The Kallanon Scales (47 page)

“There will be
no recrimination, I swear it. If we are to deal with the Dragon, we
must have trust. I shall remain here until that happens.”

“Gods, what
about the Murs?” Camot shouted out. “My Lord, they will attack
soon.”

“Then you will
fight them, war leader.”

Levin turned
to study Camot with speculation and Camot subsided. His Vallorin
gave him status in the freedom he bargained for.

Levin nodded.
“Very well, we accept. However, the bars cannot be removed just so.
We fashioned them to prevent a prisoner using magic to escape.”

“It cannot be
undone from within, my Lord,” Caltian said, “and will take time to
dismantle from without.”

“We shall
begin immediately,” an Overlord said.

Krikian
groaned theatrically.

Torrullin’s
lips quirked. “Allow me.” He waved his hands once, a sharp gesture,
and the bars surrounding the team vanished without thought and
trace. One moment they were there and then they were gone.

A gasp went up
and the Overlords scrambled back, while Force stepped inward to
tighten the perimeter. Chaos resulted. In the midst of it, the
freed prisoners were unmoving.

Levin
blanched, but held his ground.

“I am not
going anywhere,” Torrullin said.

The Creed
Controller stood for long minutes in the disorder before moving to
confer with others.

“This will not
hold you,” Caltian said.

Torrullin
faced the shattered man. Caltian still knelt. “Your cell is
excellent and it would hold most anyone. It drew the Dragon as
intended. There is nothing absent in your power.”

“You are not
most anyone.”

“Neither are
you. This is only part of your destiny.”

Caltian’s eyes
lowered. “I have failed.”

“No, you are
to fulfil your naming another time.”

“My Lord,
forgive …”

“There is
nothing to forgive. I learned something tonight. The Dragon is
impulsive, greedy and impatient as I had not thought him to be, and
difficult to control. All of this gives me ammunition to use
against …”

“My Lord!” Krikian shouted, his voice carrying over the
chaos. “
Look
!”

Torrullin
looked. Up.

Two Dragons
descended from out of the dark sky and sank their talons into
Tristamil and Tymall. They vanished and it was untraceable
sorcery.

Torrullin
urgently waved his cell away, and Quilla was there, holding tight
to his arm as he made to follow where he knew not to go.

“Enchanter,
you cannot!”

The noise, the
fearful screams, was overpowering, but Caltian heard that.

Enchanter. All
gods. Like Nemisin. His cell was a flimsy thing after all.

The Dragon-man
was free.

Dragons once,
hidden now

hold in their
palms

a glorious
green sword

a beautiful
blue sword

the magic that
will

slay the old
monsters

~

Star
Chamber

T
he brothers were brought to an
octagonal chamber.

Ceiling, walls
and floor were ebony with tiny points of light recessed into all
surfaces. It was akin to floating among stars and was as silent as
space.

In the centre,
a black cylinder rose from the floor, and on it, two glowing
swords.

A blue sword,
a green blade. A scrying came to pass.

Tymall moved
to approach and a booming sound stopped him.

“Not yet.
First there is the final trial.”

Tymall glanced
at his twin, seeing health and confidence, but Tristamil ignored
him and studied the chamber. He was unafraid and it made Tymall
angry.

“You are not
concerned?”

Tristamil did
not turn. “Everything has its place.” The two Dragons melted
through the walls, which he doubted he could duplicate. He touched
the wall. Stone, not magic.

“You are
correct in your estimation.” The booming voice again. They could
not tell whether male or female, but it spoke Valleur and was hard
on their ears.

“What is
this?” Tymall burst out, pacing madly. “Where are we? Who are you?
Show yourself!”

“Have no fear,
we are not here to harm you.”

Tristamil
stepped closer to the swords and looked upon them with hands folded
behind his back. “You altered reality recently.”

“Correct,
young lord.”

“What?” Tymall
screeched.

“There is no
way out, is there?” Tristamil surmised.

“There is
always a way out.”

“How can you
be so calm?” Tymall shouted. “Look what we have been through!”

