Wrath of Lions Page 15

  He almost laughed aloud when he saw Lanike pause at the bottom of the stairs, staring up with her mouth hanging open at the bald thing that used to be her husband. Her hand trembled as she grabbed hold of Joben, who had offered his assistance. Her feet were unsteady, even when they reached the top of the platform. Joben led her to her husband’s side, but she refused to look at him. Even when Clovis’s bulging arm draped over her shoulder, she did nothing but stand and shudder.

  Shaking his head, Velixar climbed the dais. Once he reached the top and stopped, awaiting the signal to kneel, he heard the crowd below, smallfolk and soldiers alike, pressing in toward him. He knew that if he were to turn around, he would no longer see the road, just a never-ending sea of watchful eyes. The thought filled him with pride, and it took great effort to keep from swiveling his head for the tiniest of glimpses. Instead, he kept his stare fixed on his chosen god, ignoring the white noise of the crowd.

  Joben stepped away from Lanike, nodding to his acolytes before taking his place by Karak’s side. He spoke a few words that Velixar couldn’t hear. Karak then held out his hand, and the cleric took whatever was in it. Clenching his fingers around the object, he cleared his throat. When he spoke, his voice easily rose over the noise of the crowd.

  “Citizens of Veldaren,” he said, his usual mutter suddenly magnified tenfold. “We come here today on the brink of war. Our very way of life is threatened by the cretins of the west, by the brother god who heinously tossed aside his pact with our Divinity. So many of our good men perished that day to Ashhur’s rage, men who were sons and fathers, men who died well before their time. It is past due that we avenge their deaths.”

  The murmur of the crowd rose slightly in volume.

  “But today is also a wondrous day. With dark times ahead, let us bask in the light of new leadership that will help lead us to heights we have never dared dream possible.”

  With that, Joben nodded to Velixar, then bowed and backed away. Velixar’s heart raced as he dropped to a knee before his deity. The glow of Karak’s eyes was like the explosion of twin stars. The god stepped forward, raising his hands to his creations.

  “My children, I come to you today as the father you have always wished me to be,” Karak said, his voice many times louder than Joben’s. “I have been apart from you for too long, but my forty years in seclusion were spent wisely. While I was away, you blossomed from the infants you were into the capable men and women you are now. You have built a great society that will be written about in the tomes of legend. You are the mighty, you are the worthy, and it is for you that I lead our brave fighting men to war. For a poison has infiltrated our kingdom, a poison spread by my brother himself. He thinks you are still children! He lords over his Paradise, refusing to allow his people the simple freedoms a human life warrants. However, those poor souls are not your enemy! They are like you, people of flesh and blood and a desire for liberty, who have been denied that freedom by the very god who created them.”

  The crowd grew deathly silent. To Velixar, it sounded as if no one even breathed.

  “We embark on this great conflict,” Karak continued, “not as invaders, but as liberators. We will free this supposed Paradise of my brother’s tyrannical reign, and we shall spread our virtues of order, responsibility, and honor throughout Dezrel. By the time we are through, all of humanity will be united, a true brotherhood of man in which no further war is ever needed.”

  A single female voice shouted, “Praise Karak!” It stood alone for a brief moment, but a buzz slowly gathered as more joined the first. In a matter of moments the whole of the hub was awash in the united voices of the populace chanting, “Karak! Karak! Karak!” Once more, Velixar wished for a momentary glimpse of the spectacle.

  The deity held his arms out wide, and the throng abruptly silenced.

  “This will be no easy venture,” he said, his words rumbling throughout the street, echoing off the gray stone buildings. “There will be sacrifice, there will be horrors, and many of our brave men will perish. For though we seek to liberate those in Paradise, many will not freely toss aside the shackles they wear. Those shackles are all they have ever known, and it will take force to break them.”

  It was then Karak’s eyes fell to Velixar. “In any great conflict, even greater leaders are required, both in spirituality and in the ways of war.” He held out his massive hand. “It is now that I present you, my people, with the First Man created in all of Dezrel, by the hands of both my betraying brother and myself. He who kneels before you is my greatest servant, Velixar. He speaks my truth, and he lives it.”

