Song of the Risen God Read online

  Tamilee slipped to the side, bending low, nearly sitting, and using her hands to help her drop to the next ledge. This one was much narrower, and angled, and the loose stones slipped out from under her so much that she only remained upright because she had a firm grasp on the stones above.

  She lost her spear, though, and it went sliding, then falling fast down the ravine.

  “How do we do this?” Asba asked, unable to find a way to join her.

  It wasn’t possible. He had to hand Asef down to her, but even that seemed problematic, for the woman had no solid footing down there. He gently rolled Asef down in front of him and took his brother’s arms, hoping to stretch him down.

  But as Asef stretched, his wound pulled open wider, blood spilling and entrails again showing.

  Asef wailed and Asba pushed him down to the ground on this top ledge. Tamilee rushed over and climbed up as much as she could to aid her wounded friend.

  “Leave me, leave me,” Asef said over and over, every word forced out through obvious agony.

  “No! Never!” said Asba.

  “Go! Run!” Asef implored him, summoning the strength to prop himself up on one elbow and grab Asba’s collar with his other hand. “Go!”

  He fell back almost immediately, groaning, but still whispering, “I’m already dead. Go … run.”

  Tamilee looked at Asba, who stared back in horror as the realization sank in. They couldn’t get Asef down this slope.

  “We have to find another way,” Asba stated, but as he ended, they heard more sounds of approaching enemies, and not far away.

  Asba half slid, half ran back across the small ledge and looked back the way they had come. He saw movement, not far away, and started for his spear, but stopped and ducked when the person came into a view. No bright-faced stranger, this one, but an unwelcome sight anyway.

  Tamilee crouched by the lower ledge, staring at her friend, who had his back to the wall, looking back at her, sweating profusely and mouthing, Usgar!

  “Leave me,” Asef called out with all the strength he had left, and the effort left him convulsing, blood pumping from his garish wound.

  Asba leaped for him, falling to his knees beside his brother.

  “Go! You must go!” came a harsh whisper, but not from Asef, not from any of the three companions. Tamilee and Asba glanced up and saw her, straw-colored hair, a head unshaped by swaddle cloths, an Usgar woman, holding one of the cursed tribe’s trademark and deadly crystal-tipped spears.

  Asba scrambled back to his feet, or started to, for as he rose, his foot slipped out from under him on the loose dirt and stones, and down he half slid then stumbled.

  Tamilee grabbed at him, trying to catch him, but the added weight and her already unsteady footing had both of them sliding down the angled ledge, then dropping hard to the ledge below. The two managed to catch themselves there, scraped and bruised but not badly injured. Together, they looked up, seeing only Asef’s feet hanging over the top ledge for a moment, wondering how to get to him. But then they saw the Usgar, popping her head out beside those feet, and then her arm waving at them frantically to flee.

  A spear flew over the ledge above her.

  Tamilee and Asba had no choice. Down they went, as fast as they could, Tamilee pushing Asba before her, urging him to hurry and not look back. Tamilee did glance back, just once, to see the Usgar woman coming over the top ledge.

  She didn’t know what to make of any of it.

  She knew in her heart, though, that Asef, her friend, her lifelong companion, was certainly dead.

  * * *

  Connebragh realized that she had little time and understood that she should abandon this gravely wounded man.

  But she could not.

  She told herself that he was just an uamhas, and so what did she care? But she did care. With all of the horror of the last two days, with all of the upheaval and the arrival of these bright-faced monsters, she had nothing. She had no one.

  She had to hurry.

  She fell into the song of the spear tip again, the same green flecks she had used to heighten the lizard’s leap and send it flying out over the ledge. Now she lessened the weight of this fallen uamhas and slid him toward her. She kept her focus strong on the song as he came into her arms, used it to lighten them both, and they slid together, then dropped, but gently, to the third ledge.

  But the bright-faced sidhe monsters had arrived, she knew from the sounds high above. They were right up there, soon to look down.

