Chris Evans - The Light of Burning Shadows

Hrem made a show of pondering this, though everyone knew the answer. Being a member of the Color Party was a great honor, right up until it stopped being one when you were dead. The enemy always tried to capture the Colors, making the guarding of them crucial in every battle. It also meant you were a prime target. Alwyn himself had volunteered for the Color Party three times now, but Yimt had denied his request.

“No one here’s looking to be a hero,” Hrem said, “well, ’cept maybe Ally there. You keep charging ahead of us like that and you’re bound to come to a sticky end.”

Alwyn smiled and tried to wave it off. “I just get my blood up, you know? I’m not trying to be anything.”

“You’ll be a Darkly Departed is what you’ll be if you don’t watch it,” Teeter added. “You don’t want to be joining our dead like Meri and the rest of those poor souls.”

“I can take care of myself,” Alwyn said. He could feel the color coming to his cheeks. This was nothing he wanted to talk about.

“Now, now, leave the lad alone. He’s young, he’s foolish, and he’s got a magical tree for a leg,” Yimt said. “I think it’s just a matter of the wood wanting to get ashore so it can plant itself and start sprouting some leaves.”

Laughter echoed off the timbers and Alwyn found himself chuckling.

“You mock his plight,” Inkermon said, setting down his parchment and pointing his quill at Yimt.

“He’s just kidding,” Alwyn said. “There’s still hope.”

“Hope? You mock that, too,” Inkermon said. “You all mock this…this abomination that has befallen us. Do you not see? Our curse grows with every passing day. The foul temptress haunts our dreams even as She calls forth creatures long dead, and now the very earth we walk attacks us, burning our very souls alive.”

There was only the sound of the wind and the creaking of wood. Inkermon had touched on something none of them wanted to talk about. Alwyn and Hrem looked at each other, then quickly looked away. Feeling his shadow burn had been pain beyond his experience, but there had been something else as well. For a moment, before he extinguished the white fire, Alwyn had felt a clarity and sense of peace that he had not known since taking the Blood Oath. It was as if Her powers were being cleansed from his very soul.

Yimt slapped his hands on his knees and stood up. “Right. Put a big bloody cork in it, all of you,” he said, turning to look each one of them in the eye. “What is or isn’t the state of our eternal rest is a conversation for another day. Right now, it’s time. Grab your kit and get topside. We’re going to honor the poor bastards while the weather holds.”

Hrem climbed to his feet and began buttoning up his tunic. He gave Scolly a gentle nudge with his boot. Scolly opened one eye and looked around.

“Are we going to bury them now?”

No one said anything. Finally, Alwyn nodded. “Yes, Scolly, we’re going to bury them now.”

Scolly opened the other eye and sat up, stretching and yawning as he did so. “Only, I was having a dream and the Shadow Monarch was there. She seemed…happy.”

The wind began to swirl, snapping the canvas sailcloth above their heads like the musket fire they’d become all too familiar with. Alwyn kept his eyes on the four bodies laid out on the deck in front of him. Each dead soldier was sewn into an old hammock. Iron ingots from the ship’s ballast had been placed inside first to ensure the bodies slid out of sight quickly, but experience had shown it wouldn’t matter. The Queen’s Colors draped each body, though the flags would remain as the bodies were pushed over the side. They were bound to be used again.

The regiment formed a three-sided square around the bodies, although this meant many soldiers were perched on barrels, crates, and parts of the ship in order to see. No sailors were present. Even the ship’s captain, Captain Ervod, was absent. He’d insisted on presiding over the first ceremony, but after the shock of the first one, Captain Ervod left it to the regiment to handle.

Prince Tykkin stood off to one side, tapping a white-gloved hand against his sword hilt. The silvery-green of his uniform jacket looked new and was a marked exception to the dull appearance of his men. Even Major Swift Dragon’s uniform looked grubby by comparison. It was only natural that the future King look the part, but Alwyn knew the main reason was that the Prince stayed on board while the Iron Elves cleared each island. It spoke volumes that no soldier ever complained about it; they all preferred the Prince out of sight.

Major Swift Dragon made a motion to Yimt, who took a step forward. “Parade…attention!” The soldiers came to attention as best they could. Captain Ervod was struggling to keep the ship steady, but the seas did not appear to be cooperating.

Prince Tykkin nodded to himself, then began speaking. The first few words were carried away by the wind, but Alwyn knew the speech by heart. Everyone did. The Prince went through the motions, exalting the fallen, though Alwyn doubted he would even recognize them.

“…through their sacrifice the Empire will survive, and the light of civilization will shine in all the corners of the world…”

As the Prince spoke, Alwyn looked around the formation. Anticipation and apprehension filled the air. Coughs and shuffling feet were muffled by the wind, but there was no hiding the looks in men’s eyes. They all shared the same thought as they looked at the four bodies. That could be me one day. What happens next could happen to me.

“…in taking the fight to our foe, we stamp out disorder and chaos, bringing the order of the just throughout the known lands. Ours is a cause most worthy, and so to fall in the furtherance of that cause is an honor…”

Alwyn caught Yimt’s eye and realized they were both sneering at the Prince’s words. Alwyn coughed and looked over at the Prince, but he continued to talk, his eyes unfocused and staring at nothing.

The ship took a wave off the port bow, sending a shudder through the timbers. The Prince stumbled, then righted himself. He looked questioningly at Major Swift Dragon, who saluted. The Prince returned the salute and without another look back, walked across the deck and into his cabin.

The roll was called for each section that had lost a man. When they got to Harkon, the entire regiment stiffened. Word of his strange death had quickly made the rounds. Soldiers understood dying in battle-they even were beginning to come to terms with the idea of a ghostly afterlife-but to have your shadow burned was something new.

Major Swift Dragon took a moment and panned his eyes along the ranks. When he came to Alwyn he paused, and Alwyn held his gaze. The major looked away and called the last name.

“Harkon.”

Waves battered against the hull with dull booms.

“Private Harkon.”

A clewline snapped and began whipping back and forth against a sail.

“Private Kester Harkon.”

The ship rose on a large wave, then slid down the other side. Spray shot up from the bow and sprinkled down on the assembly, but not a person moved to wipe his face.

Major Swift Dragon pulled his saber from its scabbard and held it skyward. Four soldiers standing at the ready bent and lifted the first body and carried it to the railing.

A mournful, keening sound came from somewhere high in the rigging of the mainmast. Alwyn knew Tyul Mountain Spring, a diova gruss, an elf lost to the natural order after bonding with an overpowering Silver Wolf Oak, was up there. Miss Red Owl had decided to keep him with her, perhaps as another project, as Yimt put it. Alwyn wasn’t sure there was anything that could be done for the elf. He seemed to live in his own world. When he wasn’t sitting and staring off into space, he was climbing the mainmast that had once been Jurwan’s ryk faur Black Spike to howl whenever there was a burial at sea.