“Quiet, Ty.
You will learn nothing in hysteria.”

A chuckle
filled the chamber, bouncing off the walls. Both winced. “The two
sides. You are truly opposite.”

Tymall paced,
muttering and cursing, and Tristamil ignored him, gazing at the
swords. They drew him. He sensed the kind of influence that caused
difference to the future. The glows from the two weapons reflected
on his face, blue and green fireflies in his eyes.

“May I?” he
asked in a low tone.

“Not yet,” an
equally soft voice sounded, this one clearly female. “You may
touch, but it will not release until you are ready.”

Tymall rushed
at his brother and grabbed him. “Are you selling me out?”

Tristamil
heaved him off, throwing him to the floor. “I am not you, Ty, and
this time you are on your own. Save yourself, it is entirely up to
you.”

“I aim to and
I am not taking you with me!” Wiping spittle from his mouth, Tymall
rose.

“You chose in
your altered realities to become one breed of soul.” The voice was
gentle now.

“Get to the
point,” Tymall snapped.

“You chose the
dark, your brother the light.”

“There was
choice? It was foisted upon me!”

“You chose
your way out, Tymall. However, it has not been an entire cycle of
the universal day, which means you have before you a final
opportunity to renege.”

“I must do it
over?” There was panic in Tymall’s tone.

“My decision
…” Tristamil said.

“Whatever you
believe, you will have this time. Then is your answer final. You
will not experience alteration again, you are to witness your
past.”

“Who are you?”
Tristamil said.

“I am the
voice, altered now to your auditory senses, of Queen Abdiah,
eighty-sixth Dragonne ruler.”

Tymall sat,
leaning against the cylinder. The glows danced in his knotted,
streaked hair. Despite his returned health, he was thin and
appeared scruffy and half-dressed in overlarge breeches and
waistcoat pilfered as he left the clearing on Lucan.

Tristamil wore
black, clothes borrowed from his father. He continued to wear the
variety of reed and grass bangles he fashioned on his soul’s
journey - a tangible reminder, and a personal badge of honour. He
was clean-shaven and Vannis cut his hair short. Physically, the
brothers were also in opposition.

Queen Abdiah
continued. “Allow me to begin with a little history. We are the
Kallanon. We are not of this universe, we are from another where we
fought terrible wars - wars of greed, wars of gender, wars of
sorcery and wars where light fought dark. Peace does reign in our
reality, but is tenuous. That destabilising factor is the reason we
are here now.” Her voice quieted as if she pondered and neither
brother broke the silence. “My court and I followed the trail of a
telling to this place. The last war we fought resulted in supremacy
of the Light. We won, but one wonders daily, hourly, how long it
will hold, and that is why we are here.”

“I do not
understand,” Tristamil said.

“There is to
be war here, young lord. Lumin versus Darak, as you say in this
realm. The outcome will determine in which spirit we return
home.”

“That is too
glib.”

“There are
intricacies. One would be your trials, the one completed and this
final one, and that leads to your possession of the swords. Another
intricacy is the likelihood of Neolone’s release. He will call to
the Darak Dragons, and then perhaps we Kallanon will fight the
final battle here.”

“Neolone?”
Tymall growled.

“The Dragon in
symbiosis with your father.”

“Where do the
swords come into it?” Tristamil queried.

“That will
become clear.”

“Is yours the
same prophecy?”

“The Kallanon
are not farseers. Until this telling, there was no precedent. All
Kallanon know it in our realm and had we not won the last war, you
would now be dealing with the other side. Neolone, we learned,
spoke the prophecy of the swords here, which shows how far across
time and barriers our own telling meant to reverberate. Neolone’s
is a direct result of other tellings, as he himself came to this
time in knowing them.”

“Our
father.”

“He is the
One. He is the reason we have come.”

“What?” Tymall
burst out. “Goddess, always the Enchanter!”

“Why?”
Tristamil asked.

“I cannot
reveal that until your trial is complete.”

“Well, get on
with it! I find this tiresome.”

