Wrath of Lions (67 page)

Malcolm shook his head. “No, High Prophet. I am but Karak’s humble servant.”

“I see.”

The captain’s sword, Darkfall, was displayed next to the bodies on a slab of its own. Velixar circled around to it and lifted the heavy weapon, which he himself had presented to Gregorian in the aftermath of Vulfram Mori’s demise. The steel was polished and shining, not a scratch on its surface. When Gregorian had marched into Karak’s pavilion, a few of his underlings carrying Avila’s body behind him, he had immediately confessed to killing the Lord Commander and handed over the sword, which he claimed not to have cleaned since the clash took place. Yet it looked as new as the day it had first left the smithy, not a spot of blood on it.

“How did you defeat her?” he asked the man.

“I drove that very sword through her chest, High Prophet,” the captain replied. “I thought that part was obvious.”

“Yes, but
how
. Avila Crestwell was trained in the art of swordplay since she was still sucking her mother’s tit. The only man in all of Neldar who even approached her skill was her younger brother.” He looked at Gregorian once more. “You, Captain, are a meager swordsman by your own admission. So how did
you
manage to strike the killing blow?”

“Karak,” he answered.

“Karak?”

“Yes. Karak.” The captain lifted his lone good eye, which was ringed with a nasty-looking bruise, and stared at the silent deity. “You granted me the power I needed. It is only because of you that I emerged victorious.”

“Is that so?” said Velixar.

“It is.”

“And yet Karak was here, with me, the entire time. That being the case, how is what you say possible?”

“I don’t know, High Prophet. All I know is that I prayed for the strength to end Avila’s chaos, and Darkfall alighted in purple flame.”

“Hmm.”

Velixar lowered the sword and approached the kneeling man. Ever since their first meeting at the door to the Tower Keep, Captain Gregorian had greatly interested him. He was truly devoted to their god, that much was obvious, yet Velixar sensed an irresponsible and frenzied streak in him, a trait the captain tried to conceal beneath layer after layer of ritual, routine, and convention. Still, he had always been loyal, obeying Karak’s edicts without question. It would be a shame if the man were lying, and his clash with Avila involved some personal issue. He sighed, wishing again that his ability to detect truth from lie had not fled him when he turned his back on Ashhur.

Though in the end, it didn’t matter.

Velixar reached down and ran his fingers over the scar that marred the left side of the captain’s face, where the Final Judges had made their everlasting mark.

“I believe you,” he told the man.

The captain bowed even lower. “Thank you, High Prophet.”

“I deserve no thanks, Captain, for though I find you to be truthful, the fact remains that you convinced your men to slaughter two hundred converts who had sworn their lives to Karak. And despite your good intentions, you still took the life of the Lord Commander, named so by our god. The proper channels were not
followed; none were told. You acted on your own. This army is about order, Captain, and you catered to chaos.”

“It is true,” Gregorian whispered. “I knew it was true the moment I lifted my sword against my leader.” He held his arms straight out before him, threw his chin back, and squeezed his good eye shut. Disturbingly, the milky one remained wide open. “My life is my god’s to do with as he wishes. Take it from me, purge the turmoil from my veins, for I have sinned, and there is no mercy for agents of chaos.”

Velixar raised his eyebrows. “You would give your life away so freely?”

“My life is not mine to give.”

“Enough,” said Karak. He strode toward them across the open space.

“Yes, my Lord,” said Velixar. He backed away from the captain, bowing.

Karak stepped up to the kneeling man and placed a massive hand atop his head.

“You are indeed my humble servant, Captain. Your actions prove it more than your words. Now stand up, my child, and have a physician mend that arm.”

“Yes, my Lord,” the captain replied. When he looked at the god, tears flowed in twin streams from his good eye. “Forever for you, my Lord.”

Gregorian rose to his feet and kissed Karak’s hand. The god smiled down on him, then reached behind him and grabbed Darkfall off its slab. He handed it to the captain.

“The instrument of your faith,” he said, his voice soothing. “And the instrument of the Lord Commander, as well.”

