Sword Destiny (5 page)

Time itself was suspended. The minutes, hours, days, weeks or months had no meaning. The journey may have taken seconds or centuries. He had no way of knowing. Stardust might have evolved into suns, swollen into fire-gorged monsters, died and shrunk into the infinity of black holes and he would not have been aware of their passing. Peace filled his soul, the ultimate bliss of total belonging. His willpower almost waned in the wonderful understanding of how pure and permanent was the underlying essence of creation. It was almost as though he had only to reach out and take the waiting hand of God. There was a source behind all those images and ideas to whom he had sacrificed and prayed, a single indefinable heart that mortal men would always sense and attempt to define.

Suddenly there was a world below him again, an Earth-like planet of blue oceans wreathed with white cloud, but with a different configuration of continents.

He saw two great land masses, one in the northern and one in the southern hemisphere, both reaching up into the frozen ice caps of the poles. As the details grew larger, the timeless spell was broken and he plunged down toward the southern continent. The astral memories flooded back, the knowledge of a score of past lives. He had lived on Alpha and he had lived on Ghedda. His spirit form was Gheddan now, but he descended over Alpha.

It was night over the City of Singing Spires and it was not to Kananda that he was instinctively drawn, but to Laurya. He had no way of finding his lost prince, but the aura of his eternal lover was a bright shining beacon in his darkness. He found the room where she slept beside her husband, Kyle, and jealousy surged through him again as he saw that although they were both soundly asleep, they still lay together in a close embrace. Laurya's cheek rested on Kyle's chest and her golden hair was spread over his shoulder.

Kaseem hovered above them, unsure how to raise her on to the astral plane of consciousness and suffering a torment of emotional turmoil. There had been a moment of deep spiritual ecstasy when it would not have mattered if he had never arrived here, but now that he had been wrenched back from his astral space flight into the Alphan time flow, all of the old frustrations and conflicts came surging back. His soul had been stretched and twisted like a thing of elastic on the exquisite rack of eternity, and then drowned in an equally intensified joy of well-being, only to be flung back, exhausted, into all the ache and anguish of the near-flesh. It was almost too much, and he felt as though he now tottered on the edge of an unimaginable abyss.

Laurya sensed his presence. Her spirit form separated from her sleeping body and swiftly she rose up to face him. Her eyes were wide and startled and it was another moment before she could recognize him. She caught him before he slid into the pit of his own weakness and held him tight to her breast, instinctively pouring some of her own spirit strength into his faltering soul.

“Kharga, Kaseem? How? Why?” She could not even clarify the questions that collided in her mind and spoke her thoughts aloud.

“I had to come here. So I came.” Kaseem struggled to shape answers to her thoughts. “I don't know how.”

“You made a passage between the worlds? Your physical body is still on Earth?” Laurya did not know whether she could accept that it was possible. “I would not have believed it.”

“My need was great. I made the effort. I did not really believe that it could happen either. Yet I am here. I am with you. We are on Dooma?”

“Yes, unless I am dreaming, or we are both dreaming?” Laurya held him at arm's length and spun him around in an excited dance. “But I do not think we are dreaming. This is too vivid, too sharp, too real. We are together on the astral.” She kissed him, a long, lingering kiss that recalled all their past incarnations together. Then she pulled back and stared at him in renewed wonder. “But the risk you have taken. I have never heard of an astral flight between the planets. You could have been destroyed. Perhaps even now you may not be able to return to your physical body. Why did you take such a terrible risk?”

Kaseem sagged, feeling his spiritual self deflating. “I had to come. These are evil days for Karakhor. Our King is dead. The armies of Maghalla storm our walls. I have to know if the Prince Kananda is alive or dead. I have to know whether Kananda will return.”

“Kananda is not here. He has crossed the Ocean of Storms—to Ghedda to search for his sister Maryam.”

“Maryam!” Kaseem suffered a deep pang of guilt. In his desperate need to find Kananda, he had temporarily forgotten his missing princess. “Is Maryam still alive?”

“This I do not know,” Laurya said helplessly.

“Is Kananda alive?”

“Kananda was alive twelve hours ago. I am sufficiently familiar with Commander Zela's aura to be able to locate her within a given area. With Antar's help, I have been able to keep track of them as they have moved across Ghedda. We saw them last in the forest above the Great Gar Desert. They were heading west toward the upper reaches of the Black Swamp River where they have a skimmer craft hidden and waiting.”

