Call Of The Flame (Book 1) (5 page)

Morae signaled his troops to halt at the gate to the docks,
all too close.  Kyric tried not to look at him but couldn’t help it.  Beneath
the wide-brimmed hat, his dark eyes fell in turn upon each man waiting at the
gate, and those who met his stare stepped back, looking down, or quickly turned
to a companion.  Kyric didn’t even notice when his sausage fell off the stick.

Morae stood in the stirrups, his head back as if catching a
scent on the breeze.  Kyric wanted to get away, but found that he couldn’t
move.  Suddenly Morae looked straight at him, and Kyric felt something stir in
his breast.  Inexplicably, he wanted to go to him.  So drawn was he that he
could hardly stop himself.

“Sir!” the lieutenant said to Morae, snapping to attention
directly in front of him, “how may I be of service?”

Morae looked down at him, not sure now if he had scented any
prey.  “Has anyone sailed for the open sea this night?” he said in a voice
sounding a bit too high for a tall man.

“No sir,” returned the lieutenant, “they’ve all been
ferrymen and those rowing out to anchored ships and the like.”

“Be sure to look in everything,” Morae commanded.  “Even in
water barrels or casks of wine.  And don’t forget that you can hide half a
house under a woman’s skirts.”

“Yes sir,” stammered the lieutenant, now even redder in the
face than before.

Kyric felt a tug at his sleeve as Aiyan dragged him into a
dark place behind the sausage stall, and from there into a narrow side street. 
If Morae turned to look for him after dismissing the lieutenant, he wasn’t
there to see.

“His horse was lathered,” Aiyan said.  “He may have followed
your scent all the way from Karta.”

“When he looked at me, I almost walked over to him.”

“That’s the draw of the blood.  It will fade.  And I will
tell you something.  He may have followed the weird to the old docks, but when
you allow it to lead you, the weird sometimes takes you to places that have
nothing to do with your life or what you want.  So he couldn’t be sure why he
looked at you.”

Aiyan hurried him along until they ran into the main
boulevard and a river of people.  “Like worldly eyes,” he said.  “It’s harder
for the spirit eye to see us in a crowd.  Still, try to stay empty.”

“I’m so tired I really do feel empty.”

“Not far now,” said Aiyan.  “We’re only a mile from Sedlik’s
house.”

The street was the famous Way of Kings, and Kyric tried to
take in the ancient grandeur of the old city, the columns and arches and
wondrous facades.  This was all he had thought about during the last years of
his servitude, coming to Aeva, the birthplace of his civilization, the source
of the artwork, history, and literature of the Aessian culture.  He had dreamed
of standing in the Palace of the Old Kings, and in the Balerius, the great hall
of the god and goddess.  Sevdin might be the center of commerce, but if one
would seek to know the soul of Aessia, he would come to Aeva.

They passed into the theatre district, where folks clustered
thickly in front of cabarets.  Below brightly-colored marquees, the tall commedia
houses disgorged patrons onto the street while carriage drivers vied for places
in the side lanes.  Aiyan kept looking behind, once even stopping and waiting
in a dark alley, but never spotted a follower.

At length, Aiyan led them down a dim side street, still flowing
with tourists, the little paper lanterns they carried bobbing in the dark, and
they entered a neighborhood where narrow lanes ran chaotically, crossing each
other at odd angles.  Stopping at an unmarked door, Aiyan tapped lightly with
the knocker.  They waited a minute and he tapped louder.

Something rattled behind the door and a tiny hole opened. 
“Who is it?” squeaked a girl’s voice.

“Jela, it’s me, Aiyan.  Let us in.”

Another rattle and the door flew open.  A young woman
wearing little more than a shift leapt upon Aiyan, her slender arms around his
thick neck.

“Uncle Aiyan!” she squealed.  “But it’s the middle of the
night.  Are you alright?”  She pulled them into the house.

A heavy-set man in a nightshirt thumped down a staircase
next to the entryway with a candle in one hand and a shortsword in the other. 
He looked at Aiyan.  “Well?” he asked.

