Days Of Light And Shadow (61 page)

But even though he doubted there would be a second, he was sure that more would come in time. One of those two evil elves had paid good gold to have him killed, and the chances were that when he found out his man had failed, he’d be angry. But he’d try again.

Iros tried not to let his despondency show as he mentally added another  problem to his list. Missing people, abominations running through the land, endless problems trying to repair a broken land and a broken people, and now assassins.

Every time that he thought he was beginning to make some headway, a new problem beset him. It seemed that the misfortune of Aris was upon him, and there would be no reprieve. Not until Y’aris and Finell were properly dead. Now that would be a day to celebrate.

Chapter Ninety Seven.

The city was dead. The people were dead. So many were dead that the bodies couldn’t even be buried. They had to be burnt. And so huge bonfires had been built, and the bodies of the fallen thrown on them by throngs of mourners.

Those bonfires had burnt for days, they still burnt and the black smoke that rose from them covered the forest for as far as the eye could see. The smell, especially during the cool still mornings, was enough to make a man gag.

And those who had survived, those who wandered the remnants of what had once been a beautiful city, looking for more bodies to burn; they were dead too. Their legs moved but their hearts had stopped long ago. Their thoughts were with their missing loved ones. Their souls were already beginning the journey to be with them.

Some cried. But not many. Not any more. There was only so long that a man could cry before his tears dried up and his body refused to sob. But the pain did not end and the joy did not return. Instead they wandered the streets, their eyes down cast, their souls empty, and did the menial tasks that needed to be done.

Would they recover? Terwyn didn’t know. But with half the city dead, and at least as many abominations cut down with them, it would be a very long time before that could happen. His own family were gone. Their bodies he feared, mixed in among the others.

Though he ached to find them, alive or dead, he could not physically search through tens of thousands of mutilated rotting corpses and the burnt out ruins of so many buildings including his family home, looking for them. It was more than any man could do. And the same was true of so many others. His family might be living or dead. They might have fled to safety in another city or their bodies might be still lying on the ground somewhere, or they might already be ash in the remains of their home. He would never know. None of them would.

So the bodies were picked up and carted away to the roaring bonfires in their scores where a few priests spoke words of blessing on them. Futile words. There would be no blessings in this city.

The smell of death permeated Leafshade. The smell from the dead slowly returning to the soil. The smell from the rest burning when the wind blew the wrong way. The smell of death.

Leafshade was dead. Even if the ten or twenty thousand who survived had had the strength and the desire to rebuild, they didn’t have the will. Already some of the survivors were leaving. Packing up wagons if they had them, and leaving for parts unknown. They were scattering in all directions and he knew that they would not return. In time he thought the city would become an empty ghost. A memory of what had been. No more. And eventually the forest would reclaim it.

Maybe that would be for the best.

Still even in death there were things that needed to be done. Wisdom that needed to be learnt. And he like all the others of Y’aris’ cursed army in the city, had learnt a valuable lesson. Though they had been broken and were beyond hope of ever reclaiming their honour, they still had a purpose.

Terwyn stood before his remaining soldiers, just as broken as they were. They had been broken for a very long time. And the rage that had burnt through them, it hadn’t healed them. Nothing would ever heal them. But for a time it had been glorious. For a brief shining moment, he had been alive again and free from the memory of what they had done.

The same was true for all of them. He could see it in their eyes. A hundred pairs of eyes, all that remained of them, knew that one moment. It was all they knew. It was why he’d called them, and it was why they’d come. 

“My friends.” He began with that because he could no longer call them his soldiers. They were no longer watchmen. He was no longer one. They had disgraced themselves unutterably, and no rank, no title and no status could ever be theirs again. Nor should it be. “My brothers and sisters in arms, we have fought off these abominations. We have saved many. And for that we should be grateful. Grateful, but not proud. That is a joy that none of us will ever know again.” No one cheered or clapped, but no one disagreed either. For the most part they simply stood there in silence, heads bowed, knowing the same terrible pain he did. And the memory of that brief shining moment when glory had been with them again.

“These things, these abominations served the same master we once did. High Commander Y’aris!”  Terwyn spat out the name.

