Frostfell

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

The Isle of Witness

"Father!" The cry went out, echoing into realms beyond the paths of mortal men, and Vyaidelon answered. Arantar, his son, his only son born to him of a mortal woman, stood beneath the Witness Tree.

Weariness hung upon him, and the light in his eyes was dim. Five sorcerers, clad in the royal gray of Raumathar, surrounded him.

Vyaidelon could look beyond the scope of mortal eyes, and he saw the cold, hungry darknesses writhing within them, giving them great strength even as the darknesses consumed them. Vyaidelon merged with Arantar, combining their spirits and lending his strength to his son.

The five sorcerers howled in fury and struck, calling upon every spell they knew as they charged. Arantar and Vyaidelon, two beings sharing one body, struck back, pouring holy light and life into the never-ending hunger that filled the sorcerers. The five screamed, and four of them fell. The dark infusion, the thousands of tendrils of unlife burrowing into their souls, twisted and frayed. The leader, the one that had been Khasoreth, fell to his hands and knees upon the ice-slick steps and looked up at Arantar. The shadow lifted from Khasoreth's face, and his eyes cleared. "Master… please. Remember.

Remember… mercy." The words hit Arantar stronger than any of their spells had. They cut to his very heart, for they were ideals by which he had tried to live his entire life, as a servant to the people of the steppes, as a husband and father, and most of all as a man. In that moment of hesitation Khasoreth struck, sending a thick arm of darkness crashing into Arantar. The thing within Khasoreth shrieked in unholy delight, and Vyaidelon's song faltered. Arantar stumbled against the tree, and the thing that had been Khasoreth leaped, falling upon him with fist, tooth, and spell. Vyaidelon concentrated his strength to strike. No! said Arantar, calling to his father in the mind they shared. Mercy. He began to lift away, but the thing that had been Khasoreth struck, its great arm of darkness seizing Vyaidelon, grasping and tearing at him. Darkness warred with light, but this time Vyaidelon did not fight it. There would be another way. Another day when justice and mercy could meet as one. Do not fear, Vyaidelon told his son. You have planted the seed. It is not for you to see the flower bloom. Arantar breathed his last, a small smile upon his lips, and Vyaidelon fell. The five creatures of darkness seized him and battered at him, but their attempts were futile. Light was stronger, and Vyaidelon knew it even as he fell into the darkness. Vyaidelon sought the last bit of warmth, the last living thing upon the island-the Witness Tree-and fell into the pure essence of the tree.

The five sorcerers struck, but try as they might, they could not destroy the now-hallowed tree. Spell after spell and the darkest of magics broke upon it. Knowing that the murder of the tree was beyond them, the five sorcerers used their darkest spells and imprisoned Vyaidelon in the lifeblood of the tree. Through the long years, through the coldest winters and darkest nights, the deepest heart of the tree remained alive. Warmth and life still lived there, waiting.

Waiting for the true blood of Arantar to set free his celestial father.