  The deity reached beneath his black plate and drew out a shining metal disk attached to a silver chain. It was a pendant, and it swung from side to side in front of Velixar’s eyes. Sculpted upon it in bas-relief was the image of a lion standing atop the crest of a mountaintop. Velixar knew that adornment well. It was the very same pendant Ashhur had worn over his heart since the first day he could remember.

  “The greatest servant in all of Neldar has served as Highest of Karak for months now, and he has served me well.” The god’s eyes flicked to the side. His holy lips rose in a grin. “However, I have come to the realization that he should no longer wear such a title.”

  What? Velixar’s heart leapt in his chest. He tried to keep the sudden anger he felt from flushing his cheeks and making his eyes burn red, but heat crept up from beneath his collar. He clenched his fists tightly, fingernails digging into his palms.

  Noticing his reaction, Karak’s smile grew all the wider, almost playful.

  “For Highest is a human designation,” he said, as if the pause in his speech had never taken place, “and Velixar has advanced beyond humanity. He is the embodiment of an ideal, the embodiment of all I stand for. He is now a brother to me, much more so than my true brother ever was. Unlike Ashhur, Velixar shares my vision of a world without chaos.”

  A sharp exhalation left Velixar’s lungs, and all his previous anger disappeared. He was too shocked to speak, to rise, to even breathe.

  “It is because of this newfound brotherhood that I present to you, Velixar, the pendant Ashhur and I once shared. You shall wear it around your neck with pride, as it is now yours, and with new ownership comes new meaning. Where once the symbol carved upon this pendant was meant to portray a pact of peace between my brother and I, it now represents the shape of the world to come; that of my children winning victory over the blasphemous ideals of the west, that of the lion climbing to the top of the mountain and claiming it as his own.” He bent down—quite far, given his immense size—and draped the pendant over the still kneeling Velixar’s head. “This is the most tremendous gift I could give a man. Now rise to your feet, Velixar, and face your people. Rise to your feet, High Prophet of Karak!”

  The deity touched his cheek, and a sudden surge of power rushed through Velixar. His mind in a numb daze, he stood. Karak grabbed both his shoulders, stooped over, and kissed him atop the head. The crowd behind them roared, a thunderous applause that swallowed him in a warm, pulsating embrace. Karak nodded to him, and he finally turned to face the people.

  Countless common faces stared up at him, awash with hope and exhilaration. A litany of arms pumped into the air, thrusting forward in a single repetitive motion. All the while the throng chanted, “Velixar, Velixar, Velixar,” just as they had shouted Karak’s name only moments before. He glanced down the dais, where the king and the Council of Twelve were clapping. Darakken was gazing at him, its eyes an unnatural red, and Lanike had her head bowed next to it, her hair dangling in front of her face. He turned away from them and faced his congregation once more.

  “I serve you!” shouted Velixar. “Forever, for Order, for Karak!”

  High Prophet. His High Prophet.

  Then and there, nothing could have kept Velixar from smiling.

  CHAPTER

  9

  As Lord Commander Avila Crestwell marched her regiment south, she fondly recalled the moment three weeks ago when t
he raven had arrived under the cover of darkness, its wings flapping like the charred cloak of an old ghost. She had known what the letter strapped to the bird’s leg would say before her fingers ever brushed the wax seal that bound it.

  She was as restless as she’d been since setting camp in what was left of the township of Haven. The ruins of the Temple of the Flesh, which Karak had decimated with a fireball from the sky, marked their northern boundary, whereas what remained of the township itself lay to the south. In between were erected hundreds of simple tents, inside of which the five thousand men (and a few women) who had been placed under her command rested their weary bones.

  Avila had hated every moment of their stay in the delta. The marshy land, the humid air, the fluctuating temperature, the aggressive insects that pecked away at her perfect skin, raising inflamed welts that she constantly scratched without realizing what she was doing—all these made life near impossible to endure. It was difficult to train men for battle under such conditions. The weight of their armor caused them to sink in the mud during exercises, the heat of the day inflicting dehydration and heatstroke. She ended up allowing the soldiers to train wearing only their smallclothes, using wooden practice swords instead of the genuine article.

