death's Knight 26

 woke at half eight; thought 'another half an hour.' er... 

 

Chapter 26

 

“Oh, Alethos, be with me, give me courage to face the Trickster,” prayed Kaz, in her heart. As a hero of the cult, her prayers were not blocked by being in another temple, as she counted as a temple herself. She felt her god’s startled acknowledgement of her prayer.

“I do not recognise you, but I know you are one of mine; have courage. You will do what you have to do,” he said.

It was enough.

Kaz straightend still further. She knew what to say. On close inspection, Daze was grotesque, fish-belly white skin, with a scarlet gash of a mouth, and a liver-coloured mark over his forehead, eyelid and onto the cheek on one side.  She knew he could seem fair, but she saw his true visage that day.

“You! You ill-begotten chaos monster!” she cried. “I did not come back far enough to stop you pronouncing the curse that makes my people stunted and weak!  You are an abomination, and one day, one of my kind will kill you!”

Daze stared; then laughed.

“Oho, managed to get sent through time?” he said. “You can’t go back, you know; but perhaps I’ll keep you as a pet, and let you watch the misery of the toróg, and the most helpless of them, your kind.”

“At least I will not survive long in your snare, and can go to the rest of death,” said Kaz.

“You shall not have that comfort!” He flung out an arm and pointed at her. “You, I curse you! I curse you that you shall live forever and desire Death!”

The chime rang in Kaz’s head.

“Is that it? Can I go now?” she thought, silently, at Fate,

“You can go now, dear one,” said Moraia.

Kaz turned, and fled, apparently blindly. Daze laughed.

“Oh, you cannot escape,” he called. “I can close off the ways and trap you.”

Kaz was banking on him letting her run and then toying with her.  The shaft which had lifted her reversed to go down; presumably those who reached the temple were allowed to leave. There were no riddles to get out, but walls started closing in. Stone to sand cantrips gave her time to get through, and finally she was out of the enclosed portion. Kaz jumped, and managed to pull herself up on top of one of the walls; and took a direct path towards the exit, leaping gaps using the acrobatics Alethos had taught her.

“Ooh, my slave is cheating; but you won’t do so well on my thorny hedges!” gloated Daze.

“Into thy hands, Alethos, beloved lord, alive or dead,” prayed Kaz. Her feet were hard from having grown up barefoot; and she had been made, as a punishment, to run on sharp stones, or hot coals, so she could face the pain, running, jumping, and finally, as Daze screamed in anger and frustration, diving off the hedge and head first into the still circling rings. There was a flash, and Kaz landed hard on the blue floor of the sky dome, her feet bloody and sore, half swooning with reaction.

Alethos scooped her up in his arms, and she laid her face against him, and knew no more.

 

oOoOo

 

“Am I alive, or dead?” asked Kaz.

“Alive, sweet one,” said Alethos. “I took you to my sister, and she has treated the poison from those thorns which ripped your feet so cruelly. You are brave, and I salute you.”

“I had to get back to you,” said Kaz. “If I died in our now, it wouldn’t have mattered.”

“But you live, in our now,” said Alethos. “Go back to sleep, little one; Pythas knows, and has told your friends, and he broke out the aged mead he was keeping for a special occasion.”

“Not as sweet as your kisses, though,” said Kaz, snuggling down obediently.

 

oOoOo

 

“Get to Mesolimnos now! Or faster!” Selen screamed into Thea Drex’s sleeping mind, knocking aside the feeble attempts of Zeandine to control the narrative of the heroine’s dreaming. Thea sat up.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Allenna Dren is dead! Of old age! She was cursed by a Sun-Seer, and my daughter has vanished, I consumed an ice spirit to lay with Ombros and make a child of winter to menace Mesolimnos! The only consolation is that they won’t have her as an asset for long as I laid the chaotic feature of rapid ageing on her, so she won’t live more than another seven years at most.”

Thea was long capable of keeping parts of her mind invisible to anyone, even her goddess, and shoved all pity for the child into this closed space, expunging it from her conscious mind.

“Do you need me to find the child?” she asked.

“No, that gambit has vanished; let them kill her if they cannot use her,” said Selen, indifferently. “I need you to find out what has happened, why they are in disarray, why so many of my priests are dead and confused about how this happened. Go, go, go, and report to me!”

“Of course, my goddess,” said Thea.

She rose, and packed hastily, rousing Erlax Sorn.

“My goddess needs me to go to Mesolimnos now,” she said. “It is still dark, so I can travel by going to the moonsphere, below the sky dome, and down to wherever I choose.”

“It is fortunate that you are able to travel like that,” said Erlax Sorn, trying not to sound sarcastic. It was, of course, too much to expect that the cult heroine would remain with the men in their damp misery as the steppe rains continued longer than usual and froze overnight, not that snow would be much better. “Those ships which could be mended should be in Hals Ochuroma with the reinforcements.”

“I need to get a report from the garrison at Mesolimnos before I can issue further orders to the new garrison,” said Thea.

 

oOoOo

 

Kaz’s friends greeted her warmly, her feet fully healed, if a little tender, and she told them all, and Alethos as well, what had happened.

“And you don’t feel as if he has any control from all those riddles?” asked Protasion, anxiously. Kaz snorted.

“Mostly they are just childish,” she said. “The only profound one was more about contemplating the role of Fate.”

“That’s because you have been Fate’s pawn, my love, as well as my knight,” said Alethos. “My mother tells me that you are now free to form your cult as you wish.”

“Of course I’m not,” scoffed Kaz. “It’s an illusion of freedom, but my path is one of a hero of yours, and yet mother of the trógling. She can’t fool me, but it’s nice of her to let me think I earned my freedom. We are none of us truly free of Fate, or time.”

