Chapter 4
The siege of Mesolimnos was an open joke. Sobus Aren had spies at the nearest tavern, where mercantile parties stopped, and thereafter, disappeared. Only to reappear, with different goods several days later. Aren gave orders to stop merchants before they reached the tavern; and the tavern was abandoned, and another built a little further out. He could not afford the men to police the whole road.
Apateonas, Guildmaster of the Temple of Merkedes in Mesolimnos, was grateful for the aid and advice of the Alethosi; who knew those dour fellows had a sense of humour lurking beneath their grim exteriors! It was a hero-path for his own cult to keep trade smooth, and Merkedes could always be bargained with by his glyph-ranks. Moreover, he had the aid of Hraazaz, heroine of Rogaz but also worshipping the toróg aspect of Merkedes, via the Merkedean heroine, Zhodax, the high toróg who had brought trading to the toróg as an alternative to internecine tribal warfare.
By the simple expedient of setting up a temple to Merkedes in the barn of an inn, Apateonas was able to take the hero path from one temple to another, and lead the merchant trains through, as long as their horses, mules and donkeys were blindfolded, as they found the journey unsettling otherwise. One reason Thea Drex had let the light cavalry proceed at their own pace; their horses balked. The heavy cavalry horses were bred for size and stamina but were stupid enough to go where ridden.
Thus, merchant trains streamed happily into the besieged city and out again, as if there was no siege at all; and that was not counting those who came by water. Aren ordered a boom built.
Lightning burst the boom asunder.
Thyella had her own worshippers in addition to her husband, and her Fulminatrix, as her chief priestess was known, was more than capable of calling down lightning, especially to copper targets laid overnight by trógling.
“This is ridiculous,” said Sobus Aren, to Arialla Larth, high priestess of Selen for the troops. “We cannot sustain a circle about the city; our reinforcements have failed to arrive, and we cannot ask the divine heroine anything as she is still shut in her tent, and no spells nor wardbreaking can break through. I almost lost my hand trying to cut my way in, and it was like striking iron!”
Neither the commander of the Selenite troops, nor the priestess, had any idea that Thea Drex was no longer in her tent. Arialla had tried praying to Selen, but Selen was refusing to answer, as she could not find her heroine, whom she had last sensed dying. And then her presence disappeared as if Thea was in another temple. Selen had looked for her in the place of souls, where Alethos was obliged to sort souls by their godly affiliation. And Alethos had shrugged, and said that Thea Drex, nor Sjurgi Gordsdottir, as she was born, had not passed through the place of souls at all; and he could not lie.
Selen had to assume that her heroine was now apostate; and it was fruitless to send spirits of retribution, as someone of Thea’s ability would make short work of them. Hence, she ignored Thea, and refused to speak of her to any priestess. Naturally, Arialla knew nothing of this.
“The heroine is on a spirit quest,” she lied to Sobus Aren, unwilling to admit that she did not know what had happened.
“What for? How does that aid us?” demanded Sobus Aren, irritably.
“The ways of the goddess and her quests are not for mortals to query,” said Arialla, primly. “There is only one Thea Drex, and she might be needed in other parts of the empire.”
“I think she’s a fraud,” said Sobus. “She’s only a woman, after all.”
“I am also a woman,” said Arialla, tartly.
Sobus smiled a patronising smile.
“And a lovely one, too, but still, only a woman, and I don’t see that there is any reason for you to be on the field of battle. OW!”
Arialla was getting sick of this misogyny, and Sobus had a fine crop of boils in some very tender places.
“Consider how that makes you feel about wearing armour and how it might affect your fighting, dear Sobus,” said Arialla, sweetly. “And you come close to heresy; our goddess is, after all, female, and you aren’t about to say that she is feeble, are you?”
Sobus Aren looked down his nose.
“I know you use the so-called gods to keep the commons in order, because you have learned to channel more potent magic than most people, but we’re both adults and nobles, but low enough down the social pecking order to laugh at well-connected pieces of totty playing at being soldiers and calling themselves heroines. We don’t have to pretend between ourselves that the gods exist, or if they do, that they have anything to do with mortals. I’ve done my lip-service to Thanus to get on, and achieved the rituals to use iron, but frankly, I prefer to rely on my own abilities.”
Arialla could only stare at him in disbelief.
“You can’t be serious,” she said. “When you worship, surely you experience the presence of Thanus?”
