The Destroyer Book 4 (77 page)

“I have a plan,” I said to my new partner.

They had all cursed me. Malek. Thayer. Alexia. Gorbanni.

Shlara.

They trusted me to lead them against an impossible evil. In the end, I brought them to the cusp of victory and then I betrayed them all.

None of that mattered now.

I floated with the islands.

I danced with the white birds.

I laughed like the water falling into the sky.

And I forgot.

I forgot the pain. I forgot my failures and my guilt. I forgot Kaiyer and Shlara and Iolarathe and everything else that ever mattered to me.

I forgot my daughter.

What is the moon but a reflection of the sun? Each day it hides and forgets the night that has passed. Why should I remember when all it brought me was pain?

“Hi.” It was an old man, skin weathered by years, his face and stomach round and merry.

“Hello,” I said back to him.

“Don’t you have something to do?” He tilted his head and his mouth moved in the other direction.

“No,” I replied.

“Are you sure you are not forgetting?”

“Who are you?” I asked him. He seemed familiar.

“I’m your friend. Do you remember?” he asked. His face was kind and I felt tears come to my eyes.

“I never said goodbye.” My voice choked. The tears were streaming down my cheeks now.

“What you said while I lived means more than what you did not say while I died.”

“I loved Shlara. I killed her, Entas.” The woman screamed in my memories and the white clouds around us darkened.

He nodded his head. “You have been trying to forgive yourself. Was there anything else you were trying to do?”

“I don’t want to do anything but be here with you.”

“What about Iolarathe?” His words hammered into my chest and I gasped.

“Is she here? I never said goodbye to her either.”

“She is here. She wants to see you. But more than that, she wants you to meet your daughter.”

I had a daughter with Iolarathe.

“I need to find our daughter.”

“Yes.” He sighed. “You do not belong here anymore.”

“What about Iolarathe? What about you?”

“We will be okay. We are friends now.”

“I find that hard to believe.” I laughed and felt relief in the brief expression of joy. When was the last time I had laughed?

“It is true. Will you return?”

“How do I return? I don’t remember.”

“You just have to decide that you no longer want to be here.” He rocked his head up and down.

“I do want to be here.”

“More than you want to find your daughter?”

“No.”

“Protect the Ovule. She will be our Savior.”

I tried to speak again, but the world began to fade. Night fell upon the islands. The birds quieted, the sky darkened and the clouds and islands dissipated like evaporating mist. It was familiar. I realized I had been here before. This was not the first time, nor the second or third.

I had been to this strange place thousands of times.

The bright sunlight faded into darkness and I blinked a few times to make sure that my eyes were actually opened. I looked around. Again I found myself on a stone dais, in almost complete darkness. This time, I was alone. I did not know how much time had passed, but I felt refreshed and ready as I rose. I had to find Nadea.

Then the memories hit me like a tail whip from a dragon.

They could not kill me.

I remembered Thayer driving his sword into my chest. I remembered Malek taking my head off with his sword. Gorbanni drove his lance through my chest. Then he cut me in two with his cavalry cleaver. Alexia killed me numerous times with her arrows and her blades.

I would not stay dead.

I heard their curses echo in my mind. I recalled the frustration in their eyes as they fought me. I was a sickness that never left them. I was a hell they could not escape.

And I kept trying to get the Ovule.

I understood, finally, why they had to exile me. I felt the pain I had caused them; the desperation they must have felt. They were forced to send me here, in exile, to keep me from returning. To keep themselves safe. To keep the humans they had fought to free safe from me.

Memories tumbled through my mind with tears too painful to shed. They did not know why I wanted the Ovule, or even what it was or how it worked. Perhaps they feared I would use it to kill more of their people. They were not acting out of simple hate for me, but from fear and love. Love for the world they were building. The world I should have been building with them.

“I am sorry, my friends,” I said to the empty salute of the Radicle beds. I had been more than cruel to those who loved me. I had believed any life was worth sacrificing if it meant I could recover my daughter from the Radicle. I still believed it.

I should have told my friends the truth. I should have confessed my love for Iolarathe, told them of our child. They would have helped me. They would have understood. They would have forgiven me.

The leather satchel lay at my feet. I did not remember how many months it had been since I left it there, but it seemed like lifetimes had passed. There were still many steps left to my journey and the unknown variable of Nadea. Did she know my daughter’s name?

Would she even be willing to help me?

I grabbed the satchel and felt comforted by the weight of the Ovule inside. I slung the straps over my shoulders and then walked down the flights of stairs to the exit of the spire that made up one of the support columns of Castle Nia.

