Andrea Höst: Voice of the Lost

The man on this wall, tall and too pale, with his ridiculous length of hair neatly bound in braids, was the fourth to be named Illukar las Cor-Ibis. Descended from the first Illukar’s child, with no drop of Farakkian blood to sully him, he was the epitome of a traditional Ibisian: measured, powerful and reserved. Medair was ashamed to be so glad he had survived acting as keystone for the shield.

That, above all else, made her every decision suspect. Had she given the Horn of Farak to the Ibisian Kier, to Ieskar’s descendant, because she did not want Illukar las Cor-Ibis to die?

"The Horn is in that chest," Ileaha murmured. "The shielding isn’t so complete as that on your satchel, but it serves."

"The air feels thick," Medair said, not certain if that was due to the unbound power lingering in the wake of the Conflagration, or to the enchantments of two armies. "It’s different than – different to other sieges."

"Other–" Ileaha’s gaze wavered, and the hand she rested on her sword hilt twitched. "It takes some adjustment, knowing who you are, realising what you have seen. I don’t imagine that in any of those past battles blood magic would have been used by either side, and I fear that is part of what we are feeling. Look."

She stepped closer to the parapet, but Medair was slow to follow, reluctantly moving to gaze down at what had driven her, finally, to take up her name.

A most orderly army. The Ibisians had been the same way: arraying themselves before the walls of the Empire’s cities with care and precision. Five hundred years after Athere fell to the Ibisian invaders, the Decian King, Estarion, used wild magic to give himself the strength to drive them out. Now his forces were placed safely out of the range of combat casting, and in the tinted light there was an almost pleasant symmetry to their serried ranks. Sewn with an even hand among them were giants, near half again as tall as ordinary Farakkians, their horned helmets increasing that height further. Had they been human once, before the transformative power of wild magic had swept over everything outside Athere’s shields, and changed their entire world and all its rules?

"Not all blood magic is foul," Ileaha was saying. "It’s very closely related to the healing arts and, used with care and good conscience, a portion of life force can be sacrificed without permanent injury. But that is not what we feel now, what is stifling the air. If that truly is blood magic, then people are dying out there, before the first blow of this battle has fallen."

"Was he known to use it? The Estarion before the Conflagration?" Medair was finding some slight comfort in Estarion’s lack of morals. She had called the invading Ibisians White Snakes , thought them cold and greedy, but they had prosecuted their war with an aim to minimise losses, taking advantage of their disproportionate strength in magic to capture their first city without the loss of a single life. Estarion threatened the opposite, promising to slaughter every Ibisian down to the smallest child.

"Known?" Ileaha lifted both hands to measure her lack of certainty. "Not in the world which was mine. But is one who is willing to risk the possible consequences of drawing on wild magic less likely to directly sacrifice lives to his cause?" She lowered her voice. "You – you must not continue to blame this on yourself, Medair. If you had given the rahlstones to Decia instead of us, they still would not have granted Estarion enough strength to take Athere with any surety, let alone place himself before her gates so abruptly. There is every chance he still would have turned to wild magic to gain the strength he lacked."

"Unless he had the Horn," Medair pointed out, and Ileaha fell silent because it was true. The whole reason Medair had set out to find the Horn of Farak was that it promised easy, overwhelming victory; a single weapon to lay low an entire army. Lacking that, Decia’s King had summoned wild magic, the temptation of every mage who desired more than they had strength to achieve. The secret of how to do so was supposed to be hidden, locked away, because if wild magic slipped from control it would burn unchecked over all Farakkan. That was a consequence which no-one should have been willing to risk, but without the Horn, Estarion had taken that step. Impossible to predict that the arcane fire he unleashed would not burn the world to dust, but remake it into one where he was well able to bring down the walls of the White City.

With so much changed, what had become of the Corminevar heir Estarion claimed to support? Was he out in that forest of swords? When the Horn was sounded, would Medair be responsible for his death?

The sky faded, and it was a relief not to be so visible. But then Cor-Ibis stopped talking with the Kier and moved several steps closer to Medair. The glow surrounding him – an after-effect of serving as keystone to the shield – grew ever more marked in the gloom, and he made an admirable beacon for those who wanted to stare at the past come to life. He did not speak to Medair, had not said a word directly to her since she had revealed herself. He seemed impossibly Ibisian: cold and distant. How strongly had her actions been influenced by this man? How could someone who so epitomised everything purely Ibis-lar, who reminded her so strongly of Kier Ieskar, draw her as he did?

" MEDAIR AN RYNSTAR."

The voice rolled out of the twilight, turning Medair’s name into a wave which crashed across Athere. Medair was not altogether surprised that Estarion chose to address her, that he knew what she had done. For the southern king to underline her betrayal would likely be only one of countless incidents. Assassinations and accusations. The life her conscience had not allowed her to avoid.

" MEDAIR AN RYNSTAR," Estarion repeated, voice thoughtful, contemplative, despite being magnified to an almost painful volume. " A NAME I HAVE HEARD ALL MY LIFE, IN BALLADS, IN TALES TOLD TO ME WHEN I WAS A CHILD TOO RESTLESS FOR SLEEP. A NAME OF HOPE AND HONOUR. A NAME WHICH MADE A PROMISE."

"I sense a major casting, Ekarrel, " Cor-Ibis warned Kier Inelkar. "Something beyond the enhancement of his voice."

Glancing secretly at the Keridahl’s cool profile, Medair saw his eyes narrow slightly at Estarion’s next words.

" I ENVY YOU."

"He is a showman, this Estarion," Avahn murmured, moving to stand beside Cor-Ibis. "Full of dramatic pauses." He smiled reassuringly at Medair, but in the dim twilight he looked worried.

" THE PALLADIAN EMPIRE, THE GOLDEN AGE OF PEACE. IT SHINES IN OUR PAST, A TIME OF GROWTH WITHOUT STRIFE, OF A SEEKING FOR PERFECTION RATHER THAN POWER. WE WILL NEVER KNOW THE WORLD YOU WERE BORN TO, MEDAIR AN RYNSTAR, BUT WE SHARE A DESIRE TO SEE AN END TO THE WARS WHICH SNATCHED IT AWAY."

"Don’t tell me he’s going to back down?" someone muttered disbelievingly. Medair barely heard the interjection, eyes fixed unwavering on the stone beneath her feet. Where was Estarion leading? This was not the harangue for which she had steeled herself, but a far crueller attack. She faced the despair which had kept her paralysed this past year. The Empire was gone. Everyone, everything which had been hers. Nothing would ever change that.

" I CAN ONLY GUESS AT YOUR FEELINGS, WHEN YOU RETURNED HERE, TO WHAT HAD BEEN THE HEART OF THE EMPIRE, AND FOUND IT AS IT IS. DID IT NOT WRING YOUR VERY SOUL TO SEE IT? WERE YOU TEMPTED TO USE THE HORN, EVEN THOUGH THE MOMENT WAS LOST?"

Again a pause, serving to underline his last words. She remembered that angry desire all too well.

" I DO NOT NAME YOU ENEMY, MEDAIR AN RYNSTAR. YOU, AS I, SEEK PEACE, AN END TO WAR. YOU FELL INTO THE HANDS OF THE WHITE SNAKES AND LOST PERSPECTIVE, REACTED TO THE MOMENT RATHER THAN THE LARGER PICTURE. THERE WILL BE NO PEACE WHILE A SINGLE COLD SNAKE THINKS TO RULE FARAKKIAN TERRITORY. THERE WILL BE NO END TO WAR UNTIL THE ROT IS CUT OUT. CAN YOU DENY THAT?"