Heirs of the Fallen: Book 02 - Crown of the Setting Sun Read online

  Leitos studied the closest bowl and found that a small wooden lever sat under its bottom edge, and attached to that was a very fine black string. The line zigzagged back and forth from the bowls to the low ceiling through a series of tiny, nearly invisible metal rings. Like the first bowl, all the subsequent bowls, metal rings, and the line were invisible to anyone coming the way Ba’Sel had brought them. The last thing the warrior did was to unwind a tail of the line and stretch it low over the ground, farther down the passage from the last bowl. As he worked, the line tensed and released, jiggling the levers under the bowls.

  When Ba’Sel came back and retrieved the second pot, he answered Leitos’s questioning look. “I am setting a snare. This,” he said, slicing the wax off the clay container, “is a gift given us soon after the Faceless One rose to power. An old woman, Hya of the Sisters of Najihar, showed us how to make it, just before her long years took her from us.”

  “What is it?” Leitos asked, careful not to touch anything, as he followed Ba’Sel to the farthest bowl.

  “The Blood of Attandaeus,” Ba’Sel said grimly. “The Nectar of Judgment. A single drop of any liquid sets it alight—we use oil, because it flows better and does not splash so easily as water. Nothing can smother its fire before it has burned away.”

  Ba’Sel knelt on the ground and brushed clear a line in the sand, revealing a thin slat of wood. He pried up the slat and set it aside. Below waited a deep, narrow groove etched into solid rock. One end was open to a sloping gutter gouged in the wall under the bowl of oil waiting above.

  With excruciating care, Ba’Sel filled the groove on the floor with what looked like glimmering crimson sand, replaced the slat, and then covered it with sand. They retreated a little way, and he repeated the task. By the time he began filling the fifth groove, sweat glistened on his brow. He daubed it away with his sleeve, took a few deep, calming breaths, and continued until the last groove was filled and covered. While he had no doubt of the destructive nature of fire, Leitos wondered aloud how such a trap could work.

  “When the first enemy trips that far line,” Ba’Sel said, pointing down the passage, all the bowls tip at once. The oil is thin and flows fast, but not too fast. Once it ignites the Blood of Attandaeus, even a running intruder will not have passed this point before the flames trap it. Anyone or anything behind it will also be consumed.”

  “What if more come,” Leitos asked, “after the first wave?”

  Ba’Sel smiled humorlessly. “My brothers and I can set enough traps to destroy a small army. They may not be needed, for even the most bloodthirsty Alon’mahk’lar fears death enough to reconsider a useless attack. Nevertheless, I will set all I can.”

  True to his word, Ba’Sel set many more traps along the way. The first two were rock falls like the one he had used to block their pursuers, the next was an even more elaborate snare using the Blood of Attandaeus, in which crumbly clay pipes routed the deadly substance overhead, and also along the ground. Other traps employed unseen mechanisms that hurled darts tipped in poison, or hinged grates arrayed with wicked iron spikes. The farther they went, the more deadly the contraptions became.

  “They have to be,” Ba’Sel said, when Leitos asked after the reason. “If an enemy is tenacious enough to come so far, then they are truly a deadly foe.”

  “Has an enemy ever come so far?”

  “Only in our first Sanctuary,” Ba’Sel said, tying off a trip line which would unleash a fall of dust that, he explained, was laced with powder from a plant that dissolved the eyes and liquefied the lungs.

  As they pressed on, he spoke of another matter. “Rumors say that the Faceless One is tightening his grip across Geldain, perhaps all the world. I have heard that the bone-towns are teeming with Mahk’lar and strange Alon’mahk’lar, not those brutish wretches that serve as slavemasters, but other things. Neither I nor my brothers know what this means, but there can be no question that the world is changing. I fear that the darkest days since the Upheaval are before us.”

  “I was in a bone-town overrun with Mahk’lar and their vile creations,” Leitos said. “With Zera.”

  Ba’Sel seemed about to say something, but then pressed his lips together, and led them into a series of ever tighter passages. At one point the main passage took a sharp turn around a jut of stone. Instead of continuing on, the brother circled around the protruding rock and got down on his hands and knees. “Stay close,” he advised.