“These abominations were once our brothers and sisters in arms. And in time we would have become them. This you know.” Even if many of the abominations hadn’t been wearing the remains of the uniforms of the watch, they knew it. The elder had told them what would have become of them in time when they’d been freed. And the knowledge had been burned into their very souls by the Mother.

“We no longer stand in the black. We have been spared that misery. But we also do not stand in the light. We cannot stand among our own people. Never again will we be the people of the forests and the skies and the seas. Those days, those dreams, are no longer ours.”

“Instead we stand in shadow. Caught between the light and the dark, and we will never leave it. Thanks to the blessings of the elders, the dark may not take us again. But due to our own failings, we can never return to the Mother. We can never go home. This too, you know.”

“So we stand in the shadow, and we are of the shadow. This is all we are. It is all we will ever be. But it is not all that we may do.”

“For the shadow stands between the light and the dark, but while it needs both to exist, it can only be created by light. We are no longer of the light, but we are still created by it, and we still serve it. Unto our dying breaths, we will serve!”

“That is our calling! It is our command! It is why we breathe. We will serve the light, and we will battle the dark! We will fight and we will die! But we will not surrender. We will not yield. We will not retreat. We will fight and we will die, and maybe in our deaths, though we will not die with honour, then at least our shame may be wiped away. We are the shadow watch!”

As speeches went it wasn’t much. But for the former watchmen it was all they had, and they knew that too. They knew one thing more. They would be called upon again. The Reaver was once more in the world. His servants roamed the lands. And the shadow watch would battle them until the end.

The shadow watchmen might not win. But they would not yield.

Chapter Ninety Eight.

Finell sat on a flat rock in his mountain cave, shivering. He was wrapped up as tight as he could against the cold, but it wasn’t enough. Summer had come and gone and fall had well and truly settled in. That meant long cold nights and frosty mornings, especially in these higher lands to the south, and his clothing was far too thin for the conditions. When he’d set out after Y’aris, tracking him along the southern copper road, he’d never fully considered where that path might lead him.

All he’d truly known was hatred and despair.  His memory rang with the endless laughter of the brigand Anders. Even though he was dead, and though he knew he was dead, Anders’ laughter haunted him like a ghost. He couldn’t stop hearing it. But over the long months he had learnt to live with it. For the laughter echoed his shame and  guilt, and he had every reason to feel them. He was clinging to a tightrope suspended over an abyss of guilt, and he knew that sooner or later he would fall into it and never rise. All he could do was hang on to that rope for as long as he could.

The rope itself was his hatred. The memories came flooding back whenever he let go of his hatred for too long. All those bodies, hundreds if not thousands of them, lining his walk to the Honeysuckle Grove, and all of them dead because of him. All those faces, gathered behind them. The faces of those who grieved for their lost family. The faces of those who blamed him. Who rightfully blamed him. And they were just the beginning. Those were only the ones he had sent or allowed to be sent to the prison. But there was a war to consider as well.

Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands dead because his soldiers, had invaded Irothia.  It didn’t matter that Y’aris had commanded them.  He, Finell bore the ultimate responsibility.

Finell also didn’t understand why Y’aris had wanted the war, but he knew that everything that he’d been told by Y’aris had been a lie. They had attacked Irothia, and he had endorsed that attack because he had believed the humans had murdered his sister. But they were innocents, falsely accused and wrongly attacked. Murdered in his name and by his will.

There were other victims as well. So many of them. People he and Y’aris had destroyed. Poisoned. Murdered.

And then there was his house, his family, his kith and kin. Those he had been obligated to love and support, and those he had betrayed and hurt. His cousin sold into marriage to save his skin. Sophelia had done nothing save tell him the truth and he had been angered by her for it. He had taken pleasure in the suffering he’d caused her. His other cousin, Herodan, sent to the demon prison he had helped build, and for no crime at all. Just more of Y’aris’ lies. And House Vora, gone. He had destroyed his entire house! And because of that every member of his family suffered. Tenir might have been the one to sign the paper, but he was the one who had forced him to.

