BLACKVEIL
“Remember, we are all prey here.”
As one,
Grandmother’s retainers glanced down at the puddle of blood soaking
into the duff of the forest floor. It was all that remained of
Regin.
“Do not step outside
the wards,” Grandmother said, “where I cannot protect
you.”
As if to augment her
words, a bestial cry rang out from the forest. Sarat whimpered, and
the others shifted uneasily.
Grandmother said
some appropriate words in memory of Regin. He’d been a good, strong
porter, always helpful with camp and obedient to her every wish and
devout in the ways of Second Empire. During their break, he had
left them to relieve himself. By necessity, the warding Grandmother
set when they were stopped for a mere break was not great in
circumference. Regin had taken but a couple steps too many past its
protection. They heard his scream, its sharp cutoff, and he was
gone.
Blackveil Forest was
dangerous. Perhaps the most dangerous place on Earth. Grandmother
frequently reminded her people of the forest’s treachery, but Regin
proved that a moment of inattention could be one’s last. A harsh
lesson to them all.
It did not help
anyone’s flagging spirits that they were lost. Again.
Grandmother pulled
her hood up against the unceasing drizzle. It was late winter, but
snow never seemed to reach the ground here. It was as if the
whiteness of snow was too pure, too clean, to exist within the
darkness of the forest. The drizzle seeped through the canopy of
crooked tree boughs and matted clumps of pine needles, and anything
that dwelled here lived in perpetual dusk. At night, the blackness
was total.
Blackveil was the
product of conquest and defeat. Long ago, Grandmother’s ancestors,
led by Mornhavon the Great, sailed from the empire of Arcosia to
the shores of the New Lands seeking resources and riches. Not only
did they find these in abundance, but they also found resistance
from the native people, who rejected the will of the empire,
sparking a hundred years of war.
The first land to
fall to the empire was the Eletian realm of Argenthyne, which
covered the whole of a peninsula that bordered Ullem Bay to the
east. Mornhavon made it his capital and renamed it Mornhavonia. At
first his campaigns to quash rebellion and dominate the New Lands
went well, but then supplies and reinforcements stopped coming from
the empire.
Abandoned, with
dwindling forces and many enemies arrayed against him, Mornhavon
fell in defeat.
The Sacoridians then
walled off the peninsula, trapping within the residue of darkness
left behind by Mornhavon. The perversions he created with the art
festered here for a millennium. The forest rotted amid etherea
defiled by the use of the black arts during the war, gripping the
land and spreading like a disease; ignored, neglected, and
forgotten, until an Eletian coveting the residual magical power of
the forest breached the D’Yer Wall three years ago.
Their journey
through the forest was not only dangerous, but toilsome. They
attempted to follow an ancient road of upheaved cobblestones.
Sometimes it vanished into bogs or was swallowed by masses of
thorny undergrowth. Patiently they sought ways around the
obstructions and more than once found themselves led astray along
remnants of side roads, or following paths toward traps set by wily
predators.
This time an
impenetrable thicket of scrubby trees, exhibiting wicked daggerlike
thorns, had blocked the road and sent them off course. During
trials such as these, Grandmother began to believe their situation
hopeless, for she could not even consult the sun or stars for
direction in this cloaked, shadowed place. She thought they’d die,
forever lost in the tangled wilderness of the forest. She assumed
they might yet. Their chances of survival, even if they found their
way back to the road, were not good.
She was careful
never to convey her doubts to the others. She could not. She must
hold them together. They expressed complete faith in her, believed
she would bring them through this. But if she fell apart, they’d
fall apart, too, so she maintained a facade of confidence, even
though it was a lie.
She gazed upon her
weary retainers. There were only five of them now. Five, plus her
true granddaughter, Lala, who sat upon a slimy log playing string
games. Lala never issued any complaint, remained implacable as
ever, trusting in her grandmother.
To find the road
again, Grandmother would have to use the art, and do so before
Regin’s death, and fear, had a chance to grip her people. From the
basket she carried over her wrist, she removed a skein of red yarn
and cut a length of it with a knife that hung from her belt. Her
fingers were cold and stiff, but moved nimbly to tie knots, and as
she did so, she spoke words of power.
In Blackveil, she
was cautious when it came to using the art. The etherea of the
place was unstable, tainted, and apt to warp even the simplest
spell. She’d discovered this the hard way when she tried to ignite
an ordinary campfire with a touch of power to the kindling. A tree
beside her exploded into flame, almost torching her skirts.
Fortunately the forest was so damp the blaze did not spread to a
full-scale forest fire, but after that, she did not draw upon magic
except when needed for wardings and wayfinding, and even then it
was reluctantly.
When she finished
tying the knots, she breathed on them, and they tightened of their
own volition, flexing and melding together into a single mass that
transformed into a luminous red salamander perched on her palm. Her
people, she knew, still only saw a snarled wad of
yarn.
“Find the road,” she
commanded the salamander, for it was a compass.
It gazed at her with
eyes of coal and lashed its serpentine tail this way and that until
it settled on a direction, pointing the way with its tail. The
others probably saw nothing more than a loose end of yarn lifting
in an air current.
“We must carry on,”
Grandmother said to her people. “We must continue our journey.
Regin would wish it.”
Swiftly they took up
their packs, one or two with tears in their eyes. They
redistributed Regin’s burden, setting aside personal items of his
they could not use. Grandmother then turned, stepping carefully
through the forest, following the direction indicated by the magic
salamander’s tail.