  They followed the flickering torchlight into a suffocating crevice. Going forward proved to be sweaty work that forced them to contort themselves around sharp rocks and tight corners. They finally emerged in a small chamber. In the wall to one side, a small opening overlooked a pool of water far below.

  Ba’Sel raised his torch, showing an arched doorway at one end of the chamber, and beyond a near vertical set of steps leading down. At the top of the stairs a bronze disk splotched with green corrosion hung by a length of rope attached to an iron ring set in the ceiling. Ba’Sel rapped the disk twice in rapid succession with the hilt of his dagger. The resonant notes filled the chamber and echoed away.

  “This will let my brothers know one of their own has returned.” When the disk fell silent, he struck it three more times. “That,” he said, “will tell them death follows close at my heels.”

  Leitos cringed. “Won’t that lead the Alon’mahk’lar and the wolves to us?”

  “If they are through the first barrier, they will hear the gong as easily as my brothers,” Ba’Sel said. “But beyond this grotto, the alarm sounds as if it is coming from all directions, making it hard to pinpoint. My brothers standing watch up ahead will hear it and repeat the message. Farther along, other guards will do the same, until the Sanctuary is alerted to the coming danger.”

  Ba’Sel led them down the steep steps. Leitos abandoned counting the stairs after he passed three hundred. Soon after, his weary legs buckled and he stumbled into Ba’Sel. The warrior’s quick grab pulled him back from falling into the well of darkness that waited on their left side.

  “Unless you can fly,” Ba’Sel said, firmly placing him nearer to the wall, “you may not want to go that way.”

  Leitos swallowed. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply until the quivering in his legs subsided.

  “Can you continue?” Ba’Sel asked patiently.

  Leitos nodded, hoping they were almost to the Sanctuary.

  Not long after they escaped the stairs, another passage brought them within sight of a torch thrust into a hole in the wall. A figure waited in shadow.

  “Ulmek?” Ba’Sel called.

  “It is I, brother,” the man said, coming fully into the light. He wore robes sewn from mismatched rags. When they drew closer, Ulmek halted Leitos with a withering stare. “Is that him?” He was shorter than Ba’Sel and of an age with him. His deeply bronzed skin clung to the bones of his face, making it into a brooding, sinister mask.

  “Yes,” Ba’Sel said, affectionately clapping a hand on his shoulder. “We cannot hold him to account.”

  “You may soon change your mind,” Ulmek said gruffly.

  “Has something happened?” Ba’Sel demanded.

  “Besides the enemy at your heels, Alon’mahk’lar are swarming the eastern hills near the Arch of Tracien, and more have been spotted just south of the White Dunes. We have heard nothing out of the north or west. Daris and Sumahn should have returned before now, but have not.”

  “Our enemies have been closer before. As to our brothers, they are both of them young and strong—”

  “And reckless,” Ulmek interjected. “It would not surprise me if either of them joined battle with one of the Sons of the Fallen, hoping to collect a trophy to prove they had.”

  “They know better.”

  “As did we,” Ulmek said with a harsh chuckle, “but that never stayed our hands.”

  Ba’Sel ignored that. “Is the Sanctuary ready?”

  “Before the last sounding faded, all were armed and waiting,” Ulmek sai
d with a note of pride.

  “Alon’mahk’lar come behind us,” Ba’Sel said gravely, “and also their wolves.”

  “Wolves?” Ulmek spat. “I knew the day it was decided to help those wretches we would pay a price.”

  Leitos looked between them, trying to understand why they would have let wolves into the Sanctuary.

  “Come,” Ba’Sel said, “we must join our brothers and prepare to fend off our enemy.”

  Ulmek shook his head and cursed bitterly. “Even now, you cannot admit that you erred.”

  “Rest assured, we will speak of this later,” Ba’Sel said, looking ten years older.

  “If we live that long,” Ulmek growled. He stalked into the waiting gloom, leaving Ba’Sel and Leitos to follow or stay.

  “Do not mind him,” Ba’Sel said wearily. “Ever has Ulmek been given to wrath for wrath’s sake. But there is no better man to have at your side in battle.”