The captain’s eye bulged and his lips quivered, but he said nothing.

“Now go, Malcolm, and uphold my word as you always have.”

“Yes, my Lord.”

“One last thing,” Velixar chimed in before the man could leave. Gregorian halted and pivoted toward him, stiff as a good soldier should be, even while his injured limb dangled uselessly.

“What is it, High Prophet?”

“Some of the men reported that the Lord Commander’s fall came about because of a young girl. Is that true?”

The captain nodded.

“And where is this girl now?”

“No one knows, High Prophet. She seems to have disappeared.”

“Interesting,” Velixar replied. “That is all, Lord Commander Gregorian. You may go now.”

“Thank you, High Prophet.”

When Gregorian left the pavilion, Velixar examined Karak’s expression. The god looked pensive, perhaps even whimsical. It was an odd way for a deity to look—dangerous, even—but Velixar decided it best not to question him. Given his own failures over the last few days, the last thing he needed was to give his god a reason to strike him down.

“He is a devoted man,” Karak said finally.

“It would appear so,” Velixar said. “And his story is true?”

“Of course. Gregorian has proven that he believes my teachings completely. I do not think any human alive loathes chaos as much as he does.”

“But what of his slaughter of those of Ashhur’s children who bended their knees? Should he not suffer punishment for that?”

“He ended those lives out of love for order, not because he was a curious man intent on meddling with powers he does not understand.”

Velixar winced at the slight. He hesitated before speaking again, but in the end he decided that if he was to be the High Prophet, he should not fear questioning his deity’s decisions.

“However, I must point out, my Lord, that he did end the life of the Lord Commander. Should that sort of insubordination be
rewarded? What if every underling who wishes to be rid of a pesky superior does the same to achieve a higher station?”

Karak stared at him in disappointment. “You should know better than to ask that question, Velixar. None will rise up that way, for I reward my children with titles as I please. If I were to take the lowest delinquent in the dungeons of Veldaren and place on
him
the mantle of Lord Commander, the men would treat him with just as much respect as they do you. Do you understand why?”

“Because you were the one who named him,” he said, lowering his head.

“Correct. As a god, my title was neither earned nor given to me. It was a station I was
created
to hold, and none can strip it from me.” His eyes blazed. “I, on the other hand, can strip any man of his title, deed, and even life if I so desire.”

Mine as well,
Velixar thought, but kept it to himself.

Karak continued: “While the death of Lord Commander Crestwell is indeed unfortunate, Gregorian believed, with all his heart, that she had turned her back on me.” He pointed to her face. “You made mention of her different appearance earlier, and you were correct. Look closely at her eyes and mouth, Prophet, and you will see it: the lines of age, the withering of skin on bones. She was no longer ageless.”

“Is aging a sin, my Lord? Only a select few have been blessed with agelessness, and even those who denied that gift were not cast aside. Vulfram was mortal, and you never once expressed distrust in him…at least until the end.”

“They were different people, with different ways of thinking. Vulfram was a man who balanced the love of his family and his dedication to me. He was objective. Avila was not. Her beliefs were strident, singular. If she grew to love that girl more than me, as she visibly did, it would only have been a matter of time before she deserted me.”

“I see. That does, however, beg one question, my Lord.”

“Which is?”

Velixar wandered toward the bodies again, poking his finger inside Avila’s gaping chest.

“This wound,” he said. “I have seen none like it, burned the way it is.”

Karak joined him, peering down into the scorched cavity.

“Faith and power are interchangeable, Prophet,” the deity said, lowering his voice to a soothing whisper. “And occasionally faith can manifest itself as power in times of great need, leading to greatness. I have observed it time and again throughout the journeys my brother and I have embarked on, though this is the first instance I have seen the phenomenon here on Dezrel. It makes perfect sense that Gregorian, the only man to survive my Judges, would perform such a miracle.”

Velixar frowned, mulling it over.

“So his belief in you gave him strength and power beyond himself?” he asked.