In a moment Lala was
there beside her, grasping her free hand. Grandmother smiled down
at her. Lala gave her the strength to carry on, as did her
conviction that the empire must rise again.
After an hour or two
of bushwhacking through undergrowth and wading through muddy,
sluggish streams, they found the road. The salamander had led them
true. They all cried out their thanks to God and Grandmother.
Grandmother then released the salamander to the wind, and it
vanished in a quick, brilliant spark. Only when she stood firmly
upon the wet, mossy cobblestones of the road did she close her eyes
and loose a sigh of relief.
Her relief turned to
a cry of joy when the shifting of mist unveiled a huge, stone
figure ahead of them. The statue, carved in the likeness of
Mornhavon the Great, marked the joining of the Circle of the Ways.
The salamander, it turned out, had led them better than
true.
The roads they
traversed were not built by the Arcosians, but by the Eletians of
Argenthyne long before Mornhavon’s arrival. When Grandmother and
her little group left Sacoridia by passing through the breach in
the D’Yer Wall into the forest, they followed the Avenue of Light,
the main artery heading south to the center of the peninsula. There
it terminated at the Circle of the Ways.
In the chronicles of
Grandmother’s people were maps of the peninsula and the Eletian
roads. Apparently Eletians rarely built in straight lines, for the
Circle was indeed a circle, and from it spun six main roads,
including the Avenue of Light, that tailed off in graceful spirals
where once there were major settlements. Her ancestors had not
straightened the roads. Perhaps with the Long War raging, they
hadn’t the resources.
“Here we shall pass
the night,” Grandmother announced. After the day’s exertions and
loss, they needed rest, time to collect themselves and prepare for
the next leg of their journey, which was to follow the eastern half
of the Circle toward the south. They’d bypass the junction of Way
of the Dawn and continue to Way of the Moon.
Yes, they would
spend the night beneath the statue that to her was like a guardian.
Mornhavon: strong, heroic, the heir to an empire, his gaze stern
and looking outward toward the Avenue of Light, with shield and
sword at hand and hair flowing back from his face. His boot crushed
the bodies of his enemies, the faces of those souls contorted in
agony. According to the chronicles, each junction of the Circle had
such a statue to greet travelers and to remind them of who ruled
here.
The pedestal had
once held some other statue, something Eletian. Whatever it was, it
was toppled and replaced long ago, as well it should have
been.
The statue filled
Grandmother with pride, never mind Mornhavon’s nose, and most of
the sword, had crumbled away, and the stone was darkened with moss
and lichens, vines creeping up his legs.
Mornhavon may have
been defeated, but that did not mean he hadn’t fought valiantly,
despite great adversity. No one knew why Arcosia abandoned him, and
perhaps they never would, but Second Empire lived to resurrect the
ideals of Mornhavon and the empire, to continue the conquest and
make it succeed.
We will make things right, Grandmother promised the
statue. I shall see to it.
Setting up camp was
a well-practiced routine, though now they had to attend to Regin’s
duties as well. Deglin attempted to build a fire with the sodden
wood collected from around them. He did carry a faggot of dry
kindling, which he used sparingly. He struck steel to flint with a
resolute expression on his face, for he knew Grandmother was
reluctant to help after what happened last time. She did not doubt
his efforts would prove successful, and she looked forward to the
warmth of the resulting fire that would chase the damp chill from
her bones.
Griz and Cole set up
their tent shelter. The oiled canvas could not dry out and smelled
of must and mildew. She thought wistfully of her small but cozy
house with its kitchen garden, now probably blanketed by snow, that
she had abandoned in Sacor City when the king started running down
members of Second Empire. She must not dwell on the past, however.
There was much to look forward to.
Min and Sarat sorted
out pots and pans, and discussed what supper would be. Either a
thin stew, or gruel. They, too, must be careful with their stores,
for much of the vegetation in the forest was poisonous, and the
creatures too dangerous to hunt.
With these
reassuring and accustomed chores taking place beneath the statue,
Grandmother focused on her own task, which was to set wards in a
perimeter around the campsite. She removed small balls of snarled
yarn from her basket: red, indigo, sky blue, and
brown.
She placed them in a
wide circle around their camp, murmuring a word of command as she
did so. Each glowed briefly, then faded. When all were in place,
she shouted, “Protect!” The forest rippled around them as though
viewed through water, then stilled, all appearing normal. The eyes
of wild creatures might glow yellow and green around them in the
night, but nothing would pass the invisible barrier she had
created. At least, nothing had thus far.
Weary beyond belief,
Grandmother hobbled over to the statue and sat at its base,
watching her retainers continue with their duties, not really
taking any of it in or listening to their chatter. Lala sat beside
her and leaned into her. Grandmother put her arm around the child.
“Not an easy journey for little girls or old women, eh?” she
murmured.
Lala did not answer,
for she never spoke. Grandmother stroked her damp hair. “It will be
worth it,” she said. “This journey, even Regin’s passing. He died
for a just cause. We shall awaken the Sleepers as God instructed,
and they will be the weapon that allows Second Empire to rise up
and claim what is ours. Our legacy.”
Yes, the time had
come. Colonel Birch would be organizing their people on the other
side of the wall, building their army, while she raised a weapon
that would shatter the Eletians and terrorize all of Second
Empire’s enemies.
The incessant
drizzle, the damp cold, the sacrifice of her people, all would be
worth the fall of Eletia and Sacoridia.