I had forgotten about the wurms before I used the Radicle, but they would not stop me from reaching Nadea or saving my daughter. My armor was gone, as were my familiar mace and shield. I had not even bothered to think of them when I first arrived here. I wondered if I could call them forth again. I would try later. Every moment I tarried here was one more my daughter waited, trapped in the stasis I had once endured.

She had been stuck even longer than I had. My heart ached and I felt my jaw clench and my eyes blink back tears. I did not know the girl’s name, but I knew I loved her beyond anything I had ever loved before. I would not fail her. I would bring her here, hold her in my arms and tell her how much I loved her until the day that I died.

I neither heard nor smelled the putrid wurms, though I felt little reassurance in this. The beasts were powerful and deadly enough to make prey of any man, woman or creature I had ever encountered on this world or any other.

Save a dragon.

I grabbed the ledge above me and I flipped up to the higher platform. Then I jumped across to the bridge system and carefully sneaked to the main pillar with stairs winding around its circumference. I remembered that the stairs led to the dungeons above these vast caverns.

As I climbed the stairs that clung precariously to the sides of the giant pillar I began to consider where the creatures came from, why they were so horrid, and how they acquired sustenance. Perhaps I could return here some day and rid the place of their presence. I might need to do the same at Nadea’s keep. I had killed the remaining lizard monsters on the switchback leading up to the eastern fortress, but that did not mean that there were not more hiding deep in the pits of the mountain.

My heart burned at the thought of meeting my daughter. I wanted this more than I had ever wanted anything in my many lifetimes. More than I had wanted to eradicate the Elvens. I wondered what she looked like, how old she would be, what she would think of me. Had Iolarathe told her of me? Would she be as excited to meet me as I was to meet her, or would she be fearful, or worse, angry that I had not rescued her sooner? That I had not saved her mother? That I had destroyed the Elven people? That I had betrayed the humans? She was both human and Elven; both races had reasons to despise me.

If I had never met Iolarathe, our daughter never would have existed. My life would have been so different. Such a simple choice on her part led to the creation of an entirely new world. A new life of freedom for millions. Death for millions more. She had created everything by loving me. For it had always been her choice, I was a helpless slave against her limitless power. I led the war, but she set me in motion. Without her I never would have felt a rage strong enough to drive me to lead a revolution.

If there was an afterlife as Jessmei described, perhaps Leotol and Kai looked upon me and knew what I had done with the life they had been denied. Leotol would have been proud. He would have fit right into my army, becoming best friends with Malek, falling in love with Alexia’s cool aloofness. He was strong and loyal; he would have been a great general.

Our father was a steadfast, simple man, devoted to his work. He never spoke of freedom or yearned for change. He rose and worked every day as he was required, seemingly satisfied and accepting of his fate. Was that because he truly did not care, or because he did not want to give a hope to his sons that he knew they would never live to see? Yearning for something you can never have is more painful than accepting something you do not truly want.

Did they deem my actions noble and applaud the freedom I had granted our people? Or did they think my crimes were as horrendous and unforgiveable as I knew they were?

It did not matter now. All that mattered was rescuing my daughter.

At the top of the stairs sat the familiar gate that divided this ancient place from the younger dungeon. I had left the rusted iron portal closed, there had been no lock then, but now a shiny new padlock was firmly in place.

The lock broke easily in my hand and I cautiously unhinged the latch. I did my best to go through the gate without causing the rusted hinges to screech in protest. I was partially successful, and while there was a bit of a yelp from the metal, no one in the castle would hear it, unless they expected my arrival.

Of course, it was possible that they were expecting my arrival.

Telaxthe was cunning. I had not been able to surprise her, yet she had continued to surprise me. I believed Turnia had defeated the empress and was shocked when she revealed her plan to overtake the O’Baarni clan leader. It was as if she anticipated all the possible negative outcomes of any situation and planned for them accordingly. I had done the same as the general of my army. It was a wise course of action when facing an enemy intent on destroying you and your entire race.

Telaxthe may have alerted her generals to the possibility that I would escape here, seeking Jessmei and Nadea. They would be heavily guarded.

The dungeons were a simple maze. Corridors formed a horizontal ladder of cells. At the end of each level, a set of spiraling stairs led up to the top floor of the dungeons. There, stairs led out to the castle courtyard. I was in the lowest level. The only light came from the very distant glow of the Radicle beneath me. I doubted any human or Elven could discern the soft violet light, but my eyes were strong and had adjusted to the near darkness enough that I could use the dim light to guide me.

It grew ever more faint as I ascended, so I produced a tiny flame in the palm of my hand. While I walked I listened for any signs of life on this floor or the ones above me. I heard nothing, not even the scurry of rats, and no torches were lit, nor had they been in some time.