Fall of Light (The Kharkanas Trilogy 2)

She had abandoned the horses, stripping them of saddle, bridle and bit, knowing that the animals would find habitation when the needs for food and shelter overwhelmed whatever elation attended their sudden freedom. It was in the nature of domesticated beasts to welcome the company of their masters, or so she had always believed. Generation upon generation of dependency could transform familiarity into need.

And so it may be for us Tiste as well. I have known too much solitude of late. And yet, when I found myself among my own kind, what did I do? How often are we compelled to destroy what we need, as if driven towards misery as a stream finds a sea?

Dismayed by her thoughts, she set out, plunging deeper into the forest. She had passed through burned-out camps, walked among bones still bearing remnants of gristle. She had found, beneath a thin tatter of blanket, the corpse of an orphaned child.

Outrage was a powerful emotion, but all too often it drowned in helplessness, and all its flailing amounted to little. Still, Sharenas found she could feed upon it, when need arose to demand from her the necessary violence. Such virtues remained hollow, however, when she found herself simply fighting for her own survival.

Kagamandra, where are you now? Why do I long to feel your arms around me, hard as bent branches, with loss written in your every caress? As if you offer nothing more than winter’s embrace, while my own season wallows in indecision. Still I hunger for you.

I know I cannot have you. No point in imagining impossible scenarios. Your path is plain, and holds still to its honour. By that alone we are driven apart. I must and will ever remain a stranger to your destiny, and you cannot but answer mine in kind

.

Sound carried in this forest. She was not alone, and the shouts in the distance were harsh, eager and deliberate. They would herd her now, drive her to some place of their choosing, where her fate would stumble into their hands – within the reach of their weapons. Already they had refused her way southward. For the moment, however, her hunters were mere scouts, and the advantage remained hers. They were too few in number, and the cordon they sought to impose could be broken through, particularly behind her, back towards the open eastlands.

But the scouts represented the leading elements. Half a company of regular Legion soldiers might well have already set out from Neret Sorr, under the command of a lieutenant, if not a captain. The scouts were intended to harry and force her to keep moving. The regulars were there to take her down. She would find no safety to the east.

Kagamandra, see what I have done. See where it has taken me. I have begun my own war against Urusander’s Legion. Will I find allies among the Legion’s enemies? I cannot say. Why would they welcome a betrayer, a murderer, into their camp? How fragile this banner of righteous retribution, and dare I raise it before me to defend what I have done?

She worked her way westward, keeping to the deer trails, praying for the snowfall to thicken. But the sky slumbered still, and the flakes drifted down like the unmindful shedding of remnant dreams. I know. You frown at this mention of outrage – you know enough to distrust it, in yourself, in others. Is that disapproval in your eyes? Dispense with this hunger for judgement. When you are married, it will ill suit you, inviting as it does rightful retort.

I will keep you here, for the company. Stay silent. This is the season you wear best, Kagamandra.

She caught the snap of branches ahead and to her right. Drawing her sword, she hunched down and continued forward, her moccasins making little sound upon the snow-softened trail.

The woman had sought a place of hiding, perhaps intending ambush, but the skein of dogwood she had crawled into was more dead than alive, partially caught by the past season’s fire. Twigs that should have bent broke instead. Even so, if Sharenas had not been relatively near by, and had the timing been otherwise, she might well have stumbled into the trap.

Instead, she approached the crouching scout from a flank, keeping what she could between her and the woman, until one footfall made a thin creaking sound. As the scout turned, Sharenas was already rushing forward, thrusting her sword through the lattice of twigs and branches.

With a faint squeal, the woman lunged back, seeking to avoid the thrust. But the branches behind her caught her motion, bowed, and then propelled her forward again, and the sword’s point punched into her chest.

The tip sliced through wool, and then leather and skin, but rebounded off the scout’s sternum. The blow was enough to knock the woman off her feet, and she flailed in the thicket as she fell.

Sharenas advanced, slashing against the outside of the woman’s right thigh, cutting flesh down to the bone. Blood sprayed and the scout screamed.

Now they will converge in earnest. Sharenas shifted her sword’s angle and chopped down again. This blow severed a major artery in the woman’s right leg, and cut deep enough to nearly sever the limb, although the thigh bone remained in place to grip the meat. Yanking her blade free, she met the frightened, shocked eyes of the young woman, and then, shaking blood from her sword, retreated into the forest once more.

I should have killed her – but her death is assured, too much and too quick her loss of blood. Still, she might have strength remaining to point her friends after me.

Oh, Sharenas, think it through! My tracks are now plain enough!

Behind her, voices converged, and the forest awakened to discordant sounds, and once again Sharenas fled the loss of control, cursing the place in which she found herself. I succumb to the criminal’s mind, stumble from one wrong to the next, and the stupidities mount higher. This fool’s legacy is now mine.

Swearing under her breath, she quickened her pace.

* * *

‘Nothing must impugn the glory of the faith,’ Syntara told the scholar who now sat at the desk. ‘Father Light has revealed his worthiness by the reluctance he displays. He speaks only for his soldiers, his followers, and thinks naught of himself. This is the proper manner of both a god and a king.’

Sagander’s hand, gripping the stylus, was yet to move from where it hovered over the parchment. His eyes were in the habit of watering profusely in this preternatural light, and often he would reach down as if to adjust or knead the leg that was not there. On occasion, she had heard the words hidden by his muttering, as he spoke to demons of pain, begging an end to their torment. At times, she believed he prayed to those demons. The man’s usefulness, she considered as she studied him from her chair upon the dais, might well be coming to an end.

‘Do my instructions confuse you?’

Scowling, Sagander half turned away. ‘She mocked the very thing you would now have me do. This is the flaw among our people against which I have battled for most of my life. The lowborn must not be raised above their capacity.’ He shot her a dark glance. ‘Urusander’s common soldiers. Even the officers. They all seek to uproot rightful order—’

Syntara felt a smirk come to her lips. ‘You elected the wrong side, scholar. Reveal such thoughts unwisely and your head will roll.’

‘Draconus is the enemy, High Priestess!’