David Dalglish: Dawn of Swords

“He’s right,” said a voice from behind him. Patrick peered over his lumpy shoulder to see that the brown-haired young man had stepped forward. Azariah had as well.

“Indeed he is,” said the Warden.

“All of you,” Ashhur said, addressing the entire crowd now, sixty men deep. “Do you wish to fight should it come to that? All of your lives may be lost, but if I surrender, you will be spared.”

“You mean if he kills you,” Patrick said. He met Ashhur’s eyes and saw the truth in them. The god nodded. It was answer enough for them all. They had seen the mercy of Karak. They had seen the torment of Ashhur when the temple came crashing down.

Armor clanked, weapons rose into the air, and the surviving warriors of Haven chanted. It was a communal cry, as if they possessed a single, commanding voice. It took no time at all for the newcomers to join in the chant, and soon the entire pasture was awash with the fury and certainty of their cries.

“Ashhur!” they cried. “For Ashhur!”

When it ended, Ashhur turned away from his congregation, tears in his eyes.

“We have a long road ahead,” he said, his voice once more resounding across the countryside. The god glanced momentarily at the sky, toward Celestia’s burning star, and said, “We will face many trials ahead, and we are already at a disadvantage. There is not a moment to waste. Come now, my children. All of Paradise must be warned of what will come, and I fear we will face this test alone.”

Patrick didn’t need it spelled out for him. He knew exactly what Ashhur meant.

“She won’t help you, will she?” he asked, sidling up to the god.

“No,” Ashhur replied. “For as long as Karak and I are at odds, she will remain far away from here.”

“But you were lovers, were you not?”

The deity smiled sadly. “Above all things, Celestia is devoted to Balance. To choose sides.…”

He shook his head.

When the sun finally began to rise, those from Haven who had lived through the night moved back through the trees, intent on spreading word of the tragedy that took place here, warning the survivors in the delta of what was to come. Meanwhile, the party that had accompanied Ashhur on his journey headed back the way they had come. Patrick joined them, taking Jacob’s place at Ashhur’s side. He mouthed a silent prayer for those who were not with him. He wished to see Rachida one more time, if only to glimpse the gentle slope of her belly as the child within her- his child-grew. He also prayed for those whose lives had been lost, trying to remember as many faces as he could, hoping beyond hope that they had reached the golden Paradise safely. Deep in his heart, he needed to believe they would be waiting for him when his life ended…if it ever did.

Leaving Haven behind, Patrick glanced back only once, to see Deacon Coldmine impaled on his own sword before the ruin of the temple.

Veldaren was sleeping when Jacob returned to it. He had not seen the city in seventeen years and was amazed to see how much it had grown in his absence. Though the outskirts were still underdeveloped, the central area, miles wide and crisscrossed with cobbled streets, was a veritable jungle of gray stone and stained wood. Merchant buildings rose up all around him, and candles burned in the windows of the various homes, their dancing flames doing their best to chase away the nightmares of those who slept inside.

The journey back from the delta had taken more than two weeks, for Jacob had convinced Karak that it would be best to accompany the remaining army instead of opening a portal and taking the easier route-though in truth he questioned whether the god was strong enough to ride the shadows even if he desired it. To keep spirits high , had been his reasoning. To show them their god is by their side through thick and thin. Jacob had walked for most of the voyage, his preferred method of travel, spending time mingling with the fighting men, both healthy and injured, listening to their stories, their fears, their sorrows over the loss of their fellow soldiers. He did his best to further the idea that the attack on the delta had been justified, promising that their selfless service to their god would be rewarded in both this world and the next. Most of the soldiers had never laid eyes on him before, but most had heard stories of the fabled First Man, the only human crafted by the hands of the two gods combined, and after witnessing the esteem with which Karak treated him, they accepted his words as if they had been uttered by the deity himself.

For long stretches he walked alone, mulling over events now past. Twenty years of preparation had come screaming together over the past three months. The speed of it had nearly overwhelmed even him, and in spite of all his care, not everything had gone according to plan. Even with his excellent mind, he could barely remember the first time he had contacted Clovis Crestwell under the shadowy guise of the Whisperer, filling his mind with visions of a united Dezrel with Clovis its king. Jacob’s first failure had been letting Martin die in the initial attack, a simple oversight that had rattled his plans. Martin Harrow and Geris Felhorn were to have been his clandestine spies in the west after he rejoined his true Lord, strong boys malleable enough to bend to his subconscious urgings, who would eventually step down to allow the pathetic Benjamin Maryll to take the mantle of King of Paradise. But Jacob was hardly slave to a plan, and Geris’s mind had been easily broken once he’d discovered the right method of attack. Although it frustrated him to lose Geris as a spy, at least the weakest of the three kinglings had assumed the throne, for the weak were predictable and easily manipulated. Just as frustrating was his inability to dispose of Patrick DuTaureau, even though he had poisoned the freak day after day in Lerder. He had misjudged the hunchback’s strength, both then and when he’d altered his scheme once more to try to lessen the morale of those who wished to oppose the true god of the land. He would not do so again.

Despite those catastrophes, he forced himself to smile, to take pride in all that had gone right. The downfall of the Lord Commander had been inspired, set into motion by a promise he had made to Broward Renson that the old man would earn a place of high esteem by Karak’s side if he facilitated the ruin of Vulfram’s daughter. He was also able to rid Neldar of its greatest threat: Crian Crestwell. The boy had strayed too far from his father’s ideals and might have one day overthrown all that Jacob had set into motion. His love for the DuTaureau girl was a dangerous, flawed example that the two gods could coexist peacefully. It was Jacob’s hand that had performed the murders; he had stepped through the dragonglass mirror while Roland slept outside the cave. The worst had been hauling the drunken, unconscious Vulfram up the stairs. The man weighed a ton. But at least one of the First Families had been broken. They were irrelevant now, unnecessary remnants of the early period of man, no different from the Wardens of the east, who had been cast aside long ago. Jacob had a far better plan for how to instill order in the populace.

The First Families.…

“Damn you, Clovis,” Jacob whispered as he walked through the streets of Veldaren. The man had acted beyond his orders, sending his mad son into the Tinderlands to stir up trouble in a doomed grab for power. Jacob never should have been there, but he’d gone anyway, needing to ensure that nothing disturbed his carefully set plans. And because of that, because of their involvement.…

Jacob fingered the crystal in his pocket, the gift from his dead love. He’d been so close to giving it all up. Everything he’d done, every measured step to bring about the great future humankind deserved; he would have tossed it all away if it would have brought Brienna back to him. Ashhur had called him a hypocrite, and he’d been right. He had been overwhelmed by sorrow, and if the god had managed to bring life back from death, Jacob had been prepared to forsake everything he’d been working toward. But no. No life. Instead, Ashhur had caved to his demands and brought him back a corpse. And then, as if to mock him, Ashhur had scattered her body as ashes, denying him the chance to say good-bye, the chance to bury her with his own hands and place a stone above her final resting place. Her remains floated on the wind, and with them floated every last doubt Jacob had in betraying Ashhur.