Valedor, p.19
Valedor, page 19
News had spread of the performance and many thousands of eldar were converging on the amphitheatre. Despite the crowds, Ariadien and Neidaria found seats quickly. The excitement of the throng filled the space. Swept up in anticipation, the distance the Biel-Tanians had regarded the twins with had gone, and they found themselves surrounded by eager, welcoming faces. They were two eldar among many, distinctions of kindred gone.
The amphitheatre took a tenth-cycle to fill, so huge it was. The conversation of the eldar, reflected back upon them by the dome’s peerless acoustics, became the rushing of the sea, and the twins clasped hands, the memory of Lechthennian’s powerful music still fresh in their minds. They searched the crowds for him in vain; there were so many eldar in there and such were the angles when looking up or down the stepped rows of seats that it was impossible to pick out a single face.
The noise of the crowd eventually abated, their chatter giving way to anticipation. The air became pregnant with it, and Ariadien experienced a larger version of the sense of unity he shared with his sister. The crowd thought with one mind, breathed with one breath. Within this joining, the twins wondered to each other, if this was the way it had once been, when the eldar were mighty and not afraid to enjoy their senses to the full.
When the last whisperer had ceased his whispering, the lights dimmed to a level just above blackness. Faces and hands were visible as luminous blobs, blue as deep sea fishes, the eyes in the faces moist jewels, all fixed upon the stage.
A sweet smell wafted over the twins, and they felt their minds sharpen.
A spear of white light snapped on, illuminating a figure dressed in the motley of the Harlequins. He was a hundred paces away from the twins, but every lozenge upon his multi-hued cloak was visible to them. His mask was alabaster white, fixed with a caricature of a smile that could have been a sneer, a single sapphire tear on the left cheek. He wore a tall brush of hair of constantly shifting colour, curving almost over to touch his nose to the front, running to long tails at the back.
He said nothing, but bowed artfully. The light went off.
‘Tomorrow we fight,’ said a female eldar’s voice; a breathy whisper alive with joyful humour, it filled the auditorium wall to wall. ‘But tonight we dance. Tonight we dance the Dance Without End, tonight we dance it as many, and in full.’
The lights came up. Forty-nine dancers were on the stage, frozen in poses suggestive of might and wisdom – these were the eldar of old. Music struck up, a skirling of pipes, underpinned with deep and sombre bass. A dozen eldar of noble bearing strode among the others as they slowly came alive. Their masks marked them out as the gods – Asuryan, Vaul, Khaine, Isha, Morai-Heg, Kurnous, Lileath, and more, each baiting, gifting or dancing with the eldar as to their own imperative. For the most part, these interactions went unseen by the dancers playing the eldar, for the dance showed the race of Eldanesh at their height of power, when the gods had been set apart from them by the will of Asuryan and their influence on the eldar was subtle.
The Harlequins playing the eldar danced nobly and with strength, various movements within the dance alluding to legendary happenings, some well known, but many leaving the twins feeling ignorant. Over time, a note of discord crept into the music. The gods’ movements became halting, concerned. The eldar moved ever more twistedly, and one by one their dances became darker and darker, until they were acting out depravities in groups all around the stage. The music grew unpleasant. Stealthily at first, then with brazen openness, others came and joined the dance. They wore black body-
suits, their masks projecting snarling faces that whisked into the audience and peered into their eyes, causing them to shrink back and cry out. The servants of Chaos.
The sweet scent grew stronger, and the dancers grew in stature, becoming giants. The black-suited creatures moved among the eldar, dancing obscenely. They drew them into grotesque pairings, and when they touched, the dancers representing the eldar took on the dances of the servants of Chaos, their bodysuits losing their colour, their stances losing the cast of nobility they had previously displayed. The gods recoiled as more and more of the Harlequins dancing the dance of the eldar were corrupted, and then they too were assailed. Prancing Death Jesters came swarming on stage, somersaulting over the writhing dancers. They attacked the gods, fighting mime battles with them, until one by one they were felled, their corpses thrown through the air to land in a pile. Only Khaine remained, battling skilfully with numberless opponents.
