Satisfied with the advancement, I willed away my character sheet. For a moment, I sat in silence in the forest with little more than the sound of the wind rustling in the leaves to accompany me.

  The next step in the plan was going to be dangerous—a gambit that no one liked. I didn’t even like it myself.

  Still, it’s the one chance I have of solving this whole situation once and for all.

  I sighed and rose to my feet.

  Time to get to it.

  Freshly leveled, I returned to my women. They were still gathered around the bound figure of Sagoth Bloodhoof, discussing what to do with him in a low tone of voice. I emerged from the trees and beckoned them. Anuina signaled one of the Elven warriors to keep watch over Sagoth, and my three women came over. We huddled together, and I explained my plan.

  “We have what we need to summon the Blooded One, but we need another Awakened like me to take him down.”

  “How do you know that?” Anuina asked, blond eyebrow raised.

  “Navaldus the Lich told me,” I said. “After he forced me to help him obtain the Shard of the Crying One.”

  “If that is truth, then who will help us?” Roswitha asked. She looked around, eyes focusing on Sagoth Bloodhoof. “He’s the only Earth-Awakened around.”

  I shook my head. “Navaldus,” I said. “Navaldus himself will help me. I know a trick to get him here.”

  My women looked at me with wide eyes, incredulous. Leresah spoke first. “This has to be a joke.”

  “I wouldn’t joke about this,” I said. “I can get Navaldus to come here,” I said. “I’m sure of it.”

  “He’ll be a God,” Roswitha said, her Northern accent a sharp cut. “If he fights you, you would hardly stand a chance.”

  “If,” I emphasized.

  “You think he would help of his own will?” Leresah asked. “Why?”

  I opened my mouth, but Anuina spoke before I did. “Because this is a threat to us all—to Man, to Elf, to Dwarf, and even to the Gods.”

  Roswitha and Leresah turned to Anuina, but she kept her emerald eyes on mine, guessing my thoughts. “Roswitha, Leresah, you have not seen it yet,” she said, “but we fought the Blooded One and his Yfthanweligers for the past weeks… They are not here to conquer; they are here to destroy.”

  I gave a slow nod.

  “Mith-Ahannan,” she said and swallowed. “They laid waste to the moonlit halls of old. They burned down what they could and tore down even the ruins. It is not just Khal-Had’s ancient hatred of the Elves; it is a desire to undo the works of the civilized races—all of them.”

  “Right,” I said. “If the Blooded One succeeds here, he will continue with his quest to gather the Shards, until he has all of them. And then—” I shrugged.

  “Even if Navaldus seeks to be a tyrant, he will understand that if the world is destroyed, he will have nothing to rule.”

  “And Ur threatens Earth as well,” I said. “Navaldus is from Earth… If he has loved ones there, well…”

  Leresah turned her red eyes to me, defiant, hands on her hips, and she shook her head. “Is there no one else? I never want to see… him again!”

  “I understand,” I said, making a calming gesture. “I wouldn’t—”

  “Why not Rahandi?” she demanded. “He’s like you, is he not? Earth-Awakened as you call it? If you need another one like you, get him instead. You trust him, at least.”

  “He would be an excellent choice,” I said. “If he were here, I’d ask him.”

  “Well, my father isn’t here either! The odds of finding him are equally likely.”

  “It doesn’t matter where he is, Leresah. I know of a way to get him here.” I gave her a smile to take the edge off my words. “Besides,” I added. “Your fath—Navaldus is strong, much stronger than Rahandi. With him beside us, we get a real chance at overcoming the Blooded One.”

  There was a momentary silence, and Anuina turned to Leresah. “What Oram says makes sense,” she said. “This Navaldus seems intelligent enough. He will understand the threat.” She turned to Roswitha. “He will see that an alliance now means elimination of the greatest threat to us all.”

  Roswitha raised a slender finger to her mouth, thought for a moment, but Leresah fluttered her lips. We were still on the Elvenway. Sagoth Bloodhoof was not too far away, bound to a tree, two Elven guards assigned to guard him. Leresah pointed at him. “Why not use him?” she said.