Sobus scoffed.
“I feel light-headed and have the drugged dreams the priests make sure we all have to make us think it’s a supernatural experience. If there was a powerful supernatural being, it could hardly visit all our temples, could it?”
“You fool! We are transported to the god-plane and all temples come together! How do you think Thea Drex was able to move the army forward through the temples of Selen?”
Sobus shrugged.
“Some kind of magical portal. What does it matter? I’m not about to go telling people that it’s all a trick, am I?”
“You’re unbelievable!” gasped Arialla, and went off to pray for guidance.
Not that Selen was in a particularly guiding state of mind, and Arialla was told to ignore him whilst he was useful, and kill him when he had outlived his usefulness.
In her comfortable cell, Thea felt the withdrawal of the goddess she had trusted, like the snapping of something within her, and she wept. It reaffirmed her desire to return to being Sjurgi. Her brothers had searched for her, Torval had died in the search for her, and being told that her family abandoned her had been a lie. And she had been tricked into worship! Sjurgi Gordsdottir swore she would join her brother and bring down the lies of the Selenite empire.
She looked up eagerly when the door opened, and her disappointment was palpable when it was not Harkon.
“I’m sorry, Harkon is busy, and I miss him too,” said the beautiful pale-haired woman. “I’m his wife; my name’s Thyella.”
“The same name as the goddess of lightning, the celestial virgin? But.... I feel your power and it is more than a hero. Surely you cannot....” Sjurgi tailed off.
“As our dear friend, Kaz said, ‘not any more,’ with regards to being the celestial virgin. Harkon has freed me from being tied to a stereotype, so I may hope to survive the gods’ war,” Thyella added more soberly. “Yes, I am that Thyella; your brother is a hero of Alethos, and I was fortunate to win his regard. That makes us sisters.”
“I am in a temple opposed to Selen, I know that; Harkon said I can pray to Alethos, but how then are you here?”
“Alethos has sort of adopted me as another sister because Phrodine thinks it wildly romantic, and because Harkon is a favourite of his. Now I confess I’m hoping you will like to be an associate hero of mine, as well as joining Alethos, because it would be fun to have a sister other than my rather hidebound sister, Zephyra.”
“This is all going past to fast for me,” said Sjurgi. “I... I am coming to terms with feeling the bonds to Selen snap, and with finding that most of my life has been a lie.”
Thyella hugged her.
“Come and meet everyone,” she said. “We’re an odd bunch but it works.”
An hour later, Sjurgi was reeling from meeting people, convinced she would never remember their names, but feeling welcomed in a way she never had been in the worship of Selen, where all that counted was how much you outranked others, socially or within the cult, and the idea of trógling – she must remember the correct pronunciation – being equal to humans, and the acceptance of what they called wolfingas, Lycoids, sometimes called werewolves, who had had the taint of chaos removed to change form at will, overwhelmed her. What struck her was how very young some of them were, and yet how much power they radiated. And yet, there was no backbiting, or barbed compliments; they teased each other in a good-natured sort of way. They were almost like children... no, she corrected herself, they were carefree.
She had a small child thrust into her arms.
“This is Chionea; Harkon and I adopted her. She’s my brother’s child,” said Thyella. Sjurgi held the child carefully, and gasped.
“She is the child of frost and wind; Selen’s child using the powers taken from a spirit of ice,” she said.
“And she will grow up as a child, not as a tool,” said Thyella.
“You are testing me, to see if I attempt to take her to regain Selen’s graces,” said Sjurgi.
“No; I am trusting you with her,” said Thyella. “I wouldn’t risk our daughter on a test.”
Sjurgi wept again, and found herself touched, patted, stroked, licked – by wolves – and surrounded in sympathy which she had never known. The sturdy, curly-haired young man who had been cuddling the visibly pregnant trógling, came over to her.
“Will you renounce Thanus and accept me in his stead?” he asked.
She looked into his eyes.
“Alethos?” she gasped. “The Daykaz is to be the child of a trógling?”
“No, the Daykas is my beloved,” said Alethos.
“The prophecy said, ‘When Death seeks love, beware of the goddess who will grow from it.’” said Sjurgi.
“She has grown from it to be mother goddess of the trógling,” said Alethos. “Kaz saved your life, you know; she conjectured that you had shut out air as well as everything else when you retired to your tent.”
“I am in your debt, er, Kaz,” said Sjurgi.
