The Forever Knight: A Novel of the Bronze Knight (Books of the Bronze Knight) (29 page)

The glow from the painting vanished, and all was darkness again. Diriel’s cries echoed down the cave and then were gone, disappearing like the man who’d made them. He wasn’t dead, though. He was just in the realm of the dead. I suppose he still had his soul, and that irked me. A man like that . . . it seemed so unfair.

I
took my time leaving the tomb. For awhile I stared at the place where the portal had been, wondering at the kind of world Diriel would find there. It seemed perfect for a cruel lunatic like him. I had, in fact, kept my promise to him. I had given him what he wanted: his monster. Let Gahoreth deal with him, I figured. This world,
my
world, was better off without him.

In the last two days I had killed more men than I could count. Their blood crusted my fingernails. But I still had one more execution to carry out. I lingered by the dead portal a few moments more, then sauntered out of the chamber and through the corridors of the tomb without the aid of my fire stick. I didn’t suppose that Wrestler had run off. In some ways he was as insane as Diriel and still thought he could best me. When at last I emerged from the cave, Wrestler was waiting for me, standing in the river, stripped to the waist. He had removed his sword as well, tossing it to the riverbank where his horse waited. The three legionnaires lay dead in the mud.

At first I thought Wrestler had killed them. He was completely unbothered by their corpses, stretching his enormous back and contorting his arms into impossible shapes as he prepared for our fight. He paused as he saw me come out of the cave, and didn’t seem surprised I was alone.

“You killed him,” sighed Wrestler. “I knew it the moment these clods dropped dead. Diriel was a fool to trust you.”

“No, I didn’t,” I said. “Your master got what he wanted. The monster took him to hell.” I stepped out to the bank of the river, spying the dead legionnaires. If they had died when Diriel left, maybe the other legionnaires did, too. That was part of the plan I hadn’t counted on, but it thrilled me. Isowon was safe, then. “You should have run,” I told Wrestler. “I would have found you eventually, but as least you’d have had a chance.”

Wrestler threaded his fingers together, raised his hands over his bald head, and stretched his body until his spine popped. He bent almost all the way backwards, then stood upright again, grabbed his right leg, and touched his ankle to his chin. I had never seen anything like it.

“Do you know how hard it is for me to find an opponent worth fighting? Maybe you’ll be it this time. You certainly weren’t last time.” He gestured to my sword. “Will you be a man and toss that away?”

I thought of taking his head off with a stroke. He knew I could have, but knew I wouldn’t. I undid the Sword of Angels from my waist and laid it down in the mud of the river bank. I expected Malator to scream at me, to chide my foolishness, but he didn’t. Instead he whispered vengeance in my ear.

Make him suffer.

I pulled off my boots and lay them by my sword. I had wrestled like this as a boy, half-naked and brutal, just to prove myself. It felt oddly familiar when my bare feet hit the mud. I strode out into the river, charged with Malator’s power. Wrestler seemed to be growing by the moment. His giant chest swelled out as he stretched, his ropey arms flexing. The veins in his head pulsed and turned his face scarlet.

“Something went wrong in this part of the world,” I lamented as I watched him. “Butchers for kings, freaks for subjects. I won’t miss this place at all.”

Wrestler stopped stretching and made his stance, bending his knees to pounce. “She said her name was Lisea,” he taunted. “Have you ever been with so young a girl?”

Why, I wondered, had she told him that? Had she remembered her name when he was raping her? But there was nothing he could say to goad me. “She was better than this world,” I replied. “She’s in a better place. Not where you’re going, by the way.”

I saw no remorse in him at all. “You loved her.”

“I loved her,” I admitted. “But with humanity. You’re an animal, Wrestler.”

We’d both crawled out of slums, I realized. Wrestler became a beast. I became . . . whatever I was. I didn’t move, waiting for him to come. When he did he came flying. His big body left the ground, his arms out and reaching, spanning the yards between us like a stallion. His speed shocked me, and though I spun to avoid him he hooked me somehow with his fingers, grabbing my ankle as he crashed to the ground and twisted me off my feet. My face hit the rocks; I felt a sudden pain as he wrenched my leg upward. Just as he’d done in Arad, he wrapped himself around me like tentacles, forcing me into his hold.

