A Rule of Queens (Book #13 in the Sorcerer's Ring) (10 page)

Thor sat in the small vessel with his Legion
brothers, as the man in the cloak and hood silently rowed them across the
phosphorus waters, the only sound that of the dripping water echoing off the
cave walls. Down below, Thor watched the murky waters change colors, from a
glowing green to an aqua blue, and saw something swirling beneath the surface,
he was not sure what, teeming as if it were alive with creatures. Before them,
the air swirled with mist, scarlet, thick, drifting in and out. With each
gentle splash of the water, their boat glided deeper and deeper into the cave,
toward the blackness on the other side. Thor felt a finality with each row, felt
as if he were entering another realm, never to turn back. As long as Guwayne
was up ahead, he would venture anywhere.

Thor could feel the anxiety and tension amongst
all his brothers, all of them silent, one hand clutching the edge of the boat,
the other on their weapons. They had ventured to the ends of the earth
together, but never into a realm like this. He could sense their fear. They
could battle anything—but could they battle death?

The rowing finally stopped, and their boat continued
to glide, all of them silent, until it came to a stop on the far shore with a
gentle bump. Thor looked out and saw a small strip of black rock, perhaps twenty
feet wide, and beyond that, a narrow footbridge, leading across a great divide,
inside of which swirled the mist, even thicker here.

Thor turned and looked at the man, who kept his
head down, his cloak covering his face. Thor could not see his face, and
wondered what sort of creature lurked behind it.

“The path to death lies before you,” the man
said, his voice dark, ancient. “Cross the Canyon of Blood, and if you dare to
enter, knock three times on the Gates of Death. They will open for you—once. And
they will never open for you again.”

Thor felt a sense of apprehension, all of his
friends looking to him, all pale. He knew it was now or never.

Thor took the step off the vessel and onto the
black rock, and his friends followed.

The boat pushed off, the riverkeeper returning
from where he’d come, and as he did, he called out for the last time: “If you pass
through those gates, beware: our sense of time here is not as yours. A few
steps can last many moons.”

With that, the man rowed one last time, and
disappeared into the blackness.

Thor and his brothers exchanged a worried look.

Thor looked out and could see a footbridge in
the mist. It  looked precarious, a narrow bridge of rotting wooden planks, leading
across a great abyss, perhaps fifty feet. All around it hung a swirling red
mist, reflecting some light source far below. Thor did not want to know what
lay at the bottom.

Conven stepped forward to go first, but Thor held
out a hand.

“You are brave,” Thorgrin said, “but I will go
first. The bridge might give. And if it does, I shall go down alone.”

“I do not fear death,” Conven said, looking at
him with hollowed eyes.

“Nor do I,” Thor said, meaning it.

Conven nodded, seeing the seriousness on Thor’s
face, and as the others watched, Thor took the first step onto the narrow
footbridge, only a few feet wide, with no handrails. It would be a balancing
act.

Thor hesitated, as he could feel the wood
wobbling beneath his feet. He took another step, then another, trying to keep
his eyes fixed before him, and not on the drop below.

He felt the wood shake and he knew that, one by
one, his Legion brothers were following behind him.

As he crossed the bridge, the hairs rose on
Thor’s neck as he began to hear the awful sound of planks cracking.

He turned and saw that the last person, O’Connor,
was walking quickly, and with every step he took, the planks, one at a time, fell
behind him, hurling down into the abyss. With each step they took more planks
fell. It was a one-way bridge, a bridge that would never appear again. Somehow,
the bridge magically stayed stable, and they were continue to cross, each step
erasing another plank forever.

Thor knew there was no turning back. Ever.

Thor stepped onto the black rock on the far
side of the canyon, and he looked up to see himself standing before a massive arched
entrance, carved out of black rock: the entrance rose a hundred feet high, and
it was blocked by huge gates, the largest iron gates Thor had ever seen,
putting even the other ones to shame.

Before it stood two creatures, trolls, perhaps,
twice the size of Thor, wearing black hoods and cloaks, scowling back, their
faces disfigured. Each held a long, scarlet trident, with black shafts and
short silver spikes, pointing straight up to the sky.

Thor looked up and saw the iron knocker, as
large as he, in the center of the gates, and he knew what he had to do.

He stepped forward and grabbed the knocker.

The trolls stood there silently, staring out,
as if Thor and his brothers were not even there.

With all his might, Thor pulled on the knocker.
As he struggled, his brothers rushed forward and grabbed it, helping him.
Together, with all their might, they all managed to pull it back, this knocker
on the gates of death.

Finally, they could pull it back no longer, and
they all let go and sent it flying forward. It crashed into the metal, and the
reverberation nearly knocked them all off their feet.

They all did it again.

And again.