There were three eldar left untouched by the lusts of Chaos. One turned his back upon the depravity early, and left the stage. Another waited longer before he, too, turned and left. A third remained. As the frenzied dancing reached a crescendo, the last unaffected hid himself in a cloak of black, and disappeared with a vicious laugh. The rest collapsed as one, dead.
The tune ceased. A fresh began.
A new dancer entered: the Solitaire, his suit projecting beauteous images of pleasure interspersed with those of horror. The figure at their core was inconstant, seemingly male one moment, female the next. This was the Dark Prince, She Who Thirsts – Slaanesh. He danced around Khaine, enticing him, while off the stage the audience felt a great wrath build. The unseen source of this fury pulled at the god, and he was dragged to and from the edge of the stage, almost into the arms of Slaanesh, then back to the edge again. Finally the war god fell, the dancer playing him somehow becoming many dancers, and they rolled away. Slaanesh pranced in victory over the corpses of the slain, seeking when he could for those who had eluded him. A terrible scream built, drowning out the song. It grew beyond bearing, projected into minds of the eldar audience, it tortured ears and souls alike. Laughter resounded within the scream, mad, despairing and exultant.
Another figure came onto the stage as the audience reeled. New laughter, laughter that parodied the first and took on an ironic edge, pure and cynical. The Great Harlequin. He wore the same garb as before. No costume for the one who represented Cegorach, for the clothes of the Harlequins were reflections of their god, those of the Harlequin King most of all.
Cegorach strolled around the stage, laughing at the fallen and provoking the daemons of Slaanesh before darting away from their clutches. The Dark Prince grew angry, and sent his minions to catch him. They danced around the Laughing God until they brought him low, but he burst forth unharmed, his bright clothes shining brighter. On and on this went. As it did so, the three eldar who had escaped the Fall crept back onto the stage and took up the dance of their forebears in muted form, hiding away whenever Slaanesh glanced in their direction. This attention came seldom, for the Laughing God held She Who Thirsts’ eye, sending her into furies with his antics. Once or twice, the Dark Prince snatched at the eldar, but they escaped again and again, and Slaanesh grew furious. He threw himself at the Laughing God, and they fought, the two Harlequins performing a breathtaking dance duel of high leaps and somersaults.
It was at this point that the Dance Without End traditionally ceased, the Solitaire and the Great Harlequin leaping around each other without conclusion. Every eldar knew this, for the Harlequins were much discussed and the ritual of the Dance Without End was well-known.
That night, the great dance did not stop.
A new movement began.
As the Laughing God and the Dark Prince danced, one of the fallen stirred. Their costume flickered, the blackened images of perverse lusts and violence giving way to skulls and bones of pure white, studded with jewels clearly intended to resemble waystones.
The figure rubbed at her head, as if waking from a long sleep. She stood, the waystones upon her exposed bones flaring brightly.
She looked at her hands, and they clenched. She became huge, her size magnified in the audience’s minds by the arts of the troupe’s Shadowseers. She swayed from side to side with the music, arms of shadow sweeping over the audience and back with dire whooshing noises. The Laughing God laughed at this apparition, but leapt away from it, the movements of the Great Harlequin depicting him conveying defiance, humour, hope and fear.
The Solitaire, playing the Great Enemy, stumbled in the act of snatching at one of the three remaining eldar. The dancer representing his victim fell away shrieking, but was not dead. It crawled away, a broken thing of half a soul, to lurk in the darkness. He dived again at the Great Harlequin, and the dance became more and more frantic. The audience were spellbound, unable to move, the breath stopped in their mouths. The Laughing God leapt back and forth, keeping Slaanesh’s attention from the being growing to power behind it.
At the last, Slaanesh tripped the Laughing God. Standing triumphantly over her prey, she reached for him, but Cegorach laughed triumphantly, staring over the Dark Prince’s shoulder.
Slaanesh looked around. The new god reached for She Who Thirsts, limbs burning with the light of borrowed souls. Slaanesh’s face cycled rapidly through numberless visages of terrible beauty. Inconceivably, each displayed fear, and the Prince of Chaos shrank back.
