The Arcana: Shadow Wars, Codex I

Chapter XXXIV

The Choices

In which the die is cast

My name is Selàna. My name is Selàna. And my mother is alive.

Zephyra’s mind reeled. Mentally she could not get her bearings. Every muscle in her body felt as if she were pulling a wagonload of bricks and stones. She sagged, exhausted. The day had thrown so many shocks at her, and the sun had not gone down yet.

Yet still she lived.

True to the seer’s words, she lived. Her heart skipped a beat as she relived the Siluran’s assault on her. If the Lyrcanian man hadn’t been there, would the Siluran have killed her? His presence alone saved her, because she was now helpless, thanks to the Eitanim. With the silver cuffs on her wrists they took away her powers.

Physically she might have retaliated…but the look on the woman’s face checked her: not spite, not malice, but anguish. Pain that showed through above her rage. Somehow, in some fashion, Zephyra had hurt this woman. And it was this thought that troubled her.

Anger she would have shrugged off. Anger didn’t move her, as she would expect an ideological opponent to be angry with her. Even Alia destroying her altar made sense, for Zephyra would have cheerfully destroyed an altar to the Huntress. Had she not also looked forward to the destruction of Arenavachi’s stele?

But pain? The agony in the Siluran woman’s eyes made Zephyra feel diminished. Small. Every excuse she would have made, every lie she might have told herself crumbled before the Siluran’s distress. The accusations she made against Zephyra were not delusions. When Amavand and Artostes and made their plans, Zephyra had sat high in their council. She knew the plans for Rasena Valentis, for Lyrcania, for Anshan. Orders to destroy this or that must of course result in the deaths of those involved, and intellectually Zephyra knew that.

But those deaths were irrelevant.

Necessary.

To overthrow the False Ones and make manifest the Greatest One meant sacrifices must be made. Once She appeared and took Her rightful place, the sacrificial offerings would surely feel honored for the roles they unwittingly played in bringing about the Greatest One.

But here one of those offerings stood, and Zephyra’s certainty came crashing down. The only thing tether she could cling to now was that the prophet had not led her astray. Giving up Amavand’s knife did buy her some mercy. Even if doing so made her heart wrench a little. Amavand giving her the knife had been a sign of his love. His trust. She had nothing left of his, and she never would if the strangers prevailed.

Anger surged in her, and she wasn’t sure if it was directed at herself or Amavand. Why did she miss him? Why did she cleave to what affection she thought he’d shown her? He had lied to her, kept her from her family. He’d alienated her from the regard of decent people.

Every time the others looked at her, their eyes blazed and their lips curled. The Salamandra meant it when he said he would burn her, and no one protested the possibility when he’d grabbed her hand. Her hand! Zephyra held it up and examined it closely. The Salamandran’s warmth had not lingered, and she sighed her relief.

The soldiers of Elamis despised her. When she told them she hadn’t sent the blood fiends after their children, she spoke truly. In strict terms she spoke truly. Yet. The fiends were part of her faction. She had served with Artostes; had been as much his student as Amavand had been.

Her hands were not clean.

In good time they came to the temple. To her surprise they used a servant’s entrance, rather than the main one.

“The people will want to rip her up. We can’t let them do that on sacred ground. They shouldn’t bring disaster on themselves because of her,” one of the soldiers explained to the Philomelos woman.

“Understood,” she agreed.

What did the Lyrcanian call her? Optima Philomelos? From what little Zephyra knew of Rasena Valentis, optima meant the woman came from the “optimates” class of Rasena Valentian society. Either she held significant land holdings which brought her wealth, or her father had served honorably in the legions of Rasena Valentis.

Which meant the damaged finery she wore when confronting Amavand was not a ruse. Her ploy to make herself seem like “one of you” to the Elamisi was not a ruse. On the line between truth and falsehood, yet again the Siluran and her faction fell on the side of the truth.

A lump grew in Zephyra’s throat. Was everything she knew a lie?

Inside the temple, Arenavachi’s acolytes awaited them, and ushered them inside.

“Are you taking us to the grotto?” Optima Philomelos asked. “There’s something we need to do there.”

