The lonesome crown, p.51
The Lonesome Crown, page 51
Spades laughed. Then she turned her attention to Lindholf. “You.” She beckoned him with a nod. “The one in the shiny armor, you are the only one I do not recognize. Yet I wager there’s a story behind that deformed face of yours. A divine secret.”
Lindholf gripped the pommel of his own sword tighter.
“Yes.” Spades’ eyes narrowed to cold slits now. “Grip your sword tight, boy.” She set her stance. “In fact, you’d all best ready yourselves to fight. And then ready yourselves to die, every last one of you.”
She wasted no time and flew straight at Mancellor, black sword slicing through the still of the night. Mancellor scarcely had time to bring his own blade up in defense. Yet he just managed to block her wicked slash, ducking, flinging himself backward, knocking into Dokie, who stumbled and spun toward the crumbled battlement.
Liz Hen had no weapons, but she screamed and flung herself right at Spades, purely reflex, balled fists swinging. The warrior woman elbowed Liz Hen in the face swift and hard, her black armor cracking against Liz Hen’s chin and cheekbone, sending the big girl reeling back onto her haunches, lip bloody.
Beer Mug launched himself at Spades, teeth gnashing in a snarling rage. The warrior woman swung out wildly in defense, the flat of her heavy black blade striking the big gray dog across the length of his body. With a yelp of pain, Beer Mug spun into Liz Hen. Both of them tumbled away in a heap.
Frozen in fear, Lindholf stood and watched. Jondralyn tried to lift Forgetting Moon, strange tendrils of blue smoke now curling up the haft of the ax.
Spades allowed Mancellor no moment of respite as she was once again on the attack, her sword blazing toward him a second time. The Wyn Darrè man had just recovered from her first jarring blow. He barely dodged her second swing aimed right at his head, trying to counter, his own wild momentum sending him careening away again into Dokie. They both crashed against the broken-down battlement of the tower. Spades lunged after them. Mancellor got his blade up in time to block her third strike. But the force behind her blow sent him reeling back into Dokie again, both of them folding over the battlement, off-balance, nearly falling. Mancellor turned just as Spades kicked. The sole of her heavy boot caught the Wyn Darrè man right in the chest, sending him spinning backward over the battlement and out into the darkness, where he dropped, then vanished from view. A moment later there was a splash as his body landed in the river.
Dokie regained his feet, wide-eyed, looking out over the edge where Mancellor had disappeared. With her free hand, Spades grabbed the small boy by the neck of his shirt and lifted him out over the edge of the tower. “You’re the only brave person I ever met in all of Gul Kana,” she said, jabbing the tip of her sword up under his chin. “You swam with them sharks like a hero. I respect you too much to kill you. So I shall let you go.” Then she dropped him and he disappeared into the darkness.
“No!” Liz Hen screamed as Dokie’s body splashed into the dark waters below.
She untangled herself from Beer Mug and jerked to her feet. “He can’t be down there in that river alone!” she yelled. “He’s afraid of sharks!” Liz Hen barreled across the tower toward Spades. Brushing past the warrior woman, the big girl launched herself over the battlement, knees folded into her chest as she dropped like a boulder into the darkness below. Her splash into the Ridliegh River was the loudest of the three.
Beer Mug stared at the spot where Liz Hen had disappeared, head cocked to the side as if contemplating going after her. He whimpered, took one look at Spades, then dashed toward the opening in the wood floor and scurried down the stairs of the inner tower and was gone.
It had all happened so fast that Lindholf had barely drawn a breath, Dayknight sword impotent in his shaking hand. Jondralyn was still trying to lift Forgetting Moon. Thick blue smoke poured from between her fingers, twisted and coiled up her arm, spreading over her chest.
Spades was an ominous black silhouette against the night, bloody sword in hand as she strode toward Jondralyn. She stopped. Her own green eyes were alight in wonder as she stared at Jondralyn and the glowing blue smoke twining up the haft of the battle-ax. Finally Jondralyn lifted Forgetting Moon in both hands.
Spades attacked Jondralyn with a swift and vicious swing that crashed down like thunder against the upraised ax. With a boom and burst of blue lightning, Spades’ Dayknight blade shattered into a thousand bloody and black shards that pinged and twinkled and scattered over the wood-plank floor. A quivering hilt and black-opal pommel was all that was left in Spades’ shaking hands.