The lights went out before the new god could grasp the daughter of the eldar, leaving the conclusion unresolved.
The lights came back on. The stage was empty. The crowd members looked to their neighbours, disbelief on their faces.
‘Ynnead?’ they said.
‘Kysaduras’s fable!’
‘The god of death awakens.’
‘It is a myth, a parable, that is what we have seen. It is all a parable. Isn’t it a parable?’
‘This is an ill omen.’
‘What do the seers say?’
Ariadien blew out a long breath. He was emotionally overcome. He looked at his sister. She fixed him with a serious eye, and gripped his hand more tightly in hers.
+The Dance Without End has a new ending, it seems,+ she said.
Chapter Ten
The March of the Phoenix Host
Iyanna watched the boneseers at work. They wore their strange armour, rarely brought out for a bonesinger did not lightly go to war. All were helmed and masked, with tall antlers either side of their helmets and a stubby projection on the chin in the manner of an alien’s bound beard. They danced while they sang, in a slow, languorous manner, bringing their hands around in wide passes, their arms at full length.
Several of them played instruments – pipes, cymbals, tiny gongs, flutes and harps. It was an otherworldly melody, not meant for entertainment, but possessing a profound loveliness despite its discordance. The melody of instrument and voice intersected in the centre of the ship’s hold where light glowed brightly, wisps of it revolving around a bright core to make a galaxy-like tissue.
The song changed, the light coalesced, forming matter. Wraithbone.
Iyanna was spellbound by the creation of matter from nothing.
‘Look at them, Althenian,’ she said. ‘I love to watch the bonesingers.’
‘It is dull. I am unmoved by it, war is art,’ said her hulking companion. ‘Mine is death, not the act of creation, war is all. I will fight, battle’s music is my music, not this din.’ His voice was that of Jeleniar Death-bringer, the fourth Althenian. Only Iyanna could tell them apart. Guessing which aspect of Althenian spoke had been a game she played with herself, one of her last pleasures, until the psychic signature of each soul and the minor quirks their temporary dominance brought to the exarch’s personality had become totally familiar to her and the game had lost its fun.
She rested her hand on his huge thigh, spindly in proportion with his mighty frame, but three times thicker than her arm nonetheless. The psychoplastic was warm to the touch. ‘And without it? How would you make your war music, Althenian?’
‘I would not, this is the full truth of it, you are right. Even so, I will remain unmoved, Iyanna.’
She tapped at his limb with her nail. ‘It moves me. It demonstrates how superior a way of being the path is. The bonesingers are not so different to me, we both follow paths of the mind. They use their gifts for the manipulation of the physical, I for communication with the immaterial. Without the path, how would one reach such a height of mastery? We would wander from one vocation to the next, tasting each and never drinking deeply of their wisdom. Our way is the best way.’
‘Perhaps so, what do I know of other paths? I am trapped,’ said Althenian. ‘More than that, I am twice trapped on mine, so I hold.’
‘Watch and learn, dear Althenian.’
The wraithlord growled, an affectation that made Iyanna smile to herself. ‘War is all. War is my only pursuit, that is just.’
‘And you will have war soon enough!’ she scolded.
The light at the centre of the chamber was dimming as more wraithbone solidified from intangible plasms. The product of the song was luminous, but no more than that. It had crossed the threshold from the might-be to the is.
Having judged there to be sufficient raw material for their purposes, the bonesingers changed their tune, picking up speed. Under their influence, the wraithbone moved, melting and reforming into recognisable shapes – an arm, a foot, a high-crested helm. For nigh on a full tenth-cycle they worked, until as if by some sleight of hand the wraith-stuff was gone and a tall, sculpted figure was at the centre of their circle: a freshly made wraithguard, its long helmet open and revealing the setting for a spirit stone. The song abruptly ceased, and the bonesingers stepped back. Eldar on the weaponsmith and pseudo-life branches of Vaul’s Path moved in, fitting the construct with the parts that were not of wraithbone. They too worked quickly, a team of them chanting in the smith cant. They moved easily, always on the verge of colliding with each other, always avoiding their comrades’ limbs.
