussing the Wulfian presence on the Wall and listening to Procella talk about her experiences at Kettlestan. Horada listened for a while, but kept finding her gaze drawn to the room down the corridor where two men stood outside guarding her oldest brother. The accusation that her mother had thrown at him – that it was his fault she had been forced to leave the Militis – had shocked Horada. Although she had always found Orsin irreverent, she had never quite understood her mother’s imperious attitude towards him. Now it made sense – except it didn’t. It wasn’t Orsin’s fault that her mother became a wife and mother. In that sense, Orsin’s lewd comment had been right – she only had herself to blame.

The Council were now discussing the Incendi threat and when they thought the Apex might occur. Horada turned from the room and began to walk towards the doorway outside. It was uncomfortably warm in the buildings and she longed for some fresh air. Plus, there was somewhere she wanted to visit alone.

Outside, she crossed the courtyard, left the complex and made her way through the buildings along the busy main road. She could see where they were taking down the wall now, removing it stone by stone. People crowded the streets but, to her surprise, the gates to the new wooden fence inside the old wall were shut. She stopped outside where two guards stood on duty.

“Why are the doors closed?” she asked.

“Access to the Arbor is restricted for the foreseeable future,” stated one of the guards sounding bored, seemingly reciting a well-rehearsed warning.

The second guard – an older man with grey hair – looked at Horada quizzically. After a few moments, his eyes widened. “Are you… You are not Chonrad of Barle’s daughter by any chance?”

She smiled. “Yes. Did you know my father?”

“I did. You look very like him! I travelled with him to Vichton on the Quest to Darkwater. My name is Solum.”

Her smile broadened. “My father told me all about that adventure. And my mother speaks very highly of your fighting abilities as well as your calmness and patience.”

Solum nodded his head. “Procella was a great Dux, and Chonrad was a great man. I was very sorry to hear of his loss.”

“Thank you.” She swallowed and looked away. Being here, in Heartwood, the place that she had heard so much of during her life and that had played such a big part in her father’s world, had brought her emotions bubbling to the surface.

“Have you come to see the Arbor?” Solum spoke softly.

She nodded. “I have never seen it.”

“You can go in,” he said. The other guard started to object, but Solum held up a hand. “This is Chonrad’s daughter. Of all the people in Anguis, she is one whom I would trust.”

The other guard nodded reluctantly and opened the door. Solum smiled and gestured for her to enter.

Suddenly uncertain, Horada hesitated, but she couldn’t back out now. Giving them both a brief smile, she slipped through the door and they closed it behind her.

She stood in a wide open space, the site of the old Heartwood complex, just inside the walls. Although she could still hear the city outside – including the complaints of those visitors who had seen her slip in but were being stopped from following – inside it seemed peaceful, as if more than a mere wooden fence separated her from the outside world.

The fence ringed the grassy area, meeting the mountain on both sides, the rocky face rearing above her, solid and impenetrable. Sparrows and finches hopped across the grass, and to one side in the sun, a lone cat stretched out, oblivious to anything else. The inside of the fence panels had been carved with intricate engravings of oak leaves, acorns and trees, and at any other time she would have exclaimed and stopped to admire the workmanship.

But she could not tear her eyes away from the Arbor.

It stood in the centre and slightly towards the back, its branches casting a shadow across a good third of the grass. Her father had told her many stories about it, and she had heard Julen and Orsin, her mother and many travellers also talk about it, but nothing could have prepared her for the sight of it. Three times as big as she had imagined, it appeared imposing for more than just its size. Thick with green leaves, full of ripe acorns, it arched towards her as if reaching out for her. Even above the noise of the city, the whisper of its leaves reached her ears.

She stood motionless, though, fear freezing her feet to the floor. Chonrad had told her about the moment when the Arbor had reached out for him that first time during the Last Stand. He had explained his fear, the pain that had coursed through him when he opened the Node, the sheer terror that he had felt that he would not live to see the next day. And then, of course, he had visited the Arbor again the year before, only for it to end with his death.

