The God King (Book 1) (Heirs of the Fallen) Read online

  Uzzret cleared his throat. “Perhaps luck had nothing to do with it, Your Highness,” he suggested, all but panting in his eagerness to provide an answer for Varis. “Perhaps this traitorous bastard learned you were going abroad, and sought you out for his own gain?”

  “You may be correct,” Varis said with a dismissive shrug.

  Uzzret bowed graciously. “You are too kind to your humble servant, Your Highness.” He glanced furtively between Ellonlef and Otaker. “Without having you here to lead us in these troubled times, I fear that Krevar would have soon vanished under the shifting sands of the Kaliayth.”

  The thinly-veiled slight did not seem to bother Otaker. Ellonlef felt rage growing in her heart, but tempered it with pity. Uzzret was like a drowning man, searching for hope, no matter how thin.

  Otaker searched Varis’s face. “I have heard of this mercenary. Those reports have never suggested that Kian Valara is capable of such treachery. Izutarians, for all their reckless nature and uncouth ways, are heralded as men of valor and honor.”

  “I cannot speak to what turned this Izutarian’s heart to embrace evil,” Varis snapped, “but know that his heart is turned. If we do not stop him, he will crush Aradan.”

  “Why would an Izutarian mercenary make himself King of Aradan,” Ellonlef asked, “instead of claiming a throne in his own homelands, where he is sure to gather more followers than here?”

  “How would I know?” Varis said, exasperated. “Perhaps besides being mad, he is a blithering fool with no sense of strategy.”

  “A fine point, You Highness,” Uzzret said, glowering at Ellonlef.

  “All that matters,” Varis said, “is that Kian has murdered scores in Krevar alone, and intends to do the same all across Aradan, until the Ivory Throne is his. I could command all of you to give me aid, but I would rather have your willing allegiance.”

  “The Magi Order has always provided strong support to the Crown,” Uzzret declared. “While I am not the head of my order, I can promise our aid.”

  With far less enthusiasm, Otaker said, “My fealty has always been to the Ivory Throne and House Kilvar, Your Highness.”

  Ellonlef shook her head. “Your Highness, forgive my questions, but how can a mortal army stand against a man who wields the powers of gods?”

  An horrid eagerness stretched Varis’s wasted features. “When Kian seized the Powers of Creation, some of that power came into me.”

  Otaker’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”

  “I can offer no promises, but in some manner I cannot fully understand, I believe, with the help of a proper army, I can destroy Kian Valara before it is too late. Also, I believe I can restore the life which was stolen from the people of Krevar.”

  Uzzret gasped, gaze brimming with worship. He abruptly threw himself prostrate before Varis. Otaker looked on the scene, murmuring to himself.

  Ellonlef frowned. “Why did you wait to reveal that you, as well as Kian, can wield the Powers of Creation?”

  Varis turned, and she felt the hatred behind his dead eyes. Before he could speak, Uzzret was on his feet.

  “You thankless bitch,” he snarled. “You dare question our prince?”

  Ellonlef’s anger flashed white-hot, burning away all sense of decorum. “Would you rather me join you in burying my tongue in his arse?”

  “Enough!” Otaker shouted. Silence fell on the instant. In a quieter voice, he asked, “Your Highness … can you bring back Danara, my lady wife?”

  Varis nodded. “I believe I can, as well as all the dead of Krevar—save those who have been devoured by flame.”

  At this, Uzzret dropped his worshipful gaze and began babbling his sorrow for ordering so many burned to ash. Varis ignored him.

  “Tell me what I must do,” Otaker said, and Ellonlef’s heart fell at his eagerness. What ally she’d had in Otaker was lost.

  “Gather your people with all haste,” Varis said, “and I will show you wonders.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Word spread quickly that help had come from the Ivory Throne itself. Within the hour, most everyone who could walk had gathered in the market square not far from the tents set up for the injured. Torches were lit, but the night fought to hold its ground. What little chatter there was ended, when Varis ordered a huge merchant’s wagon emptied and drawn into the open. Hundreds of eyes watched expectantly as the prince invited Otaker, Uzzret, and finally Ellonlef to join him in the wagon bed.