Aiyan did his best to sound cheery.  “Sorry to come at this
hour, Sedlik, but we need a place to stay for a couple of days.”

Sedlik frowned.  “You’re in trouble and you need a place to
hide.”  He looked down at the shortsword.  “This is my house, Aiyan.  My
daughter lives here.  You know that you’re always welcome down at the
warehouse, that you can commit any heinous act you want there — in the name of
your noble order, of course.  Old Dendi is still there and I know he would love
to see you.  I’m sorry, but you can’t stay here.”

Aiyan looked him in the eyes, the unsaid words heavier than
the silence between them.  “Not this time,” he said gently.  “This is too big.”

“All the more reason for you to go elsewhere.”

“There is no elsewhere.”

Sedlik stood staring at him.  At length he lowered his eyes
and handed the shortsword to Jela.  He shook Aiyan’s hand warmly despite his
stern words.  “Look at you.  You’re filthy.  Go down to the wine cellar and get
out of those clothes.  I’ll loan you a couple of tunics.”

Kyric tried to not look at Jela.  Her shift was cut with a
short hem and a plunging neckline.  And it was so sheer he could almost see
through it.  With her large eyes, loose wavy hair and the shortsword in her
hand she looked like one of the statues atop the arches over the Way of Kings.

“I also need you to talk to your friend the magistrate.  I
need to know the latest in the Senate.”

“Aiyan, the Games of Aeva are starting tomorrow.”

“I need to know right away.”

“Alright,” Sedlik said.  “Who is the kid?”

“Someone with whom you have something in common.”

Sedlik led them down a stone stairway behind the kitchen and
into an open storeroom.  A heavy door with a heavy lock was set in a nearby
wall.  Behind a wine rack lay a few sacks of straw.

“This is the best I can do for now,” Sedlik said.  “Tomorrow
I’ll rig some kind of bed for you.”

Jela brought down a plate of
cold meat and hard bread, and some blankets to lay over the straw.  Thankfully,
she had put on a robe.  After a few bites Kyric’s muscles turned to lead.  He
barely managed to slip his boots off before he fell back on the straw,
instantly asleep.

This time he stood in an ornate library with tall windows
and a vaulted ceiling.  Fine wood paneling reflected the light emanating from
statues of dragons, serpent headed horses, and strange preternatural birds.  He
found a secret panel and opened it, stepping into a cave with glowing
stalactites.  A man appeared before him, dressed very much like the black
knight in the dream at the jail, except that he wore a long tunic over his
chainmail and his greathelm had no visor, only eye slits and holes for
breathing.  All that he wore, tunic, sword belt, boots, all had been dyed
black.

A sparkling light shone through one of the eye slits.

“Kneel,” came a deep voice from within the helm.  And Kyric
knelt.

The knight had a small spur on the thumb of his gauntlet,
and, removing the other armored glove, he used it to open a vein in his wrist.

“Drink,” he commanded.

Kyric took his hand and drank from the flowing wound like it
was a fountain.  It was sweet, and it charged him with power, and the more he
drank the thirstier he became, drinking more and more until he was filled.

Sedlik was already gone the next morning when they came up
from the cellar.  Jela insisted they bathe before breakfast, and while they
were at it Aiyan decided they would wash their clothes as well, so they spent
the early morning fetching and heating water.  Throughout all this, Aiyan made
sure to keep his sword within reach.  By the time they made it to the kitchen
table for chickpea and spinach pie Kyric felt like he could keep food down.  He
hadn’t told Aiyan about the dream.

“Why have you been gone so long, Uncle Aiyan?” said Jela. 
“What have you been doing with yourself?”

Today she wore a plain housedress and had her hair tied
back, but in the morning light her eyes were brighter and her smile softer, and
Kyric caught himself staring at her.

“You know how it is, sweetie,” said Aiyan, quaffing a bowl
of honeyed milk, “the less I say the better.  I have spent the last two months
on Esaiya.  Before that, I was in Kandin, and before that, Aleria.”