“Ty!
Enough.”

“Let him be.
He is right, it is time. Behold your past.”

Eight years
old.

A lesson in
their father’s study. Told to leave, to close the door, because
their father expected a visitor. Standing outside inquisitive and
for once in agreement, jostling to press ears to the wooden
door.

Quilla came
and, although it was cold in the corridor, they wanted to know why
the visit was secret. Their father’s final summation beyond the
door, he is Destroyer also and may feel affinity to a son bent
towards evil.

That was the
day both became aware of the terrible duality in their father.
Tristamil was aghast, Tymall triumphant.

As the chamber
returned, Tristamil reflected on what he missed that day, being too
young - they were the halves of their father. They were aware of it
now, but then it took on indistinct form, and was instrumental in
the long protection he embarked upon, veiling someone he
loathed.

Tymall, for
his part, was envious. His father was able then, was able now, of
aligning the two forces into a workable relationship, something he,
Tymall, attempted unconsciously growing up, often failing, and in
failing striking out in inexplicable fury.

A stabbing.

Tymall hefting
a butcher’s knife in his small hand, charging at the cook, angry
for being denied a treat, and Tristamil running along the corridor
leading to the kitchens on hearing terrified screams, the two
scenes occurring simultaneously, overlaid, yet separate without
confusion.

A struggle,
the bruising kitchen floor, the cook staring at Tristamil, eyes
brimming with tears. Not merely tears of pain, but grateful
appreciation.

“She knew!”
Tymall burst out when the scene vanished.

“I did not
realise,” Tristamil murmured, and his heart warmed for that lost
boy in the kitchen. Someone saw through the veil, someone knew
him.

“Why didn’t
she say anything?”

Tristamil
glared at his brother.

Tymall
laughed. “She wouldn’t have lived long, I guess.”

“Father would
not have believed her.”

“Does that
make you angry, brother?”

“Bugger off,
Ty. Everything has its place.”

“Philosophical
of you! Do you feel better when you mouth those platitudes?”

The mosaic pool
intruded, and Tristamil caught his breath anew, duplicating his
shock then. Tymall came too close.

Saska lay at
the bottom of the pool. On the balcony Tymall and darak sorcery. He
released when Tristamil dived in, jumped in from above, both
hauling her out. Ty, the deceiver, grinned at his brother from his
position behind as they lifted her, and Vannis halted a fleeing
maid as he entered through the Dragon doors, asking who attempted
Saska’s murder. The maid pointed.

“Did you know
about the maid?” Tristamil asked.

“No. Who did
she point at?”

“Haven’t a
clue.” Vannis suspected him for years.

Tymall,
watching his brother’s face, crowed, “Liar! You took the fall. How
does that sit?”

“I am sick of
your performances. The crap I ate for you made me strong. I fought
for the Light since the hour of our birth. I am the Light.”

“You are
nothing!”

“Ty, do you
not see? If you feel remorse now, you can join me. Ty, think! We
can lock the past away and go forward as a team.”

“Remorse? I didn’t feel it then and don’t feel it now.
Especially not for
her
.
You
join
me
.
Feel the power in anger, resentment, and frustration. You felt it
then, don’t deny it.”

“There was
never power in it for me, merely a feeling of helplessness.”

Saska again, at
peace, wandering the Graveyard, believing herself alone.

Tymall
followed and she was unaware of her stalker.

Half a sal
away, Tristamil looked up, saw his twin, and moved after him,
frowning as he recognised in his brother’s gait the purpose of
evil.

Saska, entered
an empty crypt, Tymall in the doorway. Tristamil moaned now, for he
had not seen this. Tymall aroused. He attacked his brother from
behind … there had been no words after.

Tristamil
growled, “You wanted to rape her! What did she ever do to you?”

“You need ask that?” Tymall’s eyes shone with the joy
experienced that day. A minute more and he would have taken her,
dying, on the floor of a room for the dead. “She took him away! He
was so infatuated with her, he didn’t recognise me. I am who I am
because of
her
!”