Finell’s guilt was without end. The memories when they threatened to break through his hatred, tore at his heart and soul. They were a blackness that constantly threatened to overwhelm him. To swallow him whole. And many times he found himself breaking down, crying like a baby, wanting only to slice his wrists open and end the pain.

But he couldn’t do that. He could still live with the memories and the guilt. As long as he had someone to hate. And in Y’aris he had that. What he would have when the black blood was dead he didn’t know. But at least the black blood would be dead. If he didn’t freeze to death first.

The fire Finell set was too small to truly warm him, but it was all he could dare. He’d walled up half the entrance to the cave to hide the direct light from the fire, but still its glow could surely be seen by anyone who cared to look. He dared not wall the entrance any higher, or he’d start choking on the smoke. Fortunately the abominations that patrolled the forests, didn’t look up, they had no curiosity, only hunger, and the priests and soldiers that had made the temple below their home, never left it at night. No doubt they spent their nights in arcane rituals to their poxy god.

Yet it wasn’t truly the cold that bothered him. It was his despair. Having finally found the ruined temple he’d hunted for three long weeks for a way to get in. A way to kill Y’aris and all of the demon’s priests. And for three weeks he’d found nothing.

The abominations were thick on the ground, hunting everyone they could find. Finell couldn’t get near the temple without them spotting him, and several times when he’d tried he’d had to run as fast as his legs could carry him to escape their clutches. He’d barely got away, twice. They had frighteningly good hearing.

As for poisoning his enemies, his favourite weapon was useless against them. The soldiers came and went as they wanted, usually to bring back more prisoners, but never once did they bring back supplies. It seemed they didn’t need to. The temple probably had its own gardens, and the soldiers hunted for whatever else they needed. And as for water, while he was sure they had their own supply somewhere on the temple’s grounds, if they had tanks for rain, he had no idea where they were. Even if he had though, Finell couldn’t have reached them to pour the poison in. The abominations didn’t stop patrolling day or night. And they were eternally beyond the reach of his witchbane since they didn’t drink and the only thing they ate were people. Finell would be on the menu if he was caught.

It hurt, it physically hurt to know that Y’aris was somewhere inside that ancient ruin and that he couldn’t reach him. Y’aris never came out, never showed his face, but in his very core Finell knew that he was there, and that he couldn’t touch him.

He  also guessed that all those young women the soldiers kept bringing in were for him. And there were so many. Every day his watchmen seemed to drag another couple in to the temple while he watched helplessly from his cave. He knew many of the woman who were being brought to his former advisor. At least he recognised the traits of their families at the least. The daughters of high born families.

What he was doing with them Finell didn’t know; perhaps he didn’t want to know. But looking back on the times they had spent together, Finell realised that Y’aris had always hated the high born for some reason. So whatever he was doing to their daughters, he was sure that it was bad. Probably worse than he could even guess.  Regardless, he knew it was Y’aris’ doing that brought them there.

As for the rest, all those other people dragged in by the abominations and the priests leading them, Finell had a fairly good idea what was happening to them. They came in, bound in their hundreds, and the following day he would see a new batch of ravenous abominations leaving the temple, still wearing whatever clothes they had worn when they entered. It didn’t take a sage to understand what had happened.

This then was the source of the abominations. This was the Reaver’s dark home. His temple. The priests were his priests. And so were the inquisitors. Finell recognised their robes as almost identical to those of the priests. He recognised the soldiers as his watchmen too, though he guessed that they had never been loyal to him. So Y’aris was the Reaver’s servant as well, even if he didn’t know it.

He suspected that Y’aris and the Reaver had made a deal, but Finell knew from his childhood history lessons that the Reaver had never made or kept any deal. He just took. Sometimes he lied, but always he took. Even his priests knew that. They knew that they would ultimately be consumed by him. They served him purely to put off that dark day for as long as possible. So even if Y’aris thought he had a deal, he was wrong. The Reaver owned him. It was just a question of when he would take possession. When he was no longer useful to the demon. Surely even Y’aris should have known that. But hatred could blind a man. It had blinded him.

As he stared into the fire and hated Y’aris with every fibre of his being, Finell knew that for the truth. 

