A Darkness Forged in Fire

FORTY-EIGHT

A lwyn walked alone in the growing dark, his eyes searching the path before him for any sign of danger. The others had moved on ahead while he and Miss Red Owl had walked slowly, talking for quite a while about Miss Tekoy and the major. He got the distinct impression that Miss Red Owl didn't entirely approve of Miss Tekoy for some reason, but he thought they were very much alike, though he kept that to himself. Miss Red Owl had finally stopped asking questions and gone off into the forest to visit with her other children for a while. Alwyn wasn't sure if she meant elves or trees.

He unstoppered the gourd with the tree sap that was a lot more than tree sap and took a drink. The liquid tingled as it went down his throat and the aches and pains of the march vanished. Even the throbbing in his chest subsided. He tipped the gourd up for another drink, but only a drop came out. He shook it. Empty. He considered tossing the gourd away, then thought better of it, knowing the way the elves of the Long Watch felt about trees and such.

There was a rustling in the bushes off to the left and Alwyn froze in midstep, his musket already in his hands. He knew it wasn't the elves. They moved through the forest like fish through water. He envied their skill and tried to imitate their light walk, but in a pair of heavy boots with all his equipment it was a bit like getting a muraphant over eggshells.

The sound grew louder as the source of the noise moved toward the path. Alwyn eased the hammer back on his musket and crouched. He wasn't going to be surprised again. The leaves of the nearest bush parted and out came one pleased-looking dwarf.

"If the elves ask, I was watering the mushrooms," Yimt said, straightening his caerna as he emerged onto the path. He walked up to Alwyn and gently turned his musket aside. "Ally, lad, there are many things a sigger can get shot for in the Imperial Army, but emptying your bladder ain't one of them…well, unless you do it in an officer's shako."

Alwyn uncocked his musket and stood up straight, letting out his breath. "I should have known it was you."

Yimt patted him on the arm and the two started walking on the path. "Better to be safe than sorry these days." He looked around them, scratching his head. "The others must be ahead. I left Teeter in charge of Scolly and Inkermon. Mercy, those two are a pair. You see what rank gets you? Put in charge of a group of misfits an insane asylum wouldn't take on account it would give them a bad name."

Alwyn smiled and quickened his pace, forcing the dwarf to keep up. It did nothing to slow his tongue.

"Speaking of not quite right, did Miss Red Owl tell you any more about that leafy fellow and that flying rat? Something ain't right about that little critter. And as far as that elf goes, I don't think the shaft goes all the way up in that mine."

Alwyn looked around, knowing it wouldn't do any good. Tyul could be a couple of feet away from them and they wouldn't see him unless he wanted them to.

"He really, really likes trees-well, at least his one tree anyway. Seems they bond with them for life. That's how they get their weapons and those arrows."

Yimt raised a bushy eyebrow. "Bond with trees, you say?"

Alwyn blushed. "Not like that! It's more a spiritual thing. You know, I think I've been hearing them a little, sort of…talking, but not with words exactly. The trees, I mean." He waited for the inevitable rebuttal.

"First, there was poor, old, dead Meri come back to life as a shadow, then there was an elf that wasn't exactly an elf but was like the major only not exactly, and now, now you're hearing trees talking," Yimt said, ticking off the offenses on his hand.

"I'm not crazy, Corporal," Alwyn said, glaring down at the dwarf.

Yimt's shoulders started shaking and before long he was laughing so hard he had to stop walking. Alwyn looked around nervously, but nothing that might want to eat them appeared.

"Ally, you don't know how glad I am to hear you say that. I thought maybe I'd cracked my crystal ball," he said, rapping his skull with his knuckles.

It was the last answer Alwyn expected. "I don't understand."

Yimt looked up at him, wiping the tears from his eyes. "Neither do I, Ally, but I've been hearing trees in my head, too. I thought I'd finally gone over the edge, but if you're hearing them, then either we're both a few stones short of a castle, or everything you've been saying might just be true."