  “He’ll betray us first chance he gets,” I said. “I’m sorry, but that would be taking an unnecessary risk.”

  “Ugh!”

  “If you have a better plan, by all means, tell us.”

  “Ask Rahandi!” she said. “You have this dream spell, right? Contact him through that and ask him to come here.”

  “That will take too long. Besides, the Blooded One is master in the dream realm. He’ll trap me the moment I cast that spell.” I glanced at Anuina. “He did it before, when I tried to contact Anuina.”

  She sighed. “And how are you going to contact Navaldus?”

  “I know a way.”

  She crossed her arms. “What way?”

  “A way you will not like, but I can have him here in a second.”

  She raised an eyebrow, arms still crossed, and stood in silence.

  Anuina watched Leresah with big, soft green eyes. She stepped forward and placed her hand on Leresah’s arm. “He is your father, is he not?” she asked.

  A muscle in her jaw pulled as she looked at the ground. “Not anymore,” she muttered.

  “The Earth-Awakened claimed her father’s body,” I said. “Just as I claimed someone’s body when I first came here.”

  Anuina was lost in thought for a moment, her mind no doubt going back to that fateful day when she and I first met in the Janneskog Woods. Her eyes cleared, and she looked at Leresah. “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Leresah swallowed. “Don’t be,” she said. “It’s for the best. He wasn’t a good man.”

  I placed my hand on her shoulder, fixed her red eyes with mine. “We’ll do better,” I said, then lowered my hand and placed it on her stomach. It would have been too soon to tell, but I felt it, just as I had with Roswitha; there was a spark of life inside her, and it was mine.

  She offered me a gentle smile, placed her hand over mine. “We will,” she said.

  We lingered on the road for a while longer before we agreed that the Elven warriors would take Sagoth Bloodhoof back to their camp at the Willow of Liandrenn.

  When we found a moment, Anuina also told us that the Beastfolk had returned in numbers. They fought alongside the Yfthanweligers that served the Blooded One and the Konungur Silver. Together, they had brought low most of the outposts of the Woodland Folk and scattered the inhabitants. At length, they had descended on moonlit Mith-Ahannan, discerning its location through some dark magic, and infiltrated the city at night.

  To the shame of its inhabitants, the city fell into disarray, and there had been nothing to do but save as many of its people as possible and flee to the Willow of Liandrenn.

  “Ironically,” Anuina added, a mirthless smile playing with her full lips. “It is the same place where Khal-Had and his ilk made their last stand when we took the Willow from them.”

  “It won’t be a last stand,” I said and peered up at the sky through the dense canopy. “We will strike directly at the Blooded One, and the evil spirits and wretches that answer his every beck and call will scatter to the winds.”

  Anuina’s green eyes sparked with hope and admiration. Next to me, I sensed resolve gather in Roswitha, and she gave a firm nod. “It ends here,” she said, the finality of it rang iron in her Northern accent.

  Leresah was silent—haunted by the demons of her past—but she did not waver.

  “One thing,” I said. “One rule. Something you must all abide by. I cannot have any of you risk death—not against the Blooded One and not if Navaldus decides to fight. I told you all, one death will not bring me low, so if things go awry, you need to flee and let me distract the enemy to give you the best chance of escaping.”

  Roswitha stiffened. “We cannot leave you behind.”

  I turned to her. “It won’t be death,” I said. “I will come back at the Willow; that is where I set my Home. You will meet me there, and we will discuss how to continue our war against the Blooded One after that.”

  “Honor demands—”

  I reached out and touched her. “I know what your honor demands,” I said. “But my honor demands that if things turn against us, I take the fall.”

  She opened her mouth to protest again, but I squeezed her arm. “Think of Ryst—of our clan, of Frost-Fist.”

  She took a deep breath and sighed, then gave a resolute nod.

  My gaze shifted to my other women. “We are all in agreement?”

  Leresah nodded, and Anuina spoke her soft consent.

