Age of Empyre Read online

  “Because we need new paths, new options.”

  Moya spat again and wiped her nose. “You gambled with my friends, with the eternity of their souls.”

  Beatrice turned to face her. “This isn’t a game, Moya, and you still have a part to play, so I can’t tell you anything more except Tekchin needs you. Love—knowing someone cares about you—is a powerful medicine, both on Elan and, especially, in here. It gives a person hope, and that is unbelievably powerful.”

  Chapter Four

  Losing the Light

  All too often, that which we are most certain of is that which we are the most wrong about; and that which we are wrong about can change everything. — The Book of Brin

  Gifford wandered the bleak landscape of craggy rocks, which were coated with layers of crystallized frost. Each step made a declarative crunch.

  Too loud, he thought, although he didn’t know why.

  The Abyss was desolate, deserted, and depressing. In comparison, Dureya, with its brittle grasses, vast skies, and cloudscapes, was a paradise of life and beauty. Gifford wandered the open plain between the two cliffs with no specific direction. He searched for help in a place he suspected held none. He felt heavy, burdened, and slow. Plus, his hip still hurt from the fall. The injury got worse the more he moved, or maybe he’d misjudged the initial extent of the damage. Walking was painful and noticeably tiring—at least in comparison with how it had been since his death. Contrasted with the thirty years he had lived, this was an almost insignificant hindrance, certainly when viewed against the backdrop of his inability to help Tesh and Tressa. And then there was Roan, or rather the lack of her, which made his quest all the more desperate. The Abyss, he discovered, was a realm of hopelessness.

  As Gifford stepped down to a lower shelf of rock, his hip twinged in pain. He put a hand to his side and worked at rubbing away the hurtful spasm. The effort succeeded, and the sensation faded.

  No body, he reminded himself. The pain is self-inflicted. This conjured a new and bewildering question: Why had Tressa and Tesh suffered so much more from their falls?

  The two had resembled collapsed tents, spread out in gruesome displays. Despite knowing they lacked bodies, they puddled in pain and wallowed in anguish. Gifford stepped up onto another shelf, and felt the stab in his hip again.

  And I can’t erase the idea of a wound that is getting worse. This realization disturbed Gifford. What does that mean? It seems we are our own worst enemies.

  A sound.

  He heard it, or thought he had.

  Gifford stopped and listened. Staring out into the dark, he tried to will it so.

  Nothing. Just wishful thinking.

  But in the absence of anything else, Gifford embraced hope and imagined the sound had come from a nearby rock wall, so he veered toward it. Vertical fissures appeared as violent scars in the dark-gray stone—the claw marks of some colossal beast. As he neared a cleft at its base, Gifford heard voices, or, more precisely, a voice.

  Something is inside.

  Gifford was aware he had thought something instead of someone. He remembered Brin telling him about a raow she had overheard in Alon Rhist, and that certainly couldn’t be described as a person. But in this new world, anything might be possible. Only the mental picture of Tesh’s and Tressa’s mangled bodies and their pleas for help drove him inside. Entering slowly, Gifford took time to allow his light to peel back the mystery of the interior. The entrance was narrow, but the fissure widened as he went deeper. He paused to listen. No sound. Maybe I’m mistaken. Caves were usually empty things. The noise had been so slight.

  I was wrong. This is the Abyss. It’s nothing but a void.

  “You’ve been a naughty girl, haven’t you?” A voice issued from deeper in the cave. “A very, very bad girl.”

  I know that voice!

  “You poisoned Daddy. Fed me something terrible and then watched me die, frothing like one of Gelston’s sheep. I can see why you landed here. The gods can’t forgive a killing like that.”

  Oh, dear Mother of All, not him! And who is he talking to? Gifford knew the answer, though he shoved it away, denied it the right to be. No! he thought. Not her! Not him! Moving deeper, rushing forward, Gifford’s light revealed the answer.

  Iver the Carver stood crouched in a small pocket-chamber. He looked soft, fat, and greasy. Gifford hadn’t noticed before, but seeing that pasty face and bags for cheeks and that extra ring of neck, he realized Iver was the only one on the dahl to have cut such a round figure. He wasn’t just fat and sagging due to his weight. He looked melted, like a candle left in the sun.