  Not that these men required much training. Other than a few green boys, they were the best of the best, those she and her traitor brother had instructed back at the Omnmount staging grounds. Yet no matter how skilled they were, a stagnant soldier was one step closer to falling on the wrong end of a blade, so she kept hounding them. The morning horns were always blown at the first hint of sunrise. Such practice was needed to keep them limber, for daily tramps through the southern portions of the delta did not do the job. Whereas Avila had expected pockets of well-trained and devoted opponents like those who had defended Haven the day the brother gods had come to blows, her search parties had discovered that the remainder of the delta was a deserted wasteland. There were few stragglers, just old hermits or some of the more unsavory bandits who dwelled deep within the swamp. These castoffs were easily dispatched once discovered, and their heads ended up gracing pikes when the squads returned from their searches. It seemed as though the rest of the populace had lifted their banners and fled.

  Avila found the situation more than frustrating. She was a general without an opponent, which made her useless. The coming of the raven had given her purpose.

  Yet as she trotted her mare south along the humid, packed-dirt road, leading her fighting men beneath a burning sun, part of her wished to be back in the encampment. The gurgling sound of one of the Rigon’s tributaries flowed to her left, just off the beaten path, taunting her with its ease of movement. She had grown used to the immobility, to the lack of action. Her legs were developing sores and her back ached from sleeping the previous night on the hard ground. And that didn’t take into account the ache of her loins…

  “Something troubles you?”

  A hand brushed the silver hair from the left side of her face, an almost tender gesture, and Avila jerked in her saddle. She stared incredulously at Malcolm Gregorian, the former Captain of the Palace Guard who had been chosen to serve as her new lieutenant. Malcolm’s arm retreated swiftly, and his sudden movement caused his charger to take an unexpected step away. He grabbed tight to the reins and squeezed his thighs against the horse’s side to keep from falling.

  “Never touch me that way again,” she spoke imperiously, keeping her voice low so the troops marching behind her would not hear.

  Malcolm, stunning in his silver mail overlaid with deep blue plate, gained control of his steed. His lone good eye glimmered in the afternoon haze, light brown and soulful, matching the hair atop his head, which flowed in loose curls down to his pauldron. His left eye was milky white, forever encased between the four wicked scars that ran diagonally across his formerly handsome face.

  Self-consciously, Avila tugged her silver locks back into place and turned away, hiding the gash of reddened tissue that slanted across the left side of her head—Crian’s gift. She greatly disliked looking at Lieutenant Gregorian’s scars. They reminded her too much of her own.

  “Why do you cover yourself so?” asked Malcolm. “I wish to see your beauty in full.”

  She scowled at him, grabbing her sword and pulling it slightly from its scabbard.

  “Do not speak to me of beauty. We are warriors in the Army of Karak, and I am your Lord Commander. You will address me as such, not treat me the way you would some tavern wench.”

  He bowed low. “Yes, Lord Commander,” he replied gravely, though his scarred lips smiled. “Once more, you have my apologies. I will leave you in peace.”

  With that, Malcolm pulled back on the reins, circling his charger around. Darkfall, the broadsword that had been the property of the deceased Lord Commander Vulfram, bounced on his back. She heard him shout a phrase to the soldiers, who replied in unison, filling the moist air with their dedicated voices.

  Avila glanced over her shoulder as he rode away, catching a glimpse of the seemingly endless procession of soldiers and supply carts that packed practically every inch of the southern pass. She could barely see their faces, for the gleam off Malcolm’s silver armor had blinded her. She turned back around, closed her eyes, and offered a silent prayer to her deity. Once more her loins felt a twinge, and she inhaled sharply in frustration.

