“Not this time,” Valorian cried. “I won’t go. I can’t, Hunnul. I won’t leave my wife and family to the Tarns and starvation. Not while I can bring the hope of escape.” Even as he spoke, the thundering noise became audible as hoof beats.
From out of the glimmering light where the mountain range had vanished came four white riders on pale steeds galloping toward him with the speed of diving eagles.
The hunter looked around angrily for a weapon or some means of holding off the Harbingers. He spotted his sword lying several paces away from his dead body, and in more hope than knowledge, he lunged for it. His hand closed around the hilt and hefted it. It felt real enough to him.
Forged of braided iron and decorated with silver, the weapon had been burned black and its tip warped by the power of the lightning. At that moment, Valorian didn’t care. The hilt still fit comfortably into his grip, and the weapon sang through the air as he swung it in a wide arc.
The clansman shouted with relief, sprang to his horse, and brandished his weapon at the oncoming steeds. “Sorh honors me by sending four,” he shouted to Hunnul, “but they will have to return without me.”
Hunnul pranced sideways, infected by his master’s agitation. Together they watched the four immortal escorts come galloping out of the sky to take them to the realm of Sorh. As the Harbingers drew closer, Valorian could see they were male in appearance, dressed in battle gear that shone with an icy light, and apparently unarmed. He studied them curiously. No living person knew what the Harbingers looked like, for very, very few souls died and returned to life. Valorian had never personally known a man or woman who had come back from death. Nevertheless, it was said that others had done it, and their success gave him hope. If he could just hold off the shining riders, they might let him go.
The four riders were almost upon him when he kicked Hunnul and shouted the Clan war cry. The stallion lunged forward into the midst of the white horses, squealing and snapping like a maddened creature. Valorian, his expression carved in adamant fury, swung his sword left and right at the riders. His weapon passed through two Harbingers and met nothing but air. Yet his attack seemed to surprise them.
They broke away from him and gathered at a distance to watch him. Their faces—if they had any—were invisible behind the visors of their helmets. Their postures were alert yet relaxed. They didn’t seem to be particularly angered by Valorian’s attack, only cautious. Most souls did not object so vigorously.
In a flash of worry and irritation, Valorian realized that they didn’t have to fight or subdue him. They could simply outwait him. The Harbingers had all eternity.
Valorian noticed something else, too. The land around him was almost gone. The mountains and the ridge had faded out of sight, leaving only the small patch of stone and earth where their two bodies lay. Around him was only the gentle light. Alarmed, Valorian kneed Hunnul back to stand by the bodies. He knew instinctively that if they left their mortal shells, they would lose their only chance of returning to the living world.
“Valorian!” The clansman started violently at the sound of his name.
“Sorh has called for you.” It was one of the Harbingers. His voice was low, masculine, compelling. Valorian felt a strong desire to obey his command. He forced it down with all his might.
“Not this time!” he shouted. “There is too much left for me to do.”
“What you have left undone shall have to be done by others. Your time is over.”
“No!”
“You must come, Valorian.” The Harbingers’ steeds took a step toward him.
All at once and without any warning, a great wind blew up around Valorian and the death riders. Like a living creature, it howled and roared and pushed between the startled clansman and his escorts.
Out of the raging wind, Valorian thought he heard a voice say, “Tell Sorh he will have to wait.”
Suddenly the wind swooped up Hunnul and Valorian and carried them with giant, unseen hands up and away from the small patch of mortal earth. The man was too stunned to protest. The powerful wind had no adverse physical effect on his soul, but it left him mentally breathless as it bore him with incredible speed into the glowing, unfamiliar boundaries of the realm of the dead. The world of mortality and the Harbingers were left behind.
Beneath him, the stallion tried to neigh. Hunnul was terrified, but he couldn’t move a muscle in the grip of the roaring, rushing wind.
Gradually the wind began to ease. Its force gently dissipated; its grand roar quieted until the strength of its passing was nothing more than a breeze. Ever so carefully the unseen hands of the wind set Valorian and Hunnul down, unharmed, and whisked off in a gust that sounded like laughter.
Both man and horse let out their breath in a great gust of relief. Hunnul stamped his hoof and snorted, as if to say, “Well!”
“Great gods of all,” the clansman exclaimed, staring around. “What was that all about?”
There was no immediate answer. He and Hunnul were standing on what looked like a vast, featureless plain of gray stone—granite from the look of it, the substance of mountains unborn. The sky above them, if that’s what it was, was a pale shade of gray and equally as empty. There was nothing else as far as they could see.
Valorian noticed he was still holding his sword. He hefted it once, then slowly slid it back into the sheepskin scabbard at his side. He had a feeling that no weapon would avail him here on this strange plain of stone. Something or someone of great power had brought him here with deliberate intent. He could only wait to see what would happen now. Swinging his leg over Hunnul’s mane, the clansman slid off the horse and came to stand by the animal’s head.
Together they looked at the stone around them.
“Now what?” Valorian murmured, nonplussed.
Hunnul nickered. The big stallion dipped his nose toward something on the ground in front of his hooves.
Valorian looked once and bent over for a second look. A tiny green plant had somehow taken tenuous root in the stone. As the man watched, the plant grew larger, spreading its tiny roots wider and deeper into the rock. The granite began to crack beneath the force of the roots. Tiny leaves popped out of the stem, opened, and spread wider. Tendrils curled toward the sky. Still deeper went the roots into the hard rock, but now Valorian could see the masses of fragile, hair like roots were crumbling the granite into sand. He gasped in surprise and stepped back. Excitement, wonder, and dread crowded into him until he was shaking with emotion.
Swiftly the plant grew taller, without water, earth, or real sunlight. It stretched its stems and leaves up toward the sky in joyous, quivering life and suddenly burst into brilliant bloom. The flowers were of every hue imaginable, glistening bright with morning dew and filled with a delicate unearthly fragrance that was sweet and alluring.
Valorian’s mouth dropped open and he fell to his knees. “The flower that shatters the stone,” he breathed. The power of life. The power of the goddess Amara.
As the truth clarified in his mind, the plant began to shimmer with a pearlescent glow. Its stem, leaves, and flowers wavered and shifted before the man’s eyes into the shape of a woman.
She was a glorious woman to Valorian’s mind: tall and fair, with strong limbs, wide hips, and a noble figure. Her long, heavy mane of hair hung to her waist like a swirling cloak of pale spring green. Her eyes were as brown and deep as the earth. She wore a gown that belied description of its color, for it shifted in rainbow hues with every move of its wearer and clung to her body from her neck to her feet like gossamer webs of silk.
Valorian bowed low before her.
Amara, the goddess of life and birth, of the rejuvenation of spring and the grace of fertility, the beloved mother of all to the clanspeople, stepped forward and raised the hunter to his feet.