Into the Dark Lands (18 page)

“Belf,” she whispered. “Please.”

The light grew, encircling him in bands so brilliant that she had to close her eyes yet again.

He moved.

She bit her lip, praying that it was his motion, and not her trembling, that she felt. “Belf?”

He moved again, this time planting his elbow feebly into her side. Light or no, her eyes flew open. Even the tears that started to slide down her cheeks were glowing.

She turned him around, supporting less and less of his weight as the power built in him as well.

“You idiot.” She half shouted into his ear. “You b-bloody i-idiot.”

She felt his lips move against her hair, and although she couldn't hear a word he said, she knew it was an apology.

Beyond the fire that still tried to cage them she could see the Lady of Elliath. Although the fire around her feet had not grown much closer, it still bit into her ankle. And if it caused Erin pain, who had only half the blood . . .

Clutching Belfas tightly by the shoulder, she walked the last few steps and reached out to touch the Lady's taut hand. She felt pain shoot into her palm for a moment, and then she dispelled it, as if it were a careless word that a friend had said in a moment of anger. She was glowing, she could see this beyond the red of the enemy light. Glowing, yet casting no shadow, she stood in the Hand of God. In that moment, although she could not see it, her eyes flashed the deep, living green of the Lady; and of the two, she was momentarily the stronger. No eye, mortal or blooded, would have easily been able to tell the two apart.

This blood, this power, this was God's—and wrapped in its warmth and its strength, there was nothing that she felt she could not do, nothing. She turned to look for a moment at Belfas and met his wide-eyed stare; she saw a reflection in his eyes of her face surrounded by strands of glowing hair that blazed a trail that the red-fire could not follow. Then she turned to look back at the Lady of Elliath, standing free now of the pain that had gripped her only moments before. The slim, immortal hand felt cool to the touch. If not for the pale color of the Lady's hair, they might have been sisters at the dawn of the Awakening.

And the Lady of Elliath knew fully, for the first time, Lernan's Hope as it stood before her, cloaked in his fires.

Standing in red-fire, with one hand on Belfas, and one hand on the Lady, Erin looked ahead into the dark horizon.

The shadow was there, closer and larger than it had been. She smiled as the Lady suddenly returned her grip. From somewhere, she heard the faintest whisper touch her mind.
Great-grandchild
. . . But it was not the Lady's voice; it was both deeper and stronger, for all its faintness, than Erin had ever heard before. She shook her head, and it was gone.

A pillar of white fire rose from the ground, utterly destroying the red.

The Lady of Elliath slid her hand free of her granddaughter's.

“Enough!”
A ball of white-fire raced outward. It touched a red wall; touched it and crumbled it almost at the same moment.

Erin had barely time to shout, “The horsemen!” at Belfas. He swiveled his head around, caught a glimpse of the cavalry, and lost it again as the white-fire spread out like a tidal wave.

“Come to me, line-children! Come, and quickly!”

From the left came Telvar, Kredan, Carla, and the Grandfather. From the right came the Sarillar, Evanyiri, Dannen, and Dorse.

“Anders?” the Grandfather shouted.

The Sarillar shook his head sharply.

“Now,” the Lady said. “Step forward; we have done what we must.”

She looked once, briefly, at her granddaughter before the scene shifted and the Gifting of Lernan once again sparkled dimly in an open clearing.

 

They returned to the Great Hall in silence. Anders had fallen; a victim of the nightwalker that the Sarillar and his warriors had struggled to destroy. All others who had been chosen still
walked—all but the Lady, who lay in a slumber from which none could wake her. Andin, the Sarillar, was the only one who had power enough to try, and when he failed, they carried her gently homeward.

“She sleeps,” the Grandfather told the younger line-mates. “Were she . . . dead, she would not remain; she would pass from us like sunrise. Do not grieve.”

He turned to look at Erin.

“And you, Erin.” He bowed formally. “Your childhood is past; you have touched the Bright Heart's hand and He has welcomed you.”

He waited for Erin's reaction, but she stood staring blankly past him. Shaking his head a little, he turned to leave.

“Grandfather.”

He stopped walking, but did not look back.

“I touched the Bright Heart. I think I heard His voice.”

His eyes widened, but she couldn't know that, couldn't know that the power of the Servants alone was strong enough to hear the words of the Bright Heart.

“Why—why did he come to me?”

“You were dying,” the Grandfather replied, thinking,
you heard the voice of God, child. No, not truly child any longer.
He saw again the image of her face as it had been just an hour ago, alive with the light of God. It was a wild thing, a terrible thing, and a sight of incredible beauty.
I have presided over the initiation ceremonies many, many times. Never have I seen such power.
No, not even in the days of his youth, so very long past. If only Erin could have made her ward in the natural way . . . He shook his head; best not to think on it too much. “You were dying,” he repeated softly.

“So was my—so was she.”

“Erin,” he said, turning to face her, “God comes as He is able; He listens for any sign from His children that He can hear. He came to you because your death-voice could reach Him. He did not aid your mother because hers couldn't.”

“But she—”

“She faced a Servant of the Enemy, one who could afford to turn all his power against that communication. We faced three, true—but those three could not silence us all because they had to contend with the Lady herself.”

“Why didn't the Lady—”

“It wasn't known until it was too late. And had it been . . .
you have not touched God's power before; you can not know how much our use of the Gifting weakened Him.

“Erin, any adult faces death and accepts it when it comes to
any
warrior. You
must
learn to do this. Not all life can be the responsibility of any single man or woman.”

He left her then, not wanting to diminish her achievement, but fearing his expression could do nothing else.

