Jeff Salyards - Scourge of the Betrayer

That put an end to the discussion. But while Mulldoos had ridiculed and threatened everyone into silence, it didn’t change the tension still hanging in the air. There was that barely perceptible pull from the Veil, even from this distance. More than a simple desire to see how many bones might lay strewn along its course. This wasn’t curiosity, wasn’t even just fascination. It was a horrible compulsion to step closer, to approach the Veil, despite the surety that to do so could only end in doom. Mulldoos was wrong on that count-there wasn’t anything natural about it.

But the tension wasn’t only about the Veil itself, but the Deserters who’d created it. Ages had come and gone since they stranded us on this half of the world, but even though their temples had been torn down by decree, their names forbidden and lost, nothing could wash away the malaise they left behind. People rarely thought or spoke of them, but when they did, it was impossible not to acknowledge… they abandoned us because we had failed. There were different accounts in different lands, but they ultimately amounted to the same thing-we were too weak, too passionate, too ignorant. We’d disappointed the oldest gods in such a profound and egregious way they decided we were hopeless. And so they left. They abdicated, left the throne vacant. New gods had sprung up in their absence, lesser gods to fill the void, but the Deserter’s judgment and condemnation still hung over all of us. Their desertion was unconscionable, but the reasons for it were inescapably damning. To think of the Deserters was to meditate on our own awful foibles.

But while everyone else was fixated on the Godveil and regarding it with quiet awe, fear, or in the case of Mulldoos, real or feigned contempt, and perhaps contemplating our failings as a race, just like I was, I noticed that Braylar was staring at something at the front of the ruined temple, rapt as rapt could be.

Stone stairs led to a single archway in what remained of a wall, with a large pedestal on either side. While one pedestal was empty, the one to the right of the arch supported a massive bust as tall as a man. This wasn’t all that unusual-temples new and old often housed sculptures of gods, heroes, martyrs, and mystics. However, looking more closely, I saw what arrested Braylar’s attention.

The giant head was roughly human in proportion and shape from the cheekbones down, albeit thick-lipped and foreboding, but the similarities ended abruptly at eye level. Or what would have been eye level. Where a man should have had eyes, this statue had two large horns protruding out and up, as well as a ring of somewhat smaller horns circling its head the entire way around. It also had two rows of short horns, spikes really, extending from front to back. The familiarity was obvious. The heads on Braylar’s flail were more stylized than the giant bust, and screaming in rage or pain while this head was utterly stoic and solemn, but it was clear both sculptures were inspired by the same source. This had been a temple for the Deserter Gods, back when they had names and widespread worshipers. Before the Deserters erected the Veil to cover their escape from us.

Braylar’s left hand had dropped down to Bloodsounder, and he was staring down at the Veil beyond the ruins.

I stepped closer to him and whispered, “Is something wrong, Captain?”

His left hand flicked the chains and his eyes didn’t leave the Veil. “You feel the draw, yes? The subtle but powerful urge to approach, to unravel its mysteries, or your own?”

I nodded, and he did as well, but then said, “I do not.”

I looked at him closely. There was no twitching around the lips, no sweat on the brow, no angry scowl. In fact, he looked as calm as I’d ever seen him. Quietly, he said, “The first time I saw the Veil was many years before. And as it happened, I was far closer than we are now. So I felt the pull, bone deep. Our division was trying to evade a much larger force on our heels, and the terrain pushed us much closer to the Veil than our commanders would have liked. It was incredibly difficult to resist the pull. We actually lost several soldiers-warnings mean nothing when you come that close, you simply ride or walk to the Veil until your mind is blasted and you fall down dead in its shadow. And several years after that, I had cause to travel near it again. And while the pull wasn’t quite as potent, it was still there. So I remember it well.”

He turned his head and looked at me. “But now, I feel nothing at all. No tug, no draw, no impulse to approach it. Nothing. It’s as if… as if the Veil weren’t there at all.”

He said this last in amazement. And for good reason. I’d never heard anyone utter this before. Everyone knew someone or had heard of someone drawn to the Veil, slaughtered by it. It was ubiquitous. But to say he felt nothing at all… it was like saying he stuck his hand in the fire and felt no heat.

I glanced down at his flail, and then back to the bust at the temple, looked at the images of the Deserters. “Did you, before, did you have-”

“No. The first two times I’d encountered the Veil were before I’d unearthed Bloodsounder.” He looked back down the hill.

“What does it mean?’

He shook his head and for once seemed truly at a loss. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “It is… significant. But what is signified… I don’t know.”

Others had gathered nearby, so the conversation was over. But I was mystified.

We’d gotten as close to the temple as we dared without leaving the heavy cover of the trees on the hill. Further down, bush and bramble gave way to a large tract of wildflowers and meadow that led to the ruins. It was as secluded a spot as could be hoped for, and must have been ideal and idyllic for whatever priests made this place their home in another age. Now, it served as the perfect spot for a secret meeting, well away from the traffic of the trade road ten miles to the west, and in little danger of being accidentally stumbled upon, as even the closest farmstead was in the next valley, far from the Veil and its dangers and ramifications. It occurred to me that a location so well chosen for a clandestine meeting was also the perfect spot for an ambush or treachery.

I looked back at our party when I heard Braylar grilling Vendurro and Glesswik, who had stepped out of the trees to join us.

“You saw no movement then? Nothing to indicate a hostile presence?”

Vendurro replied, “No, Cap. Gless and me, Xen too, we’ve been here since dawn yesterday, exactly as ordered. Circled as close as we could without giving away our positions or getting too near the Veil, and as far as I can tell, we’re the only hostile presence in these parts. We split watches, so there’s been an eye open the entire time. No one in the temple grounds, and so far, no movement along the perimeter neither.”

Braylar pressed him. “As far as you can tell? Are you confident that the woods are clear, or is that merely a guess?”

Vendurro’s cheeks colored and his jaw tightened, but before he could fashion a response, Glesswik said, “Three sets of eyes are better than one, Cap, but they ain’t as good as ten, if you take my meaning. We ate cold rations, moved as cautious as we could, and circled close. Shifting watch the entire time, like Ven told you. No ambush in the bush that we seen. I don’t know that I’d stake my life on it, but-”

“You stake yours and ours as well. Make no mistake.”

“Well, then, two days of scouting and screening says it looks like a safe field. That’s as much as I can say, Cap.”

Braylar nodded at both. “Very well, then. As always, much will be risked on appearances. Assuming he isn’t already hiding among the wildflowers, High Priest Turncloak should arrive shortly. Is Xen still in position near the goat track?”