“Can you take me to them?”

“I can.” Laurya looked at him doubtfully. “But can you make another astral journey?”

Kaseem smiled. “I have flown between the worlds. Now, with you beside me, I can do anything.”

Laurya hesitated, but then took his hand. Together they ascended to hover high above the City of Singing Spires. For a moment they lingered, listening to the wind playing soft night music through the crenellations and filigree apertures of the high, needle-pointed towers. The three moons of Dooma sailed at different heights above them, white and pale-gleaming in the starlight. Laurya looked at him again with concern in her eyes, but Kaseem merely smiled and nodded. She gripped his hand more firmly, and then they soared upward and sped due north.

Again Laurya flew high above the vast Ocean of Storms, avoiding the worst of the merciless magnetic hurricanes which always raged across its surface. When they descended again, it was over the continent of Ghedda, at the dark mouth of the Black Swamp River. Without pause, Laurya followed the course of the river north into the heart of the continent.

They found their quarry easily enough, two tiny figures poling a crudely made log raft down from the narrow upper reaches of the river. The two were Kananda and Zela, working the poles on either side of the vine-lashed platform, while Jayna lay exhausted on the deck between them. They were making slow progress against the current, toiling silently except for the laboured gasp and grunting of their breathing. They too were almost spent and had no energy left for idle conversation.

“They have a few more hours of hard work ahead of them,” Laurya said. “But then they should have no difficulty in finding the creek where they left their landing craft. The third moon will be high enough to give them plenty of light. Here, where the river is narrow and the lagoons are shallow, the swamp creatures should not breed big enough to cause them any trouble.”

Kaseem made no immediate answer. He was overjoyed to find his prince alive, mystified to see that Kananda's face was now Gheddan blue, and frustrated by the fact that there was no way of communication between the physical and the spiritual dimensions. They could only watch unseen as Kananda and Zela thrust and pushed at their poles, alternatively struggling to pull them clear again from the clinging mud. Eventually he took notice of the third figure lying on the raft.

“It is not Maryam.” There had been a swift flicker of hope and then the realization was filled with sudden disappointment.

“Her name is Jayna,” Laurya explained. “She was their guide. I do not know what has happened to Maryam.”

They watched, but there was no way that they could intervene to offer any physical aid, and at last Laurya pulled at his arm. “Come, Kaseem. We must return. I must make sure that Antar knows they are on their way. He will have an aircraft waiting at the mouth of the river tomorrow night. After that, I know that the Council intends to send Zela back to Earth. We know that a Gheddan task force is on its way back to your planet. Our early warning systems detected their launch path and we are monitoring their progress. A ship has been made ready to lead a small fleet in pursuit and Antar is only waiting for Zela to take command. She is the natural choice to lead this mission.”

“And Kananda will return also?” Kaseem felt a sudden surge of elation.

“I think I can promise you that. But now, my love, I think that you must make the attempt to return to Earth. We do not know how long you have been absent, or how long your physical body can survive in the separation state without you. If your body dies before your spirit can return, you will be lost.”

Chapter Three

It was the second day of the greatest conflict the world had ever known. The earth trembled as the armies of Maghalla and Karakhor charged at each other, and the battle chariots of the champions again rushed forth to seek out their opposite numbers. Men, elephants and horses all screamed together in fury, in fear and in pain. The sky was dark with soaring flights of javelins and arrows. Weapons and shields crashed in a thunder of flashing steel. The red gore flowed and the fallen were crushed or trampled under the chariot wheels, the flying hooves, the lunging tusks and the great stamping feet of the war elephants. For most men in the horror of it all, there was no room for thought, for quarter or for mercy. Each man fought terrified for his own survival.

The proud banner of the golden hawk flew high above the rest, where Prince Sanjay rode the back of Huthar, the largest elephant in the field, a monstrous black beast with blood-reddened tusks three times the length of a man. The animal's great black ears fanned out on either side of him, like flapping leather shields that slapped away most of the arrows aimed at Sanjay's swaying form. His trunk was raised in a soul-shrinking scream and his hot eyes blazed. Nothing could stand before that terrible charge and the ranks of chariots and men seemed to melt before it. Sanjay aimed for the centre of the battle and stood poised with one of his deadly javelins ready to throw. He was seeking the banner of the black leopard and his target was Sardar.