 

Katalaan was waiting for her. Light flickered from beneath the curtains of the house they shared. It was near dawn, which meant that the baker's stall would be empty for at least the half day. Erin was weary.

She had left as a child. She returned now as a warrior, an adult.

But as she opened the door to the house and its luminous shadows, she wondered for the first time if that would mean as much to Katalaan as it did to the lines.

“Kat?” she whispered as she stood hesitantly in the entranceway.

Lights touched the ceiling and flickered there as Katalaan stepped out of the small fire-room holding a lamp aloft. She closed her eyes for a moment and sagged against a wall.

“Erin.”

“I've made my ward, Kat,” Erin began. She could think of nothing else to say. “I'm an adult now.”

The lamp was deposited on the stairs as Kat took two steps forward and put her arms tightly around Erin.

“Blessed Bright Heart,” she whispered. “Thank you.” She stood there, shaking a moment. “Thank you for sending my daughter back.”

“Kat?” Erin whispered.

Katalaan only shook her head.

“You've never called me that before.”

“I never had to, Erin.” Tears streaked the old woman's face; old tears, covered now by newer ones. “I don't know how they can take this. I don't know how the lines can send their children to war.”

Because they're all warriors.
Erin had heard it many times before, but couldn't bring herself to say it. Instead she held on to Kat tightly. For she realized that sometime soon, there would be no Kat to come home to at the end of the day. The war had called, and she had proved she could answer it.

That morning, she left off class and went with Kat to the market square.

 

Although Erin was acknowledged from that point on as adult, it was a full month before she was granted the robes of her office at her ceremony of initiation.

For that month, the Lady of Elliath lay suspended in a healing trance, her body seeking to recover the power that she had spent in the final moments of the confrontation. The ceremonies were never done without her presence.

The information that Belfas was able to provide from his brief glimpse of the cavalry charge enabled the strategists of the line to identify the Malanthi that had been present, and for some time Elliath knew a measure of relief, for the high priest, foremost of the Karnari, had indeed been upon the field, and had almost certainly perished under the last great wave of the Lady's light.

 

The deep blue sky was tinged with the faint red of sunset, but even that hated light vanished as the clouds began to roll in.

The First of Malthan stood upon the highest spire of his palace and looked westward. The shadows of his fingers pressed into the buttressed cut stone.

“Three.”

The priest in attendance bowed yet again to control his shaking. His black robes fluttered above the stone as if they, too, feared his Lord.

“Yes, Lord.”

The fingers upon the wall bit deeply into precisely cut stone, leaving their mark.

“The high priest?”

“Yes, Lord,” the man stammered. “And the—and the commander of the Swords.” He did not mention the twenty others who had died in the charge; these he knew his Lord would deem inconsequential. Although he stood in the center of the platform, he could still see over the edge; the fall was said to be near endless. He did not want to find the truth of that, not this eve.

“I see.” The First Servant turned, a swirl of midnight velvet. Of all of the nightwalkers, fell Servants of God, only this one chose to maintain a semblance of human appearance. But it was far from a comfort for those of the Malanthi that had to work under him, for each expression was crystal clear and unveiled
by shadow. Between the shadow and the sudden red glint in the Servant's eyes, the shadow was by far the better option.

Nevertheless, the Malanthi priest struggled to hide any sign of fear. It was the one thing that was certain doom when the Lord was in this frame of mind.

“How?”

“The First of the Enemy, Lord. She came to Karana short days after it had fallen. We believe that the Sarillar of her line was also present.” As the priest watched the First Servant, he relaxed. Although he did not know what he had said, something in his words calmed his Lord.

“The Lady herself,” Stefanos said softly, turning away. “We drew the Lady to the fields she had forsaken.” He was silent a moment, but the priest did not move—he had not yet been dismissed.

“Any other news?”

“Yes, Lord. We believe that an army composed of three lines will reach Karana within a week. At this time, our own army is not capable of holding the city; the nonblooded are leaving in spite of the incentive to remain.”

“Very well. You may go.”

The priest nodded and began to retreat.

“One more thing.”

“Lord?”

“There were a number of prisoners taken for the altars.”

“Yes.”

“When the new leader of the Greater Cabal is chosen, have him perform his ceremonies along the broken walls. Tell him he is to leave the bodies there when he retreats.”

The priest smiled softly.

“As you command, Lord.”

In silence and privacy, the First Servant drew strength from the coming of the night.

“First of Lernan,” he whispered softly. “When we meet, you will rue this.”

So saying, he took a step over the edge and descended from the spire. The night had come, and he would take time for the luxury and necessity of walking.

Erin lay back against her bedroll,
forcefully massaging her sword arm. She was tired—no, exhausted—but she'd gotten thoroughly accustomed to that state during her four years at the front. She'd almost gotten used to four small walls of canvas, to rain, heat, and insects as well. And trees. She had never thought to be so weary of forests. It made her appreciate her leave and her visits with Kat. But even at the end of those weeks she longed for this. Bright Heart, she was stupid sometimes.

The thin flap of canvas couldn't block out Telvar's angry shouting. It was a wonder that at the end of day he had the voice left to berate the newer fighters. She smiled, remembering her own first days under his command. But the smile was half wince; many of his words still had the power to sting over time—even at almost four years' distance.

The next few weeks looked to be peaceful ones—at least as peaceful as the front ever got. Tomorrow—or more likely the next day—they would begin their twenty-mile march to the Vale, where Korinn's unit was fighting.

She rolled over onto her stomach, letting the ache of the day settle into her back.

In four years, they had lost about fifty miles and gained back ten. In four years, the Lady had traveled out to the front another six times to stand against powers assembled that were too great for her warrior line-children. And it wasn't enough.