Fall of Light (The Kharkanas Trilogy 2)

At the mention of Hunn Raal’s name, Urusander’s expression twisted. ‘He is censured, I assure you, captain. This war against the Deniers is an absurd dissembling of our cause. It has done more harm than good. The man does not comprehend justice, nor even propriety, it seems.’ He half turned, to gaze southward again, and set a hand to his face, but cautiously, as if uncertain what his touch would find. ‘What is it, Sharenas, which you must speak? And why this hesitation?’

‘In a moment, sir, if you will forgive me. Since I last departed here, there have been changes.’

He shot her a look. ‘You doubt your footing?’

You fool. I doubt yours. ‘The High Priestess holds to a lofty station now. Is it Hunn Raal who sits cupped in her hand? What of Captain Serap? Sir, I must know – who advises you on affairs of the state?’

Urusander scowled. ‘I have accepted the responsibility for my legion,’ he said, his voice trembling with suppressed emotion – if not anger, then, perhaps, it was shame. ‘I will reassert the justice of our cause.’ He paused, and then said, ‘Captain, I am offered no advice, nor do I ask it. It may be that this may change, since now you have returned. But the others, they come to me inside clouds of confusion, and leave me bemused, and then made to feel foolish for being so blind.’

‘They tell you nothing?’

‘The pending wedding is all they will speak of. As if that was for them to decide upon!’

Ah, you see their contempt, then. Is this how it is, now? Righteous fury lost on the horizon, amidst white winds. And here before me, Vatha Urusander, the greying wolf with its fangs pulled. ‘Sir, what you might call marriage, they name machination. In a joining of hands, as you might see it, they grasp for leverage. Not a union of love, then. Nor one of respectful regard, you with her, her with you. Rather, they set you both upon the same anvil, and from two blades they would hammer and twist the pair of you into one single weapon.’

‘For them to wield?’

She almost stepped back at the sudden fire in his eyes, a flame of light unnatural in its fierceness. The fangs remain, but still I sense his … helplessness. Was this the mark of Syntara’s blessing? Skin of white and the blinding fires of Liosan … all pointless? Did she curse as well as bless? What reach this newfound power of hers, and was that what Sharenas saw in Hunn Raal? ‘It is my thought, sir, that they would take hold of such a weapon, even knowing the threat of uncertain edges, a sliding grip, an unexpected unbalancing, and swing hard, unmindful of innocent victims.’

‘As you say,’ he said sharply, ‘an uncertain weapon, no matter what they might desire, or expect. To think that we are seen this way, a Legion commander and a goddess. As mere tools for their ambitions. I will speak to her!’

He meant Mother Dark, she presumed. ‘They must line the steps of that path first, and so they urge you to remain here. Sir, was it truly your desire to … do nothing?’

‘And yield trust to any messenger? Were you, captain, not enough?’

‘Day by day, sir, my reiteration of your avowed loyalty, in the name of peace, rang more and ever more hollow.’ Pray that stings you, Urusander. Words scud like clouds over the blood-soaked landscape. High and noble they might be, but their shadows prove weak.

He squinted southward for a time, and then seemed to deflate. ‘I am filled with promises,’ he said. ‘None worth the weight of the breath that utters them.’

The wealth of light, it seemed, invited extremity. There would indeed be little balance left to this newly forged weapon. In sudden clarity, she saw the marriage, this union that would bring peace upon the realm. A bloody peace. Light and Dark will war, one against the other. I see the spitting out of children, a family brood both venal and vicious. A marriage of two bedrooms, two keeps, two worlds. ‘Commander Toras Redone’s grief, sir, is for the soldiers of the Hust Legion, almost all of whom are now dead.’

The face he swung to her was such a cascade of expressions that she could make no sense of it. ‘That cannot be. Have the Forulkan returned? Does the war begin again? I’ll not yield this time! I will pursue them down to the very sea, and see the crest ride red for years upon that cursed shore!’

She blinked. ‘No. The Forulkan have not come. They renew no war. Did their own queen not acknowledge the justice of their defeat? Lord Urusander, you broke them, and they shall not return.’

‘Then what has befallen the Hust?’

‘Treachery,’ she replied, once more searching his face, and once more baffled by what she saw. A warlord in search of an enemy. But surely, this is the season for it, as the chambers you pace grow smaller and smaller still. ‘They were poisoned,’ she said. ‘In a single night, following a gift of wine and ale. A gift, sir, from Captain Hunn Raal.’

When he said nothing, when he but stared at her, his face like cracked ice, Sharenas looked away – almost desperately. ‘This is why,’ she said, ‘they speak only of the wedding.’

Urusander finally spoke, his tone viciously cold. ‘How does the First Son give answer? Does he now march upon us?’

‘With what?’ Sharenas snapped. ‘The Houseblades of the nobles? None are summoned to Kharkanas. Lord Anomander is not even there. Instead, he searches for Andarist. Lord Silchas commands in his place, and seeks to restore the Hust Legion.’

‘But – how?’

‘He raids the mining pits, sir.’

Urusander raised a hand between them, as if to push her away. She fell silent. With her words she had battered at him, wielding them as would a madwoman. No shield thrown up against them survived their relentless frenzy. She thought she saw in him, now, at last, signs of shock. But balance is not a game. Have I pushed too far, even when I spoke nothing but the truth? Is this, perhaps, the reason for keeping Urusander ignorant?

‘They think me a puppet,’ Urusander said. ‘I was told that Ilgast Rend defied every effort at conciliation. He threw away the lives of the Wardens, and killed many of my own soldiers. Was it courage or cowardice that he chose to die in battle?’ He waved a hand. ‘When Calat Hustain learns of this, of what Rend did with his people … ah, even I do not know how I would survive that. Such betrayal, and by a nobleborn …’ His voice trailed away. He stared south again. ‘It is curious, is it not, how the horrors climb the walls of our righteous indignation? Up and out, spilling over the battlements with howls, in a night of lit torches and wind-whipped flames. I see their grim forms, spreading out, and out, over Kurald Galain. Hunn Raal? May the spirits forgive me, but it was my hands that shaped him. My blessed, poisoned portrait.’

‘Sir, it is not enough to harden yourself to such atrocities.’

‘You misjudge me, Sharenas,’ Urusander replied. ‘It seems that you have forgotten the campaigns against the Forulkan and the Jhelarkan. No battle shall be unveiled until it is already won. I must think like a commander. Again, after all this time. Gift me with your patience, and consider my words a promise.’

Sharenas shook her head. ‘The time for patience has passed, sir. Your camp is in need of cleansing.’