The sound of running feet and branches being swatted aside heralded the arrival of Scolly, who came to a halt before them, struggling to catch his breath.

"Oh, now look, laddie," Yimt said, his good humor disappearing at the sight of the soldier, "if you ask me one more time if we're there yet, I swear I'll be lacing my boots with your tongue."

Scolly shook his head and pointed back down the path, still trying to catch his breath. Alwyn walked a few steps past him and then heard it.

"No, Yimt," he said, as the boom of a five-pounder echoed through the forest, "he's trying to tell us we've finally arrived."

Visyna shivered and hunched her shoulders, trying to keep her focus on the wounded soldier before her as her fingers danced through the skeins of life. Musket fire popped and crackled down the hill, intermixed with the screams of the dying. She felt each death like rain on bare skin, each blending with the other until their pain and fear washed away everything else. And yet here she was, tending the very men who were inflicting that suffering on her people.

Her fingers paused, the beat of the soldier's heart palpable in her hands. She could let him die. He was a soldier of the Empire, a tool of oppression and death, and worse, bound to the regiment in a way that frightened her. She had first noticed something wrong when she had tried to help the soldier named Meri in the vines. Then, she had put it down to the general malaise that stalked the land, a vague stain that did not yet pose an immediate threat. She knew better now. This was Her doing, and Konowa had been the means, even if he meant well.

"It's getting cold," the soldier said, his lips pale and trembling. Three fires crackled and sparked around them, their heat doing little to warm the open air of the fortress courtyard where the wounded lay. Visyna motioned for a private standing nearby to put another blanket over the man.

"No amount of covering will warm him now," the man said, eyeing the soldier with the casual disdain of one who knew something about death. "It's that elf-witch that holds all the cards here."

Visyna bristled at the comment and started weaving again, eliciting a cry of pain from the wounded soldier. "I'm sorry," she said, slowing and chiding herself for being so easily goaded. "Shouldn't you be with your company, Private…?" she asked.

He sneered. "Zwitty's the name, and no, on account of my wound." He pointed to his left arm. The jacket was covered in blood, yet Visyna remembered dressing his wound earlier, and it had only been a small cut. "Safer to be here. Besides, the scenery is better."

She ignored his last comment. "The elf-witch you speak of does not hold sway yet. The sarka har are still young, their roots not yet long enough to feed them the power they seek."

"Wouldn't matter if they did," he said, winking at her. "As soon as the Prince gets his precious Star, we'll be leaving this place and She can do what She wants with it."

Visyna concentrated on the wounded soldier, blocking out the private's words. She found the faintest of skeins and delicately began to weave them together, slowly creating a strong thread to hold on to the life ebbing before her. There! She felt a clean strength and focused her mind on it. Zwitty was still talking, but she could no longer hear him. All her focus centered on the precious spark of life that yet burned within the man before her. She called on the last reserves of her power and laid her hands on the soldier's body. He gasped, his eyelids shooting open. Slowly, his breathing returned to a more normal rhythm as his face grew less pallid.

"…do a little of that weaving on me," Zwitty said, reaching out and grabbing her arm.

Visyna spun around and used what energy she had left. There was a shock of ice and heat colliding as she pushed him, and then Zwitty was flying through the air. He landed hard on his back, then clambered to his feet, one hand cradled in the other, a look of surprise and anger on his face. He turned and ran back toward the regiment.

Visyna turned away from him and was pleased to see, and feel, that the wounded soldier was indeed healing. She walked briskly to the far end of the fortress, ducking under the remnants of a half-collapsed roof, and sat down on a small keg. Her eyes closed on their own and she let out a shuddering breath. She wrapped her arms around her body and shivered.

"Do you still serve your people, child?"

Visyna stood up suddenly, swaying as she did so. The image of the Star shimmered before her, its form a shattered mosaic of light and dark. Her weariness vanished in an instant.