There was the familiar chime.

“She says that she wanted you to have a chance to relax,” said Alethos. “But she is proud of you for your understanding.”

“I’ll relax when we have brought down the Blood Moon,” said Kaz. “And it won’t cure all. I doubt humans will return to a yearly period of fertility, and the Blue Moon may have to adapt to marking time with showing different faces. That’s not part of my remit, however. But I would like to know if we can be together now? She asked Alethos.

“We can now get married and be together,” said Alethos. He kissed her, and her friends cheered.

Kaz kissed him back, enthusiastically.

“Thank goodness, we can now say, ‘Get a room,’ and they can without being bound by Fate to behave,” said Protasion.

Alethos wordlessly, and without stopping kissing Kaz, made a time-honoured gesture with one hand, and Protasion blushed and laughed.

“Oh, now I know I am favoured by my god, when he is able to be as rude to me as any brother-in-law,” he said.

Alethos lifted his head.

“You have let me into your lives, and as such, you are all as kin to me,” he said, seriously. “I love you all dearly as my brothers and sisters, younger brothers and sisters, to be guided and aided, but my dear sword-siblings, aye, and as siblings to Kaz, all my in-laws.”

“Or, according to the Selenites, outlaws,” punned Evgon.

“That, too,” said Alethos. “Harkon, Thyella, Protasion, Lelyn, Evgon, Kuros, Svargia, Rynn, Pythas, and Arana, and more recent members of the family, Polia and Vulk, Phaedros, and Ralthur Kron, my fourteen dear ones.”

“Can you steal people like Thyella and Phaedros?” asked Harkon.

“Of course I can,” said Alethos. “If they are willing to be stolen.”

“I’ve learned more from you and yours than from my father and his,” said Phaedros.

“I’m Harkon’s,” said Thyella.

“In-law,” said Alethos.

“In-law,” said Thyella. “Chionea will be waking  soon; I must go to her.”

 

Pythas officiated at the small, private wedding; and Harkon gave Kaz away. It was a triple wedding; Protasion married Lelyn, and Polia and Vulk regularised their situation to be official. Chionea was not yet mobile, but she was passed around, and cuddled, something she accepted with aplomb. She was not snowing, or icy, and Harkon and Thyella were much relieved.

“You know you will probably be quickly with child?” said Alethos, to Kaz, as they withdrew to his chambers in the underworld.

“And then Iphianira gets her chance at a happy childhood and to grow up,” said Kaz.

“It’s likely to be faster than most,” warned Alethos.

“So long as she feels loved, that’s what is important,” said Kaz.

 

 

“Daze! Do something!” Selen was almost hysterical, and Daze shook her.

“Yes, I felt Death’s satisfaction too, and we agreed any child of his would take time to grow and come into her powers.  There is no curse to be laid upon her when conceived inside her father’s realm, but once she comes out, perhaps before her powers are set, then we can see what we can do,” he soothed his sister. “Pull yourself together! It’s not the end of the world!”

“I have had so many setbacks... my daughter has disappeared, and I cannot feel her anywhere, because she does not love me or worship me. I... one of my most senior priests died before her time, and most of her underlings! I cannot get any straight answers from anyone! I have sent Thea Drex, but she has not yet reported!”

“Sister! Stay calm!” said Daze.

“It’s those wretched tróglings, I swear since they started coming to Mesolimnos, things have gone wrong!” declared Selen. “I wish you had never made them!”

“You laughed at the idea at first,” grumbled Daze. “Besides, I think you over-estimate their chances. They are little and weak, cowardly, and weak in kormajaia too... for the most part.” A near forgotten memory scratched at the back of his head. He ignored it. “Thea Drex will tell you what is going on, and how she means to fix things. It’s only a few mortals lost, and they breed fast. The Ice Child was always expendable.”

“Yes, I suppose so.... I hoped we might maintain the winter into their growing season at least.”

“It’s a setback. We might send the wolves in.”

“Just as they are planting. Yes, that’s a thought to hold in mind.”

 

oOoOo

 

Thea Drex was trying to get straight answers from a near hysterical Thorus Mils.

“Let me get this straight,” she said. “This old Sun-Seer marched through your camp without once being challenged, despite being supposedly blind; cursed ageing on Allenna Dren, disappeared, which time also disappeared our goddess’s daughter, a child appearing to be some four years old, or possibly older, since she has an ageing taint on her, and then the campsite collapsed.”

“Yes,” said Mils. “The collapsing campsite was caused by undermining. Those damned trógling!” he added.

“You feel they are a true threat?” asked Thea.

“When directed by a military genius like Pythas Deathsinger, or Harkon the Barbarian,” said Mils.

“Harkon?” Thea was startled. It seemed as if she should know the name.

“He’s from the Great Depression beyond the northern mountains,” said Mils. “He has a reputation for raiding our slave pens and releasing slaves.”

“I see,” said Thea. “It isn’t a very common name.”

Mils shrugged.

“It might be a common name for the barbarians,” he said. “Who cares?”

“True,” said Thea. “Fine; you can pack up camp. I’ll have a replacement garrison ready in two weeks. They can’t move as fast as I can; unless you have a priest capable... oh, chaos take it, I’ll consecrate a chapel in a tent, and then I can bring the advance guard through the temple.”

“Thank you,” said Thorus Mils. “We all need some rest and recreation.”

“You won’t get any,” said Thea. “You’re on a charge for losing half your army, most of your officers, and didn’t you send word that the enemy wandered into your camp, released a prisoner, and kidnapped Lazar Kron, as well?”

Thorus Mils went white.

His career was over and he would be lucky to avoid being sent to the mines.

By the time Thea had set up a temple, he had fallen on his own sword.