“I will miss you,” Ushahin said quietly, clasping Tanaros’ hand. “For all the days of my life, howsoever long it may be.”
Tanaros nodded. “May it be long, cousin.”
There was nothing more to be said. Ushahin turned away, his head averted. At the top of the winding stair, he paused and raised his hand in farewell; his right hand, strong and shapely.
And then he passed through the left-hand door.
Tanaros stood alone in the darkening Chamber, breathing slow and deep. He returned the black sword to his right hand, his fingers curving around its familiar hilt. It throbbed in his grip. His blood, his Lordship’s blood. The madlings had always revered it. Tempered in the marrow-fire, quenched in ichor. It was not finished, not yet.
Death is a coin to be spent wisely.
Vorax had been fond of saying that. How like the Staccian to measure death in terms of wealth! And yet there was truth in the words.
Tanaros meant to spend his wisely.
It would buy time for Ushahin to make his escape; precious time in which the attention of Haomane’s Allies was focused on battle. And it would buy vengeance for those who had fallen. He had spared Cerelinde’s life. He did not intend to do the same for those who took arms against him.
There were no innocents on the battlefield. They would pay for the deaths of those he had loved. Tanaros would exact full measure for his coin.
He touched the pouch that hung from his swordbelt, feeling the reassuring shape of Hyrgolf’s rhios within it.
The middle door was waiting.
It gave easily to his push. He strode through it and into the darkness beyond. These were his passageways, straight and true, leading to the forefront of Darkhaven. Tanaros did not need to see to know the way. “Vorax. Speros. Hyrgolf,” he murmured as he went, speaking their names like a litany.
TWENTY-FIVE
The passageway was long and winding, and the marrow-fire that lit it grew dim, so dim that she had to feel her way by touch. But Tanaros had not lied; the passage was empty. Neither madlings nor Fjel traversed it. At the end, there was a single door.
Cerelinde fumbled for the handle and found it began to whisper a prayer to Haomane and found that the words would not come. The image of Satoris Banewreaker hung before her, stopping her tongue.
Still, the handle turned.
Golden lamplight spilled into the passage. The door opened onto palatial quarters filled with glittering treasure. Clearly, these were Vorax’s quarters, unlike any other portion of Darkhaven. Within, three mortal women leapt to their feet, staring. They were fair-haired northerners, young and comely after the fashion of Arahila’s Children.
“Vas leggis?” one asked, bewildered. And then, slowly, in the common tongue: “Who are you? What happens? Where is Lord Vorax?”
Tanaros had not lied.
It made her want to weep, but the Ellylon could not weep for their own sorrows. “Lord Vorax is no more,” Cerelinde said gently, entering the room. “And the reign of the Sunderer has ended in Urulat. I am Cerelinde of the House of Elterrion.”
“Ellyl!” The youngest turned pale. She spoke to the others in Staccian, then turned to Cerelinde. “He is dead? It is ended?”
“Yes,” she said. “I am sorry.”
And strangely, the words were true. Even more strangely, the three women were weeping. She did not know for whom they wept, Satoris Banewreaker or Vorax the Glutton. She had not imagined anyone could weep for either.
The oldest of the three dried her eyes on the hem of her mantle. “What is to become of us?”
There was a throne in the center of the room, a massive ironwood seat carved in the shape of a roaring bear. Cerelinde sank wearily into it. “Haomane’s Allies will find us,” she said. “Be not afraid. They will show mercy. Whatever you have done here, Arahila the Fair will forgive it.”
Her words seemed to hearten them. It should have gladdened her, for it meant that there was hope, that not all who dwelled within the Sunderer’s shadow were beyond redemption. And yet it did not.
What will you do?
What do you think? I will die, Cerelinde.
A great victory would be won here today. She would take no joy in it.
Havenguard were awaiting when Tanaros emerged from the passageway, crowding Darkhaven’s entry. The inner doors were shuddering, battered by a mighty ram. The enemy was past the Gate, had entered the courtyard. They were mounting an offense, coming to rescue the Lady of the Ellylon, coming to fulfill Haomane’s Prophecy.
They would succeed.
And they would fail.
Tanaros grinned at his Fjel, watching them respond to it like a deep draft of svartblod, relishing their answering grins, broad and leathery, showing their eyetusks.
“Well, lads?” he asked them. “Shall we give our visitors the welcome they deserve? I’ll give the greeting myself!”
They roared in acclaim.
“Be certain of it, lads, for it means your deaths!” He touched his branded chest, clad only in his padded undertunic. His armor was lost, vanished in the darkness of the crumbling passageways where the chasm gaped. “In his Lordship’s name, I go forth to claim mine. I ask no one to accompany me who does not seek the same!”
The Havenguard Fjel laughed. One of them shouldered past the others, hoisting a battle-axe in one hand and a shield in the other. “I stand at your Side, General,” he rumbled. “I keep my shield high.”
“And I!”
“And I!”
“So be it.” The words brought to mind an echo of Cerelinde’s farewell. Standing before the great doors, Tanaros paused. He felt keenly the lack of his armor. He wondered about Cerelinde, bound for Vorax’s chambers, and how she would live with her deeds afterward. He wondered about the Bearer, if he lived or died. He wondered about the Bearer’s comrade, who hung in chains in Darkhaven’s dungeons, unable to lift his head. Somewhere, Ushahin was making his way through the hidden passages, Godslayer in his possession.
An Age had ended; a new Age had begun. The Shapers’ War would continue.
The thought made Tanaros smile.
In the end, it didn’t matter.
Haomane’s Allies would Shape this tale as they saw fit. What mattered, what mattered the most, was that the tale did not end here.
“Open the doors,” Tanaros ordered.
The Fjel obeyed, as they had always obeyed, as they had obeyed since his Lordship had fled to take shelter among them, sharing with them his vision of how one day, Men and Ellylon alike would envy their gifts, fulfilling the promise of Neheris-of-the-Leaping-Waters, who had Shaped them.
Tanaros strode through the open doors, flanked by a stream of Fjel. The Men wielding the battering-ram dropped back, gaping at his sudden appearance, at the doors behind his back, unbarred and thrown wide open.
Brightness in the air made him squint. The sun, the symbol of Haomane’s Wrath, had pierced the veil of clouds that hung over the Vale of Gorgantum. It was low and sinking in the west, but it had prevailed.
Tanaros opened his arms.
They were there; they were all there amid the ragged, dying remnants of his Fjel. All his enemies, gathered. Aracus Altorus, grey-faced and exhausted, barely able to hold his shattered hilt aloft, his Soumanië flickering and dim. Malthus the Counselor astride his pale mount, his white robes swirling. The Rivenlost, at once bereft and defiant. The Archer of Arduan, a bow wrought of black horn in her hands.