  Leitos looked after Ulmek. “What did he mean about ‘helping wretches?’ ”

  “Let us hurry,” Ba’Sel said, pointedly ignoring the question. “As I said before, there is someone waiting for you.”

  “It is Zera, isn’t it?” Leitos said, glad for the distraction.

  “Love,” Ba’Sel muttered with a shake of his head, and turned away.

  Grinning sheepishly, Leitos followed.

  Chapter 27

  A dozen doors of thick, iron-banded wood—all of which were shut and barred by robed watchmen upon their passing—stood between them and the Sanctuary. Leitos had never fully imagined the fortress of the Brothers of the Crimson Shield, but he had anticipated more than what he encountered when he passed through the final doorway.

  In the light of dozens of torches, the chamber reached no more than ten paces high, spread twice as wide, and ran half again as long. Along the curve of one wall, wooden ladders led up to a ledge that gave access to what could only be sleeping quarters, which were not so different than the cells in which he had slept in the mines. And where he had thought that perhaps there would be hundreds of warriors, their numbers proved pitifully small, no more than four score. All save a handful had assembled at the far end of the chamber, while the remainder ran past Ba’Sel and Leitos with brief nods of greeting.

  “I hoped you would have more time for your reunion, but you must hurry,” Ba’Sel said.

  Looking for Zera, Leitos asked, “Where is she?”

  Ba’Sel gave him an unreadable look, then pointed to a man firing arrows into a plump sack. Something about the man’s posture caught Leitos’s attention. The man who turned was the last he expected to see. His mouth fell open in disbelief when his grandfather’s gray eyes found his.

  “Leitos!” Adham cried, hastily stuffing the arrow he had been about to fire back into the quiver at his waist. He sounded less hoarse than Leitos remembered, and he looked stronger. He caught Leitos in his arms.

  Leitos awkwardly returned the embrace. Of Zera, there was no sign, and despite his joyful surprise, he wondered why Ba’Sel had never said outright that his grandfather was waiting and not the woman who had rescued him from the Hunters.

  The next Leitos knew, he had sat down at his grandfather’s feet, his legs too weak to hold him. He tried to say something, anything, but confusion ruled his mind.

  Adham squatted down, his eyes showing concern. “Are you injured?” He ran his hands over Leitos’s shoulders and arms.

  “You … I thought….” Leitos’s words dried up and he drew back to get a better look. Ever had Adham been emaciated, and he was still thin, but now he looked younger, his flesh filled out. Even his wisp of shoulder length white hair was thicker and shot through with streaks of iron gray.

  “I saw you die,” Leitos muttered, unsteadily gaining his feet. Leitos backed a step away, then another. “Are you a … a spirit?”

  “He is no spirit,” Ba’Sel said.

  “You need water, food, and rest,” Adham said.

  “I saw you die in the mines,” Leitos insisted. “How can you be here … unless—”

  All weariness drained away, and he lurched clear. “Who are you?” he spat.

  “You know me,” Adham said, raising his hands to show he meant no harm. “I escaped the mines soon after you did. It was a terrible battle, but we drove the slavemasters back. Others fled with me, but in our search for you, the desert took our kindred, one by one, until only I remained. The Alon’mahk’lar who survived the rebellion drove me far to the north. In time, I was able to escape.”

  Leitos shook his head, unable to believe his grandfather was alive. But he was. There could be no question that the man who stood before him was the same who had raised him.

  Slowly, Leitos approached his grandfather, heart swelling, tears brimming. He caught the old man in a fierce hug, feeling as though a part of himself that had been long dead was blossoming into new, vibrant life. Adham returned the embrace.

  At last they broke apart, and Leitos faced Ba’Sel with a hopeful grin. “Where is Zera? Have you hidden her away somewhere?”

  “There is no time to explain,” Ba’Sel said distractedly. “If our enemies have not found their way into the lower passages by now, they soon will.”

  “Is she safe?” Leitos asked. “At least you can tell me that.”

  Ba’Sel raised himself up to his full height. “I share your concern,” he said stiffly. “She is as a daughter to me.”

  “But is she alive?” Leitos pressed.

  “I have little doubt that she is,” Ba’Sel said.