Horada’s mouth had gone dry. But it was pointless to avoid walking forward. She had come all this way – was she really going to pretend this wasn’t the reason she had come, the reason for what was right and wrong in the world, the reason for everything?

She walked slowly forward to the middle of the grassed area. The morning sun beat down on her face and arms, and she hovered on the edge of the shade. The leaves on the old oak stirred and fluttered, although she could feel no breeze on her skin.

Heart pounding, she closed her eyes.

The sounds of the city faded completely. The birdsong faded. And then, as if from a long way away, came the sound of voices raised in song.

She listened for a while, lips slightly parted, entranced by the beautiful, haunting melody. And then she opened her eyes.

The source of the voices was a line of people walking from somewhere behind the tree trunk. She stared at them, mouth still open in wonder as she looked at their faces and watched them walk and sing.

She recognised some of them. The man with the long dark hair and golden eyes was Teague, the Komis Virimage who had given up his life for the tree all those years ago. Walking with him, holding his hand, was the young, beautiful knight Horada was sure was Beata, who had also given her life at the Last Stand. Behind them walked a tall man with huge shoulders, a shock of thick grey hair and piercing eyes that could only be the mighty Valens from Procella’s long descriptions of him. The young man whose hair curled in exactly the same way as his twin brother’s had to be Gavius who had died after completing his quest.

Behind them walked more people Horada was sure she recognised from descriptions given by her parents over the years. More and more people followed behind them. Gradually the people began to look different, their clothes old-fashioned, and Horada realised she was seeing all those who had given their lives in service to the tree, stretching back in time hundreds if not thousands of years.

They walked around her in a circle, then made their way back to a figure standing beneath the tree. Dressed in a long grey cloak, his hood pulled over his head, he held out his hands as if in welcome. To her shock and bewilderment, one by one the people walked right up to him and
vanished
into his billowing cloak.

Stunned, scanning the figures and trying to make sense of it all, only as the last person in the line passed around her and walked towards the tree did she see his face.

It was her father.

Emotion welled inside her and made her catch her breath. She wanted to run up to him, to throw her arms around him, but her feet wouldn’t move, frozen to the floor as if held by invisible hands. He smiled at her, but continued walking until he reached the grey-cloaked figure, at which point he, too, vanished into the grey cloak.

She stared, tears coursing down her cheeks, realisation making her feel as if shutters had been removed from her eyes.

Cinereo was not one person – he was
all
the people who had given their lives for the Arbor. So maybe in that sense he even
was
the Arbor, which in itself was formed from the energy and life given to it by all its sacrifices and all those who had helped it over the years of its existence.

Cinereo stretched his hands out to her, and she walked forward. Her heart pounded – was she to be welcomed into his arms too? Was she that year’s sacrifice?

As she approached him, however, he dropped his hands, and she came to a halt before him. They stood six feet from the base of the tree, and as she glanced at the trunk, she saw that one side of it had been carved to represent two figures – Teague and Beata, the wood worn smooth and shiny over the years as countless people touched the loving couple.

Voices sounded from behind her, and she saw the side doors leading to the Nest open and people come running in, spilling onto the green grass to stand before her in shock.

Everyone was there, including her mother – who looked alarmed to see her daughter standing with Cinereo right by the Arbor – and Julen, who walked forward until he stood near her, his eyes alight with excitement and caution.

“Horada?” he said, glancing over his shoulder as Nitesco and Dolosus also approached. “What are you doing?”

“It called me,” she said, breathless, something rising inside her and sending the blood shooting around her veins. “I think it is beginning.”

They all looked shocked – clearly they had thought to have more warning, or that they would all be aware and ready when something finally happened.

More people came forward – all the council members, including Grimbeald, Fionnghuala, Bearrach and Gravis the Peacemaker – to stand in front of the Arbor with wide eyes.