The ground trembled beneath them, Thor’s ears
ringing with the noise, his hands shaking from the vibration. But he had
knocked three times, as instructed, and now all he had to do was wait.

Slowly, there came a tremendous groaning noise,
and the massive gates began to open inward, a few inches at a time, until finally,
they opened the entire way.

Thor saw, lying before them, a massive cave lit
by sporadic torches, filled with the sound of a million screeching bats. The
entrance to the land of death. A threshold beyond which he could never return.

Thinking only of Guwayne, Thor took a fateful step
forward, across the threshold.

Then another.

He stood inside, and beside him, his brothers appeared,
one by one, until he heard a great groan and the massive doors slowly,
definitively, slammed shut behind them.

As it echoed and echoed, and as he looked
before him at the endless tunnel leading into the earth, he knew he would never
return to the land of the living again.

Alistair stood beside Erec, holding his hand,
the two of them standing on the highest plateau of the Southern Isles, looking
out together at the dazzling vista, at the morning sun spreading out over the
isles. Alistair was elated to have Erec back, on the road to healing, and to be
standing by his side again. Erec was finally like his old self, clutching her
hand with the strength of the warrior she once knew.

As Alistair stood there, greeting another day
with him, all the chaos and bloodshed behind them, she felt her own life being restored
to her again, and felt so grateful to God for answering her prayers.

The two of them stood there, looking out, and as
Alistair surveyed the landscape of her new home, this home she had already come
to love, she could already see all the rebuilding taking place, up and down the
isles. Like she and Erec, this entire nation was picking up the pieces, getting
ready to rebuild, to start again. In the distance, Alistair could hear the
soft, soothing noise of distant chisels, hammering away, rebuilding.

“The hammers and chisels never cease,” Erec
said, “and yet there remains much to do.”

The land was in ruins, destroyed from the civil
war. But with the men finally united again under Erec’s rule, there was now a
joy, a purpose in the air, and they all set about rebuilding with alacrity, as
one. Houses were already beginning to rise again, as bodies were dragged from
the streets, buried in the hills, and bells were tolled to commemorate the
losses. Alistair could hear them even now, distant, ringing from one village to
the next.

It was a peaceful air, a calm after the storm.

“You saved my life,” Erec said. “Don’t think I
don’t know that. It is a very sacred thing. Our lives are bound. Mine to yours,
and yours to mine. Until the day I die, I shall owe you.”

Alistair smiled and squeezed his hand.

“You are back to life,” she replied. “That’s payment
enough.”

He draped an arm around her shoulder and Alistair
leaned into him. She looked out, overwhelmed with the beauty of this place, the
sun shining off of everything, the beauty of her future before her. She and Erec
would wed soon. They would have a child. She would rule this magnificent place
with him.

Her dreams were finally coming true. It was
time to start again.

ONE MOON LATER

Gwen, slumped against the wall of the cave near
its entrance, heard the exotic birds tweeting, and she opened her eyes to look
out at the breaking dawn of yet another day here in the Empire. She had been
awake most of the night, unable to sleep yet again, staring most of the night
into the flames of a dying fire, beset with grief. Another day on this earth
without Thorgrin. Without Guwayne.

Gwen looked out on yet another day here in this
Empire, the arid landscape desert landscape spread out below, and she could hardly
believe an entire moon had passed. And still no sign of Thorgrin, of Guwayne. Each
day she had woken up expecting them to arrive here, knowing with all her heart
that they would. After all, how could they not? Thorgrin was her husband. Guwayne
her child. There was no way they could stay away from her for long. It was all
just one long nightmare waiting to be over.

And yet each day she had awoken, and they had
never arrived, and no news had arrived. Now that an entire moon cycle had
passed, the reality of it was starting to sink in. Gwen was finally beginning
to realize that they might not ever come back to her.

The realization made her feel crushed, hollowed
out, lower than she’d ever had in her life. Perhaps that seer had been right:
perhaps Thorgrin had truly gone into the land of the dead. And perhaps her baby
would never return.

Gwen had tried desperately to rouse Argon
during the past moon cycle, and the few times that she had, he had spoken weakly,
barely conscious, and had been unable to give her any insight into their
whereabouts. It all felt increasingly foreboding to her.

Gwen had sat inside this cave day after day,
depressed, frozen with immobility, with indecision. She was a Queen, she knew, but
now she found herself unable to make choices even for the smallest things. Each
day, Kendrick and Aberthol and Steffen and Godfrey had come to her with the myriad
of small things her people in exile needed—and she been unable to make even the
smallest decision. She was a Queen, she knew, frozen by grief. Frozen in
depression.