  Iver stooped over something that lay on the ground.

  “How’s my daughter, eh?” Iver cooed.

  Daughter?

  Iver noticed the light and turned. The wax man was dressed in rags, remnants of a long-forgotten tunic. Torn and threadbare as spiderwebs, the unraveled ends waved with the same eerie undulating motion as long hair underwater. Spittle glistened on Iver’s lower lip, and as small as his eyes were, they were wide with an eager joy. As Iver moved, Gifford gasped.

  Roan lay at his feet. She didn’t move except to quiver, didn’t speak except to moan.

  Instantly the cave grew bright as Gifford’s rage flared. “Let go of my wife!” he shouted.

  “Gifford? Gifford . . . the Cripple?” Iver stared in shock, backing up.

  Gifford wasn’t wearing armor, didn’t have his sword, but none of that mattered. He charged in with fury and a raised fist. “I said let her go!” The quiet potter of Dahl Rhen shook, but not with cold. His eyes were wide and wild, his jaw clenched.

  Iver cowered.

  “Touch her again and I’ll find a rock and spend eternity bashing your head in! You got that?” He was screaming then. “Do you understand me, you sick son of a bitch? You stay away from her!”

  Iver disappeared into the dark recesses of the cave as Gifford reached down and gently lifted Roan in his arms. She continued to cry as Gifford carried her out.

  “Don’t go out there,” Iver said from the shadows. “It’s not safe. The light . . . they will come for you.”

  At the sound of his voice, Roan shuddered.

  “It’s okay, Roan,” Gifford whispered. “I’ve got you. He’s gone. He won’t touch you anymore. I promise. I’ll tear him apart with my bare hands if he ever tries, so help me. With Eton as my witness and Elan as my judge, I swear it.”

  By the time Gifford had carried Roan back to the others, things had improved. While they still lay broken on the frost, both Tesh and Tressa had recovered somewhat. Instead of appearing crushed, Tesh’s head merely looked as if he’d been horribly beaten with a stout stick. Teeth were still missing, and his nose was askew, but at least his jaw seemed to be working. Tressa had not recovered nearly so much, though she had rolled to her side, and her twisted limbs had resumed what resembled proper alignment.

  Both could talk again.

  “You found Roan,” Tesh said. His head tilted slightly as he struggled to see. His jaw was working, but Tesh’s voice was weak and shaky.

  Gifford nodded as he laid Roan beside Tressa. He started to draw away, but Roan surprised him by latching onto his arm with surprising strength. “Don’t leave me.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” he assured her. “And you should know by now, I’ll never leave you.”

  Just the same, Roan pulled him into an embrace and held on. “So scared.”

  “If I could kill him for you, I would.”

  “Who?” Tesh asked.

  “Iver the Carver.”

  “Iver is down here?” Tressa asked, then winced in pain from the effort.

  Which wound troubled her was beyond Gifford’s ability to reckon. The woman was battered such that he couldn’t look at her. “He took Roan.”

  “And you found him?” Despite her obvious agony, Tressa managed a grin. “How’d that go?”

  “I didn’t need to do anything. I just yelled.”

  “Really? You let him go?”

  Gifford rolled his shoulders. “Roan’s all I care about.” He brushed the hair from her face. When he’d first found her, she had looked terrible. Not as bad as Tressa, but not far behind. Her face had been black and blue, bleeding from a dozen cuts. Like Tesh, some of her front teeth had been missing, her nose crushed, and one eye was pooling with blood. Now her teeth were back. Her eye was still red but clearing, and her nose only had a bad bruise. Like the others, she, too, was recovering. Each reclaimed a sense of themselves but at different rates. Roan outpaced the others, and as he watched the bruises began receding.

  “You look so much better,” he told her, tears watering his eyes.

  “You’re bringing me back,” she whispered, her lips trembling.

  “Do you know where Brin is?” Tesh asked, his voice growing steadier as he spoke. “See any trace of her out there?”