  Before Leitos could ask anything else, Ulmek trotted up with a harried expression. “Word has come that Alon’mahk’lar have passed under the Arch of Tracien and are converging on the Gates of the Sleeping Jackal.”

  “How many?” Ba’Sel asked.

  Ulmek swallowed. “Hundreds. An equal force marches from the south. Thank the gods that neither group is led by their wolves. Nevertheless, we have little time before they attack.”

  “How could they have found this place?” Adham demanded, sounding as he had the day he rose up to challenge the slavemasters, like a king of men. “Unless one of your own has betrayed you?”

  Ba’Sel and Ulmek shared a look with Adham that verified his unthinkable question. Adham cursed under his breath.

  “If you can use that bow,” Ba’Sel said, “there is a place for you in our ranks.”

  “It has been a long time,” Adham said, raising the double-curved bow before him, “but my arms and eyes have not forgotten its use.” He took a deep breath. “You have given me refuge, and now I must ask you to extend that courtesy to my kindred. Keep Leitos with you … and keep him safe.”

  Ba’Sel said, “There is nowhere safe, and the most dangerous place at the moment is among our number. But I give my word, I will guard Leitos with my life, as long as it lasts me.”

  “You told me your snares could hold off an army,” Leitos protested, unable to believe what he was hearing.

  Ba’Sel shook his head. “An army that has no knowledge of our defenses would suffer great losses, but—”

  “But since those who betrayed us and were removed from our order are among the demons that attack us,” Ulmek said, grinding his teeth in rage, “those traps are all but useless.”

  “We are caught,” Ba’Sel admitted, looking between Ulmek and Adham. “I did not believe we could be, but we are. To make our stand here ensures our deaths, to the last. Yet, even if we flee, many of us will perish.”

  “A few of us can stand,” Ulmek said grimly. “Our counterattack will serve as a diversion so the rest may escape. You are our leader, Ba’Sel. Take our brothers from here. I will stay behind with a few others.”

  Before Ba’Sel could argue, the heavy door blocking the entrance to the lower passages exploded in a blast of indigo fire. One moment Leitos was looking between Ba’Sel, Ulmek, and Adham, wondering how things could have turned out so badly, and the next moment a hot fist of fire and smoke smashed into him. He floundered on his back, ears ri
nging. Shards of splintered wood and twists of iron rained down around him.

  As the worst of the smoke began to clear, Ba’Sel roared and faced the invaders. One side of his robes blazed, but he entered the fray with sword bared. Ulmek shouted something over his shoulder, then joined his brother against two wolves struggling to squeeze through the narrow doorway. Growls became agonized yelps as the two men attacked, swords slashing.

  “Get up!” Adham shouted, his voice muted to Leitos’s ears.

  Leitos struggled up and followed after his grandfather. They did not retreat far before Adham turned back. No fear marked his expression, nor did he hesitate. As the chaos spread, Leitos’s only dazed thought was to wonder just who his grandfather had been before the Alon’mahk’lar had chained him.

  Adham circled to one side and nocked an arrow. He waited until Ulmek and a smoldering Ba’Sel danced back a pace from their foes, then fired the shaft. The arrow streaked into the eye of the nearest wolf. Still jammed tight against its companion, the beast let out a terrible squeal, and began swinging its great head back and forth. Another arrow flashed into its bristled neck. The creature’s remaining eye dimmed, and blood spilled over its lolling tongue.

  Ba’Sel charged in again, Ulmek by his side. They hacked at the wolves, steel ringing off thick skulls. Leitos’s insides turned at the reek of crushed bone and spilled blood that flooded from the carnage.

  “Is that all?” Ulmek challenged when the wolves went still. A wild light glazed his eyes, and he gave the nearest wolf another swipe with his sword. His laughter, harsh and bellowing, mixed with the steel’s clang to make a brutal, ugly song.

  A dozen brothers had come near, weapons held ready. The two wolf corpses began to shift and slide. Something was pushing against them from behind. The gathered brothers fell into wary stances, forming an arc of edged steel, spears, and drawn bows poised to attack whatever came through the doorway.

  Adham pulled Leitos farther back, then placed a dagger in his hand. His grandfather seemed more imposing than he ever had before. There was nothing left of the chained man in his posture or in his gaze.