I barely resisted.

His legs wrapped around my chest and squeezed. The air seeped from my lungs. I closed my eyes and summoned the strength of Malator, concentrating only on my pinned right arm. Wrestler put all his might into crushing me. I felt my bones constrict under his assault. I could smell his sweat as it dripped on me. Slowly, bit by bit, I tugged my arm out of his hold. He cursed as he felt me slipping away, tried to flip me onto my back. That one fatal move loosened his grip. Out came my arm, my fingers like arrows shooting into his skull, bursting one of his eyes. Wrestler screamed, letting go of me and spinning away, but now I was the hunter. I snaked my arm around his neck, used my other arm for leverage, and dragged him backward. He fell against me, choking, gurgling, his legs flailing and his eye socket sluicing blood.

“Wait, wait,” I whispered in his ear. “Don’t die yet.”

His iron fingers worked to wedge themselves under my hold. I tightened just enough to threaten him. Saliva dripped from his mouth, but his screams were nearly silent, more like a screech.

“Now you know what it’s like to be helpless,” I said, wrenching him back each time he struggled. “Now you know what it’s like to be a little girl, afraid, with no one around to help you!”

He cursed and kicked but couldn’t free himself. I delighted in his antics. Like a cruel child I wanted to torture him, to make him suffer as Cricket had suffered, but I knew there was no bringing her back. There was only this brutal kind of justice.

“Good-bye, Wrestler,” I sneered. “Let’s see how you do with a broken neck.”

I jerked back, flexed my arm, and snapped him like a toy, twisting his head around as the last breath gurgled from his lips. He died instantly, falling against me, then into the river. I leaned back and watched the water wash through his ruined eye, and I remembered how much losing an eye had hurt. It was so much worse than when my neck broke. I was glad Wrestler had experienced both.

His horse nibbled at the grass by the riverbank. The horses of the three dead legionnaires wandered aimlessly around their corpses. I stood up in the river, and when I did Venger came to me, splashing through the water to reach me. It took a moment for me to realize it was over. I rubbed Venger’s eager nose, my mind strangely blank. With the legionnaires dead, surely Isowon was safe now. There was almost no reason for me to return there.

Almost
no reason. There was still the matter of friendship.

T
he next afternoon, I returned to Sklar Valley.

I rode like a savage onto the bloodied sands, half-naked, my ruined shirt left behind at the tombs. I had even left my bronze armor there. I supposed it could have been repaired again, but I didn’t feel like the “Bronze Knight” any longer. I wasn’t sure who I was now. Without a soul I wasn’t really human. Humans weren’t immortal. Gods were, I supposed, but I certainly wasn’t one of those. Mostly I felt lost, and very, very anxious to go home to Jador.

Finding the valley was simple enough. I merely followed the cloud of buzzards. The roar of battle had fled, but people still moved among the dead in the field. Mostly these were folk from Isowon, men and women who’d come out from the city to look for survivors and start burying the countless dead. A stench had already started rising from the corpses. Buzzards and other beasties pulled at fallen flesh. I rode Venger into the heart of the field, going mostly unnoticed by the soldiers and civilians. At once I saw the bodies of legionnaires scattered in the human wreckage. Like their brothers at the tomb they had collapsed when Diriel left. It was a mystery even Malator couldn’t quite explain—something about his being the one who called them. I reined in Venger over one of the figures, looking into his white face. He’d already been dead, long before yesterday.

“Are you with Diriel in Gahoreth now?” I wondered out loud.

“Lukien!”

I turned at the sound of my name, seeing Kiryk striding up to me through the carnage. He had a huge gash down his face, still unbandaged, and had not even cleaned off his blood-soaked uniform. He looked exhausted, too, barely recognizable. Worse than that, he was all alone. My head swiveled to scan the field, and I did see a handful of Drinmen, but none of the proud trio that always accompanied the young king. Kiryk stopped just in front of my horse, looking up at me in shock, immediately asking the question I knew he would.