Jela smiled ironically.  “Where good Avic-speaking folk are
taming a wilderness in the face of hostile savages.”

“It’s not so bad there,” Aiyan said.  “I’ve been to other
former colonies where it is much worse for the natives.”

The two of them chatted while they ate, Aiyan telling her
about a play he had seen in Kandin, asking her why she hadn’t married yet. 
Kyric discovered that she was nineteen, a year younger than he, and that she
had had a suitor but no longer saw him.  He could tell she was smart, and
wasn’t too surprised to learn that she studied accounting to help in the family
business, which was mainly the wine trade but included a gambling parlor and some
shady dealings in antiquities.

“Shall we all go to the games today?” she said.

“Kyric and I need to wait for the news your father is
bringing.  We also need some rest.  Besides, the first day is mostly ceremony
and entertainments.  The only contest will be spear throwing later this
afternoon.”

“Well I’m going out to see some ceremony and
entertainments,” Jela said, leaving the kitchen.

“Be sure to take a friend,” Aiyan called after her.

“What now?” Kyric asked.

Aiyan shrugged.  “Sedlik could be all day.  More of the
story I think.”

“Wait.  You told me last night that you know someone who was
there two hundred years ago.  Who would that be?”

“Be patient.  You will know that
when I have finished my story.”

The knight who stood guard over the rear entrance to the
castle, the gate above the tiny quay, was a young man.  But his face was of the
ageless sort, neither young nor old.

The night had grown unseasonably warm.  Breaking off his
restless pacing, the sentry slipped out of his surcoat and leaned out over the
parapet, letting his thin inner tunic catch the last hint of moving air.  All
was still, as if the world held its breath.

A sound.  A shadow on the battlements.  He whirled, hand on
his sword.  “Who goes?” he challenged.

“Fear not, Zahaias.  It is only me.”  Sorrin stepped
forward.

“I’m sorry, Master Sorrin.  I expected no one till dawn.” 
Zahaias saw him clearly now, saw that he was dressed for sleep and for battle. 
He wore leather breeches tucked into war boots, and he carried his sword.  But
his only armor was a nightshirt.

Sorrin leaned in close with a pale and moist face.  “Has
anyone come to this gate since you’ve been at watch?”

“No.  No one.”

Sorrin nodded and stood still.

“But,” said Zahaias, lowering his voice, “I have been uneasy
this night.  Tell me what it is that troubles you, Master Sorrin.”

“I do not know,” he said, turning to face the sea.

Zahaias looked at him.  “Some of our brothers say that you
at times have strange dreams.  Dreams that hold meaning.”

“Yes,” said Sorrin, his voice distant, “I have dreamed
tonight.  I dreamt I saw the world as a great egg.  It cracked and split open
and leaked forth a black bile.”  Sorrin blotted his face with a sleeve of his
nightshirt.  “But who can say what meaning this holds?”

Zahaias said nothing.  Sorrin turned to him sharply.  “I
charge you this, Zahaias — watch well tonight and let no one pass these walls
without my word.  No one.  Do you understand?”

“Yes.  I shall be vigilant.”

“Who has the watch at the gate to the bridge?”

“Sir Allin.”

Sorrin tugged at his loose hair.  “Perhaps I should warn him
as well,” he said to himself, “in case of threat from the land.”  He shook his
head as if to clear it.  “But watch the sea, Zahaias.  Send word to my cell if
anyone comes.”

“I will.”

Sorrin nodded a curt farewell,
turned, and walked away along the parapet until he was just a ghost on the far
battlements.  Zahaias returned to his watch.  A faint wind was rising with the
incoming tide.

Kyric interrupted him.  “Who was this Sorrin and what made
him have dreams like that?”