  The third ledge had an overhang, and under it went Connebragh and the wounded man. The Usgar woman went to the spear tip once more. She was exhausted, physically and spiritually, but she couldn’t fail now. She needed the magic.

  She heard the sidhe coming down.

  A ball of darkness surrounded Connebragh and the man. He groaned and she slapped her hand over his mouth.

  “If you make a sound, we both die,” she whispered to him, and she pressed harder to silence him.

  She changed tactics immediately, though, and called to a second song in her magical crystal spear tip, the thinnest of the three magics by far. Wedstone was the conduit to access the powers in these spears, and it was also the stone of healing. Connebragh brought it forth with all she could manage, at the same time maintaining the darkness globe.

  The wounded man calmed and quieted almost immediately.

  Connebragh focused, holding her breath. She could sense them above.

  Then they were right before her, out on the third ledge! She heard them, not two steps away, a pair, at least, with more above.

  She felt the man tense up—he sensed them, too, she knew.

  But he stayed quiet, and she stayed quiet, and somehow, beyond what she thought her limits, she held fast to the magical song. Desperation overcame exhaustion. With her life so obviously on the line here, Connebragh found strength she did not know she possessed.

  She held on.

  The bright-faced monsters moved away.

  Soon after, the magical darkness faded. Connebragh, barely able to summon the strength to move, crept out of the overhang just enough to look around.

  All was quiet.

  Behind her, the uamhas groaned.

  Connebragh sighed. He would surely die, she thought. She had no strength left, and the healing magic in this spear tip was minor, only minor. She thought of leaving then, of going far from this dying place.

  But no. Connebragh shook her head in defiance and crawled back in beside the man. She inspected his wound. She tucked his guts back in.

  Then she fell over him, demanding of the spear.

  She wasn’t sure if she was doing this to save the man’s life or simply to deny the bright-faced monsters the kill.

  It didn’t matter. She went at that wound with purpose and anger.

  * * *

  “So I’ll bury him, then,” Asba growled back, and Tamilee backed away. “I’m not leaving my brother for the vultures.”

  Tamilee understood and didn’t want to upset her friend any more than they both already were. They had spent a sleepless night hiding in the forest, invaders all about for half of it, and even after they had left the area, neither could find any rest.

  Not with Asef lying back here. Not with Asef likely dead.

  They crept back to the base of the gully and ducked low. For they saw her up there, the Usgar, on the top ledge, her back to them as she peered back to the east over the side of the gully.

  Asba took up his spear determinedly. She was too far for a throw, some forty feet above them at least, but he sorted his way and started off quietly, Tamilee right behind.

  Up they crept, almost close enough to throw a spear into the Usgar’s back, watching her.

  She shook her head and turned back, then saw them, saw Asba lift his spear and let fly. He missed badly, the missile striking the ledge below the woman.

  Tamilee ran past him, long-striding, jumping, determined to get to the enemy before she could properly set herself. To the th
ird ledge from the top Tamilee jumped, rushing.

  Then skidded to a stop.

  For there, before her, feet toward her, lay Asef.

  Up above, the woman began to cry. “I tried,” she pleaded. “I tried, but I…”

  Tamilee scrambled up and fell to her friend’s side, with Asba closing a short way behind her. She inspected the wound and saw that it was closed, the skin knitted but still swollen and purple. She moved to Asef’s face, calling to her friend, begging him to answer.

  He was cold.

  He was dead.

  Tamilee let out a wail. She had expected this, of course, but having it so real before her had proven too much for the shocked and battered woman.

  Behind her, Asba made the ledge, growling in denial.

  “I tried,” the Usgar said above them. “My magic … it couldn’t…”

  Asba jumped up and slapped his hand over the second ledge, grabbing his spear.

  Above him, the Usgar woman sank to the ground, sobbing.