An acolyte affirmed as much, and Optima Philomelos nodded with undisguised satisfaction. Zephyra gave her a sidelong glance. What was the Siluran up to?

Inside the grotto, a cluster of Salamandra awaited them, along with violet-robed Eitanite priests. They turned to see her when she entered the room. Hard, flinty eyes met hers. Some people folded their arms across their chests, others openly put a hand to their weapons. The crowd maneuvered, some shifting forward, some shifting back until they formed a phalanx. Once completed they exchanged glances with each other, nodding in agreement before turning their full weight on her.

Allied against her. And well they might be; her gaze strayed to the spot where she had killed Gira. As expected, no blood remained to mark the desecration. All trace of her crime had been wiped away, and when she breathed deeply the scent of hyssop came to her. But regardless, everyone in the room knew what she had done.

“What’s happened?” the Lyrcanian and Optima Philomelos asked at the same time. They didn’t seem to notice the crowd’s hostility, but then, it was not directed at them.

Optima Philomelos added, “Did Zareen Prime and General Shirzad make it out?”

“Yes, and trust they are in the care of the Restorites,” an acolyte replied.

Fravak beckoned them with a flick of his fingers. He was looking into the Well. With her lightning quiver Optima Philomelos prodded Zephyra forward, and they drew even with the priest.

Zephyra’s spine stiffened when she saw the scene in the pool. Ironwing and the Eitanite woman still lived, but something was in the gate room with them.

Recognition made her heart skip a beat.

Let’s see how strong you are.

That’s what Artostes had said, years ago, as he escorted her to what he called the proving grounds. Only later did she learn the room was truly the antechamber of the shadow gate.

It had been a harrowing night for her. She had struggled mightily to awaken from a never-ending stream of bloodcurdling nightmares, only to learn as she awakened just why she couldn’t scream.

A bakhtak perched on her belly, crushing the breath out of her.

The hideous creature grinned down at her in obvious amusement at her distress. Breathless, she could not gasp or call for the guards to aid her. She had groped in vain for some sort of weapon, but nothing was near except her pillows. She had tried to writhe her way free, but the fight made her breathing harder, and with each hard-won breath the bahktak grew heavier. It let out a strange sound, somewhere between a bark and a laugh.

Zephyra stopped struggling. No sound emerged from her lips when she parted them to scream. Tears coursed down her cheeks as at last the futility of her struggle sank in. Desperate, she clutched her amulet and tore its chain from her throat. An amulet of the Greatest One, a gift for her fifteenth birthday, which had passed that day. She brought it to her lips as her sight began to dim.

Did she have to die this way? What enemy had sent the nightmare beast after her? She lashed out, shoving the amulet into the bakhtak’s mouth. Its breath was hot on her fingers. She recoiled at the saliva coating its teeth and tongue, but she forced herself to drive her hand further in, raking the hard edges of the amulet against the creature’s tongue until she found its throat. She let go of it, dropping the amulet down the gullet of the beast. It leapt up, clutching its throat.

Zephyra coughed violently and smiled, pulling her legs up from under the beast and drawing her knees to her chin. She braced her back against the headboard and raised her legs still more, keeping both her feet together. Putting every ounce of strength into it, she shoved, straightening her legs so that her knees locked on impact.

The bakhtak fell backward, allowing her to scramble off her bed. The creature danced frantically, hopping from one stubby leg to the other. Zephyra raced for her altar. In her haste she dashed herself against it, but did not regard the pain; so intent was she on groping for her knife. Her fingers at last closed around the handle. Normally she used the little knife to make small offerings of doves and any other bird she loved. Now instead she slit her own hand open.

“In the name of the Greatest One,” she cried in her triumph, “I banish you from my sight!”

The bakhtak vanished, its screams echoing on the walls.

Only then did the guards come. They brought her to Lord Protector Amavand. When Zephyra explained what happened, he summoned Artostes to his chambers. The two men exchanged glances when she repeated the part where she killed the nightmare arsh’atûm.

“My daughter is ready for the test,” Amavand had insisted, pride edging his voice.

