Master of restless shado.., p.24
Master of Restless Shadows Book Two, page 24
part #2 of Master of Restless Shadows Series
“We have to go. Before the city guards arrive to see you.” Atreau threw the splintered pike to the ground. He nudged Nube to Firaj’s side and then caught Fedeles’s reins. The light of Oasia’s wards drifted almost hesitantly to his side.
Fedeles felt like he might be sick or weep. Everything he’d feared of his own weakness had come true.
“I didn’t mean to . . . I wanted to save them,” he whispered.
“You can’t save everyone, Fedeles.” Atreau replied. “You’ll only get us all killed if you keep trying.”
Fedeles bowed his head into his hands and let Atreau lead Firaj away. He knew Atreau was right. If they stayed, then they would be discovered, and then both he and Atreau would face charges of witchcraft—at the very least. But leaving the sacred grove stripped down to a few faint wards and two plaintive crows, that felt so wrong. He’d done more harm to the sacred grove than either Hierro or the royal bishop had managed in years of assaults. He had to put things right.
Fedeles lifted his head and took in Atreau’s exhausted figure.
He couldn’t drag Atreau back to the sacred grove and risk his arrest.
He scrubbed at his scarred wrists, feeling old guilt and new.
Atreau looked to him, and despite the darkness of the night, he easily perceived Fedeles’s thoughts, because he whispered, “We can’t go back there.”
“I know.” Fedeles lifted his gaze to the dark sky. Clouds of smoke and shafts of moonlight created strange forms. Fedeles made out something like the immense wings of an eagle wheeling overhead. Then the wind changed and the clouds rolled into other forms. He thought suddenly of the afternoon he and Ariz had shared on Crown Hill, picking shapes out from the afternoon clouds.
And then he realized what he had to do, where he had to go. Not back but ahead. He caught up his own reins. There was no time to be lost.
Chapter Thirteen
After Atreau left the Fat Goose, Narsi and Yara describing the upcoming Solstice Day Procession to Prince Jacinto, and he agreed to suspend rehearsals. He even voiced interest in joining them, which delighted Enevir Helio as much as it did Yara. When Sabella pointed out that the prince would likely still be staggering drunk from the Masquerade festivities the night before, Jacinto laughed.
“You can flop me over your shoulder, Sabs,” Jacinto decided. “That would be in keeping with Haldiim traditions of women being in charge, anyway.”
City bells rang and Narsi and Yara took their leave. At their backs, Procopio and a Yuanese musician struck up a bouncy lute duet for Jacinto’s amusement. Striding through the theater district, Narsi hummed the melody to himself as a distraction from the anxiety he felt each time he glimpsed a royal bishop’s guardsman on patrol.
He hadn’t been aware of how very tense he’d become until they reached the Haldiim District and met Esfir and a group of her friends. Surrounded by Haldiim faces and voices, he relaxed into the crowd. The knots pinching the muscles between his shoulders seemed to melt. He breathed easily and gave himself over to following the crowd and listening to various discussions drift around him.
Though when the subject of Lord Vediya’s writing came up, Narsi pounced into the conversation. He and a charming silversmith debated the beauty of passages describing Cadeleonian battle, while agreeing that Kiram Kir-Zaki’s depiction as an unprecedented genius was quite astute. Narsi promised to lend the man his copy of Lord Vediya’s second volume of memoirs after he returned to the Quemanor estate.
Yara laughed and teased him about his obvious crush on Lord Vediya, though not unkindly. Esfir patted his hand and quickly changed the subject to a book of botanical medicine she’d found.
“Several of the herbs mentions are ones I’m certain I’ve seen growing in the sacred grove,” Esfir said. “I’d like to collect them, if you all wouldn’t mind.”
So, their party ambled to the Circle of Wisteria. As with the Circle of the Red Oak in Anacleto, the sacred grove was a popular summer picnic spot, especially for the young and unmarried. Because of this, food sellers set up their carts on the peripheral streets, hawking adhil bread, skewered lamb and lemons from Anacleto. In the midst of the Haldiim delights a few vendors also offered sweets made from cow’s cream and crisp cheese-covered chips called casocres.