“Why’d you leave us?”

I tossed my leg over Venger’s back, dropping down to face him. “I had to. It was the only way. Diriel’s gone, Kiryk.”

“You could have killed him on the battlefield. You could have done it easily.”

“I had other business.” I kicked at the dead legionnaire with my boot. “They fell like dolls. All I had to do was cut the strings.” I glanced around the grim scene. “Lenhart?”

“Dead,” said Kiryk.

“Jaracz?”

“Dead. Sulimer too.”

I hesitated. “Sariyah?”

Kiryk’s face caved with sadness. “He found his son. They’re both dead, Lukien.”

“How?” I asked softly.

Kiryk unbuttoned the top of his uniform and sighed. “Asadel wasn’t a conscript. He’d been given the powder, Lukien. He was one of Diriel’s. When the rest of them fell, so did he. They just kind of dropped where they were standing. And then . . .” He shrugged. “Then it was over. It was just over.” He looked around, still trying to make sense of the horror. “Over.”

We stood like that for awhile, together and alive in a sea of heads and body parts. A good many mercenaries were among the fallen. Zurans, too. I thought of Chuluun, my friend for so brief a time, and how anxious he’d been to fight with me. I still wore the hahlag he’d given me around my neck, only now it was splattered with blood. Where was he in this slaughter, I wondered?

“We buried Sariyah with his son,” said Kiryk. He pointed to the very sand dune where Cern had waited with Venger the day before. Now it was covered with men with shovels, burying the dead who’d been dragged to the berm.

“Not exactly a hero’s grave,” I sighed.

“My men are there too. Better than being food for vermin.”

I nodded at that. So far, I’d been too afraid to ask my final question. “Kiryk,” I said. “I see a whole lot of dead mercenaries.”

“Yes.”

“Did Marilius make it?”

At last, Kiryk cracked a grin. “He did.”

“He did?”

“That’s one lucky man,” said Kiryk. “Lost a hand, though.” He flexed his right hand. “This one. Lost it in the last charge. No more freelancing for him.”

It was an unholy thing to smile in such a place, but I did. Of all the men who’d died here, Marilius had survived. That, at least, was something. I wanted to go to him, to tell him about Diriel and Wrestler and to see his missing hand.

First, though, there were bodies to bury.

*   *   *

Late that night I returned to Anton’s palace with Kiryk. Instead of mercenaries, servants greeted us, hurrying us to Anton’s lush baths and filling us with food and drink. The palace was less grand than I remembered—Anton had given most of his belongings to his mercenaries—yet there remained that sense of wonder to the place, and I let the bare-breasted serving girls pamper me, massaging my shoulders in the bath and feeding me newly plucked grapes. Kiryk dismissed himself quickly after that, anxious to be with his fellow Drinmen and make his way home. He left the very next day.

I remained in the palace for a week. Occasionally I visited Marilius in his sick bed and jibed him about his missing hand. Anton spared no expense for his dear captain’s comfort, of course. Marilius had his own room and his own servants, even a musician who sometimes sang to him while he tried to sleep. The pain of his wounds was excruciating, but it would pass. Not only had he lost his right hand to a legionnaire, but he’d taken a sword to the side of his belly as well. He looked like a real man now, I told him. The father who had so easily disowned him would have been proud.

I healed, too. I spent my time looking at what was left of Anton’s art collection. I swam in his pools and made love to his servant girls. I even sniffed some of his spices. I wanted to forget, but I couldn’t. Cricket was always in the back of my mind, dying over and over again in my arms, and no amount of spice or lovemaking could make her go away.

Anton and I made peace, and I no longer blamed him for all that had happened. The tattoo of Crezil had vanished from his forehead, and he delighted at the story of Diriel’s demise, insisting I tell it to him again and again. He’d lost so many men, but he would rebuild. He still had his spice routes, and he still had his guile. Each day he implored me to stay behind, to be his personal bodyguard or help rebuild his private army, and although Isowon was truly like paradise, I was never tempted by his offer. I had my own home and ached to see it again.