  “Good,” I said, studying them with no small measure of pride. “All that remains is for us to decide where and how we shall summon Navaldus.”

  “It needs to be far away from the Willow,” Anuina said. “That is your haven and that of my people. We cannot risk exposing it to either the Blooded One or to Navaldus.”

  “Good point,” I said. I had hoped to use the Willow. I knew it would provide combat buffs so long as we controlled it, but Anuina was right: we couldn’t risk it falling into enemy hands—that would be an instant game over.

  “If Navaldus is hostile,” Leresah began. “Then we would not want him close to a place where he has access to the Necromancer’s prime resource…”

  “Corpses,” Roswitha said with disdain in her voice, and Leresah nodded.

  “Trees,” I said. “I would like trees for cover.”

  “Among my people, we often say that cover aids both.”

  “True enough,” I said.

  “Perhaps an open field. Your Windward spell will yield greater advantage than any tree,” she said.

  She had a point. Considering cover was old Earth thinking; notions from the time before I had magic to manipulate the elements into granting whatever I needed. I gave her a firm nod. “Still, should we have to flee, then trees might aid in covering our escape.”

  Anuina agreed. “Should that happen, I shall take the lead. My abilities as a Ranger allow us all to navigate the forest without penalties to our speed.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “So a glade?” Roswitha ventured.

  “Glade sounds good,” I said. “There should be some water… I have a few spells that rely on it. Soil, too—an unworked floor.”

  Anuina smiled. “These are all things that we should be able to find with relative ease.”

  “And I want you all among the trees when I summon Navaldus,” I said. “I don’t want him to know you are with me. That way, you can surprise him should things go bad or just flee unseen if things go really bad.”

  I could tell it didn’t sit right with Roswitha, but she offered no objections, set her jaw, and gave a firm nod.

  “All right,” I said. “I will use my Mold Earth spell to dig a trench around the glade. That will buy you girls some more time should Navaldus give chase.”

  “And maybe cast all those spells you call ‘buffs’ in advance this time?” Roswitha said, giving me a lopsided grin.

  I chuckled. “Good point. In fact, I’ll cast Invisibility on all of you.”

  “You could summon a few of those Ice Elementals, too,” Leresah said.

  I nodded. “I don’t want him to think we’re hostile toward him… although that will be a wonderful idea for when we’re dealing with the Blooded One.”

  A momentary silence followed in which I studied my women one by one: Roswitha of the iron blood and resolve, Anuina the swift, and Leresah of the shadows. They were a powerful group. We had mastery of every element that a group of adventurers needed.

  Except a tank.

  “All right,” I told my women. “Think on it a while longer. I need to have a chat with Ydbrad Ydbradson.”

  “You want to face a God?” Ydbrad asked.

  His expression was somewhere between incredulous, afraid, and amused.

  “Yes,” I said. “Although Navaldus may not fight us.”

  “May.”

  “I cannot guarantee anything.”

  “This is a far cry from scouting the forest to make clear the way for my jarl’s army.”

  “It is,” I agreed. “That is why I’m asking you and offering you the opportunity to leave. I cannot ask this of anyone; only of your own choice could you stand beside me.”

  He nodded, rubbed a callused hand through his coarse beard. His sharp eyes looked up at me from under grizzled brows.

  “You’ll bear the brunt, too,” I said. “None of my women is as skilled with armor and shield as you are. Your job would be to take the blows.”

  He chuckled. “Hoping that your Priestess can heal me fast enough?”

  “And that I, Anuina, and Leresah can dish out enough damage to bring him low before your shield shatters.”

  He laughed, a glint of amusement in his keen eyes. “You certainly know how to sell it.”

  “I would not lie to you or try to convince you in a dishonest way,” I said, giving him a pat on the shoulder. “You deserve truth and honesty, Ydbrad Ydbradson,” I said. “You have done right by me—you were an ally from the moment we first met, and I know you are a stalwart defender of Wealdhaven and its people. If you turn away, I will not think less of you.”

  He ground his teeth together, peered past me into the forest.