Gwendolyn looked around and saw her people lying
about, scattered by the embers, most asleep, and the few who were awake, staring
hopelessly into the flames. Most had wine sacks in their hands, empty from
another long night of drinking. She could see in their eyes what they were thinking.
They were thinking of home. Of the Ring. Possibly of family and friends lost or
killed along the way. They were thinking of how much they had given up, how
much they had lost. Of how they were all living like moles here, hiding, wasting
away in this cave, not really living at all.

Gwen knew it was better than the alternative:
being captured by the Empire and taken as slaves. At least they were alive, and
safe.

Gwen kicked the embers with her boot and
watched the sparks. She could not imagine her life had come to this. It seemed
like only yesterday she was in King’s Court, in the most beautiful castle, in the
most abundant landscape, preparing for her wedding with her most devoted
husband. Holding her baby. Everything had been perfect in the universe, and she
hadn’t appreciated it. Everything had seemed indestructible.

Now here she was, stripped of her husband and
her son, night after night staring into flames in a lost land.

Gwen snapped out of it as she heard a sudden scream,
the sound of a woman crying out, followed by hurried footsteps coming from deep
inside the massive cave. Gwen turned and peered into the cave, and there suddenly
appeared, in the predawn light, a girl, perhaps Gwen’s age, stumbling toward
her, half dressed, her shirt torn. She had a frantic look in her eye, and she
was weeping as she ran toward Gwen and threw herself down at her feet,
clutching her ankles in hysterics.

“My lady!” she cried out. “Please, you must do
something! You must help me!”

Gwendolyn stared at her, pulled from her
reverie, wondering what could have put the girl in such a state.

The girl sobbed, and Gwen placed a reassuring
hand on her shoulder.

“Tell me what happened,” she said, her voice
compassionate, queenly. It carried a strength she had not heard in a while.
Caring for someone else made her forget her own troubles.

“I was accosted, my lady!” the girl yelled. “He
came upon me in the cave. In the black of night. While I was sleeping. He
attacked me!”

She wept.

“Justice must be done!” she cried out. “Whether
we are in the Ring or not, justice must be done!”

She sobbed at Gwen’s feet, and Kendrick,
Godfrey, Brandt, Atme, Aberthol, and several others roused, coming over, their
boots crunching on the gravel.

Gwendolyn looked down at the girl and raised
her to her feet and hugged her, her heart breaking. Gwen could not help but
feel that somehow this was all her fault. Her people had become too restless
here in this cave, with nothing to do but sit here day after day in the
blackness, drinking. Order was beginning to fall apart, chaos was beginning to
rule. Gwendolyn hated herself for this girl’s suffering.

“His name?” Gwen demanded. “What was his name?”
she asked, remembering her own attack at the hand of McCloud and feeling a new
indignation rising within her.

“It was Baylor, my lady,” she said.

Baylor. The name struck a nerve in Gwendolyn. Baylor
was one of the survivors of the Ring, a minor captain in one of the King’s
guards, who had survived, unfortunately, with the others here in exile. He had
been a rabble-rouser from the start, constantly expressing dissatisfaction with
the Queen’s rule, perpetually drunk and instigating others. She should have
known trouble was coming from him.

Gwendolyn held the girl’s face in her palm, and
made her look in the eyes.

“I promise you justice shall be done. Do you
hear me? Justice shall be yours.”

The girl finally began to calm, nodding through
her tears.

Gwendolyn looked over to see Kendrick nodding
back at her in understanding. On her other side stood Godfrey, drunk, wobbly,
but standing there by her side in solidarity.

There came from the far side of the cave a
sudden shuffling of feet, followed by a low, chaotic murmur, and Gwendolyn
stood with the others and peered into the blackness of the cave, dimly lit by
sporadic fires. The shuffling grew louder, and finally she spotted Baylor
marching toward her, leading an unruly mob of men. He was clearly drunk,
slovenly, unshaven, a portly man in his fifties, with a wild beard, a balding
head, and scowling eyes.

He didn’t concern Gwendolyn; what concerned her
were the hundreds of men marching behind men, all with a wild, cooped-up look
to their faces.

“Nor shall we stand it one more day!” Baylor
yelled out, and there came a cheer behind him. They all marched threateningly
toward the entrance of the cave, toward Gwendolyn, and as they did, all around
Gwendolyn her circle loyal to her got to their feet, including Brandt and Atme,
and stood by her side.

Gwen stood her ground, blocking them, knowing
she could not allow them to leave. Baylor came to a stop ten feet away from her,
glaring back at her.

Gwendolyn looked over to see Kendrick, Steffen,
and the others by her side, and took comfort in their presence. At her feet,
she looked down and saw Krohn standing beside her, hairs standing on end as he
faced the mob.

“Out of my way, girl!” Baylor yelled to
Gwendolyn.

Gwendolyn merely shook her head, standing in
place, not about to give in.