Jondralyn managed to keep the battle-ax aloft, the blue light of its smoky surface agleam in her lone startled eye. Spades flung the useless black hilt away and dove for the long white sword, Afflicted Fire. The warrior woman seized the sword’s ivory-colored hilt and rolled to her feet, ferocious pale face now determined and hard-edged with a seething rage. She set her stance, square to her enemy.
In the center of the tower, Enna Spades and Jondralyn Bronachell faced each other in silence, the princess of Gul Kana bearing the double-bladed battle-ax, Forgetting Moon, the fierce red-haired warrior woman wielding Afflicted Fire—the bone-white sword with the crescent-moon hilt-guard and pearly blade that Lindholf himself had seen drink the blood of men. And what can my Dayknight sword do against magic such as that? he thought. The wrecked remains of Spades’ Dayknight sword scattered across the wood-plank floor spoke to that. But I still have Seita’s poisoned Bloodwood dagger. His hand released its frozen grip on his sword. He reached for the hidden black dirk buried under his armor. Instant death it held. Seita’s poisons still coated its blade. His fingers curled around the hilt.
“You really believe in the magic, don’t you?” Spades’ voice cut the silence. “You really do believe in yourself, Jondralyn Bronachell. You believe that the battle-ax is going to save you?”
“I do,” Jondralyn answered. “Laijon is with me. Mother Mia, too.”
Spades’ cold green eyes narrowed. “You really do believe there is some form of divine power in you that makes you better than me, more worthy?”
“The gods have guided me here,” Jondralyn said. “Guided me to this place through my dreams, to Savon, to this very tower, to claim what is rightfully mine. The gods deem me the Harbinger, the one to stave off Fiery Absolution and slay Aeros Raijael.” Her lone eye narrowed to a hard, cold slit. “The gods shall help me slay you.”
Spades offered the princess a curling little smile. “You cannot be better than me through simple dreams and wishful thinking and magic and prayers to your god. That is not real power. Real power comes through hard work and practice and experiencing thousands of battles and thousands of deaths.”
Spades then held up the white sword, admiring it, saying, “As I’ve told many of Aeros’ young female slaves, nothing compares to having a sharp blade in your hand and knowing how to wield it. When you can kill as efficiently as a man, that is strength. When nobody can defeat you with a blade, that is power. There is no more dangerous force in the Five Isles than a woman with a sword. Or a woman willing to use her own mind. Or a woman ready to do whatever she damn well pleases. And I am that woman. You, Jondralyn Bronachell, are naught but a dreamer who has put in scant little time or effort to compete on my level.”
“Try me,” Jondralyn said. “I have been trained by the best. I have been trained by Hawkwood.”
Spades swung Afflicted Fire. Jondralyn blocked with Forgetting Moon. Blue sparks and white thunder roared into the night as both women were flung away from each other, sliding along their backs across the floor of the tower.
Tumbling to a stop, Jondralyn lost her grip on the vibrating Forgetting Moon. The ax tumbled and skittered over the wood-plank floor, coming to rest against the tower’s crumbled battlement.
Spades also lost her hold on Afflicted Fire. She scrambled and caught the white sword before it clattered into the open hole in the floor and tumbled down the stairs and into the black hollows of the tower.
Back on her feet, Jondralyn lunged for Ethic Shroud and the five angel stones that were nearer to her than the lost battle-ax. Spades slowly advanced on the princess. Jondralyn scooped up all five stones in one hand, then snatched up the shield by the leather strap hooked to its back. Standing, Ethic Shroud protecting the length of her body, the princess held the five angel stones out toward Spades like a weapon, as if some magic would surely jump from them and devour her foe. And magic it was. Blue. Green. Red. White. Colorful shards of light came streaming out from between Jondralyn’s quivering fingers. And Ethic Shroud shone like pure starlight against her chest, illuminating the entire rooftop with blinding white light.
Enna Spades rushed the princess, Afflicted Fire steady in her hands, an icy confidence fixed in her cold eyes. Jondralyn braced herself behind the shield.