“He was our founder, the
greatest knight of our order,” Aiyan said.  “And I don’t think Sorrin himself
knew why he had those visions, waking and sleeping.  I know that some magicians
learn the art of dreaming and can enter the dreams of others.  In your case, I
think the Unknowable Forces are intruding on your dreams, and that happens to
some of us.  But I believe that Master Sorrin was so immaculate a warrior that
his dream self was like a mirror, and that it was
he
who looked into the
dreams of the Powers.  Now let me continue.  This next part will reveal much.”

Sorrin returned to his cell and dressed in the tunic of his
office.  Sitting cross-legged on his pallet, sword laid bare on the floor
before him, he waited, studying the runeblade that had been carried by all the
first masters before him.  In the last hour of the night the candle burned low,
then out.

Now he became aware of the faintest light; a dim grey dawn
outlined the shutters of his window.  He heard a rhythm, steady, unyielding. 
An echo.  Close now.  Footfalls.  He rose quickly, sword held low but ready,
then he froze, listening, hearing only his own heartbeat.  At the door of the
room, shadows clustered thickly, a chill seeping in.

“Come then, if you will,” he whispered fiercely.

The door slowly drifted inward.  Black against the dusk, a
huge helmeted figure entered with a single stride.

“It,” Sorrin said, faltering, “is you.”

“Yes.”

“I . . . I heard you coming.”

“I made no sound,” said Cauldin, removing the greathelm. 
The pupils of his eyes, enormous, scintillated with crimson streaks deep
within, like those of a nocturnal predator.

“Tell me what has happened.”

“Aumgraudmal is slain and by my hand.”

Sorrin nodded slowly.  “Then he did not speak.”

“Oh yes,” spat Cauldin with a sound that served as laughter,
“he spoke.  After I had looked into his eyes and he took my will from me, he
revealed all.  He told me how he devoured Temma while the old man’s heart still
beat, how the living blood of the magus mixed with his own and gave him this
new power, and how I would be the first of a dark cabal — men skilled in the
ways of the unseen, all strung on invisible lines across the realm of power,
puppets of the will of Aumgraudmal.  He would have become our god.”

Sorrin strained to see him clearly.  All of Cauldin’s
vestments, his tunic, corselet, breeches, even his gloves, were stained inky
black — the black blood of the sea dragons.

“But,” Cauldin continued, “the final act, intended to forge
the link of his domination, allowed me to share his power instead of becoming
subject to it.”

“Tell me,” said Sorrin, a fear he did not understand
beginning to rise.

“You already know.”

“Tell me.”

“He opened an artery and I drank his blood.  My power
unfurled like a great sail, and it was I who rode the wind of the realm of
power.  Then he gazed into
my
eyes.  And for a moment it was
he
who knew fear.  Aumgraudmal opened his jaws, but before his poisonous breath
could issue forth I thrust my sword into his palate and pierced his brain.”

Sorrin stood motionless, sword still in hand.

“Why do you look at me so?” Cauldin said.

“Because I fear my oldest friend and I do not know why.”

“I know why.  And you as well.  It is because I came here to
share the dragon power with you.”

“Dragons do not share power.  They horde it.”

Cauldin held his arms wide.  “I have not a dragon’s
essence.  Can you not see me?  My essence is still that of the warrior.”

“I see you.  You bear an essence all your own.”

“As did Elistar.  As will you.  Those with destinies such as
ours must always stand apart.  Do not be afraid.  It takes only a moment.  We
could do it here and now.”

Sorrin felt beads of sweat at his temples.  He closed his
eyes.

“You feel it.  I know you do.  You sense what you will
become — that which you sought when first you came here.”

“Please,” whispered Sorrin, “please do not — “

“Here,” Cauldin said, “let me open a vein for you.  Drink of
my blood.”

“No,” said Sorrin, backing away.  “I do not want this.”

Cauldin smiled grimly.  “That is because you do not
understand it.  Listen to me Sorrin.  With the dragon’s blood you will feel no
separation from the realm of power.  You will live in it.  I do so at this
moment— we will be the heroes of the new myths to come.  We will look into the
hearts of the Powers themselves.”

Sorrin held his head up and let the fear of temptation pass
away.  “I have fought and suffered for years to be the man you see today.  I
wish to be nothing more.”