Every bit of Gyaidun's body, both inside and out, pulsed with agony. Cracked bones, bruised muscles, skin cut and scraped-all of it clawed at his mind, trying to drag him down to unconsciousness. He fought it, willing his eyes to stay open, forcing his lungs to breathe, as he watched his life's blood pouring out of the gash in his hand. Damn my haste, he thought. Cut too quick. Too deep. Gyaidun heard Amira cry out, saw the blood from his and Jalan's hands soak into the roots of the tree-that thing at the bottom of the stairs cried out, "No!" — then the boy stood, stretched out his hand, and grabbed a pale blossom fluttering in the wind. A blossom? Gyaidun thought. Hro'nyewachu said nothing aboutJalan's hand blazed. It was as if a thousand suns had condensed into the boy's fist and exploded with all the light they'd ever held or would hold. And then, in the deepest recesses of Gyaidun's mind where he walked in dreams, Gyaidun heard music. It came as if from a great distance, but in the melody he felt warmth and light filling his soul, and in the corners of his mind that had known only darkness for years, something old and buried awoke: hope. Jalan looked down at Gyaidun, and the scared boy was gone. In his place stood a lord, a hero, and in that moment Gyaidun believed Amira's words, that the boy was of the line of Arantar himself. Jalan was smiling, and his eyes sparkled like sunlight through amber. A shard of blue light struck Jalan, and the boy stumbled. Gyaidun turned. Three of the dark sorcerers had come; the tallest led them, the magic of his spent spell still sparking minuscule lightning around his fist. Two of the other sorcerers struck, one sending a funnel of frost spiraling at the boy, the other loosing a barrage of blue-white light that seemed to devour all warmth from the air. With a wave of Jalan's hand, the air before him solidified into a concave golden shield, and the sorcerers' spells shattered against it. "Kneel, worm!" said the sorcerers' leader. "Submit, and I will make your death swift." Jalan laughed, and Gyaidun heard two voices-one young and full of life, the other old beyond the reckoning of human minds. "Your time has come," said Jalan. "Time to release them." The leader snarled and turned, motioning behind him. Up the stairs behind him came the two remaining sorcerers-one who shambled, almost on his hands and knees, and the other was Erun. He held Amira under her arm, the point of his sword resting against her neck. She struggled to walk, arching her back to keep the blade from piercing her skin. The leader turned back to Jalan. "Surrender and die quickly," he said, "or he will kill her slowly." Jalan glanced down at his mother. His smile faltered, for a moment seeming almost sad, then he said, "No, he will not." A look of triumph and utter joy filled Jalan's countenance. It looked as if the boy's skin were glowing, as if a power so great filled him that it was leaking out through his pores. Jalan extended both hands, palms open, to Erun and began to sing a music that was beyond words. Gyaidun gasped as he saw Erun's muscles tighten to thrust the sword, but then he sensed something ripple between Jalan and the sorcerer, and Erun trembled. He blinked and shook his head as if confused, then his muscles spasmed, his back arched, and a scream beyond sound was torn from him. Amira ripped herself away and stumbled down the stairs. The sorcerer's blade clattered to the stone. Jalan's song filled Gyaidun, awakening his senses beyond anything he'd ever experienced. He'd sometimes heard the belkagen speak of the heart's eye, the vision that the enlightened were granted on the dreamroad, and for the first time he understood it. He saw beyond fleshy reality to the deeper life within it, saw Erun's tortured and tormented body, his imprisoned soul; latched onto it like a parasite was a cold darkness, a thing of never-ending hunger and malice. But even as Gyaidun watched, the dark thing's grip weakened. Three of the other sorcerers shrieked in confusion and fear, and their leader screamed, "No! You dare not! You dare not!" And then the dark thing was gone, and Erun fell upon the stone steps. He did not move, but with his new sight, Gyaidun could see life there-weak, faint, and hurt, but there. The remaining sorcerers turned all their strength and spells upon Jalan. Even the weak one loosed spell after spell as he clawed his way up the final steps. Jalan blocked or turned most of their spells, but some few managed to break through, and Jalan fell back, frost and ice forming where the blue shards of light struck him. Walking backward to Gyaidun and continuing to try to block their barrage, his song changed. It did not lessen in power but broadened in scope, and even Gyaidun, who had never studied the ways of priests or sorcerers, recognized it for what it was: A call. A summons. The sorcerers doubled their efforts, fanning out to hit Jalan both in front and to the sides. Still smiling, Jalan shouted, "Wed chai'el!" and a great wall of flame roared from the stones of the island between him and his foes. So great was the heat that Gyaidun backed away. In that moment of respite, his enemies cut off, Jalan turned to Gyaidun and extended his hand. The gash where Gyaidun had cut the palm still bled freely.

"Gyaidun," said a strong voice, the voice of the singer speaking through Jalan. "Time for you to trust me." Gyaidun reached out. He grasped Jalan's hand with his own bleeding palm, and their blood mingled anew. Gyaidun gasped, and the gasp turned into a laugh, for he saw whom Jalan had summoned.

Over the wind and crashing waves, through the roar of magic and the crackle of the flames, Amira heard something she had never heard nor hoped to hear: a laugh of pure, utter, unrestrained joy-and it was coming from Gyaidun. She tossed her hair out of her eyes and looked up from where she'd fallen at the bottom of the stone stairway. The four sorcerers had fanned out in a half-ring at the crown of the hill, and they faced a great wall of fire. But even as Amira watched, the four summoned a great wind off the sea and the flames bent and died. Amira pushed herself to her feet. Her skin was a mass of bruises, scrapes, and cuts. Her arm still throbbed from where the sorcerer had held her, and she'd twisted both her right knee and ankle in the fall. Agony flared in every injury, but she forced herself up the stairs. The sorcerer had taken her staff and thrown it away, but she knew she dared not take the time to look for it now. She still had a few spells of her own ready. She had to get to Jalan. Amira passed the body of the fallen sorcerer but did not spare it a glance. The sounds of spells and the incantations of the other sorcerers shook the air above her, and she forced herself to move faster. When her knee gave out on her, she crawled up, tearing her clothes on the rough stone of the stairway. She crested the hill, pulling herself over the final step and through the rubble of the broken wall, but the sight she saw there stopped her. Passing the dead tree in a slow, deliberate walk, the four sorcerers advanced upon… a god. Amira blinked and shook her head. No, it wasn't a god. It was Jalan, but a power-a living power-beyond anything she had ever experienced filled her son, and through him it held back the devil-possessed sorcerers. But she could see that he was at the limit of his powers, and the attacks of the sorcerers were breaking through more and more with each strike.