The Lyrcanian man snapped her out of her reverie. He was explaining to the others what sort of creature the jiangshi was.

“It’s a kind of soul thief,” he was saying. “It sucks your life out of your body.”

Optima Philomelos’s hand flew to her lips, and all color drained from her face. A small moan escaped her.

From the corner of her eyes Zephyra stared at her. If her friends died, the Siluran would likely consider it justice if Zephyra should die, too.

The others erupted at news of a soul thief. Zephyra’s head began to pound as she tried to follow the thread of the cacophany. Quickly, one thing became clear: none of them had heard of the jiangshi, nor did they know how to counter it.

Unnoticed, she backed away from them. All of them were focused on the Well. On their terror for their friends. From their point of view, she ceased to exist. Possibly because they intended to make her cease existing in short order.

The door was clear.

Zephyra could escape if she wished.

But instead she scrambled up a rock formation overlooking the Well. She let out a loud, high-pitched trill with her tongue, ululating as though in celebration.

As one they whirled about. Seeing her, their hands went back to their weapons. Instantly Zephyra broke off. She suppressed a smile. These people would rejoice at her death; no sense in recklessly provoking them. Three of them were already starting forward, their shock worn off. She stopped them in their tracks with her next words.

“I know how to kill that thing.”

The jiangshi leapt high and landed with such force that the ground shook. Edana, impervious to trembling ground, remained upright. Unfortunately, one of the guardsmen pinwheeled for a heart stopping moment, crashing into one of his fellow guards. The second guardsman pitched forward, across Tregarde’s barrier. In the blink of an eye the jiangshi unfurled its tongue, coiling it around the watchmen’s neck and yanking the man to him.

“Zhubin!” Captain Darasha cried.

The jiangshi received Zhubin in its outstretched claws, which were so long they spanned the entire width of the watchman’s back when it grasped his shoulders. The claws impaled Zhubin, piercing his armor and sinking into his back, putting an end to the man’s struggles.

The monster opened its mouth and made a sucking noise that made Edana’s insides freeze. It stole the breath right from the watchman’s lungs before anyone could even react. The jiangshi finished him quickly. Long and slick, its tongue curled around Zhubin’s torso. Thrills of terror rippled through Edana’s body when the tongue lifted Zhubin off his feet. Without any effort, the tongue hurled the watchman’s lifeless body, sending the corpse flying right at Tregarde and Alia. They dodged right and left. The corpse crashed against the wall with a crunch before crumpling to the floor.

Yet again the Salamandra unleashed their fire, but the jiangshi leapt once more, retreating into the tear in the shadow gate barrier.

Stunned, motionless, everyone froze. Edana eyed the damaged shadow gate with open suspicion. She worked loose the bandages on her right hand. The cut she’d made for her blood bonding had come open during her fight, and she bled anew.

Edana darted over to Tregarde’s shield barrier, stopping short of where she’d last glimpsed one of the gate seals. She held her hand over the seal, palm down. The droplets fell, and she quickly waved her arm in a wide arc.

A violet light flashed from somewhere near her feet. In an instant the miasma retreated. Edana allowed herself a small smile of triumph. Now she had a better view of the boundaries for the first ring of the seals. In reverse of how she came she went left, dropping her blood onto each seal in the ring. The death wind retreated from every seal Edana closed.

Alia unleashed her amulet, aiming for the shadow gate. Narsai and the four remaining priests joined her in short order. A silvery have undulated beneath the arch of the shadow gate, but their shield was incomplete over the gate. Tregarde hurried forward, redrawing his shield line to account for the new boundary Edana had made.

But soon enough Edana came to the center of the room, directly across from the open shadow gate. Here she stopped, unwilling to come closer to the gate.

Baleful eyes still glared out at them.

At that moment Khorshid appeared beside her, unleashing another tongue of fire toward the rapidly closing rift.

“Fall back,” he commanded.

Alia’s original stratagem called for them to close the front door to the gate room, and work their way to the second, sealing off their every step along the way. Closing the first door would oblige the shadow beasts to concentrate on the second. More to the point, it would trap the infernal creatures in the room, allowing for more destructive tactics.