"My people are being butchered out there because they believe in you. How can you let this happen?"

"Their deaths are of no consequence when weighed against the greater need."

Visyna felt the color drain from her face. "No. You must stop this!"

"Foolish girl, why would I want to?" The image of the Star curved in on itself. Shadow ate light and ground heaved in front of her, crumbling apart as a black figure emerged from the earth beneath her, and Visyna realized the extent of her mistake.

"Deceiver!" Fury blossomed inside her. She brought her hands up to weave a spell, but she was much too slow.

Her Emissary drew forth a long, black dagger. Frost fire danced along the blade, the air sizzling around it. It had drawn back its arm, preparing to strike, when something small and white flew past her.

The shadowy figure shrieked and dropped the blade, a white feather quill stuck in its hand. Rallie emerged from the shadows, another quill held lightly between her fingers.

"I've always believed, but I must admit it is rather gratifying to see, that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword."

"You!" it roared, ripping the quill from its hand and incinerating it with a black flame. It held out its good hand and the dropped blade flew into it. "You should not be here. This is not your time."

"Oh, I don't know," Rallie said, twirling the quill between her fingers. "I usually think I should be exactly where I am at any given moment. You, however, are definitely in the wrong place, and very much at the wrong time."

"Your words are as weak as your weapons. This is becoming Her time, and all those that serve Her."

Visyna gasped for breath as two powerful forces consumed all the life energy around her. The natural order began unraveling and she tried desperately to stitch it back together, even as she realized her magic was woefully inadequate to the task.

"That remains to be seen. In the meantime," Rallie said, preparing to throw the quill, "it's time you left."

The ebb and flow of the competing forces suddenly surged in one direction, and Visyna caught her breath, a pleasant warmth filling the air. The dark figure howled, its form splintering, reforming, then splintering again. Visyna reached out her hands and grabbed some of the threads, giving what aid she could to Rallie to help her banish it.

"You cannot hold us for long. A new forest will grow here before the night is out." The ground shook and Her Emissary disappeared between the cracks and was gone.

Visyna felt sick. She looked down at her hands and saw they were trembling.

She had listened to that thing, taken its advice, done whatever she could to help it. This was all her fault. Everything.

"Really now, my dear, you're getting as melodramatic as Konowa," Rallie said, walking over to give her a pat on the arm. "This is the Shadow Monarch's fault, first and foremost. Our task, and it's a significant one, is to undo the damage."

"I should have seen through it," Visyna said.

"Perhaps, but it is skilled in the art of deception, and you saw what you wanted to see."

"That was the last Viceroy, wasn't it?" Visyna asked, looking at Rallie with a newfound respect.

"Her Emissary now," Rallie said, reaching into her cloak for a cigar. She pulled one out and made no pretense of lighting it, the end suddenly glowing red of its own accord. "It's been looking for the Star for some time, believing, apparently, that it is buried somewhere beneath the fort."

"Do you know where the Star is?" Visyna asked, hope rising in her chest.

Rallie shook her head. "Not that I can find it, but don't despair, my dear, I think it will reveal itself when it's ready."

"What did it mean about this not being your time?"

Rallie cackled softly and blew out a long stream of smoke. "That, my dear, is a story for another time." She flexed her fingers around her cigar and for the briefest of moments filigrees of light flowed from them like gossamer threads caught in a breeze.

Visyna looked at her in stunned surprise.

"Oh, come now, dear, you suspected as much, no?" Rallie said, cocking her head to the side as if listening to something far away.

"Then you are a witch," Visyna said.

Rallie brought her head up straight and clamped down hard on the cigar between her teeth. "After a fashion. I like to think of myself more as the one you least suspect…until it's too late. Now, I suggest we get out to the ramparts. We're about to become rather busy, you and I. The trees that surround us are focused on digging for the Star, but Her Emissary may soon decide to redirect their energies."

Visyna nodded, following the old woman, the smoke from Rallie's cigar swirling about them in the darkening night.