And like a strike of lightning, the shimmering white blade of Afflicted Fire came arching down, shearing the hand holding the angel stones off at the wrist. Jondralyn’s suddenly detached appendage dropped to the wooden floor of the tower with a wet thump, spilling the five angel stones from five lifeless fingers—fingers that slowly curled inward on themselves until they were motionless. Blood drained from the raw, severed end of the hand, soaking into the wood, oozing toward the five angel stones.
“Laijon almighty and Mother Mia too.” Spades stepped back. “You should have known those weapons and stones weren’t gonna be worth a lick of ripe oghul shit in your hands, girl.”
Lindholf gaped in horror. He felt his hand gripping the hilt of the Bloodwood dagger. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to leap to the aid of Jondralyn. In fact, he felt himself cower back, almost hoping to hide his entire body in the darkness of the night sky behind him, heart pounding with fear. His feet were rooted in place. His whole body immobile. Frozen with cowardice. It’s everything from my dream come true. He imagined himself back in Memory Bay, a mermaid clawing at his arm. The visions! Mancellor falling from the tower. A woman in black armor! Jondralyn could only stare down at what remained of her arm—a stump of an arm that gushed blood over the pure white shield and her own Silver Guard armor.
“Rotted fucking angels,” Spades grumbled. “Lady Death take me to the underworld right now, but you’re getting everything all bloody.” Spades snatched up Jondralyn’s bleeding severed hand and tossed it out over the edge of the tower. Lindholf heard the faint but unmistakable wet slap as it lit on the cobbled street below.
Spades then took one step forward and stabbed the tip of Afflicted Fire two inches straight into Jondralyn’s remaining eye and pulled the blade swiftly back out. The princess screamed in both terror and pain and dropped Ethic Shroud, both of her hands frantically clutching at her face, where her lone remaining eye now drained blood.
But she only had one hand to clutch her face with. The handless arm brushed against the side of her face uselessly, pumping blood all over her neck and down her silver chest-plate armor. Jondralyn folded to her knees in agony, crying in desperation now, both arms waving out in vain before her, totally blind.
Spades ignored Jondralyn and her cries. The red-haired warrior woman casually gathered up the angel stones, slipping them one at a time into the leather satchel from whence they came. When she was done, she stretched the tarp out over the wood floor of the tower. She then began gathering up the rest of the weapons, placing them into the middle of the tarp.
Jondralyn rolled over onto her side, writhing in agony, crying aloud, crying for help. Lindholf had to look away. He couldn’t go to her. As he watched Spades collect all the weapons of the Five Warrior Angels, he began to truly believe he was something abnormally wicked and slothful, worse than some creature from the underworld. He had done nothing, not one single thing to prevent all that had happened here tonight. Why? Why did I do nothing? Why do I still do nothing? He had not lifted a finger. Yet he still felt drained, like an empty water skin made of leather, shriveled and useless. He just couldn’t muster up anything in the way of bravery. It’s like I don’t even exist, not even to Enna Spades. It’s like she can sense that I am not a threat, that I am nothing.
Spades had ignored him throughout the entire battle. And that is how useless I am!
They were all now gathered in the tarp: Afflicted Fire, Forgetting Moon, Ethic Shroud, Lonesome Crown, Blackest Heart. Spades folded the canvas over onto itself and hauled the weapons up and over her shoulder. The load was bulky and huge, but she headed for the hole in the floor, carefully taking the stairs, vanishing down into the dark.
Lindholf just stared at the hole. Then he turned and watched Jondralyn squirm in pain. Then, at length, whatever spell of fear that had held him immobile for so long broke and he went to her. He knelt at her side. Grabbed up her one good hand in his. She lay on her back now. Blood covered her entire face.
“It’s me,” he said. “It’s your cousin, Lindholf.”
“I can’t see,” she cried.
“I’m so sorry.” He found he was crying too.
“Which hurts worse, the hand or my eye?” She wasn’t making any sense, and Lindholf’s heart crumbled.
“Why didn’t you help me?” Her bloody grip tightened around his own hand. “Why didn’t you help me, Lindholf?”
“I don’t know,” he sobbed. Jondralyn without eyes. Underwater visions!
“How can I live as a blind person? How can I live without sight? Why did you not help me, Lindholf?”