Horada stared at Julen. He was watching her, so he wasn’t aware of what had started happening to his pendant. The sunstone in the middle glowed orange-red, and as it brightened, so he looked down and exclaimed, holding it out before him.

“She is right – it is beginning,” said Dolosus, gesturing for everyone to fan out in an arc around Horada and Cinereo, who still stood silently, his face covered by the grey cloak. “It is too late to do anything now. We must assume the Arbor is ready to start, and we will have to follow its lead.”

Horada’s chest rose and fell with her rapid breaths. Julen walked forward a few steps to stand before her, and they both watched as the sunstone brightened even more, seemingly carrying within it a piece of the sun, which continued to bathe them in warmth.

Before them, the air shimmered the same way it had in the room deep inside the mountain, and Horada caught her breath. Tiny specks of dust glittered like when sunlight falls through a curtain in a forgotten room, and as she passed her hand before her, the air stirred as if it were smoke.

Her head lightened and spun. Next to her, Cinereo’s hand drew a sign in the air, and she saw the image of an hourglass appear, the sand trickling through from the top glass to the bottom.

“You are the Timekeeper,” he said.

I am the connection, she thought. I am the one to connect all three sides of the Apex.

A shaft of light shot from the sunstone in Julen’s hand towards her, hitting her solidly in the heart.

Immediately, the scene flickered. Once again, she saw images of the people she had seen in the mountain – the young man Tahir with long dark hair and golden eyes standing with his arms around the Arbor, and through a misty red fog, the woman they had called Sarra lying on the ground, her stomach swollen, obviously about to give birth.

In both times, just like Julen, others stood with glowing pendants, the sunstones sending beams of light that formed a shining web, centring within Horada. It burned white-hot, making her gasp, but she stood transfixed, unable to do anything but let the energy surge through her.

It was only then that she looked up and glanced past the arc of men and women who were watching her with bated breath. To her shock, behind them stood another figure, the remnants of his iron manacles hanging around his wrists – Orsin.

She opened her mouth but nothing came out, and she could only watch in stunned silence as he lifted his hands and they balled with leaping flame.

Some of the others had finally seen Orsin too, and shouts rang out around the grassy area in warning. But even as a couple of the nearest members of the council approached Orsin, he let out a bellow and the flame in his hands shot across the grass towards his sister.

Horada inhaled sharply, but fixed as she was to the ground, there was nothing she could do, and the firebolt enveloped her in a sheet of flame.

II

Tahir felt more than saw Demitto’s sunstone burn brighter than the sun. Fire shot up in the air, and with alarm he felt the ground tremble as the mountain above them shook and finally blew its top completely. Large pieces of rock showered on the crowd, and hot ash began to rain down, burning everything it touched.

Tahir cried out from where he stood with his arms around the Arbor’s trunk and went to step back. Shocked, he found that he couldn’t let go.

As screams arose around him and people began running across the grass, Tahir’s heart pounded, and he howled as he tried to pull back from the trunk. But the roots that wrapped around his legs had crept up his body, and all they seemed to do was pull him tighter.

“Let me go,” he sobbed.

He didn’t hear the tree answer. Instead, the Arbor’s words crept into his mind, the whisper louder even than the noise arising from the chaos around him.

I need you…

He didn’t want to be needed. He wanted to escape. But beside him, Demitto appeared unable to move, his sunstone still emitting light and fire, and next to him Catena was yelling and trying to get the pendant from around his neck. The King and Queen had vanished along with most of the dignitaries, and the Nox Aves in their grey robes were running around trying to shepherd people out of the arena. Nobody was paying attention to him. He was all alone.

Alone, except for the small warm body that pressed against his legs.

His heart pounding and panic rising within him, Tahir managed to look down, and he caught his breath at the sight of Atavus curled up by his feet. In spite of the noise, the fire, and the white-hot ash that was starting to settle on the grass, Atavus refused to leave his side.

