Troy Denning - The Titan of Twilight

“No one could have done better, Avner-not even Tavis.” Brianna’s voice broke as she said the words. The queen touched the young scout’s neck, checking for a pulse that was not there. “I wish I could repay your courage, but even Hiatea’s magic cannot bring the dead back to life.”

Avner’s spirit lingered with his body long after the titan took the queen and left, until long after his flesh had frozen as solid as the stones it lay upon. He did not stay because duty demanded it-he had never been much for such folly and certainly did not feel bound by it now. Nor did he stay because unfinished business tied him to the world-he had died valiantly, and an honorable death always cuts such fetters.

He stayed for vengeance. The fomorians had started to scream almost as soon as Lanaxis set the forest alight, and the agony in their voices had been music to Avner’s dead ears. They had continued to wail all through the night, some of them until long after the last tree had burned. Even now, the dead scout-he had lived more of his life as a thief, really, but he had died as a scout, and he wanted to be remembered that way-even now, with the gray dawn light revealing the charred and barren landscape of the canyon, he could still hear a few of them moaning. Avner would always remember Lanaxis kindly for this favor, at least.

But the dead scout knew that he must soon forsake even this final pleasure. Already, he could feel the pale sunlight scorching his gossamer spirit, burning away the last airy threads by which he clung to his lifeless body. The time was fast approaching when he would have to let go and begin that terrifying journey every spirit makes alone. Avner saw no reason to wait. He loosened his hold, and his ethereal substance started to sink.

Then he heard a familiar voice coming up the ridge. Avner grabbed hold of his body-with what, he was not exactly sure-and held tight.

“Up here!” The voice belonged to Tavis Burdun, the firbolg who had changed him from a thief to a scout. “They came this way!”

“I’m coming Tav-” The speaker suddenly fell silent. Avner recognized this voice as his friend Basil’s. “Stronmaus save me! What is that there?”

“Avner.”

A pair of large, hot hands-they felt as fiery as forge irons-slipped between the young scout and his body, then lifted the remains off the ground. Avner struggled to stay, but there was nothing for him to hold to and he began to sink.

“Now will you listen to me?” Though Basil was screaming, his voice was fading fast. “Now will you use Sky Cleaver?”

Avner did not hear the answer, for he had already settled into the emptiness between the stones.

Tavis skirted a monolith the size of a castle tower, then clambered up another as large as an entire keep. He and Galgadayle were following Basil through the swarthy depths of Annam’s Hallway, an icy gorge running straight as a lance through the heart of Split Mountain. A thousand feet of jumbled talus boulders, some as enormous as hills, covered the canyon’s floor. Its sheer granite walls soared more than a mile upward, narrowing into a pair of jagged, needle-tipped peaks that could have been mirror-images of each other. According to Basil, Annam the All Father had created the chasm a hundred centuries earlier, when, exasperated with Othea’s faithlessness, he had hurled Sky Cleaver into the mountain.

The runecaster stopped atop a monolith, then slipped his divining rod from his belt and held it before him. The glowing tip bent downward at nearly a right angle.

“We’ve found it!”

“Not so loud!” Tavis urged. Though Orisino and the verbeegs still trailed a hundred paces behind, the high scout did not want his friend’s elated voice to carry to their ears. The last thing he needed was to let Orisino hear about Sky Cleaver. Tavis stopped next to Basil. “Put your rod away.”

On the other side of the monolith, a boulder-lined pit corkscrewed a hundred feet down into the talus stones. The deep-worn channel of an ancient trail spiraled along the shaft’s jagged walls, jumping from one listing monolith to another like some sort of cockeyed fomorian staircase. At the bottom of the hole, the track slipped beneath a stone as large as Keep Hartwick and vanished into the crooked maw of a dark, yawning grotto.

“I thought Sky Cleaver was a lost weapon,” Tavis said. Although he still felt the cold, the scout was well-enough rested that it no longer made him stutter. “How come it has a guardian? Lost weapons don’t have guardians.”

Basil shrugged. “The stone giant histories don’t describe any guardians.”

Tavis gave the runecaster a sidelong glance. “Have you read anywhere that the axe is guarded?” he asked. “Saying yes won’t stop me from trying.”

Basil met his gaze squarely. “I’ve told you all I know.” The runecaster showed no irritation at Tavis’s mistrust. “This is for Avner. I wouldn’t hold back.”

Tavis accepted the reassurance with a nod. Avner had been half grandson, half accomplice to Basil. The runecaster would never lie on the youth’s name.

“Well, someone lives down there,” Tavis said.

“And he must be as old as the mountains,” added Galgadayle. Though it had been two days since the storm giant battle, the seer remained hunched over in pain. Despite the death of his own shaman, he refused to allow Orisino’s healer to mend his cracked ribs. “To wear a trail that deep into solid granite must have taken ten centuries.”

“At least ten centuries, but the path was not made by a single walker,” Tavis said. “The steps are too erratic. Everything from verbeegs to cloud giants has lived down there.”

Galgadayle raised a brow. “Then the axe can’t be here. Someone would have claimed it by now.”

“If they knew how to free it-which isn’t possible,” said Basil. “It took me three years and two new languages to learn the secret, and even I wouldn’t have succeeded without the library at Castle Hartwick.”

“That still doesn’t explain the trail,” Tavis said. “If whoever’s down there can’t retrieve the axe, why do they stay here?”

“Because a mortal doesn’t possess a weapon of the gods,” Galgadayle answered. “It possesses him. This is a bad idea, my friends. By recovering Sky Cleaver, we may do more harm than letting the titan keep the queen and her child.”

“I’m still going after it.” Tavis spoke softly, for he heard Orisino and the verbeegs clattering toward their location. “It’s the only way I can kill Lanaxis.”

“And after the titan is dead? What will you do then?” Galgadayle also spoke more quietly. “If you lack the strength to slay Brianna’s child, you have only unleashed two scourges on the world.”

“Perhaps not,” Basil countered. “The titan’s death will certainly alter Kaedlaw’s future.”

“You cannot change a person’s destiny,” Galgadayle warned. “You can only kill him before he fulfills it.”

“If you’re right, we’ll know soon enough,” Basil said. “Sky Cleaver can cut to the heart of the matter. After that, Tavis will do the right thing.”

“Assuming he can recognize it,” Galgadayle replied. “Sky Cleaver’s power will be a bright and shining thing. Even Tavis’s eyes may be dazzled by the glare.”

“Then you and Basil will help me see.” Tavis glanced over his shoulder at the approaching verbeegs. “And now we will discuss the matter no more.”

The three companions turned to await the exhausted verbeegs, who were laboriously pushing and pulling each other over the massive talus boulders. Only twenty-five of their number had survived the battle with the storm giants, and many of those suffered from wounds their shaman had not yet healed. Still, with the fomorians strewn in ashes over Cuthbert Pass and the firbolgs annihilated, even two dozen warriors were sufficient to give Orisino command of the war party. Tavis had tried to win back control by waiting for the two companies of royal footmen trailing them since the storm giant battle, but the crafty verbeeg chieftain had ordered his followers to keep moving, objecting that humans would only slow the company down.