Lords of Rainbow (66 page)

Elasirr froze.

“
Take my horse, my lord,” urged Marihke. “You will be able to see better!” As he spoke, Marihke barely glanced at Elasand standing next to Elasirr, as though there was nothing unusual about the sight of Lord Vaeste alive and in perfect health, only minutes after he had been lying dead on the ground.

In that same instant, a few steps away,
something
had faded completely. A shadow of a shadow.

And then, nothing.

No memory of it in the minds of all, except for Elasirr and Ranhé. Apparently they were also the only ones aware that Elasand was now
someone else
.

“
Look at the strange
colors
coming from him!” exclaimed Nilmet, pointing to the figure in the distance. “His form seems to be on fire with light!”

Oddly, he did not appear to notice the other wonder right here in front of him, the strange auric
color
surrounding Lord Vaeste.
Indeed
, thought Ranhé,
how brightly
white
he burns!

“
I don’t understand,” whispered Elasirr, and glanced at Elasand in shock. “Is it your doing,
Andelas
?”

In Elasand’s face, the alien eyes appeared to smile.

“
No,” said the god. “This is strictly your doing. You set this in motion.”

“
Set what in motion? When I broke the glass on that casket, nothing happened! I stood and called him, and howled at his grave! And he lay there, cold and dead!”

But Elasand-
Andelas
was now silent, and observed Elasirr out of pale alien eyes.

Elasirr frowned, wiping sweat from his cold brow, and stood holding a sword that Ranhé had handed him. Fortunately, no enemy soldiers seemed to be moving at him; the Bilhaar and the Masters of the Guild had effectively surrounded him in a circle of safety.

And thus, Elasirr allowed the implication of the new possibilities to come over him all at once, like a psychic avalanche, daze him, stifle him. For indeed, their world was once again turning upside down within the span of minutes.

Ranhé briefly glanced at the one who was now Elasand, at his bright aura (she could not bear to gaze long at him, but not because of the light). She stepped back, lowering her bloodstained sword, while a hundred different feelings rushed through her, underneath her impassive surface.

The cries of wonder rose to shut out all sounds of battle in the square. The Qurthe were falling back toward the center that was
Dirvan
. They rallied round several of their captains—those faceless fierce warriors wearing crested helmets. And yet there was no leader to direct them, despite their terrifying superiority.

No leader, only a memory of a shadow. . . .

And soon, no memory at all.

H
e rode the pale animal they had given him, stiff-backed because of the weight of the ceremonial black armor that had been meant for a dead man’s burial, not a living relic’s triumphant advent.

His thoughts, still muddled. Or maybe it was the constant overpowering optical illusion of encroaching blindness, or intense claustrophobic perception of dark and light, black and monochromatic gray. No matter where he cast his gaze—even when he glanced up through this cream-thick fog in the air at the strange pale weak mockery of a sun—all he could see was this singular storm-hued landscape of unrelieved gradations of day to night.

No, this monochromatic sepulcher of universal twilight was not his world.

The men, mindless with awe and a kind of worshipful fear, had taken him to a secret place in
Dirvan
—yes, he still knew
Dirvan
, recognized it for what it was, the heart of the City. Although what surprised him for a moment, made him pause with dizzy consideration of reality, was the number of bridges overhanging the old Arata Canal. In his time there had been only two, to the north and south, to minimize traffic through the Royal Outer Gardens, and for a greater degree of security. Or so he’d been told by his advisors—he, who was a well-loved young King. In his time, there was a wider line of ceremonial distance drawn between the Royal House and Aristocracy, and the rest of the City multitudes.

In his time.

And what in all gods’ name was this?
When
was this? How many decades had passed? How many hundreds of years? Millennia? For, a world cannot change its fundamental nature to such an extent, in less than some time period off the human scale, a stretch of existence unimaginable. . . . Or, so he thought.

Somewhere in their secret hiding place, which led below ground into a strange network of catacombs, he was greeted by a group of startled people, armed and ready for combat, who looked at him with awed dilated eyes filled with almost childish emotion. There, he had his first taste of water in centuries, in a small cup that a young woman had carried up to him with trembling fingers.

The water had tasted cool and bland. A dash of hueless silver in a translucent glass. Somehow it reminded him with a pang of his former life.

“
Are you at war?” he had asked them in a hoarse stiff voice of an ancient (and they wondered at his archaic speech and dialect). “Who is the Enemy of this City?” And then, with a shy pause, added, “And who rules the City now in my place, who is your present King?”

They looked at each other, expressions unreadable, faces dim in the underground twilight. “We have no King,” they said (and he wondered at the strange unfamiliarity of some of their words and pronunciation). “You were the last one we’ve had. There is a Regent of the Grelias, but he has gone somewhere, having been taken by the Enemy, and thus lost to us.”

“
The Enemy,” he repeated, looking intensely into their faces. “Who is it?”

But the silence in their eyes was peculiar. And then, after a long pause someone said, “Your Sovereign Grace—we do not know. . . .”

At which he frowned, drawing together his fine pale brows in emotion for the first time since awakening to this gray nightmare. And for the first time, he winced in pain (again, that cancer eating at his insides).

“
If you do not know the nature of your Enemy,” he spoke then softly, “why do you fight at all?”

“
We don’t remember. . . .”

And then Alliran Monteyn, seeing only integrity and confusion in their faces, asked another question that he finally dared voice.