  “Your Highness,” Otaker said, “there’s no way to be certain if this is everyone, but you spoke of haste.”

  “So I did,” Varis said, scanning the crowd with his pale gaze. “Be at ease, lord marshal, you have done well.”

  Uzzret squeezed past Otaker and placed a hand on Varis’s arm. “Only ask, and I will provide any assistance you need.”

  Varis shrugged the man off and faced the people of Krevar. In a strong, clear voice, he quickly repeated what he had said in Otaker’s quarters.

  It was not lost on Ellonlef that the prince’s tale now sounded more refined. She saw confusion and fear written on the faces of the people, but mostly she saw weary sorrow. When Varis began telling them that he could bring their loved ones back to them, however, every face slowly, hesitantly, became rapt.

  It was then that Ellonlef really thought about what the prince was saying, and began looking for an escape. If Varis’s promises proved false, as surely they must, the crowd was apt to become enraged and tear apart anyone who stood at the prince’s side.

  When Varis stopped talking, the market square was dead silent. Nodding as if that was what he had expected, Varis raised his arms and closed his eyes.

  Ellonlef, who had not heard his final words, gazed around, but saw nothing unusual. Not at first.

  ~ ~ ~

  Varis raised his arms and closed his eyes, drawing every eye to him alone. When the quiet was complete, he opened his eyes and saw the life of those gathered as a waving sea of silvery threads. But this life he did not need. Instead, he sought the life he had earlier placed within the Qaharadin Marshes. As he drew it back into himself, he sensed countless miles of new growth wilting and dying. Carefully, cautiously, he filled the dead of Krevar with the life he had previously stolen.

  Moments passed, and the life he harvested became a torrent visible only to him. Everything around him was bathed in silvery radiance. More time slid past without anything happening, and he began to worry that he had overstepped the limits of his ability. Did Peropis lie to me again? No, he decided, for what would she gain in doing so?

  He continued filling corpses with life.

  Minutes ground past, and still nothing. He heard Uzzret murmuring worriedly, and the scrape and clatter of Otaker’s boots against the wagon bed. Sister Ellonlef said nothing, nor did she move, but he felt her scrutiny pressing on him like judgment. She did not trust him, but he meant to rectify that very soon. She was a willful and beautiful woman, and he would enjoy teaching her proper manners.

  A shout went up, far away. More followed, rapidly becoming joyous cries. Varis knew then that he had succeeded.

  A tide of murmurs swept through the crowd. Blinded as he was by the fierce radiance of life, he could not see the corpses rise and look around, but he could feel it happening.

  He did not know how long he labored, but after what felt an age, the Powers of Creation began to recreate life inside him. At that moment, he severed the flow and began using his own life. His thin, pallid skin grew tighter over his bones, and he slumped in weakness. Let them see how I suffer for their sake, he thought, hiding a smirk.

  His smirk gradually withered into a grimace, as he drew near to the threshold between life and death. And then his work was complete. It was no act when he toppled off the wagon to sprawl in the dust. His subjects, his army, rushed forward and raised him up. When they saw that he was alive, they broke out in song.

  ~ ~ ~

  When Otaker first saw the dead begin to rise and join the euphoric throngs, he leaped off th
e wagon and ran back to the keep crying out the name of his lady wife.

  Ellonlef followed. Others came as well, those who had friends and family that had died. Ellonlef felt as if she were caught in a frenzied herd of sheep, all bleating of “Miracles!” and “Salvation!” and “The blessed one!” What caught her unawares was that a part of her responded to their ecstasy, and embraced the hope Prince Varis offered.

  Another part of her recoiled from what she had witnessed. As a healer, she had seen men rise from apparent death, and as a scholar, she had read of similar accounts, but those miracles were rare and, in the end, often explainable.

  And yet she had watched Prince Varis Kilvar restore the lives of hundreds of men, women, and children who had become shells of leathery skin and dry bones. Without question, the dead had truly been dead. And now they were alive.