Edana stepped back. Movement from the corner of her eye brought her to an instant halt.

Captain Darasha shouted.

She whirled, then gasped.

Zhubin’s corpse jerk itself upright, as if pulled from above by an invisible string. Those standing nearest the once-dead officer reflexively scrambled back, out of reach of Zhubin’s newly forming claws. However, Darasha advanced, swinging wildly with his sword, but the creature leapt over his head. Its tongue lashed out as it jumped, wrapping around Darasha’s neck like a scarf, and continuing down his torso, immobilizing him. Darasha retained his sword by sheer force of will, but it was of no use to him.

The jiangshi landed once, behind Darasha, then leapt again, high enough to force Darasha off his feet. It landed hard, cratering the ground. The bones in Darasha’s legs audibly cracked as they broke.

Alia and Narsai had almost closed the shadow gate. Zhubin’s jiangshi tongue became a lasso, spinning Darasha wildly over his head like a bullet in a sling. The tongue let go, sending the watch captain hurling over to Alia. Just in time she ducked, and the man passed over her head. Though only for the space of ten heartbeats, the break in her concentration shrank the shield she was making over the shadow gate. Setting back her efforts.

Darasha landed on his back, directly in front of the gate. The seals had not been neutralized there, and he screamed as the death powers roiled over him.

This time; however, several claws shot through the shadow gate. These hands were the size of men’s hands, and they reached for the screaming captain. The claws seized the captain and snatched him from their sight.

Before anyone could react, the jiangshi moved again, latching its tongue this time onto Tregarde’s neck. With his sacred moonbow-steel knife, Tregarde slashed up. In one stroke he severed the creature’s unnaturally long tongue. He danced backward as the jiangshi fell, unwinding the severed member from his throat. He swung it over his head, then brought it down, slapping the jiangshi’s head with enough force to knock a man senseless.

Two of the Salamandra pounced then. They dashed over to the jiangshi, their swords aglow with their holy fire. Two quick swipes and the jiangshi was no more.

“Fall back!” Alia shouted.

The shield she and her fellow priests were creating over the shadow gate still remained incomplete. With the other gate seals still active, her methods would require time.

Time she would not be permitted to have; something on the other side of the shadow gate was fighting them. Sweat drenched the priests, dripping into their eyes so they were temporarily blinded. Could they outlast whatever was on the other side of the the gate?

So long as Alia’s barrier was incomplete the priests could be distracted, or worse, killed, by whatever came through.

“It’s a trap,” Edana whispered.

The thing on the other side was toying with them.

“Back now,” Alia said through gritted teeth.

The obvious strain in her voice prompted all of them to hurry to the second door. Leaving the priests to do battle alone.

A gargantuan talon shot through the gate rift, large enough to seize a scorpion man … or three or four ordinary men.

Serrated blades lined the bottom of its forearm. Edana’s heart pounded. Could it be?

Alia and the others shifted, aiming for the talons even as they fell back, moving for the door.

Just as she suspected, the creature the hand belonged to slipped through the shadow gate with ease.

Edana’s heart sank.

The gigalion.

“Stop it, right now,” the Lyrcanian demanded. “Just stop. Whatever you’re planning, whatever you think you’re going to do—”

Zephyra snapped, “Truth-seers, come now. There’s no time for this, come to me.” She held her hands palms up.

They didn’t move. No one moved.

Frustration made her grit her teeth. Of course they were resisting her. It was sensible. Likely the echomancers explained to the others how she murdered Gira: with her touch alone. Perhaps they believed she could do worse than kill them by touching them. How could they know the limits of her abilities? She stood outside the order of things as they knew them, and they would ascribe any infernal ability at all to her.

Patiently she said, “I was trained for this. That creature is a jiangshi as I said. You can kill it with its reflection, or with stakes from the peach tree. There’s one in the garden we passed through—”

“And how should we get to the garden?” Optima Philomelos asked. “If this is a ploy to let you walk through Erebossa again—”

“And why in the world should we believe you?” the Lyrcanian man pursued. “Why would you be trained to fight these creatures? Aren’t they allied with your goddess?”

