Chris Evans - Ashes of a Black Frost

A thunderous broadside fired from the Ormandy across the way shook the night. Both of them jumped. Wooden buildings near the dock exploded in a shower of splinters. Jir and Tyul went to ground, but were immediately back up and running for the ship. Rakkes cut them off and a melee began. The elf was a blur of slashing precision while the bengar tore through the creatures with savage efficiency.

But it wouldn’t be enough. There were too many rakkes. More and more joined the horde surrounding the two. The rakkes finally had a chance to bring down two of their tormentors and they weren’t going to let them get away.

“Don’t shoot!” Chayii yelled, waving in a vain attempt to get the attention of the Prince’s ship.

“It’s their only hope,” Visyna said, doubting even that could save them. She could only see Jir and Tyul sporadically now as still more rakkes streamed through the smoldering ruins of the buildings and toward the dock.

The ship rocked again and the brittle, caustic tang of frost fire filled the air. She turned and saw Konowa with his saber drawn, slashing at branches while Rallie drew furiously on a sheaf of papers. Jurwan stood between them, watching, but not helping.

When she turned back, Chayii was gone. Visyna looked over the railing and saw the elf walking effortlessly down one of the mooring lines to land on the dock and start running toward Tyul and Jir. Rakkes filled the space between and musket fire from the Ormandy lashed the dockside.

“Chayii, come back!”

The elf never turned, but kept running. Half a dozen rakkes closed in on her in a converging arc. The ship rose several feet in the air then fell back sending up an icy spray that coated everything. Visyna lost her footing and started to fall as the ship tilted further to port. The deck shook as cannons tore loose from their stations and slid free. Screams and shouts and the groaning and splintering of wood mixed with the howl of rakkes and sharp crack of muskets.

Making up her mind while still falling, Visyna let her body go limp and slid through a gap in the railing. She grabbed a mooring line and slid down it, burning her hands red in the process. Once on the dock she ran after Chayii, still not knowing what she was going to do. She felt as a hollow as a reed. Her body was running on reserves she’d never tapped before.

Shouts rang out behind her as men noticed the two women running on the dock. So this is what it’s like for Konowa, she thought, pumping her arms as her legs carried her across the open space. No plan, just absolute exhilaration.

She reached Chayii as the rakkes closed in to five yards. Reaching down, she picked up a broken piece of barrel stave to use as a weapon. The downside of Konowa’s approach to things became rapidly clear.

“What are you doing out here?” she shouted at Chayii, moving closer until they were back to back as the rakke’s circled them.

“I could not leave Tyul or Jir out here alone. They are innocents. They follow where we lead. It is our duty to protect them,” she said.

Visyna suddenly understood Konowa’s frustration with the elves of the Long Watch. They really did think in the most altruistic terms, even to the point of risking certain death. And she had run out to join her!

“Chayii, Jir and Tyul are two born killers! We need their help,” she said, swinging her broken stave in front of her knowing it would do little to slow down a charging rakke. She thought about yelling back to the ship, but more branches had shot up from the water to grapple it while other ships were firing their cannons making it impossible to hear in the rising storm of noise.

“I did not come out here without a plan, child,” Chayii said. Her voice was surprisingly calm.

“Well then do it!”

Chayii turned and placed a hand on Visyna’s shoulder. “Tell my son. . that I would have enjoyed spoiling your grandchildren very much.”

Before Visyna could reply Chayii turned and raised her hands to the sky. She began chanting in elvish and immediately the world around Visyna changed. Deep, powerful voices from somewhere far away filled the air. She recalled hearing and feeling something like this before, when Tyul had used his oath weapon, but this was different. Something else added its power to the heavy thrum, something close.

“What are you doing?” she asked, aware that the fabric of the natural order around her was beginning to tear.

The old elf continued to chant, ignoring her. Rakkes howled and bared their fangs, but none dared come closer. It began growing lighter. At first, Visyna couldn’t place the source, but then realized the main mast of the Black Spike was glowing. She blinked and looked again. For just the briefest of moments she could have sworn a massive tree had stood where the mast was.

“Chayii?”

“I do what I must, child,” she said, her voice filled with something Visyna thought sounded like joy. “We are the stewards of this world. If, through our sacrifice, we can save it, then it is a small price to pay.”

Visyna’s objection was blown away in a burst of pure, golden light. She turned, and marveled at what she saw. The mast of the Black Spike, once the very trunk of Jurwan’s ryk faur from which the ship was named, dissolved into a million gleaming specs of energy. They swirled as if caught in a wind only they could feel before coalescing into the shape of a shimmering, translucent Wolf Oak standing proudly on the deck of the ship.

The leaves of Black Spike began to fall, twirling and spinning faster and faster. A glowing white acorn was attached to each leaf.

“Your time here is over,” Chayii said to the rakkes. “Be one again with the mukta ull .” A gibbering wail rose up from the rakkes. Visyna turned in time to see Chayii’s hands spread open. The next moment a wind blew over her from behind, knocking her to the ground. The leaves and their acorns flashed above her in brilliant streaks of light. Each leaf and acorn struck a rakke with the force of a cannon ball, cutting off the howls of fear.

The rakkes died where they stood. One moment they were there in all their primal fury, the next, there was a burst of light, and then for the briefest of moments, the ghostly afterimage of a Wolf Oak sapling.

Before she could get up, the wind reversed direction and blew out to sea. She heard Jir yelp in fear and looked up to see the bengar and Tyul tumbling helplessly in the grip of the wind, borne aloft on still more of the shimmering leaves. It carried them all the way to the Black Spike and dumped them onto the deck, Tyul landing lightly on his feet and Jir on all four paws.

The ship heaved and rose high on a roiling wave of water. The sarka har clawing at the Black Spike ’s hull tore and shattered. The wind howled and the heavy ropes mooring the ship to the dock snapped like thread. The Black Spike began drifting out into the harbor, picking up speed as it moved. The massive image of Jurwan’s Wolf Oak was bent by the wind, acting as a main sail.

“Konowa!” She reached out her hands, determined to weave the weather and battle the forces taking him away from her again, but already she knew her strength wasn’t up to the task. She watched silently as the ship disappeared into the night and was gone.

It was several moments before Visyna realized everything had gone quiet. Not a single rakke howled. No shouting, no screaming, no muskets firing. She sat up. Darkness had returned. She rubbed her eyes and turned to Chayii.

“Oh, Chayii.” The elf lay facedown on the dock. Visyna grabbed her shoulder and gently turned her over. She felt it as soon as she touched her body.

Chayii was dead.

She sensed a presence near her and looked up. A misty image of a forest played before her eyes. It was gone so fast she wasn’t sure if it was real or her imagination. She chose to believe its truth; Chayii walking among the trees, singing softly as she tended to the forest.