  It was entirely her fault Malcolm acted the way he did. She had been so energized after the raven’s arrival, a sort of nervous vigor with only one cure. In the past her brother Joseph had satisfied such cravings for her, though on a few occasions her father the Highest would fill the void. But Joseph was dead now, slain on the battlefield of Haven by the twisted beast DuTaureau, and her father remained in Veldaren, no longer his own man after giving his deity the greatest sacrifice possible—the use of his body as host to the demon Darakken.

  With no other outlet, she had turned to Malcolm, who’d surprised her by being a more than willing participant. A man who had always been stoic and methodical, whose devotion to Karak was surpassed by none in all of Neldar, he’d taken her on her bedroll with a verve that bordered on violence, performing each thrust like he was driving a sword into an enemy. The aggression had at first enthralled her, and she’d accepted his cock as she would a divine tool, in worship and adoration, as she bit down hard on her lower lip, hard enough to make it bleed. But the man’s passion had turned to frightful aggression, his grunts and shouts those of some feral beast wishing for nothing more than to spread its seed. At last she’d shoved him away with all her might before he could finish. At first she’d thought he would strike at her or scream, but when her chest began to hitch, his gaze had softened. He’d sidled up to her, trying to wrap a comforting arm around her shoulders. She’d ordered him from her tent immediately.

  Afterward, she’d drawn her legs to her breast and cried. It was the first time Avila could remember breaking down, and it frightened her more than anything she had ever experienced. I am an immortal Crestwell, Lord Commander of Karak’s Army, she chided herself. Not some weak peasant girl. But still the sorrow had come, and she’d longed for not only Joseph and her father, but for her mother and Thessaly, who had disappeared the night the Moris were executed for treason. She even missed Crian and Moira. In that moment of weakness she had become a weak peasant girl, one who wanted nothing but her family.

  She clenched her fists, squeezing the reins as tightly as she could. Stop this. Stop being a weakling. She grabbed hold of her sword’s hilt and drew it. The sword was Integrity, which had been Crian’s before he’d turned his back on their family, and Avila had taken it as her own when she’d been named Lord Commander by the newly dubbed Velixar. She had allowed Malcolm to keep Darkfall, as the heft of the weapon proved far too great for her narrow frame.

  She held the slender sword before her face, looking at her reflection in its smooth polished steel. She flipped her hair, exposing the ruined left side of her face. She looked hard, determined, her jaw rigid and her ey
es intense. Immediately she began to feel better about herself. Her womanly weakness fluttered away like bubbles from a drowning man’s nose. I am Lord Commander, she thought. Karak’s emissary, the bearer of Karak’s law, the wielder of Karak’s sword.

  She had barely slid Integrity back into the scabbard when she spotted shadowy figures by the side of the road, in the fields of swaying wheat. The figures halted in a small clearing between the rows of wheat, staring at the massive army with their hands cupped over their eyes to block out the sun. Avila squinted, trying to see them more clearly. It was hard to know for sure, but they appeared to be holding staffs. Or perhaps spears.

  Malcolm appeared beside her once more. He was businesslike this time, which pleased her.

  “The first of the flock,” he said flatly. “Do you wish for me to take care of them?”

  She tied her hair back in a knot, exposing her entire face, scars and all. “I think not,” she said. “If any are to draw first blood, it will be your Commander. Captain, prepare the torches. This field will burn once we pass it.”

  “Yes, Lord Commander,” Malcolm replied.

  Avila kicked her mare and the horse turned off the road, bounding across the field. The heavy heads of wheat slapped at her knees, but she paid no mind. She relished the wind beating her face, even the insects that caused welts to rise on her arms when they slammed into her as she rode. The ache in her abdomen became but an echo of what she had felt before, and by the time she redrew Integrity, the sensation had all but disappeared.

  The figures didn’t move as she approached, as if they were scarecrows instead of people, and when she drew closer she saw that they were but children; one boy and one girl dressed in roughspun, both holding irrigation rods meant to poke holes in the hard soil. Their faces were dirty, but their teeth shone white when they smiled and began to wave. It took Avila a moment to register the sight in her mind. They were smiling. A rapid wave of confusion made her slow the gallop of her mare and drop Integrity to her side.