David Zindell - The Lightstone

This news encouraged me, and I felt a warmth inside as if I had drunk a glass of brandy. At least I thought, I wouldn't be the only Vaiari knight inTria.

The Duke looked at Thaman, who had hardly spoken ten words all night. Then he asked, 'And how is it in Surrapam? Have King Kiritan's emissaries reached your land, too?'

Thaman, dressed in stained woolens that had seen better days, used a napkin to wipe his hands. Then he ran his fingers through his thick red beard and said, 'Yes, they have. A ship arrived in Taylan late in Viradar. But few of my people have set out for Tria. This is not the time for us to be making such quests.'

'How so?' Duke Rezu asked him.

Thaman lifted back his head and drained the beer from his goblet. He grimaced as if he found the taste of the thick, black brew very bitter. Then he said, 'On the eighth of Viradar, at the Red Dragon's bidding, the armies of Hesperu marched against us.

They've conquered our entire kingdom up to the line of the Maron River.'

At these words, everyone at the table grew still and looked at Thaman. These were the worst tidings to come to the Morning Mountains since the story of Galda's fall.

'So you see,' Thaman continued, 'we can spare few warriors to go off looking for golden cups that no longer exist.'

The Duke nodded his head and asked him, 'How is it then that your king can spare you?'

Thaman's small eyes blinked as if stung by particles of blowing snow. Then he drew his sword and laid it on the table alongside one of the half-eaten roasts. Its blade was shorter and thicker than that of a kalarna, and notched in several places. He said,

'With this I've sent five Hesperuk warriors back to their ancestors. Do you question my courage?'

Thaman's sudden unsheathing of his sword caused Naviru and Arashar to grip the hilts of theirs. But Duke Rezu stayed their hands with a single look. He smiled coldly at Thaman and said, 'In the Morning Mountains, as Sar Valashu has found, we must be careful of unsheathing our swords. But you are new to our land, and must be forgiven for not knowing our ways. As for your courage, no, I do not question it – it is rather the opposite. You've made a journey across most of Ea that few would be willing or able to make. My only question is why your king would allow a brave man to make such a journey at a time when your sword must be badly needed.'

'It is needed,' Thaman admitted. 'I don't know how long we'll be able to hold. The Hesperuks fight like demons – it's believed that the Red Dragon's priests who lead their army have stolen their souls. They have done things I cannot speak of. My wife, my children…'

Thaman's voice suddenly died into the silence of the room. Although he kept his face as cold as stone and stared dry-eyed at the notched edge of his sword, I felt tears burning to break out from my own eyes at the great sorrow he held inside. An image of fish-scaled Hesperuk warriors ravaging the misty lands of far-off Surrapam came into my mind then. But I shook my head back and forth, trying not to let it take hold.

Duke Rezu refilled Thaman's goblet; bitterness or no, he drank the black beer almost in one gulp. Then he said, 'You speak of having enemies all around you. But for the peoples of Ea, there is only one true enemy, and his name is Morjin.'

At the sound of this name, I felt the arrow again bite into my side and the kirax burning in my blood* I turned to see Kane staring at Thaman with an even greater intensity than that with which he had attacked his meat.

'The Red Dragon's armies,' Thaman said, 'will soon control the entire south of Ea except for the Crescent Mountains and parts of the Red Desert.'

Now Kane's eyes, like black coals, began to burn with the heat of a hatred I couldn't comprehend.

'My king,' Thaman said, looking at Duke Rezu and then me, 'King Kaiman, has sent me to your land because it's said that the Valari are the greatest warriors in Ea. He hopes that you'll attack Sakai from the east before the Red Dragon swallows up what is left of Surrapam – and perhaps Eanna and Yarkona as well.'

I felt the sudden pressure of Maram's fat hand squeezing my leg beneath the table.

Then he licked his lips as he winked at me. This was the very plan that he had proposed in Lord Harsha's field just before Raldu had almost murdered me.

Duke Rezu, who knew his history as well as anyone in Mesh, said to Thaman, 'Once we Valari fought our way across the Wendrush to attack the Red Dragon. He burned our warriors with firestones and crucified the survivors.'

At this, Thaman rapped his gold wedding ring against his sword. The thick steel blade rang out like a bell as he said, 'Someday, and sooner than you think, the Red Dragon will do worse than that to all your people.'

Duke Rezu shook his head sadly. 'This is not the time for the Valari to fight the Red Dragon together.'

'What would it take, then, to unite you?' 'I'm afraid,' the Duke said, 'that nothing less than an invasion of the tribes of the northern Sarni would unite Anjo. And to unite all the Valari kingdoms? Who can say? Only Aramesh was ever able to accomplish that, and we'll never see his like again.'

Despite myself, a thrill of pride swelled inside me. Aramesh was the great-grandfather of my grandfathers, and his blood still ran through my veins.

At that moment, I felt something like a dagger cutting into my forehead. I turned to see Kane staring at me, and his eyes were as hard and sharp as obsidian knives.

'It doesn't always take the united armies of the Valari to oppose Morjin,' he growled out. He nodded at Yashku and asked him, 'Do you know the Song of Kalkamesh and Telemesh?'

'Yes, I do,' Yashku said.

'So – sing it for us, then.'

It was unseemly for Kane to command Duke Rezu's minstrel, and so Yashku looked at the Duke to gain his assent. Duke Rezu slowly nodded his head and told him, 'We could use a song to hearten us tonight. But let's fill our goblets before you begin – if I remember correctly, it's a very long song.'

We began passing the big, brown jugs full of beer as I stared at the candles throwing up their bright flames. The Duke's grooms came out of the kitchen to remove the dishes, and the rattle of silverware and plates seemed very loud against the sudden quiet. Then Yashku, a wizened man with worn teeth, began pulling at his long, white hair and whispering to himself. His dark eyes danced with the candles' lights as he called to mind the key mnemonics that would help him remember the many verses of this epic poem.

The first part of it, which he sang out in a strong, mellow voice, told of the great crusade to liberate the Lightstone from Morjin at the end of the Age of Law. I listened to this history that I knew too well. Yashku sang of the alliance between Mesh, Ishka, Anjo and Kaash, and how these four kingdoms had sent armies across the Gray Prairies to join the Alonian army in assaulting Morjin's fortress of Argattha.

He recounted the heroics and evil deeds of the Battle of Tarshid. There, against the Law of the One, King Dumakan of Alonia had used a red gelstei against Morjin's armies. But Morjin used the Lightstone to turn the firestones against the Alliance.

Some of the firestones had exploded, destroying much of the Alonian army. Morjin had then turned his own firestones on the Valan armies, almost completely annihilating them. The survivors he had crucified along the road leading to Argattha.

Then he and his priests had drunk the blood of their pierced hands in a great victory rite which heralded the coming of the Age of the Dragon. Yashku's words cut like swords into my heart:

A thousand men were bound in chains

Along the road where terror reigns,

And one by one were laid on wood

Where once Valari knights had stood.

In breaking of their flesh and bones,