  I felt a need to convince him, but I needed him to get to the right place on his own terms. There was no point in feeble allies who doubted our venture; we all needed to be on board of our own free will. Only resolve could face a God.

  “By the Tribunal,” he muttered. “This is quite a thing you ask, Oram Ludwickson Frost-Fist.”

  “It is,” I said.

  “How can you be certain we will succeed?”

  “Were we so certain when we faced the Beastfolk together?”

  He bit his beard, stared at the grassy turf below.

  “We stood in defense of Wealdhaven,” I said. “We stand so now. If we let these Gods continue their games, our loved ones will remain but a pawn.”

  He looked up at me. “And what will you do?”

  I frowned. “How do you mean?”

  “Assume for a moment you shall bring down one of these Gods, the Crying One or the Blooded One… what then? Will you take their Shard? Will you wear it?”

  “In time, yes.”

  I had not considered the matter at all. No one had asked me the question before, but now that it was put before me, I realized at once that I would don the Shard—one, both, it did not matter.

  Godhood.

  “And you will be different from these Gods?” he asked. “Not a power-hungry destroyer?”

  “Do you even need to ask? Have I shown myself false?”

  He chuckled. “No… No, you have not.”

  “Then let my actions in the past be my bond for the future.”

  He thought about it for a moment longer, then gave a firm nod. “Very well,” he said. “It may mean my end, but it is best to stand now, firm and tall, and face the warrior’s death instead of a death cowering among townsfolk as an old man.”

  I nodded, squeezed his shoulder. “Whatever comes, I will owe you. The world will owe you.”

  Movement at my side made me turn. Anuina came up, her enticing body wrapped in leather, a resolved but fearful expression on her unearthly beautiful face. “We have found a place,” she said.

  “Very well,” I said. “Let’s make the preparations.”

  CHAPTER 18

  The spot was perfect. A wide, roughly circular glade along a babbling brook. It was far away from the Willow, at least two hours, and there was no camp or outpost nearby—no innocent lives that might get caught up in an ensuing combat.

  We went through our final preparations; the women discussed their respective escape routes and prepared their positions. Ydbrad had offered to take position beside me. He refused even an Invisibility spell, saying he would rather show himself openly to the Gods if he were to defy them.

  It made sense to me; in my time in Aerda, I came to understand the Northerners and their notions of honor and bravery.

  When all was done, my women disappeared among the trees—Roswitha with visible reluctance—and I took my position at the center of the glade.

  Now that the moment neared, I sensed the cold clutches of anxiety close on my heart. I pushed them away—fear was a daily occurrence in the merciless lands of Aerda, and I braved it often enough.

  I would not falter now.

  Silence descended on our glade as I contemplated the words I would say. I had cast my spells: Barkskin, Windward, even Trackless Step, should we need to make an escape.

  There was no more to do, and my spells’ duration was ticking away.

  Now or never.

  I took a deep breath, then raised my hands to the sky. Whether it was necessary, I would not have been able to say, but it felt appropriate. I recalled the name that Tommy Dawes—the Crying One—had revealed to me in a dying vision almost two Bloodmoons ago in the Wyslec Crypt under Chevalec.

  My voice rang out blasphemously in the silence of scented Liandrenn. “Alistair Greene of Milton Keynes, by your True Name do I summon you!”

  In reply to my summons, the world shook. The forest fell silent at once, and I braced myself against the deep rumbling. At the center of the glade grew a dot of light, as if a star sprang into existence before us. I held my breath, watched it grow as all trembled with the blasphemous horror of the summoning of a god.

  Slowly, a silhouette appeared, stark black against the white light.

  Navaldus appeared much as he had before—tall and gangly. But his boyish face was now concealed beneath the Shard of the Crying One—a mask carved in the likeness of a weeping child. The mask stood in jolting and uncanny contrast with ashen skin pulled taut over bones.

  But his posture had changed; he stood bent, claws bared, as he sniffed the air. He still wore his robe, but it was much dirtier than it had been before.

 

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