  Asba moved to throw, but Tamilee grabbed him by the arm. “Usgar magic,” she said, urgently motioning to the body lying under the overhang, to the revealed wound, which had obviously been closed, somewhat, with magic.

  “I think she tried,” Tamilee whispered.

  Asba rushed past her to fall over his brother. Tamilee stepped out to confront the Usgar woman.

  “Who are you?”

  “Connebra—”

  “Why are you here?”

  “All dead,” the woman answered. “They killed all. The bright-faced sidhe demons.”

  “Demons like the Usgar!” Tamilee answered.

  The woman slumped pitifully. It seemed to Tamilee as if her backbone just melted as she rolled her shoulders and face forward to fall into her hands, and there she bobbed with sobs.

  Tamilee gripped her spear more tightly. She even lifted it as if to throw it into the woman—she could have killed this one easily at that moment.

  She lowered the spear.

  Asba came out beside her, his face red and puffy, tears streaking his cheeks. He looked up at the Usgar, then back to Tamilee, who slowly shook her head.

  “Come down here, then,” Asba barked up at her. “Come down and tell us all, or we’ll stick you with our spears and yank you down and kill you.”

  The woman moved slowly, like a broken thing. She unwound and straightened her back just enough to slide forward, hugging her spear close. She went over the ledge and half fell, half floated to the one below, then again seemed to float and slide to the lip and over, coming down right before Tamilee and Asba, with Asef lying dead behind her.

  “I tried,” she said through sniffles and tears. “All night. I could not. I could not.”

  3

  OVERCOMING REPUTATION

  “We’d have to stay near the lake,” Talmadge told Aydrian, the two out ahead of the refugee group, which had moved fully off the Ayamharas Plateau earlier that morning. Scouting out in front now, Aydrian and Talmadge had traveled past the foothills east of their descent to come to the banks of the wide lake that had been formed by the fissure cut through the mountains. It stretched far to the south of their position and out of sight to the east.

  “There’s no cover,” said Aydrian. He ran his fingers through his curly black hair, then cupped them over his eyes and peered to the east.

  “But there is food and water, and we’ll need both to get this many across the desert,” Talmadge replied. He was taller than Aydrian, but much lankier, and nowhere near as formidable as the exiled king of Honce-the-Bear. Aydrian wasn’t wearing his brilliant breastplate now, but he was still far thicker than Talmadge, with muscles tight from years of rigorous training. “But I understand your concerns,” the frontiersman added. “Were it just we two…”

  Aydrian turned to regard him. “If they spy us along the lakeside and come out, where might we run?”

  “They’ll have a long way to get to us, though.”

  “A long way for a flying dragon?”

  Talmadge had no answer to Aydrian’s question.

  “Perhaps we should not have let the Usgar witch take the farseeing crystal,” Aydrian added. “It would be good to look back on our enemies, and good to see if the far side of this new lake empties into a river that might afford us passage.”

  “Aoleyn will return,” Talmadge insisted, and looked back up at the towering plateau. “She has to.”

  Aydrian stared at the man, locking his gaze, and gave a slight nod. “If you trust in her, I trust in her,” he said. “I hope she will return soon. It would be good to know.” He turned back the way they had come and added resignedly, “We cannot wait.”

  * * *

  Aoleyn stayed mostly low, more in a series of nearly weightless hops using the malachite stone than the actual flight offered by her moonstone. The descent from the northern rim of the chasm seemed obvious enough at first, but with trails splitting many times as she moved down the mountainside.

  She feared she might lose the trail, and feared even worse. She kept telling herself that she had been gone more than a full day and so her friends could be far along, but that didn’t much help her anxiety here. If they had been caught and killed, Aoleyn would be alone, truly alone. Only then did the young woman feel the weight of that possibility, terrifying and chilling.

  Those thoughts stayed with her and grew heavier with each stride. Where were they?

  “No signs of battle,” she whispered, but her litany sounded hollow to her. She had seen the enemy, so many, so fierce. She had seen their god, and the dragon upon which he rode.