  Gifford shook his head. “There’s nothing. Wouldn’t have found Roan if I hadn’t heard Iver’s voice. He had dragged her into a cave.” Gifford searched his wife’s face. “Did he do anything to you?”

  Roan shook her head, eyes fixed on him as if unable to let go even for a moment. “Didn’t have time. He had more trouble carrying me than you did. He was exhausted from the effort. Thank you, Gifford. Thank you. I was so scared. To be alone—all alone . . . with him.”

  Roan shuddered.

  “I love you,” he said. “I always have and always will.”

  As if the words were magic, Roan calmed. She wiped tears from her eyes and under her own power rose to a sitting position. Then she smiled at him. “You’re my hero.”

  At the sound of those words and the sight of her happy face, Gifford realized he no longer felt pain. The ache of his hip was gone, and he felt oddly lighter.
br />   “You’re brighter,” Roan said. She took a moment to study him. “Your light—it’s more brilliant than when you first found me.”

  He shrugged. “You bring me back, too, I guess.”

  “Good thing,” Tressa said. “Dark down here—wherever here is.”

  Roan looked up toward the absent sky. “Did anyone else fall?”

  “Brin did,” Tesh said, then grunted as he struggled to lift his head. “So heavy. Can barely move.”

  “Like water,” Roan said. “When you dive under, the weight increases the deeper you go.”

  They each looked up and nodded as if they could see the weight.

  “I think this is what Tressa and Tesh were feeling up there.” Roan pointed. “But down here, with depth, it’s worse. It’s terrible. You feel it, don’t you, Gifford?”

  He shrugged. “A little. It was worse before—not so bad now. Just feel a bit sluggish is all.”

  “I wonder what happened to Brin?” Tesh said. “This Iver guy, do you think he might have done something to her, too?”

  “I didn’t see her,” Gifford said. “If I had—believe me—I would have brought her back, too.”

  “Of course, I didn’t mean . . .” Tesh swallowed, and Gifford couldn’t help but think it was blood filling his mouth. “I’m just scared.”

  “Trust me. I understand.”

  Roan shook her head. “Brin wasn’t there. Just me and Iver. He talked as if I were a present sent to him by the gods. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t talk.” She shivered.

  “You’re safe with me, now. I’m not a cripple anymore, and I might not be able to kill that old bastard, but if he ever threatens you again, I’ll make him wish I could.”

  “I’m not scared,” she told him, and once more she pulled him close and laid her head on his shoulder. “It’s just that—it’s cold down here.”

  She shivered again, and seeing her do so had the same effect as witnessing a yawn. Tressa began to shiver and then Tesh did as well.

  “It is cold, isn’t it?” Gifford looked around, searching for a solution, but he saw only the unending broken plain, the root cellar of the world. “Maybe we should make another fire.”

  Roan’s eyes widened with fear.

  “I don’t think the queen can reach us down here, Roan.” Gifford glanced up but saw nothing: no queen, bankors, or even the top of the crevasse. Everything beyond the reach of Gifford’s light was the same—darkness. “Don’t think anyone can.”

  Roan shook her head. “Nothing to burn.”

  “Don’t need anything. It’s not real fire.”

  Roan trapped her quivering lower lip between her teeth. She looked back at him with trepidation. “I don’t know how to without wood.” She seemed worried about letting him down.

  “That’s okay,” he told her. “I don’t even know if we can make fire here.”

  The Abyss felt like another place, a forgotten corner of the afterlife, and who knew what worked or didn’t at the bottom of the world. In Rel and the upper levels of Nifrel, people were able to use their eshim to craft their surroundings into a place of their liking. But this place was a blank canvas—no, not a canvas, the frame. Gifford imagined all of Phyre might have been like the Abyss when the first dead arrived. The weight and pressure wasn’t as crippling in the highlands, so those like Ferrol and Drome had been able to exert their wills and craft a place to their liking. But down in the depths of the Abyss, wills were crushed, and eshim in short supply. There wasn’t enough to alter the landscape.

  “It’s not the fire that’s important. We’re looking at it all wrong. We’re not really even cold. It’s the idea of warmth that we need.”

  “I do feel warmer beside you,” Roan admitted.