“
Why is it,” he said, lifting his gloved hand up to examine it momentarily in comparison, a hand upon which danced a constant multi-hued field of static, “why is it that all I see around me is a gray world? And yet, I know I am not mad, nor am I blind, for there is a glimmer around me of light, of
color
. Can you also see it? Why has happened to the world? Where is the fullness of
color?
”

“
Color?
You mean, this?” said a man, and suddenly a ball of
orange
light came to hang at eye level before him, out of the thin air.

Alliran Monteyn stared at it, at the floating ghost of the sun before him in shocked silence, never having seen anything like it, nor imagined such a disembodied essence of light.

“
No . . .” he replied, “Never like this. This is wrong. . . .”

“
You mean, Your Sovereign Grace,
color
like the miraculous dancing light that surrounds you?”

“
I do not know . . . What is it that you see around me?”

And then he knew it. “You fight because of this, do you not?” he said loudly then. “You fight because you know that you lack this truth, this essence? Take me to the battle, then! I must see it for myself, see this Enemy, and do what must be done!”

And they obeyed without question, with awe, for the first time in all their lives, for they once again had a fingerhold upon that ancient essence, a small first glimmer.

They had again a King.

T
he harsh guttural battle cries of the Qurthe, the shrieks of the Bilhaar, the sound of cold iron beating against steel, the moans of the wounded, the hiss of breath out of dying lungs—the sound was one sound, one unique manifold sound of war. And it suddenly eroded into quiet. Then, silence stood at the scene of battle, except for the occasional helpless groans of those already dying.

The Qurthe war machine halted, and the City resistance forces too. A universal pause, and like waves upon a thunderous ocean they parted ranks before a figure of brightness.

Elasirr stood with a transfigured gaze, watching the approach of a man in dull antique armor, as dark as that of the Qurthe, riding atop a pale gray mare. And yet, the outlines of his form were as bright as all the
colors
ever seen, all dancing around him in eddies of light, a field of fine static.

He wore no helmet, and the weak sun shone down upon his long abundant hair, pale and metallic, and much like Elasirr’s own luxurious mane.

His face was young. Now that it was animated with life, and no longer a wax effigy, the face was that of a youth, quite a bit younger than the Guildmaster, and in his early prime.

And yet the face contained a paradox. Youth and antiquity. Wizened knowledge and a stamp of innocence. The ages had played a trick upon him, imprinting time itself in the shadows below his eyes, in the deep gaze. While at the same time, youth broke through to continue its journey that had been oddly interrupted for centuries.

And light had also marked him with the essence of a bygone age. It stood around him, the endless ceaseless living flicker of glory, the mother-of-pearl meandering energy, wrought of
color
and sharpness.

It was the soul, the essence of the world.

A bit of the Rainbow.

And he, the ancient King, had brought it back with him, into this newer place of dull silver shadows, a world with a weak gray sun.

Elasirr took a step toward him. But there were no words in him, nothing to utter, in the face of wonder.

But the one who had been Elasand came forward, past the stricken blond man, and his own outlines were sharp with a fine glimmer of utter brightness that was
white
.

He stretched his hand in welcome, saying “Come!” to the King on the pale mare.

And suddenly, all could see him, the one that was now Elasand, all recognized his brightness. For, the veil of apathy had come off, and they could now glance several degrees deeper into the fabric of the world.

A swell of voices, a shuddering breath of the crowd. People looked upon the two bright ones. Those of the Qurthe soldiers who were nearest, blinked, drawing hands to their faces to lift the visors off their dull metal helmets. They too stared, ebony foreign eyes out of swarthy-skinned human faces.

“
Come!”
Andelas
said again, and he walked to meet the King. “You are here, and thus, I am here also.” And saying that, he took the bridle of the mare, stopping it, and gazed up at Alliran Monteyn, with warm brilliant
white
eyes.

The King met the gaze of a man who had come before him from the parted crowd, who was
different
somehow, alien and yet familiar. And now, this man was before him, was stretching his hand toward him, and involuntarily—the King could not help it—his own hand, clad in dull ancient armor and gloved in chain-link, came forward.

The King leaned down from his saddle (while blood began to sing in him, and a dull rushing of a faraway river, a crystal stream flowed in his temples). And then he put his hand forward, and took the outstretched palm of the stranger.

The world convulsed.

No, it was simply a bolt of electricity rushing through him—through them both. An involuntary moan came from the King’s lips—or was it the
other’s
lips, or maybe, from the lips of everyone present.

Rushing . . . The world, rushing, spinning into one complete thing . . . connection . . . two circuits of energy joining, reestablishing the once broken link
.

All is right now . . .

All, as it should be
.

“
Who are you?” said Alliran Monteyn, still holding the hand of the stranger, then releasing it unwillingly, straightening again in his saddle.

But the other only smiled. Raven-dark hair framed a pale beautiful alien face.

And then the King felt the sudden change within himself.

A lightness. . . .

The touch had healed him. For, there was no longer the dull pain, not a trace of cancerous malady within him. As though it had never existed.

“
You know who I am now,” softly replied the stranger with the raven hair.

“
Yes!” uttered the King. “You are the Lord of the Rainbow!”

“
And you are the King whose time is now!”

A roar of the crowd.

“
It is time!” cried
Andelas
, stepping back from the King, stepping away from all. His figure, sharp with the outline of light, began to grow brighter suddenly, and the aura around him extended several feet beyond. It glared, incandescent, eclipsing the sun overhead—it, poor sun, had been long forgotten by all—and it illuminated faces of soldiers, simple and ordinary, and yet different today.