Joel Shepherd - Haven

“Who ordered you to burn it down?” Andreyis yelled. Everyone paused and looked. Captain Ulay saw who it was, and gave an order to two soldiers. The soldiers advanced on him. “The rest of you are just going to stand there? Your captain's gone mad! This is the High Temple of Enora, and your gods are going to hold you personally responsible for destroying it!”

The two soldiers advancing on him stopped. Andreyis saw that one, beneath his steel helm, was very young and looked very frightened.

“If this temple falls into their hands,” Ulay roared at them, “it will mark the fall of Enora! We swore that we would never allow them to place the Shereldin Star in this place, and I will not hand them such a victory!”

“That which you lose you can always win back!” Andreyis retorted. “If you burn it down, you destroy your symbol of nationhood with your very hands! Why don't you just cut your own damn throats while you're at it?”

Captain Ulay yelled at the two soldiers in Enoran. They looked at each other, and did not advance further. Ulay snarled, and strode toward the soldier holding the flint and flask.

“Don't let him have it!” Andreyis yelled. The soldier stood paralysed as his captain advanced. “He has no orders, he's just making it up! He lied to you!”

Ulay took the flint from his unresisting man, and snarled orders to two other men. Those two obeyed without hesitation, and came striding for Andreyis.

Something fizzed past Andreyis's shoulder, and struck one of those men squarely in the chest. His armour was thickest there, and the arrow bounced off, but he froze in shock. Andreyis looked behind, and there was Yshel, bow in hand, reaching for another arrow even now. Behind Yshel, walking with the aid of a tall staff, was a familiar, grey-haired figure. Andreyis stared.

“You're not burning down the fucking High Temple!” Kessligh yelled. “Have you gone completely insane?” Behind him came Nasi-Keth and serrin, more than a dozen.

“Hold them back!” Ulay commanded, uncorking the flask.

A serrin man with powerful arms took stance beside Kessligh and pulled a huge bowstring with a shuddering creak. “I have him,” he announced, sighting at the captain.

Soldiers ran in front of their captain, shields raised, and made an impenetrable wall. Still the serrin sighted, as though seeking a gap between the shields, with some confidence of hitting.

“I am Kessligh Cronenverdt,” Kessligh announced. “You have heard of my victories against the Regent! I am the most victorious of all commanders in this war, and I command that this folly shall cease!”

“You're a Lenay pagan like all the others!” yelled Ulay from behind his wall. “You have no command here! Now clear the damn temple, because I'm going to light it, and the first flame will turn everyone on this floor to ash in the blink of an eye!”

Soldiers began to leave, ushering the Lenay prisoners ahead of them. One prisoner, limping on a bad leg, made a sudden lunge for Ulay, barehanded. His tackle brought down a soldier, and opened a gap in the wall of shields. An arrow whistled, and suddenly Ulay had a serrin arrow through his arm. He stared at the arrow. His soldiers all watched as the flint hit the ground. No one seemed to know what to do.

Then there were new yells in the temple as townsfolk began charging in. The Steel's wall before the steps had failed, the soldiers unprepared to use swords on their own people. Men and women ran in yelling, swarming past Kessligh and his Nasi-Keth and serrin, past Andreyis, then past the dumbfounded soldiers and their wounded captain.

There was no violence, for the people did not attack, but formed a human wall before the flammable pile. Numbers increased in a steady flow, and the soldiers' swords remained in their sheaths. It was over.

Kessligh's people convinced the soldiers to leave, then began removing the demon fire artillery, very carefully. The crowds of common folk cheered and wept. Andreyis went with the other prisoners and sat on the steps to one side.

Soon, Yshel emerged. Spotting him, she walked over and sat by him.

“Nice shot,” said Andreyis, with a smile.

Yshel put a hand on his good arm. “You were brave,” she said.

“I've fought in wars,” Andreyis said sourly. “That was nothing.”

Yshel shook her head, impatiently. “No, that is not what I meant. This clumsy tongue, it does not offer the best translation. I meant not a bravery of the body. Instead, a bravery of the mind. You are not Verenthane. This is not your fight, and these people are your enemies. Yet you took a risk to save something that is not yours.”

Andreyis sighed. “Serrin aren't the only ones to know right from wrong.”

“No,” Yshel said quietly. “Sometimes you know better than us. I would have let them burn it down.”

“You may have been right to. Maybe we did something stupid. But it didn't feel right.”

Behind her, Andreyis saw Kessligh walking over. He climbed to his feet. Kessligh embraced him, and held him for a long time. When they parted, Andreyis saw emotion on his face. And perhaps even…was that a tear? Surely not.

“Good to see you well,” said Kessligh, attempting gruffness. “Very good.”

“No smarter, though,” said Andreyis, with a nod to the temple doors.

“And I'm pleased for it. Destroying the High Temple would have been, for the Enorans, like a mother killing her own child. I don't want to be fighting with a people who think they deserve to lose.” He looked over the group. “So you're my prisoner, then?”

“Looks that way,” Andreyis said glumly.

“You do realise you're on the wrong side?” Coming from Kessligh, the hero of Lenayin, it nearly shocked him.

“I can't fight my own people,” Andreyis said stubbornly.

“You did in the Northern Rebellion.”

“You know what I mean.”

Kessligh nodded. He saw the accusation on Andreyis's face, and on the faces of the other Lenays, sitting here on the steps. And he took a deep breath.

“We all have our burdens,” he said solemnly. “We all must do what we must. I want a full telling from you, but I don't have the time. You'll be taken to the rear soon, wherever the rear is today. I'll make sure people know what you did.”

He clasped Andreyis's shoulder, and departed. In his place stood the serrin archer from the temple. He was certainly the scariest looking serrin Andreyis had ever seen-handsome, with wild hair and green eyes, his bare arms crossed with numerous scars. Yet now, as he looked at Andreyis, he seemed uncertain. Almost shy.

Andreyis realised he looked familiar. “Errollyn!” he exclaimed, recalling the serrin who had ridden to the Northern Rebellion with his friends.

Errollyn put out a hand strong enough to crush most others, but his grip was light, in serrin fashion. “I have you at a disadvantage,” Errollyn apologised. “Sasha's told me everything about you.” He smiled, a rare flash of humour.

“I don't like the sound of that,” Andreyis admitted.

“She loves you dearly. She told me that in truth, she has five brothers. Six, counting Krystoff.”

Andreyis swallowed hard. “I know. It wasn't easy being her brother. I can't imagine how hard it is to be her lover.”

Errollyn smiled sadly. “Hard when she was here. Harder still when she is not. The Army of the Bacosh pauses at Shemorane, and the Army of Lenayin draws closer. They will circle west, and perhaps take the lead in the pursuit of the Steel.”

“The Regent's a coward,” said Andreyis. “After the battle of Shero Valley, there's barely twenty thousand Lenays and some Torovans. The Regent must still command better than a hundred thousand, yet he falls back.”

Errollyn shrugged. “Why waste Bacosh lords in pursuit when he can spend Lenays instead?”