  Otaker wheeled into his chambers ahead of her. When Ellonlef rounded the corner, she slammed into his back. Lady Danara was sitting on the edge of their bed. She regarded her husband with the barest flicker of recognition. For the most part, her gaze was as cold and blank as it had been when she dead.

  The lord marshal rushed forward and took her hand. “It’s over, my love. It was just a dream.”

  Danara’s head pivoted slowly. When she spoke, her voice was thick and croaking. “Where is the man who destroyed the veil between the realm of the living and the realm of the dead? Where is he who has freed us from the Thousand Hells, he who will lead us?"

  Otaker sat back, his mouth working soundlessly.

  “I don’t think she means Kian Valara,” Ellonlef said.

  Lord Otaker gripped his wife’s shoulders. “Describe this man you seek!”

  “His are eyes that do not see, but he will never stumble for want of sight,” Danara murmured. “His heart does not beat, yet his breast rises and falls for want of breath. The blood of his veins flows as shipwright’s tar, black and hot, but without the promise of life. He is the one who dared pass through the veil to suffer the agony of death, and now lives again. The pale one, the Life Giver, once a man, now a god made flesh. Where is he?”

  Ellonlef swallowed. “She was dead before Varis came to Krevar, and last Danara saw him, he would not have looked as he does now.”

  Otaker pulled back from his wife. “You speak of Prince Varis.”

  “He is a prince no longer,” Danara said. “He is a king of all men, the king of all kings. I must go to him. We all must go to him, and serve his will.”

  “He is in the market square,” Otaker said, trying to hold his wife in place. She rose from the bed as if he were not there, and shuffled from the bedchamber.

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” Ellonlef said, struggling to catch her breath.

  Otaker’s tears, which had dried in the bright light of hope, began to flow again. “She is lost, isn’t she? They all are. Gods good and wise, what’s happening, Sister? The earth still quakes, the Three are dead, the heavens burn by night, and into our midst comes a living corpse who can raise the dead. But the dead are not who we knew and loved, are they?”

  Ellonlef shook her head.

  In the corridor, more people were following after Otaker’s wife. It was easy to pick out the resurrected. They shuffled along, their glasslike stares fixed ahead, as if they could see through the keep’s thick walls to Prince Varis. The Life Giver. A god made flesh. A flash of dread turned her stomach.

  Soon, rousing cheers flooded the keep. The drumming of feet and clapping of hands vibrated the floor. Otaker and Ellonlef moved to the balcony. Over the keep’s outer wall, torches illuminated a boiling cauldron of humanity in the market square. At the center of that spectacle, once more elevated on the back of the wagon, Prince Varis scanned the folk of Krevar. Magus Uzzret was waving like a fool, his shouts enlivening the throng.

  “They are his now,” Otaker said.

  “All of them,” Ellonlef agreed hollowly. “The dead and the living alike. A new god walks among men, and he has given them the miracle of life. They will follow wherever he leads, even to their doom.”

  “I suspect this new god is also a liar,” Otaker said, anger replacing his grief. “He wanted an army, that’s true enough, but all that about Kian Valara was just a way to put us off guard, allowing him to seize the Ivory Throne for himself.”

  “I’m not so sure it’s as simple as that,” Ellonlef said.

  “Then what?”

  Ellonlef thought a moment. “By what we have seen him do, I think he could take the Ivory Throne easily, without or without an army. I think he wants far more than a single throne. Surely a man who can wield the powers of gods would name himself emperor, at the least.”

  “A man who can wield the powers of gods,” Otaker countered, “would surely name himself a god.”

  “Either way, I begin to think that Kian’s and Varis’s roles are reversed from what the prince told us. If so, then it’s possible that Varis not only brought the dead back to life, but he also might have killed them using these Powers of Creation.”

  “You think Varis means to use Kian as a scapegoat?”

  “That could be,” Ellonlef said. “Or, it might be that Kian Valara has never had any dealings with Varis.”