“Don’t hate me, Jondralyn. Don’t hate me. I was scared. I’m scared. I’ve always been scared. My whole life I’ve been afraid. I’ve never been very strong. I have horrible visions. It’s the Shroud of the Vallè. It’s all I can think of, all the time, it consumes me.”
A shadow fell over Lindholf. He whirled and found Enna Spades standing behind him once again, the white sword, Afflicted Fire, gripped in her hand. “Shroud of the Vallè?” Spades said. It was a question. She gave him a long, level look, and then continued, “I can get you Shroud of the Vallè. But you need to help me carry the weapons. They are at the bottom of the stairs. But I don’t want to lug them clear to Saint Only all by myself.”
“I must tend to Jondralyn,” Lindholf stammered, wiping at his tear-streaked face with one nervous hand. “She is my cousin.”
Spades took Afflicted Fire and set its razor tip under Jondralyn’s chin.
“Ow, ouch. What’s that?” Jondralyn exclaimed as Spades pushed down.
“No.” There was terror in the princess’s voice as her one good hand clawed at the blade. “Don’t.”
Spades leaned on the sword, driving the blade through Jondralyn’s chin and up into her brain. The princess of Amadon went still, her arm falling limp at her side in an ever-widening pool of scarlet.
Afflicted Fire drank her blood. Faint rivulets of red flowed up and into the blade’s pulsing and swirling innards. It was as if it were sucking away her very soul. Lindholf shuddered. Then Spades yanked the blade free.
“You needn’t tend to her now,” she said to him. “Help me carry the weapons back to Saint Only and I shall find you all the Shroud of the Vallè you can sniff up your nose.”
“You killed her,” Lindholf cried.
“She killed herself.”
He couldn’t stop the tears. “But it doesn’t seem right.”
“Oh, spare me the dewy eyes, kid. She’s a fair enough mess now and completely dead. So get on your feet. We needn’t stick around here. You’re coming with me.”
“But—”
“You’ll do as I say,” she growled. “There are more burlap sacks in that junk room downstairs. We can divide up the stuff. Make it easier for the both of us to carry the weapons of the Five Warrior Angels out of this shit-hole town and back to my lord Aeros.”
For he who hath known the mind of Laijon hath rejoiced with those who rejoice.
—THE WAY AND TRUTH OF LAIJON
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE NAIL
10TH DAY OF THE BLOOD MOON, 999TH YEAR OF LAIJON
SAVON, GUL KANA
Even before entering the tavern, Nail had felt an unsettling voice inside his head warning him away. And he wished he had stayed away from the Preening Pintail, for death was all that lived within its murky innards. The place was naught but a dank and bloody wreck of overturned tables and upended chairs. And four dead bodies lay in pools of dark scarlet in the main room; three older men and a young serving wench. All four of them crisscrossed with grisly wounds from a sword.
“Fresh slayings,” Cromm Cru’x announced after examining the two nearest the front entry. The way the oghul said the word slayings sent a shudder through Nail.
“Let’s take our leave of this place,” Bronwyn Allen advised sternly. “This whole town feels cursed.”
“But my sister!” Tala exclaimed, brown eyes roaming the ghostly tavern with worry. “What if she’s been hurt?”
“Your sister is not here.” Bronwyn’s look gave a stern warning. Turning for the door, she beckoned the rest to follow. Lawri Le Graven was the first to heed the Wyn Darrè girl’s warning, hustling back out into the cobbled street, her gauntleted arm hidden under one of the two cloaks she always carried. Bronwyn, Cromm, and Tala followed.
Nail exited the building last, stepping warily back into the night. He immediately spotted what looked like a tan leather glove lying in the gutter not far from the entry of the tavern. But he quickly realized what it was—a severed hand cleanly detached at the wrist. There was very little blood, just a smear over the nearest gray cobble. Lawri saw the hand too, and a sick look spread over her pale face. He was sure the gruesome thing had not been there when they had entered the tavern.
“Let’s find shelter for the night,” Bronwyn said, eyeing the severed hand in disgust, then scanning the street, wary. “And not anywhere near here. Glade Chaparral and his cronies are likely across that river by now. They could easily be in town. We can’t afford to run into them again. Not here.”