Krohn snarled back at the man, and the man
looked down, nervous.

“And where do you plan to go with these men?”
she asked.

“We plan to go outside, into daylight, to live
as free men, not as refugees hiding in a cave!”

There rose up another great cheer behind him,
and Gwen realized she was facing a full-fledged revolt. She realized she had allowed
herself to be out of it for too long, to drown in her own sorrows, and she had
not been perceptive enough of all that had been going on around her. She had
allowed her people to become restless for far too long—and for a queen,
restlessness was a very dangerous thing.

Gwen blamed herself. This last moon cycle, as
they’d recovered, there had been day after day of her indecision, of lack of
direction.

“And then where would you go?” Gwen asked
calmly.

“Anywhere but here!”

Another cheer.

“We will not live as captives or as slaves!”
came another shout, followed by a cheer.

“We will go out and buy ships, and sail back
home!” Baylor yelled, to another cheer.

Gwendolyn shook her head, realizing how
misguided they were.

“If you leave this cave in daylight,” she said,
“not only will you all get spotted and killed, but you will get all of us
killed, too. Even if by some miracle you reached the shore and bought a ship,
you would get killed before you even set sail. You would never make it out of
the harbor.”

“It beats rotting to death in here!” Baylor
yelled.

The crowd cheered.

Baylor stepped forward, but Gwen sidestepped
and blocked his path.

“I am sorry,” she said, “but you are not
leaving this cave.” She raised her voice, and for the first time in weeks,
assumed a Queenly tone: “None of you are.”

Kendrick, Steffen, Brandt, Atme, and Godfrey all
drew their swords beside her, and a tense silence fell over the group.

“I am not going to tell you to get out of my
way again, woman,” Baylor seethed, scowling at Gwendolyn.

“You will do as the Queen commands,” Kendrick
said, stepping forward, “whatever that command should be.”

“She has not commanded us a thing!” Baylor
boomed out. “She sits here, frozen, day after day, while we all rot!”

There came a cheer.

“She is no Queen to us anymore!” Baylor
continued.

Another cheer.

“
You
should have been King, like your
father!” Baylor yelled to Kendrick. “But you stepped aside and let a girl take
it for you. It’s too late for you now. I’m leading this group—and I’m telling
you to get out of our way, or we’ll kill you, too!”

There arose yet another cheer, and Baylor began
to step forward, reaching out to shove Gwen out of the way.

Krohn snarled, and Gwen could see him about to
lunge forward and bite the man.

But first Gwendolyn reacted; she wanted to kill
the man herself.

Gwen reached over, turned her wrist, grabbed the
long sword from Kendrick’s second scabbard, and drew it. In the same motion,
she stepped forward and held the tip to Baylor’s throat.

The cave fell deathly silent as they stood
there, Gwen holding the tip to Baylor’s throat, he looking down at it, nervous.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Gwendolyn said
firmly.

The cave was as tense as it had ever been, as
Gwen felt all eyes looking to her.

“You are not going anywhere,” she added, “because
I am your Queen and I command it. Those are
my
people that you are trying
to lead. They are
mine
to command, not yours. You will not step outside
this cave. You will not go anywhere before answering for your crimes.”

“What crimes?” Baylor yelled.

“You’ve attacked this girl,” Gwen said, nodding
toward the girl still weeping by her feet.

Baylor frowned.

“I shall take anyone I choose,” he said. “I
might even take you. Now lower that sword and get out of my way, girl, or die here
with all your men.”

“Yes, I am a girl,” Gwen said steadily, her
voice steel. “And my father was a King—and his father before him. I come from a
long line of warriors, and I assure you my blood is the same as theirs. You, on
the other hand, are a scoundrel and a rapist. I
will
stop you because I
am
your Queen—and justice will be done by my hand.”

Gwendolyn reached back, and in one quick
motion, she plunged the sword through Baylor’s heart.

His eyes bulged open and suddenly, he dropped
to his knees before her, and fell face first on the ground. As he did, Krohn
pounced on him, snarling, tearing open his throat.

Gwendolyn stood there, holding the bloody sword,
feeling shocked. Yet she also, for the first time in weeks, felt like a Queen
again.

“Anyone who steps past me shall be killed on
the spot. You will stay inside because I command it. Because I am your Queen.”

The mob looked to her, stunned, not knowing
what to do.

Slowly, one by one, they turned and began to
filter their way back into the cave. Gwen stood there, holding the sword out in
front of her. She was trembling inside, but refused to show it.

Steffen, holding his sword, came up beside her.

“I’m glad to see my Queen back, my lady,” he
said.

Gwen looked at them all, all those in her inner
circle—Kendrick, Brandt, Atme, Godfrey, Aberthol, and the rest—and she could
see the new respect in their eyes. And something else: relief.