  Otaker thought a moment. “No, Sister, I believe they know each other quite well.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Varis did not have to say a word about the mercenary. He could have raised the dead, and the results would have been the same. In the way of many highborn I’ve met, Varis believes he’s more clever than he is in truth. He wanted to show how superior he is by playing us for fools.”

  “I’d say he succeeded,” Ellonlef said.

  Otaker’s mouth twisted in distaste. “Perhaps, but in doing so, our young prince has also shown us the man he fears most—Kian Valara. If I’m right, then some of what he said about the Izutarian might also be true.”

  “In that case, finding Kian could be a boon,” Ellonlef said. “That is if he actually holds some of these godly powers himself. But for all we know, he could be back in Izutar already.”

  Otaker mulled that. “Then we have no choice but to send out a rider to find Kian and convince him to join our side against Varis.”

  “Who can you trust to deliver such an important message?”

  Otaker gazed at her. “With Uzzret turned, and most if not all of my men ensnared by Varis’s wiles, you are the only one I can trust.”

  “We should go together,” Ellonlef countered.

  Otaker shook his head. “I must stay close to Varis, gain his trust, seek out his weaknesses, and pass that knowledge along to King Simiis. If fortune favors me, perhaps I can discover a way to stop Varis before he ever reaches Ammathor.”

  Ellonlef saw problems upon problems with his plan. She also saw that he was right. What Otaker had not mentioned was that he would never leave his wife and children. Reluctantly, she nodded in agreement.

  Otaker said, “You need to ride as soon as possible. Along the way, I ask that you warn the lords marshal of Yuzzika and El’hadar.”

  “Will they believe me?”

  “You must make them believe,” Otaker said gravely.

  Ellonlef did not bother asking how she was supposed to do that. All she had was the truth, and that would have to be enough. “I will do my best, my lord.”

  “Take only water, food, and weapons enough to see you to Yuzzika,” Otaker said. “I will give you a string of my swiftest mounts."

  Uzzret suddenly bawled, “All hail the Life Giver!”

  And so the folk of Krevar did.

  “Hail!”

  “Hail!”

  “Hail!”

  “Hail!”

  A cheering roar then filled the night, and Varis accepted his followers’ adulation. Around the square, now all but unnoticed, the resurrected gathered in stiff, silent lines and stared straight ahead.

  “I must hurry,” Ellonlef said, struggling to avoid the thought that she was running from more danger than she wo
uld face.

  ~ ~ ~

  In less than an hour, Ellonlef had loaded her limited supplies on six of Lord Marshal Otaker’s finest warhorses, and departed Krevar through an underground passage that burrowed well under a section of the collapsed wall.

  She rode north until coming to a deep crack in the earth, then turned east. An hour later, Ellonlef began to lose hope that she would ever be able to veer back to the north. Eventually, though, the split narrowed until becoming little more than a shallow ditch. After using a stick to make sure the way was safe, she turned north again. Somewhere up ahead, she would find Kian Valara. She hoped it wasn’t a wasted effort.

  Chapter 12

  “Answer him!” Uzzret roared.

  Otaker thought he was looking at a stranger, rather than the man who had served him over twenty years. He spit out a mouthful of blood and held silent. So far, neither blood nor silence had done him any good.

  At the prince’s offhand order, it had taken two guards—men who had been dead, Otaker noted straight away—a few blows to reduce him to a battered heap. He now lay shuddering, most of his ribs broken, and probably one of his legs.

  The two guards, done with their work for now, stared blankly at him, not breathing hard at all. They would skin him alive without hesitation, if Varis commanded them.

  “Answer the Life Giver,” Lady Danara said, her croaking voice the same as all the resurrected. At Danara’s side stood their children, their eyes as empty as hers. Uzzret’s betrayal angered Otaker, but seeing his children join Varis smothered his desire to live.

  Otaker continued to hold his tongue. Doubtless, he would die tonight, which had not been part of his plan in the least. But he had no intention of telling them what road Ellonlef had taken. Neither would he tell them why she had left.