  He nodded. “It’s like the well in the Rhen village in Rel. More people, more eshim.”

  Roan looked at the open expanse. “The cold isn’t real, but the idea is. We think it’s freezing because it looks that way. Out here in the open, on this frozen ground, we can’t help thinking icy thoughts.”

  “If we can find shelter, someplace small like Iver’s cave, we might be able to imagine our body heat warming one another. I think that would help. Then we could work on finding a way out of here.” Gifford considered driving Iver out and taking his cave, but he suspected that revisiting his place might be worse for Roan than sitting in the open.

  “A way out?” Tressa said, stunned.

  “We fell,” he said. “Seems reasonable we can climb out, right?”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  “Well, sure,” Gifford admitted. “Right now, nothing feels possible, but once we find shelter, everything will seem better. Roan, can you walk?”

  “I think so.” She bent her legs, pushing to her knees. “I think maybe, yes.”

  Gifford looked at Tesh.

  “I’m not going anywhere.” The man was still laid out on the stone.

  Gifford didn’t bother asking Tressa. The woman resembled a sack of snapped sticks. He couldn’t carry them all.

  It’s hopeless.

  “Gifford?” Roan said. “What’s wrong? Your light . . . it’s dimming again.”

  “Sorry I—I don’t know what causes that.”

  “Hope,” she said. “Faith, maybe. That’s what must give us the power to push back against the dark.”

  “Foolish optimism,” Tressa said. “Which I just don’t get, by the way.” She lifted her eyes to stare at Gifford because lifting her head appeared impossible. “You lived a life of misery, spat on by everyone including the gods—no, especially the gods. I was better off than you—for a time, at least. Then you’re granted a handful of not entirely appalling years, and now you’re Mister Sunshine, all bright and cheerful. How’s that possible?”

  “I have Roan,” he replied. “And very low expectations. It doesn’t take much to make me happy.”

  “But you’re not happy,” Roan said. “Your light, it’s still getting weaker. What’s wrong?”

  Gifford tried to will himself brighter, but that didn’t work. “I don’t know what to do. All of you are hurt. I want to help, but I don’t know how. I’m feeling—I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed and a lot scared.”

  “We’re dragging you down with us,” Roan said.

  Gifford’s light grew fainter. “You’re no weight to me, Roan.”

  “I’m certainly no support,” Tressa said.

  Tesh, who had been trying to roll to his side, gave up. Roan, too, settled back to resting on her elbows.

  I’m losing them, Gifford thought, and once more his light weakened.

  “Giff . . . ard,” Roan said, squeezing him. “Dun’t let it git to ouu.” Her words were slurred. Her mouth—something was wrong with it. Her front teeth—she’s missing them again!

  Gifford felt the cold rush in. He shivered, and his light, once as strong as a lantern in the night, became little more than a flickering candle. He felt the weight pushing down, pinning him to the frost.

  He clutched Roan, wrapped his arms around her, squeezing tight. There was still warmth there as long as he had her. “I love you,” he said, hoping the magic would work again.

  Roan looked up and smiled, showing perfect teeth.

  Tressa, who by then was lying with her cheek on the frost, staring out across the plain, whispered, “What in Phyre is that?”

  In the distance, a light appeared—a dazzling sight just above the horizon.

  “It’s like the morning star,” Roan said.

  “Don’t go out there,” Iver had warned. “It’s not safe. The light . . . they will come for you.”

  “It’s getting bigger.” Gifford hugged Roan tighter, until he was afraid he might hurt her. “It’s coming at us.”

  Fearfully gazing at the brilliance that grew larger by the second, the four held their collective breath. They lay directly in its path.

  Who are they? Gifford wondered.

  A moment later, he realized it wasn’t a they, but a who, and she was beyond brilliant.

  Running up to them, Brin shouted, “Tesh!”

  To find anyone in the Abyss was wonderful; to find him was a joy. Yet this was the last place she would have wished Tesh to be.

  He looked terrible, all mangled, mutilated, and sprawled out on the hard ground. Tressa looked worse. Roan was better, Gifford the best, but none of them looked good.