“We have no debt inside our extended and self-chosen family,” said Kaz. “Harkon has been as an elder brother to me, and anything I could do to restore to him his long-lost sister, lost beyond hope, I must do. Until there you were.”
“There were tricks within poetry. You do not know the Trickster....”
“I have faced him to close the temporal loop,” said Kaz. “He had to gain the idea of both making trógling, and then cursing me personally to live forever and desire Death. So, here I am, cursed to immortality, with my dear husband.”
Sjurgi gasped
“What?”
“Yes, I was terrified when the old woman from the eastern lands first spoke the prophecy, but I have discovered that Fate can be kindly,” said Kaz. “Now, do accept him quickly, so that when Thanus sends his half-arsed spirits of retribution you can be ready for them in the knowledge of his love.”
Sjurgi handed off the chuckling Chionea to someone, and knelt before Alethos.
“Your eyes, mighty god, are kindly, and true, not like the coldness of Thanus,” said Sjurgi. “He trained me to make me mighty for Selen, but I hated him as I worshiped him.”
“Then, when you are settled, my dear brother’s sister, you shall have the right to wipe him out and take back what he stole from me,” said Alethos, raising her to give her the commander’s kiss on the forehead. “Aye, Harkon is as a brother to me, and this happy band here are my family.”
“With you, it does not feel a paradox that death is not cold,” said Sjurgi.
“I am stern, and I expect my people to put duty first; but death comes with love for those who go onwards at life’s end,” said Alethos. “And if Thanus trained you, I’m handing you over to Protasion to get you up to speed, because Thanus still teaches the old forms and responses instead of training people how to fight. Here, we call the old forms ‘posturing idiocy’ and we had to bring Pollonis’s son up to speed as well.”
“Alas, ’tis true,” said Phaedros. “What?” he had an elbow in the ribs from Rynn.
“You went all archaeic again there for a moment,” said Rynn.
“Sorry,” said Phaedros. “Mistress Sjurgi, you will learn a lot from Protasion; I did. He has been taught the old forms, so he will understand what you are doing, and he will educate you whilst he beats you black and blue.”
“Nobody has ever beaten me at swordplay in years,” scoffed Sjurgi.
“Rynn, show her,” said Alethos.
“Me? Am I good enough?” said Rynn, taken aback.
“I’m not risking my child by having Kaz do it, but you are her adjutant,” said Alethos. “You are worthy of the iron that you earned.”
Rynn stalked forward, catching the practice sword someone threw her. Sjurgi was taken by surprise and did not catch the sword thrown at her.
“I will try not to hurt you,” she said, to Rynn.
Rynn looked at her stance, and chuckled.
“I won’t,” she said.
Sjurgi assumed the start posture of ‘prepares descent from heaven’ and as Alethos signalled a start, moved into ‘wind from the skies reaps the wheat.’ She was shocked that Rynn just used a small circular parry to brush her sword aside, and came out of the parry into a thrust which touched and bruised her rib cage. Sjurgi gave a startled cry; that would have been a significant wound.
Sjurgi was good enough to land some blows on Rynn, especially as she learned her way round the new way of fighting, but she received many more back.
“Enough!” she cried. “I am more than convinced! How is it that the Selenite empire has done so well?”
“Lancers and combined arms,” said Alethos. “We need to combine with the plainsmen. We have wolf riders for light cavalry, but they are best as night troops. There is no point competing with your heavy cavalry directly, as we do not have the horses, so we shall have to come up with a way to break the charge.”
“I do not think there is a way to break the charge, save with terrain,” said Sjurgi.
“But some of us also give service to Zog, lord of rocks and soil,” said Lelyn. “Who owes us greatly for rescuing Mycota from Tor, and helping them flee together. And he listens to his associate priests and teaches us how to change the nature of terrain.”
“And my people can toss lightning bolts to frighten the horses,” said Thyella. “And my uncle’s people have learned that if they surround someone with spearmen, all spears pointing outwards, the horses will not approach a hedge of spears if there is no flank to attack. They have used it to evacuate wounded fellows. A lay member invented it to rescue their officer, and I believe he is now expected to rise high, despite having no noble family.”
“He saved a cousin of mine, and my cousin has been known to listen to me on taking on new ideas,” said Protasion. “Innovation and new ideas will win against the might of the Selenite army”
“Teach me,” said Sjurgi.
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