Karak shook his head. “How disappointing that you do not see the truth even now. The universe is fickle, and that which is given always requires payment. Gregorian’s faith was a
conduit
for power…
my
power. He was in a dire moment of need, with order hanging in the balance, and his belief reached through the ether, borrowing a small piece of the fire that burns within me.”

“The same as with my own abilities? All of your followers’ power must come from you?”

“Correct.”

“So without you, we would merely be human.”

“Without me, none of you would exist.”

Good point,
Velixar thought. “Did you feel it when it occurred?”

The god laughed. “The energy he borrowed was tiny, like a single blade of grass in a field hundreds of miles wide. I felt nothing.”

“How much power do you have at your disposal?”

Karak glanced away, raising an eyebrow.

“It is finite,” he said. “For now, that is the only answer I can give.”

Excitement hummed through Velixar’s veins, and on reflex, he searched for writing implements. The space was empty but for the two slabs and the bodies that rested on them. With a pang, he remembered what had been stolen from him, and he curled his hands into fists, breathing heavily. A disgusted grunt left his mouth.

“You are fretting about the book,” Karak said.

“It is not just any book, my Lord. All of the knowledge I have gleaned since you and Ashhur created me is written within it. There are passages of great power in there, ones that may be used against us if your brother recognizes the journal’s worth, which he most certainly will. Should that occur, any advantage we have may be lost.”

“The journal may not be on its way to Ashhur,” Karak said. “Your certainty in Patrick DuTaureau’s thievery is unwarranted.”

“Who else might have taken it?” Velixar asked. “The book vanished that very night, while I was away from my tent. I can think of no other reason for the mutant’s presence in our camp. Besides, Ashhur knows of the journal, as do many others in this godsforsaken land. It would not surprise me in the slightest if your brother were the one who sent Patrick after it. And if he knows of my plan with the demon…”

Karak looked at him sidelong, a glance Velixar returned.

“Darakken, my Lord. I have studied his memories, and within the elven tombs I found many secrets, some showed to me by Errdroth Plentos, some of which he would have preferred I never discovered. The spells to banish the beast are complicated and cannot be remembered, but I did find them in writing. Over the past months, I’ve worked to reverse the spell, to resummon—”

Karak shook his head, interrupting him, and he seemed strangely undisturbed.

“Once again, Prophet, you forget your place. Why would I, a part of the deity who originally created the beast, require a book written by you to make it whole again?”

“You know the spell?”

Karak laughed. “There is no spell, Prophet. What these hands created, these hands can bring back once more.”

Velixar stepped back, clenching and unclenching his fists.

“Ashhur lied,” he whispered.

“My brother is incapable of lying, Prophet.”

“He told me resurrection is impossible. He would not bring Brienna back to…would not bring the elf girl back for Jacob.”

“The elf was not his creation.”

“But if I were to perish, he could have brought me back? You could do the same?”

The god pursed his lips and squinted. After a few moments of silence, he replied, “It depends.”

“On what?”

“Think on it, Prophet. The demons were cast away from this dimension by Celestia, their bodies destroyed while their essences were trapped in nothingness. Yet there
was
one demon who perished in the great war with the elves, was there not?”

“Yes. Sluggoth.”

“You brought back the other two. Why not him?”

Velixar closed his eyes, thinking back to the moment when his entire life had been obliterated into something new.

“I couldn’t,” he said. “I reached for it, but it just wasn’t…there.”

“It was killed, not banished,” Karak said. “And as time passes, the essence continues on to its final resting place. It populates the abyss below Afram, a ghost among ghosts. The longer it is there, undisturbed, the greater the difficulty. To bring it back to mortality? A soul can be separated from a body, but it must immediately be trapped or placed within another. The moment the soul transcends the barriers between this world and Afram, bringing it back becomes near impossible. Perhaps Ashhur could have brought back this Brienna, but it would have only been a shadowed form of her, disjointed and in a body doomed to rot and break. Either that, or
she could have been brought back as a ghost, barely able to hear or understand the sight and sound of you. I am surprised that you did not realize this in all your wisdom.”