  She paused at one high point, glancing desperately to the north, to the east, even back to the west. “Where are you?” she whispered.

  It was a good question. Aoleyn pulled a small implement from her pouch. She held it up and called to its magic, peering through it, sending her vision far and wide. First to the west, then around to the north, and finally to the east, to the base of the mountain plateau.

  Aoleyn breathed a sigh of great relief when she at last came in sight of the refugee band, nestled among the boulders at the base of the mountains, already down at the level of the desert.

  She replaced the implement and called to her green malachite and her moonstone, running with great leaps, sometimes flying, taking a straight line toward the camp instead of the winding trails the refugees would have had to walk around the many broken ravines and boulders. Still, they had made great progress, and Aoleyn expected that her friend Talmadge had led the way.

  She went down to the ground, back to walking, as she came upon the last straight run to the camp. She didn’t need to flaunt Usgar magic to the uamhas, certainly. Her unstretched skull was enough to keep her dangerously distanced from them already.

  She walked into the camp tentatively, head down, glancing about only enough to make sure the scowls didn’t turn into dangerous action. There were no Usgar here, and only three others who were not of the lake tribes. And there was a fourth, a young man she at last spotted, whose head had not been elongated in infancy.

  “Bahdlahn,” she breathed, rushing for him, and how his face brightened when he saw her, his arms going wide to catch her and draw her in for a great hug.

  “I thought you would return before the night,” he said breathlessly. “I thought … I feared…”

  “Shh,” Aoleyn implored him, putting her finger over his lips. “I had much to do.” As she spoke, Aoleyn looked past Bahdlahn to another woman who was not of the tribes, though she had lived with the lakemen for some time. Using her hands to claw along the ground, the dark-skinned, black-haired woman forced her roller board across the broken ground.

  “Talmadge will be glad to see you,” the woman, Khotai, said. “And if you’ve half the power he says you have, I guess we’re all glad you’ve returned.”

  Aoleyn grinned as she looked down at Khotai, someone she had not forgotten during her time in the caves. Outwardly, and to those who did not know her, Khotai seemed a pitiful th
ing, with one leg bitten off by the monster in the lake and the other rendered useless. Now her hands, too, seemed broken things, from all her clawing about the ground in the years since the attack.

  The return look from the woman was not a reflection of Aoleyn’s mirth, though, but a frown, and Aoleyn realized that Khotai believed her smile to be condescending, as she looked down on the crippled woman.

  Aoleyn quickly fished about her pack, seeking specific crystals, turning the opening to catch the sunlight so she could see the colors of the flecks. She brought a small armful up, clutched them close, and closed her eyes, hearing the song of Usgar.

  “Ah, Usgar witch!” one nearby woman yelled, scrambling away so frantically that she fell right over. Others took up the call.

  Aoleyn ignored them, focusing on the song. She opened her eyes and held her hand out to Khotai, who, along with Bahdlahn, was staring at her curiously.

  Khotai looked at the offered hand.

  “Take it,” Aoleyn said.

  Khotai’s eyes narrowed.

  “Please?” Aoleyn begged, and she moved the hand a bit.

  Never releasing Aoleyn from her gaze, Khotai gingerly reached up and grasped Aoleyn’s hand.

  Khotai rose, floating up, her remaining leg unwinding below her. And there she was, standing, or seeming to stand, though her leg below her found no solid placement on the ground. Gasps arose all around the two women, though not from Bahdlahn, who merely smiled widely, not surprised by any miracles Aoleyn might enact.

  “Bahdlahn,” Aoleyn said, though she kept looking at Khotai, “find me a blanket that we can make into a dress, and two straps of leather, two belts.”

  “What do you mean to do?” Khotai quietly asked her.

  “I mean to make you a belt with these crystals I hold. One that will give you the power to do this for yourself.”

  “Do not tease me…”

  “Follow with me,” Aoleyn said, and she took a step aside.