“They were practice,” Zephyra replied, and tried to still herself against the memory. “And you’re wrong; the jiangshi are not in the power of the goddess, because they’re native here. They are your own dead, come back to this world when the living do things they ought not to regarding the dead. The people of Xia know of them. Listen to me: in every session, the jiangshi was the penultimate creature that appeared. After it came one of the Atta’u. Who do you think is on the other side of the shadow gate?”

Everyone in the assembly before her exchanged wary glances with each other. Not one of them looked as if they believed her.

If the Atta’u arrived, Ironwing and the Eitanite were done for. The Greatest One, Rahqu, had declared those women her enemy. Now that Zephyra knew Rahqu for a liar, the safest course was to assume that whatever she wanted she must not have. Including the humans whose deaths she sought. In some fashion or other those specific humans threatened her, and killing them would bring her a victory.

Except Zephyra was not going to let her win so easily.

She looked straight at Optima Philomelos and pointed to her. “Optima Philomelos. Time is short. You wanted me in this room for a reason. Let’s do this.”

The others stared at the Siluran, who did not appear to be perturbed at all by their attention. Instead she folded her arms beneath her bosom and addressed them calmly.

“She has no memory of her true self,” she said patiently, and flicked a glance at the Well.

Silence as the others digested this.

If Zephyra drank the water, she would remember her true identity. And remember also her father and her mother. Did not Arenavachi’s name mean “the Truthsayer”?

Optima Philomelos hesitated, then beckoned to her. The Siluran maintained a neutral expression as she looked over Zephyra. Or rather, Zephyra had supposed the woman had meant to look neutral. But for all that the Siluran had demonstrated a mastery of crowds, she had not grown up in the court of the protector: her eyes gave her away.

Hope.

Hope drove the foreign woman. And perhaps, perhaps, the memory of Zephyra—Selàna’s—mother? Optima Philomelos had acted as if she was insulting Zephyra by declaring her wanting in comparison to her mother.

Once Zephyra descended to the ground Guileless Fravak strolled up to her. He held an orichalcum rhyton, a horn-like cup, molded at the bottom in the shape of a lion’s head.

“Drink from the Well and your memory will be restored,” he said. “Drink from the Well and you will know truth from lies.”

She took the cup from him and peered into it. Pure, crystalline water which did not show her reflection, only the beaten red gold of the cup.

If she drank from the water, she would die. Everything she was would die. All her thoughts, dreams, sorrows, joys, everything that made her who she was, would be annihilated with a sip from this cup.

But it was no loss.

“Zephyra” had been a construct, a lie carefully seeded and nurtured so that it might bloom for some terrible purpose.

However—Zephyra had not been weak. She had not shied from the truth. Now she would not shy from her end.

Drink.

She drank.

At first the water merely cooled her tongue, refreshing her in a way she had never been refreshed before.

Then it happened.

Stars burst in on her vision, everything spun before her eyes, and her mind spun, too. Her nerves jangled as she screamed, the fire inside consuming her.

The floor vanished. Unmoored, she plunged to hidden depths. Or was she? She fell and she fell and she fell, never once landing.

That was when she saw It.

Monstrous, revolting to behold, a many-tentacled arsh’atum reached for her. The thing moved so fast she could not hope to escape it. Screaming, Zephyra twisted and turned as she dodged the relentless tentacles.

A column of white fire surged before her and around her, enveloping her entirely so that she could not move or even attempt to escape without destroying herself.

A queenly voice rang out, “Trespasser! Thief in My abode. Where I am you will flee. Where I walk you must wither. Begone from My house. Begone from My sight. Your work is undone, I have destroyed it past your mending. Begone! In My name, begone!”

The monster shrank away, fleeing at once, though it howled with a rage that shook Zephyra to her core. The queenly voice came from all sides of the column of fire, but the speaker did not reveal herself. Slowly, the column vanished, but not before the voice spoke again.

“You have drank of My waters. I am restored to you. Walk now in memory. Walk now in truth.”

Her great fall ended. The last thing Zephyra heard was the voice of Optima Philomelos asking,

“Is she dead?”

“No. She will awaken.”