Cauldin withdrew his hand.  “Everything has changed.  I do
not even know if I can remain in the order.  I have an important question for
the Council and must see them at once.  I only wanted to see you first.  Do not
worry, my brother, we shall speak again soon.”

And he went.

Sorrin laid down his sword and blinked the sweat from his
eyes.  Turning to the window, he threw open the shutters and let the cool sea
air fill his tiny room.  A low fog had risen, a mirror image of the overcast
sky.  He laid his arm across the sill and rested his head there, but shadow
figures came out of the fog, pointing at him, mocking.

Have you no fear of death?

He closed his eyes and listened for the sea, for the sound
of breaking waves, and when, at last, the voice of the shadows had been driven
away, an echo rang in the corridor, a shriek carried on a voice sick with fear.

Then the booming voice of Zahaias.  “An enemy is in the
council chamber!  Everyone to arms!”

Sorrin took down his longbow and strung it in one motion,
drawing a single arrow from the quiver.  The arrowhead, razor edged and the
color of sapphire, had been carved from the tooth of a firebird.

Now through the doorway, sprinting along the corridor.  A
few steps up and across the long hall.  Shouts.  The clangor of steel striking
steel — rapid blows.  Narrow shafts of dim light.  The heavy oak doors of the
council chamber, open.  The threshold slick underfoot.  A bright metallic odor,
like copper.

A few twisted forms in blue tunics lay inside the chamber,
one writhing and sobbing in pain.  Another warrior knelt before the crescent
table, hands across his eyes, mouth open in a wordless cry, his sight forever
gone.  Lying sprawled across the table, or crumpled underneath like dogs
crushed by a cart, the sages of the council lay still in their own blood.  The
Magus Archeus, even more frail in death than she had been in life, had run the
length of the chamber before a sword impaled her from behind.

Entranced, blood still dripping from his sword, Cauldin
stood behind the Pyxidium, seeing it alone.  He reached out as Sorrin nocked
the arrow, and plucked the crystal from its setting, holding it up so that its
light fell upon his face.

Sorrin pulled back the bowstring, his fingers brushing his
cheek, and let the arrow fly.

It struck the Pyxidium and split it cleanly, in perfect
symmetry.  Cauldin kept hold of one half, even as the arrow pierced his right
eye, coming to rest deep within.  It knocked him back and he staggered but did
not fall.

He straightened and took a deep breath.  With a shout of
defiance, he yanked the arrow free and tossed it to the floor.  A few drops of
viscous fluid leaked from the empty socket.  Grinning with an insane mouth, he
raised the shard of the mystic crystal and tried to push it into the empty
socket.  It didn’t quite fit.  He pushed harder and it popped in, a grotesque
imitation of a glass eye.

A bell clanging wildly in a nearby courtyard shook Sorrin
from his daze.  Casting his bow aside, he reached down and took a sword from
the hand of a fallen knight.

Cauldin unhooked the helm from his belt and thrust it onto
his head.  Both hands on the grip, he held his sword ready in a high guard.

Sorrin attacked — spring toward him, quick steps, extend,
blades clash, rush past, stop and turn.

Cauldin spun to face him.  His sword shone coldly, and misty
ghosts flickered along the edge of the blade.  Behind one rectangular slit, a strong
light came from within his helmet.

“Do not try to stand against me, Sorrin.  You did not
destroy the Pyxidium, and this half that I hold is giving me a strength you
cannot imagine.”

The bell no longer sounded.  Sorrin motioned toward the open
doorway.  “All the knights of the order are coming.  No man is an army.  And
for what you have done, there is no redemption.”

Cauldin leapt forward with a furious two-handed slash. 
Sorrin jumped back, and the air whirred with the blade’s passing.

Sorrin saw the opening and stepped up, blade flashing, but
the move had been a ruse to draw the attack.  Cauldin returned his swing
backhanded and his sword clove Sorrin’s blade like an axe through a brittle
twig.