Yara proclaimed casocres “the best thing ever invented by the Cadeleonians.”
The sun set and the moon rose.
After a pleasant meal the group of them climbed the rise of the sacred grove and entered the Circle of Wisteria. While Narsi and Esfir shared a lantern and hunted through the wildflowers and weeds for medicinal plants, Yara and the others chatted and sang. Here and there the group of them encountered homeless people—not all of them Haldiim—sheltering beneath the trees. A few engaged Yara or her friends in brief conversation, but mostly they left each other in peace.
Twice the young silversmith brought flowers to Narsi. Afterward he and two of the stagehands offered to put Narsi up for the night if he needed a place to stay. Yara sidled up to hand him a twig of redbells, then teased him about having to make rounds to climb in every bed on offer.
Narsi laughed. The lingering warmth of spiced wine allowed him to ignore the circumstances that deprived him of his own rooms and simply find all the attention flattering and funny.
An instant later the laughter died on his lips.
He forgot the bundles of fragrant herbs collected from the undergrowth, as well as after dinner discussions of literature and where he’d make his bed. Even the gnawing anxiety that he’d carried all day after being singled out by the royal bishop evaporated entirely from his awareness.
Wolves. Wolves in the middle of the city, standing impossibly tall—dwarfing mastiffs and even cart horses. Terror shot through his body. He stood as if rooted in place, clenching a fistful of widow’s weed. His horror grew as the glow of the wards protecting the sacred grove further illuminated the dozens and dozens of huge wolves charging up the street straight for the Circle of Wisteria.
They flooded the road and walkways, like a river of bristling hides and gleaming teeth. They scraped against the walls of buildings and bounded over carts. Their speed, their snarls and the flashes of their eyes ignited a primal terror deep through Narsi’s body. And the dank smell of them—so very many of them—it caught in his throat. The beasts seemed to grow as they charged nearer. Creatures from nightmares brought alive into his waking world.
All at once the paralyzing fear gripping Narsi shattered before the desperate impulse to escape. Run. Climb up into one of the trees. Anything to elude those jaws and teeth.
Then he heard the alarmed cries from people hiding among the trees behind him. A woman sobbed and the baby in her arms wailed. Haldiim voices shouted out prayers and entreaties, while a drunken Cadeleonian vagrant howled for the mercy of his savior.
The wolves reached the foot of the grove and spread out, encircling the hillock, the way they might surround a wounded deer. Narsi realized that there was nowhere to run, not for him or anyone gathered in the sacred grove. They had to fight. As if she too came to the same realization, Esfir gripped her belt knife and started forward. Yara leaned into the trunk of a tree, whispering prayers into the glowing gold symbols that slowly illuminated the branches and ground below.
Narsi drew his own belt knife and raced to Esfir’s side. His legs shook and his heart pounded.
The shining wards rising from the surrounding trees only seemed to draw the wolves closer, faster. Narsi almost wished that he couldn’t see the animals so clearly. Their eyes flashed like mirrors and foam dribbled from their gaping mouths.
One massive silvery wolf broke from the pack and charged straight at Narsi. A flock of crows burst from the wisteria branches as the wolf bounded up the hillock. Narsi lashed out at it with his pitiful knife, barely scraping the side of the animal’s wet nose.
A crow’s wing whipped past Narsi’s cheek and the bird hurtled into the charging wolf. Golden flames engulfed them both. Narsi staggered back as heat and smoke rolled over him. More crows launched themselves. A second wolf burned and fell, then a third and a forth.
Esfir lifted her voice and joined Yara’s prayers, calling on the ancient trees and the spirits of their ancestors to protect them and the grove. Even a drunk Cadeleonian vagrant shouted, “You shining trees, save me! I swear I’ll convert. I’ll forswear dice and loose madams.” He went on making garbled promises.
“We can win this,” Yara stated. “I know we can.”
Narsi nodded. But even at a glance he saw that the crows numbered far fewer than the wolves. Perhaps a dozen crows to battle a sea of immense wolves. They rushed up the hillock from all sides now, advancing like a relentless army.