The dog’s brown eyes looked up, but he didn’t rise or fuss. He just lay there, as if he knew exactly what was happening, and had already come to terms with his fate.

Tahir went still and ceased to struggle. This was what he had waited for his whole life. The day was finally here. He had known this was going to happen – all right, maybe not
exactly
this way, but he had known the Apex would bring with it a momentous time of struggle, a battle that needed to be fought. And he was part of that battle. There was no point in denying it now.

Catena had finally managed to get the pendant over Demitto’s head, and they let it drop to the ground and backed away, trying to cover their heads as the sunstone grew even brighter and more ash rained down.

“You cannot help him,” Demitto yelled as Catena tried to pull away from his tight grip. His eyes met Tahir’s, full of sorrow.

Tahir couldn’t speak but tried to convey his thoughts in his gaze. It is all right. I understand. Go!

As they turned and ran, Tahir pushed away the worry of what would happen to them. They had delivered him to the Arbor – their role was done. Now he just had to finish it.

Through the misty haze of time, he could see Horada channelling the Arbor’s power, connecting them with Sarra in the future, who lay on the ground, crying out as pain racked her. Beside her stood the man with the silvery hair, his sunstone also blinding, and before him another man stood with hands plunged into a fiery dome above their heads. Everyone was in their rightful place, playing their part.

Tahir closed his eyes against the dazzling brightness. He had to focus now on how he could help.

He concentrated on his body and the tree in his arms. On what he could feel and what he could touch. As he calmed himself, he realised that he had already begun to join with the Arbor without noticing it. The rough edges of the bark bit into the soft skin of his cheek, his arms and his tummy where he pressed against it. As the roots tightened around him, his skin broke in several places and blood flowed, but he felt no pain, only a flood of exultancy that at last it was beginning.

The sound of singing rose again and, as the voices soothed him, so the roots touched his feet, wriggled through the gaps in his leather shoes, wrapped around his ankles, penetrated between his toes. They forced their way into his skin, crept into his body, spread up through his calves, his knees, his thighs, into his stomach. He felt them slide into his skull, close around his heart, joining it with the thousands of others it had absorbed over the years, making them into one – the Pectoris, the heart of the Arbor.

Ash poured down, coating the dog at his feet, the bodies of those who had fallen. Demitto and Catena ran across the arena. Now a part of the tree, Tahir was aware that they had reached Manifred where he stood by the entrance to a hole in the ground. Steps led downwards, into the darkness, and Manifred and other Nox Aves were trying to get as many people as possible down the steps.

A refuge,
he thought. They were trying to hide them from the Incendi.

Even as he thought their name, through the mists of time he saw the man standing near Horada, hands raised in flame as he called the Incendi king into the world. And in his own time, as the volcano began to spit rocks and lava across the countryside, so the Incendi soldiers began to pour from their city beneath the mountain.

Through the Arbor’s roots, Tahir saw it all happen. The volcano had tipped the balance of the elements in the Incendi’s favour. With fire surging through the land, they were finally able to break through the tree’s control. Hidden within the thousands of men, the elementals streamed forth, and as the temperature rose and a pyroclastic flow of liquid rock poured down sweeping everything in its wake, the men were engulfed and the elementals released to burst forth into this new fiery land.

Hot ash curled the Arbor’s leaves, turning them to dust. At his feet, Atavus lay buried beneath the growing carpet of white. Tahir saw people screaming, dying, and he wept for them, for the Arbor and for himself. The elementals were closing on Heartwood, spreading through its streets. Liquid rock sped down from the volcano, and people ran, crying and yelling, only to be incinerated as they met the elementals coming the other way.

The city was going to fall, Tahir thought. The tree would burn. And all those who were trying to hide underground would be taken by the elementals. Earth would be destroyed, and fire would remain supreme forever and ever. And he was powerless to do anything to stop it.

Wasn’t he?