*   *   *

Finally, with Venger beneath me and fresh new clothes on my back, I left Isowon. I pointed us toward Arad, said my good-byes to the city on the sea, and rode for Jador. I had many days of travel ahead of me and no real hurry. Gilwyn and White-Eye’s baby wasn’t due for a while yet, and without Cricket I had no mission for myself. I wore the Sword of Angels, of course, but without my armor didn’t think myself a knight-errant anymore. My time in the Bitter Kingdoms had cured me of that. Now it was back to the boredom of Jador, of hunting rass for sport and lying out in the desert to wonder at the stars.

I passed through all the towns I had passed with Cricket, retracing our steps so I could remember her perfectly. And when I finally reached Arad I went to the spot where Wrestler had broken my neck and where Marilius had saved me. Malator was my soul companion, and I spent long hours speaking to him while I rode. Sometimes he would appear beside me, sometimes only in my brain. We spoke of good things, mostly, and he told me stories about the way his life had been when he was alive. I made my own confessions, too, the secret things that Cricket could never pry out of me. I was happy, or at least mostly contented, but I still had questions for Malator. Too much had gone unsaid.

Two days after leaving Arad, we came to a nameless forest. With a stream and leaves falling into the water, I knew I had found the perfect place to rest and, perhaps, get some answers. I made camp in a tiny clearing, where a hole in the treetops let me see the sky, and built a fire to warm myself as the sun slowly went down. Venger drank from the stream as I ate supper from my saddle bags, and when the first stars appeared I settled down in front of the fire, lay the Sword of Angels in my lap, and called forth my Akari.

“Malator.” I practically whispered his name. “It’s time for answers.”

It is.

He gave no argument, but materialized before me, sitting cross-legged like some shaman in the firelight. This time he didn’t wear his military garb. He dressed himself in simple Akari clothing, like a man at leisure. I looked at him and smiled.

“I did as you asked,” I said. “I have no friends but you. I gave myself to you, and you granted me vengeance. I’m grateful to you, Malator. But now I need to know—will you tell me without riddles? At last, will you please?”

“There are doors, Lukien,” said Malator. “Like the portal Crezil came through. Ways for men to enter other realms as Diriel did. Only he was taken there against his will.”

“Go on,” I said softly.

Malator looked sad. “You think I’ve been harsh with you. But I tried to warn you about Cricket. I told you to go to the Bitter Kingdoms on your own. I wanted you to learn. What did you learn?”

I thought hard over that. “That there are monsters?” I ventured. “Other worlds. I knew that already though. I learned that I have no soul. I learned that I am special, or so you keep telling me. Only that’s the part I don’t understand, Malator. How can all of this been worth it? What did you want to teach me?”

“Not teach you,” he corrected. His eyes shimmered. “Change you. And I have. You are not a simple man any longer, Lukien. You could have gone through that portal to Gahoreth as easily as Diriel, but without Crezil. No other man could have done that. No living man.”

“You confuse me, Malator,” I said. “Why would I want to go to Gahoreth?”

“Because you can,” he said. “Because no other man alive can. Because Gahoreth is a world of the dead, and there are many such worlds. Without a soul, you are a walker between these worlds, Lukien. You can see things no man alive has seen.” He leaned forward. “Even lost loves.”

His words chilled me. I blinked but didn’t speak. I couldn’t bring myself to hope it. “What?”

“Cassandra, Lukien,” said Malator. “You can be together with her, if you wish it. You can find the door to her death place and walk through it and back again. This is not death I speak of. Death would take you out of this world forever. I’m talking about you, alive, as you are now.”

“Cassandra . . .” I spoke the name like a prayer. “If I find the doorway?”

“I can help you, Lukien. Together we will find it. And others too.”

“How?” I asked. “When?”

“The same way we found Gahoreth—by following the clues. When?” Malator shrugged. “Whenever you wish it.”

“This is your gift to me,” I realized. “For all my suffering. A great gift.” I sat back and spied the twinkling stars. “A walker between the worlds,” I sighed. “Yes.”