Then a black rider seemed to materialize from the fabric of the night sky. He soared over the street, and an immense banner of hissing, writhing shadows followed him. The wolves turned, snarling and baring huge fangs. Then they and the rider were swallowed, as the glinting shadows crashed down upon them. Gleaming black waves rippled and crested around the hillside of the sacred grove. Where the shadows touched them, stones and earth sheared aside. Furious voices hissed and swore at Narsi from within the roiling shadows, and sudden stabbing pain rolled off it like heat radiating from an oven.
Yara gasped and doubled over, clutching her stomach. Narsi staggered to her, tried to grasp his medical satchel from where it hung across his back. Agony punched through his chest. His legs buckled. He fought to draw in his breath; every inhalation felt like a knife blade plunging into his lungs. He lurched, grasping the trunk of a tree and clinging to it for support. A foot from him, Esfir moaned but continued to pray. Some one behind them sobbed.
In the shadows below them, the wolves’ growls turn to screams, whimpers and then silence. Tears blurred Narsi’s vision as he watched the sea of shadows crest over the hilltop and continue rising overhead. It blotted out the silhouettes of surrounding buildings. The branches of the wisteria trees threw out golden blessings. But the shadows engulfed them like tar enveloping crumbs. Stars disappeared behind the darkness. The moon was lost. All Narsi saw were flickers of oily iridescence churning within blackness. All he felt was agony.
It meant to devour them all, Narsi thought. He had to do something, but he could hardly move for the pain stabbing through his body. Frustration ignited inside him. He refused to die like this—bowed down and cowering. Narsi gripped the tree trunk and forced himself onto his feet. He glared into the oncoming darkness.
Then the wall of shadows collapsed. Night sky and radiant stars filled Narsi’s view.
Then the thick odor of fresh-spilled blood washed over him. On the ground below the sacred grove, tangled, mutilated bodies encircled the hillock in a moat of gore. Narsi stared at the terrible forms as his mind slowly identified one after another. Even through the darkness he recognized the shapes of limbs. Heads. A shoulder. A torso and hip. Bodies. Scattered remains, but none of them belonged to animals. They were all human.
The silhouette of a mounted man rose from the chaos of corpses. Narsi recognized him as well. The Duke of Rauma, Fedeles Quemanor, mounted on a black warhorse. Lord Vediya rode from behind him, bellowing at him to stop, his face ashen.
Narsi stared at the duke’s profile, slowly absorbing the grace of his bearing alongside the absolute horror of what he’d wrought. Narsi recalled how that wall of murderous shadow had threatened him once before. Then, just as now, Lord Vediya had intervened to bring the duke to his senses.
Narsi shivered, despite the warmth of the summer evening.
This was all somehow disturbingly familiar. Monstrous wolves—mordwolves—waging a battle against an almost inhumanly powerful witch while hapless people all around were caught up in helpless terror. Enthralled beasts returning to their human forms when death released them from the spells holding them captive. Even the weird red light blazing from across the city. This could have been a scene he’d happily described from Lord Vediya’s memoirs only hours ago.
Nothing about the books struck him as amusing or abstract now.
Narsi gazed down at Lord Vediya. But if the man noticed him, he gave no sign of it. Instead, he caught up the duke’s reins and led him quickly away.
Somewhere across the city, fire bells clanged wild discordant notes. Narsi wondered if that could have anything to do with the massacre below him. He peered after Lord Vediya and the duke but could no longer distinguish them from the night. The clatter of their horses’ hooves already sounded distant. It was hard to imagine that they’d ever even been here.
Except for the dead men and the moat of blood they’d left behind.
How like Cadeleonian nobles to engage in some fantastic battle, then leave the remains and wreckage for others to clean up, Narsi thought in a daze. Someday someone ought to write an epic poem about the efforts of that.
The he caught sight of something moving down below him. He couldn’t be certain, but he thought something—someone—down in that heap of gore shifted. Could there be a survivor?
“I need light,” Narsi called. He gripped his medical satchel and clambered down the now battered and ragged incline of the hill. His boots slipped through blood-soaked mud and he grasped a stone to balance himself. The surface felt hot and smooth, like steel just lifted from a grindstone.