They stepped back, another half tenth-cycle gone. Now it was Iyanna’s turn. She turned to the two lesser spiritseers by her side, who presented her with a spirit stone. Small enough to fit in her gloved fist, it glowed with striated light of a soft yellow and was hot to hold. With reverence she walked to the newly minted ghost warrior, bearing the stone in cupped hands in front of her.
‘Return to your children, honoured ancestor,’ she said. ‘We call you from your slumber and we are sorry for what we ask; our hour of need is upon us, and you must wake awhile.’
She placed the stone into the setting and stepped back. It shone brilliantly in the shadow of the closing helm. The long face of the wraithguard snapped shut. The warrior sagged, lumbering three steps to the left as the spirit within tentatively inhabited its shell.
Iyanna shut her eyes and reached out with her mind, calming the spirit within. The spirit was in confusion, as they nearly always were. The final mortal thoughts of the spirit shook its being, memories of the warmth of the infinity circuit at odds with who it remembered being in life.
This one, like so many recently resurrected, had died during the voidspawn invasion. A potter, caught in his workshop and hunted through his art by a pair of hissing creatures. As he died, his dismay had been greater for his broken pottery than for his lost life.
Iyanna focused on this horror, bringing it into sharp relief. Shards of ceramic sharp in his mind, red with his own blood. She turned these thoughts of his into sword blades.
‘Never a warrior in life, Hetherion of Divinesh, that time is upon you in death. Take up your arms, drive forward your armour and avenge your art and your life against those who took them from you.’ She insinuated images of the voidspawn into his mind, a mental picture of ravaged Dûriel, sorrow at the fallen eldar race falling further. Hetherion of Divinesh’s terror at reawakening turned to resolve.
‘I…’ he said haltingly, his wraithbone voice a monotone. ‘I will live again to fight for Iyanden.’
She led him gently to more artificers, who presented a wraithcannon to the ghost warrior. With hesitant hands, Hetherion reached out and grasped the gun. He became steady. Iyanna was satisfied. She led the wraithguard to join several ranks of them already standing in the hold. She closed her eyes again. Under her mental influence, the pale bone colour of the psychoplastic blushed, turning yellow and night-blue. She caressed the potter’s soul again, turning over his memories like seashells. From them she selected a rune, and this manifested itself on the cowling of his helmet. A simple rune – artful vengeance.
‘Rest now, Hetherion,’ she said. ‘Grow accustomed to your new body. We will need you soon enough.’
She rejoined Althenian.
‘A potter,’ she said.
‘A potter? He will find no clay to throw, in this war,’ said Althenian.
‘Do not scoff. He is one who will fight without much prompting. If only that could be said of more of our honoured ancestors.’
‘You say so, there are many more to come, volunteers.’
‘Yes, but not all,’ said Iyanna. Her eyes lingered on the rows of caskets regretfully. Elsewhere in the fleet her brothers and sisters on the branch of the spiritseer performed the same rituals, placing spirit stones into new-grown wraith bodies for war. ‘Were it not so,’ she said. ‘A necessary task, but after all this time, still distasteful to me.’
Althenian did not reply. He knew when to hold his tongue and when to tease her.
She oversaw the resurrection of seven more spirits and was about to retire to rest, when news of Taec Silvereye’s arrival at the fleet reached her.
Taec was frailer than when Iyanna had last seen him. He leaned on his staff during their conversation, and was distracted when she spoke. They stood in the Pride of Haladesh’s observation lounge, watching the infinite involutions of the webway wall scroll past the port side.
‘You have made good time,’ said Taec. ‘It augurs well. It is imperative that the Phoenix Host arrives simultaneously with Prince Yriel’s grand fleet and the Swordwind of Biel-Tan.’
‘We go the shortest way,’ said Iyanna. ‘To travel the larger passages to Biel-Tan would have taken too long, and to risk planetfall from orbit would have been foolhardy in such ships. We will leave the art of void war to its pre-eminent artist, Prince Yriel. We head to a nexus where we may disembark and make our way with haste to the main gate-point of Dûriel. Such is the nature of this route that even on foot we will arrive before Sunspear’s second invasion can emerge.’