It was not to be. The black leopard banner flew far behind the intervening ranks of men and chariots as Sardar directed his forces from a safe distance. He knew that, following the death of Kara-Rashna, the wrath of Karakhor would be at its highest level and he was taking no chances.

Even so, Sanjay might have reached him, had not a Maghallan war elephant screamed its challenge. It was another bull, almost as large as Huthar, which suddenly appeared on their right flank. Foot soldiers were pounded into the earth and a chariot was smashed to splinters, its luckless driver hurled high in the air as the second bull charged. Huthar wheeled to meet the attack and both Sanjay and his driver had to cling desperately to their seats and harness to avoid being flung skyward in their turn. The two beasts met in an almighty crash of bone, tusk and muscle.

Huthar's longer tusks won the day, the heavy points ripping into the Maghallan elephant at the chest and shoulder, hooking and turning it aside before its own tusks could reach. The rival bull screamed its death agony, and then the massive steel spike attached to the head harness that protected Huthar's forehead and eyes was ramming into its helpless flank. The Maghallan elephant went down on its knees, pouring blood from its wounds, and its fighting rider and driver were both hurled down into the churning dust.

Sanjay hung on grimly with his one good arm, losing half of his store of javelins as they were spilled out of the rope racks beside him. His driver was catapulted forward, his mouth open in a horrified wail as he sailed spread-eagled over the heads of both elephants to land impaled on the surrounding sea of clashing steel. Huthar backed up and then raised his head in a fearsome, trumpeting blast of triumph. While the elephant steadied, Sanjay rose upright on its broad back, searched again in vain for the black leopard of Sardar, and then began furiously hurling his remaining javelins at every suitable Maghallan target within reach.

 

 

 

The banner of the lion's paw was another that flew recklessly through the heaving mass of fighting men. Prince Devan was also hunting for Sardar, crashing his war chariot through the yielding Maghallan ranks with a hot-blooded thirst for vengeance equal to that of his brother. He slashed his great sword rhythmically from side to side, scarcely aware of the shrieking men who vanished beneath his flying wheels or reeled bleeding from his path. The crush of battle turned his desperate, snorting horses, making them defy his control of the reins so that he too failed to cleave his path all the way through to Sardar. Instead he found another opponent to meet him in gladiatorial combat.

For this day Sardar had allowed his generals, Durga and Kamar, to lead the front ranks of his forces, and it was the black leopard claw banner of Durga which suddenly flew boldly in Devan's path. Durga was a huge warrior in black body armour with a high-plumed black and silver helmet. The battle-axe he carried was already whetted with blood and his bull roar of defiance carried clear above the tumult of the battle. He thrashed his pair of horses and charged his own battle chariot full tilt at Devan, the two horse teams hurtling at each other in a head-on collision course.

The screaming, plunging horse teams were not quite as suicidal as their masters, and at the last second, each team shied to one side, although the chariots crashed heavily in passing. Devan swung his sword in a mighty blow which Durga deflected with his arm shield, although the force of the impact shattered the shield and almost broke his arm. In the same second, Durga's double-bladed axe whistled past Devan's head, crashing down to slice a great splintered bite from the sidewall of his chariot.

They skidded past each other, and then they both hauled on their reins to bring their horses round and back. Again the chariots drew up side by side, the walls touching, and the two men traded massive blows. Without his shield, Durga wielded his battle-axe with both hands, but Devan was faster and the relatively lighter sword kept the Maghallan general on the defensive. Both of them had dropped their reins in order to fight and their horses reared and plunged, tugging the two chariots back and forth. Their wheels had locked, frustrating the efforts of the frantic horses to break free. One of Devan's horses suddenly changed its tactics and hurled itself sideways against its harness. Spokes shattered and sheared. Durga's chariot fell heavily on to one side as one wheel came off and rolled away. Devan's chariot was tipped upward and the prince of Karakhor struggled to maintain his balance. Durga saw his chance as he was flung forward and made one mighty swing with his axe. Devan's chariot tipped over in the same second and he was thrown clear as the axe crashed down. Again a great cascade of splinters flew up from the disintegrating chariot.