Yara followed him down, carrying a lamp. Esfir climbed behind her, as did a young Haldiim man. Narsi recollected that the man was an aspiring author, but he wasn’t certain of his name; that light, jovial dinner they’d all shared seemed days past. The man froze in his steps as Yara’s lamp illuminated the bisected carcass of a Mirogoth youth. The author dashed back up the hill. Narsi heard him vomiting.
“We may be on our own for a little time yet,” Esfir commented.
Narsi dragged the Mirogoth’s remains aside. Another body—or the majority of a body—lay beneath. A gasping moan rose from below. Someone lay buried beneath the weight of the dead.
“I’ll need help to reach them.” Narsi caught hold of a section of someone’s back. A rib jutted from a gaping wound and scraped against his palm. Narsi heaved the deadweight. His fingers slipped through sweat, blood and exposed organs. Then he found a grip and heaved. Esfir found purchase on a leg and dragged off a quarter of some man’s corpse. Another body lay under that. The two of them hauled it aside, while Yara lifted the lamp high for them. They rolled another half of a body aside.
Suddenly exposed, a battered, gasping wolf snarled at them. Narsi and Esfir both leapt back, tripping on limbs. Yara screamed and jumped. Her lamp slipped from her grip and tumbled into a crevice of twisted legs. Its flame cast long shadows across the wolf’s exposed head. The beast gasped and thrashed its head, but couldn’t fight free of the bodies still pinning it down. A sickly choking sound escaped its gaping jaws as it struggled to draw breath.
Narsi scrambled to his feet, then caught Esfir’s hand and pulled her up. Yara snatched the lamp up before its oil spilled. She lifted it high again, illuminating the figure before them.
As they looked on, the wolf’s visage began to melt away like burning wax. Huge paws revealed thin fingers and trembling hands. The long muzzle of jagged teeth evaporated, leaving an emaciated, pallid man struggling for breath. Narsi dropped to the man’s side. His hands shook with fear, but he felt for the man’s pulse. The weakest kick met his fingertips.
As the Cadeleonian man’s life faded, his gaunt features grew more distinct. He was dark haired and surprisingly small, hardly larger than a boy, but his face bore the wrinkles and lines of a man in his forties. The burn scar of a fresh brand stood out a bright red against the deathly pallor of his bare chest.
Tears tracked through the blood and dirt on the man’s face.
“She safe? My sister?” he whispered, but nothing more escaped him. His half-lidded stare became fixed and dull. The red brand on his chest faded to a faint impression.
Narsi suddenly remembered the enthralled physician-priest he’d watched slit his own throat this morning. He thought of Master Ariz’s desolate gaze. Dommian’s desperate writing and violent death. Heartsickness and frustration flooded him. These wolves had all been enthralled men rampaging at the behest of Hierro Fueres. That’s why the duke and Lord Vediya had slaughtered them.
What kind of monster did this to their fellow human beings? What kind of person seized lives and destroyed them like they were playthings—like they were nothing? No one should be allowed to do that.
“Is he dead?” Yara asked quietly.
He was. The fact that he’d been released from the slavering form of a wolf proved as much.
“Yes,” Narsi said.
Only death will break the brand, Dommian had written.
Since then, both Father Timoteo and Master Ariz had told him the same. Narsi saw it for himself now. But he didn’t want to accept it. Freedom shouldn’t come at so terrible of a cost, not for anyone.
After everything he’d seen and endured today, he couldn’t allow the sadist who’d destroyed so many lives to win. He hadn’t saved the physician-priest or King Juleo this morning, but he was damn well going to fight to save this man. He refused to simply give up.
He wrenched the immense weight of another corpse off the small man. His leg looked broken and superficial gashes marred his flanks, but Narsi found no mortal wound. Perhaps his heart had failed in the grip of that murderous shadow? Narsi set his hands down against the man’s sternum and began to compress his rib cage and heart.
“What are you doing?” Yara demanded.
“Waking a sleeping heart.” He continued compressing the man’s cool chest in a steady rhythm. “It’s a Yuanese technique that one of my mentors taught.”
Even at the time, the physician had warned that the technique was a last resort and failed more often than it succeeded. But when the man was already dead, what greater failure could there be?