Y’aris hated and so he had done terrible things. And like a disease he had passed that hatred on to him, persuading him to his evil. His loved ones had paid the price. His parents had been killed and now he knew why. It had taken time to understand his dark design, but that at least was clear. It had brought him to the throne and in doing so brought Y’aris power. 

His uncle and aunt in Heartwood Grove? Supposedly killed by a rampaging fell ox? Somehow he doubted it. The accident had seemed so unlikely, and to blame a gate left open by a mixed blood was unfair. But their deaths had fuelled his hatred and driven him further into Y’aris’ arms.

And when that wasn’t enough, when he might have finally said no to him, Y’aris had killed his sister to fan that smouldering hatred within him into a raging inferno. After that Finell had agreed to everything his advisor had wanted without question. He had started a war, imprisoned and murdered his own people as he saw enemies everywhere, tortured the innocent, sacrificed his own cousins and ultimately forced a revolution against himself. And he had taken pleasure in the suffering.

It was a bitter truth to accept, and yet it didn’t change anything for Finell. He still hated Y’aris with everything he had. He still yearned to kill him. And he still couldn’t reach him. But it was worse than that. Every day his ability to reach Y’aris lessened. Every day there were more abominations patrolling the forest, and his enemy was better protected while his own position became more precarious.

It wasn’t just him either that was in peril. Everyone was. The priests were striking out further and further as they sought their armies. Striking out in all directions. Extending their reach far beyond the elven realms. Some days it was gnomes that were brought in bound hand and foot. Some days it was humans or trolls. Some days it was even dwarves, though how they managed to attack their mountainous retreats he couldn’t imagine.

He had to go. He had to bring what he knew to the rulers of the realms. He had to tell them where the temple was and how large the army that they were building was. But to do that was to leave his enemy behind. To turn his back on Y’aris and his vengeance.

He couldn’t do that. Though he wanted to, needed to, he simply couldn’t walk away from his hatred. Even though he knew it was his duty, he had refused to do it again and again. For three weeks he had stayed there, hoping against hope to have a chance to strike his enemy down, and putting aside his duty. Now he wasn’t even sure if he could leave to carry a message to the others. The abominations were everywhere. They surrounded him. His hatred may not have just killed him, it may have doomed the world.

For the longest time Finell sat there shivering, staring into the fire and wishing that things were different. Wishing that he was different. And even wishing that he had never been born. That way at least he would never have known such pain. Such terrible guilt and shame. Wishing that he wasn’t going to die having failed yet again. That he would save no one.

“Mother, father, Elwene.” He whispered their names into the fire, knowing that they could not hear him. They were beyond such cares as the mortal world might have. If the elders were right, they were with the Mother and in time they would return with a new name and a new face. If there was a world to return to. But he had always doubted the elders. They had magic for certain, but so did many others who didn’t follow one of the faiths. And in the end what did it matter?

“I’m sorry. I have failed you.” If they had watched from the lap of the Mother then they surely knew that. But he had to admit his failure to someone. Before he died. And one way or another he knew he was going to die. It was then that he finally came to a decision, one far too long in the making. He could die freezing to death in his little cave, burning with hatred, or he could die in the hope of trying to warn someone. He decided to try for hope.

“In the morning I will try to reach the nearest town.” If he could slip past the abominations unnoticed. And if it wasn’t already overrun with them. And if he made it that far and it was overrun he would try the next town, and the next.

“If you could speak to the Mother on my behalf, to guide my path I would be grateful.” It wasn’t much of a prayer but it was all he had. And as the bitter tears of shame and grief rolled down his cheeks he knew that there was little else to even ask for.

The fire crackled a little just then, a small branch not fully dry spat a few sparks his way to land on his leggings, and he jumped up, startled. Then he swiftly started patting down his leggings worried that the tiny little embers might catch them alight. That would be ironic, burnt to death in these freezing lands, and before he could even begin his dangerous journey. Or worse having to begin the journey with no pants. The human’s demon of misfortune would laugh himself silly.

Fortunately no such thing happened and he was quickly able to relax back and stare at the flames. But when he did things weren’t quite as they had been. They weren’t quite normal. There was something wrong with the fire.