Bruce Blake - Spirit of the King

“Who are you?”

“One who cares about you, child.” It’s a woman’s voice.

My chest is tight; tears threaten at the memories of the things I’ve just seen, of the things done to me. I feel there’s more, that these visions were but a small part of the wrongs this man did me.

“Why am I here?”

Without moving, she is suddenly beside me, crouching. “I have shown you why you are here. You are dead.”

“You showed me?”

The cowl rocks forward and back. “Yes, child.”

I take a deep, shuddering breath and taste her perfume on my tongue. I want to be mad at her for what she showed me, but I can’t; my rage at the man in the visions is greater.

“Why did you do this to me?”

“Because you have the right to know,” she says. She caresses my cheek with the knuckle of one finger. “You have the right to know who did those things to you. He yet lives while you languish in this purgatory.”

The tightness in my chest becomes anger, boiling and festering and aching to break free. The scenes flash through my mind again, those and others. My teeth grind, my breath becomes short, forceful bursts spilling from my nostrils.

“You would like vengeance on this man, would you not?” Her voice is gentle, caring, and my anger at the man increases with the sound of it. I nod feeling the cords in my neck strain with the movement. “I can send you back to find him.”

“Yes,” I hiss through my teeth. “Yes.” My fists clench into balls in my lap.

“Good.”

The black cloaked figure stands, reaches beneath her long robe and pulls out a sword. It gleams with unseen light as she lays the blade on my shoulder. I don’t pull away from the dangerous-looking edge; I know she won’t hurt me.

She’s here to save me.

“Who is this man?”

“You are called Shariel,” she says ignoring my question. “It is not what your name was before, but you are no longer that person, that victim. Now you are strong. You are my angel of retribution.”

Somehow she has flipped the sword around without my notice and offers me the hilt. I take it in both hands and hold the sword before me like a sacred item. Steel, the fifth God-the warrior God-forced out by his brothers and sisters, all but forgotten long ages ago. This blade will help me avenge all the wrongs done me and others. The man is the embodiment of all things wicked. As my anger grows, so does my pride, for I’ve been chosen to punish him for the evil he’s brought to the world. The sword feels good in my hands. I swing it once, testing its weight, and I’m pleased.

“How will I find him? Who is he?”

“He will come to you, child,” the black-cloaked woman says, standing at my side. I replace the sword in the scabbard somehow hanging at my belt, but I don’t bother to wonder how it got there. “I will make sure of that.”

My hand touches the spot on my torso where he cut me open and spilled my life on the floor of the underground chamber. My fingers feel a ridge of scar, a reminder of what the man did to me. Anger blossoms anew.

“Who is he?”

“He is a devil incarnate,” she says, her voice unnaturally calm. “And his name is Khirro.”

The sound of the river had become a murmur, still noticeable but fading with each step carrying it farther into the distance. Khirro hacked at a tangle of brush, wishing he didn’t have to but accepting there was no other way through. He still remembered the one-eyed mercenary torn apart in a field of Lakeshi grass, and each time his sword contacted a branch or bush, he wondered if this was the time he’d meet a similar fate. Also, if they were being watched as Athryn believed, the noise of clearing a path would make them easy to follow. A droplet of sweat rolled over Khirro’s brow into his eye; he wiped it away on his sleeve.

“We should make our way back to the river,” he said over his shoulder to the magician following close behind.

“I agree it would be easier, but it is not safe.”

“Nothing is safe in this cursed land.”

Khirro swung the Mourning Sword again and the thicket fell away, opening onto a small clearing circled by tall fir and hemlock. He hesitated at the edge as Athryn stepped up beside him. Something didn’t seem right. The ground was too clear, the circle too round, like something other than the Gods created it.

“Something is peculiar,” Athryn said, putting words to Khirro’s feeling. Far behind them, leaves rattled and a branch snapped. They both glanced back then looked at each other.

“We have no choice,” Khirro said.

Athryn nodded. They stepped across the brink between forest and clearing and Khirro wished again they’d discovered the secret to Athryn’s powers. The magician claimed he knew, but he hesitated to share. Spilling Khirro’s blood had almost worked, but making the air shimmer in the shape of a tyger wasn’t enough to keep them from danger.

But what is it he won't share?

They crept into the clearing, their steps silenced by a thick carpet of decaying needles beneath their boots. No rocks lay strewn on the ground in the open expanse, no branches fallen from the trees overhead. And no sound. The trees didn’t hide chirping birds; insects didn’t buzz about their heads.

It’s autumn, almost winter. The bugs are done, the birds have gone south.

His thoughts lacked the ring of truth and did little to ease his discomfort.

“Someone created this place, Khirro,” Athryn said.

The air around them seemed to swallow his words as soon as they cleared his lips. Khirro nodded and eyed the brush growing to the edge of the clearing so thick, it gave the impression they’d entered an outdoor room bounded by leafy walls. The area was symmetrical, a perfect circle. Even the branches of the trees overhead stopped precisely at the edge of the circle, allowing the autumn sky to peer down on them like an unblinking gray eye.

“We should not stay here.”

The brush behind them rustled, confirming Athryn’s words. Khirro looked back and saw nothing, not even the shiver of a leaf. Unease made his head feel light. This was no giant following them, no animal, but something else he couldn’t begin to imagine.

“Let’s go,” he said.

Athryn hurried ahead across the clearing toward the far side and Khirro followed, the Mourning Sword in hand ready to clear the way. As they approached the wall of brush, Athryn pointed.

“Look there.”

Khirro’s gaze followed the magician’s finger and saw what he indicated: an opening in the thicket, a spot where the growth was thinner, perhaps easier to get through.

An old trail.

Athryn plunged ahead into the forest with Khirro hard on his heels. The ground was smooth and level beneath their feet, free of rocks and roots, making the going easier and faster than it had been before.

They ran without looking back for a while, hoping to put some distance between themselves and whatever pursued them, leaving behind the unnatural clearing. Khirro held the Mourning Sword in his right hand but didn’t need to use it. No branches whipped his face, no thorns plucked his clothes. For a small, seemingly unused trail that looked overgrown a moment before, it quickly became easy going. After a few minutes, Khirro checked over his shoulder to see if their pursuers were within sight but saw nothing.

Not even the trail behind them.

Fear flared in Khirro as he thought again of the field of tall grass that took the life of the one-eyed mercenary and came close to taking his, too.

The path was closing behind them, sealing them in the forest.

He looked to the front again, at Athryn running just ahead of him, but couldn’t see past. Straining and stretching as he ran, he peered around his companion and saw that the path appeared to open around them, a vague line before them widening to let them through, then closing again after they passed.