Kneeling beside Jalan and holding his hand was Gyaidun, but Amira scarcely recognized him. He was still covered in blood, he still bled freely from a dozen scratches and scrapes, and his long hair was still unbound and wild down his back. But in his face and behind his closed eyes was an expression that Amira could only describe as rapture. Then Gyaidun stood and opened his eyes. They shone like Jalan's, golden and bright. The weariness was gone from him, and he stood with the strength and power of a warrior in his prime. But in Gyaidun, too, Amira saw that the power was not his own, but came from something inside him. Something other. Recognition struck her. In Hro'nyewachu she had seen the last stand of Arantar, watched as these very sorcerers had destroyed his city and murdered him. But there had been that other, that strange power working through Arantar, that being that even the Fist of Winter had been unable to destroy. Amira recognized that same presence in her son, and standing next to him, shining through Gyaidun, was another. Combining their strength, Jalan and Gyaidun-or the beings in them-began to beat back the attacks of the sorcerers. Spells of darkness and cold met the power of light and life, and it was the cold darkness that broke and shattered. A great cry rent the air, and Amira saw the sorcerer who had crouched over Jalan under the Witness Tree, the one who seemed weaker than the others, fall to the ground. The unholy power within him was banished, the black magics that kept his ancient flesh upon his bones shattered, and he was a corpse before he struck the rocks. The leader of the sorcerers cried out, an incoherent shriek of rage. He loosed a barrage of spells at Jalan, but rather than block them or turn them aside, Jalan leaped into the air. At his summons the wind bore him up and over the sorcerers. He sailed over the boughs of the Witness Tree and came down upon the stone staircase next to the fallen body of Erun.

"NO!" cried the leader. Jalan knelt beside Erun and took his face in both hands. Erun's body spasmed, strength filling him, and he and Jalan stood together. The body of Gyaidun's son was still emaciated, but the corpse pallor was gone from his skin, and his eyes shone with the same light as Jalan and Gyaidun's. The three of them-Jalan, Erun, and Gyaidun-closed in on the sorcerers, who stood back to back. Amira scrambled to get out of the way. "No!" said the leader of the sorcerers. "Mercy! Remember mercy!" Jalan's smile faded, and an expression of great solemnity filled his face. "Today," he said,

"mercy meets justice." The leader's two remaining fellows forsook him, fleeing in either direction. One leaped over the edge, perhaps hoping to lose himself in the waves below, while the other summoned the winter winds to bear him up. But both ran into a gale summoned by the three beings of light and were flung back. They fell to the ground, writhing and screaming, one of them only an arm's length from where Amira huddled in the rubble. Like the one before them, the power of the devils faltered, their hold on the mortal bodies broken at last.

Before her eyes, Amira saw the body age decades in a few breaths. The flesh melted away beneath the skin, the eyes shriveled and sank, the remaining locks of hair blew away in the wind, and finally the skin itself peeled away. The leader stood before them, the tattered remains of his robe fluttering in the wind and sudden silence. He glanced at Gyaidun and Erun, then fixed his gaze on Jalan. "I will not bow before you, Vyaidelon," he said. "Nor your brothers. I will-" "Silence!" said a voice. It came from Jalan, but Amira knew it was the being inside him speaking. "Speak no more in this world. Go back to the hell that spawned you." Jalan, Erun, and Gyaidun raised their hands, and each of them was singing, a melodic chant in words Amira had never heard. The winter winds died, a few last snowflakes fell, and far overhead the gray ceiling of cloud split, and through it shone the noonday sun. A thick beam of light, almost like a great ladder joining earth to sky, fell upon the Isle of Witness, bathing everyone in its pure light. The leader screamed. Not the cry of a powerful sorcerer or a defeated lord, this was the shriek of a beast in agony. He ran, blinded by his own suffering, but tripped over the rubble that littered the old courtyard around the Witness Tree. He fell only a few paces from Amira. His body twisted and bounced on the rocks like grease dropped on a hot rock. Fists and feet hammered the earth, and with each strike Amira could hear bones snapping. Vyaidelon-for that's who he truly was now; he only wore Jalan's body-stood over the body and sang. The music was strong, but the melody sounded to Amira more like a dirge or even a sad lullaby than an incantation. With a final cry that scraped like sharp nails inside her ears, the thing inside the leader lost its grip. The back arched, the body taking in a long breath, then relaxed.

There, basking in the light of a sun that was beginning to fade back behind the clouds, Amira caught a fleeting glimpse of the young man he must once have been. A look of peace settled onto his face. And he died.