Reavers by the hundreds could be seen racing north along the wallwalks, dispatching any guardsman who dared try to withstand them.
At the foot of the city a vast reaver horde blackened the land. Howlers trumpeted in their midst, and the earth seemed to groan beneath their feet while clouds of gree whirled above the throng.
Near the great worm mound, a fell mage squatted, covered with glowing runes. She wielded a staff that gleamed as white as lightning. A rune was taking shape beneath her, a malevolent thing that gathered mists and sent them swirling about like a tornado.
“By the Powers!” King Anders swore when he saw the mess.
There was nothing to save at Carris, it seemed.
Even if we charge the city now, Erin thought, the reavers will wipe out its people before we get there.
Erin’s horse stamped nervously, and she leaned forward. Many a brave knight clutched his lance, as if to race into battle at any moment.
The lords at the front of the column stared hard at Anders, to see what he would do. He claimed to be an Earth King. Would he call a world worm, as Gaborn had done?
Erin shouted, “Your Highness, sound the charge!”
But Anders raised his right hand in warning, and said in a bereaved tone, “I cannot. The Earth warns against it. Those in the city are Gaborn’s Chosen, and they must die for his sins.”
“What?” Celinor shouted in horror.
Anders shook his head sadly. “I am to be the new Earth King. He is the old. But I cannot be crowned until the old is swept away.” He peered forward as if he could see through the walls of Carris.
What kind of man is he? Erin wondered. Gaborn could never have sat idle while folk were in danger.
Erin’s head spun. She was dazed with fatigue. More than that, she reeled from the shock.
She felt as if she were in a dream, or at least half in a dream. She wanted to call out to the owl of the netherworld for help, to touch his mind with a sending.
A thought struck her.
The owl had warned that Asgaroth could bend his will and read the minds of others. Could she reach Asgaroth with a sending?
Even as the thought struck, Erin silently screamed the name, “Asgaroth!”
King Anders sat on his horse just ahead of Erin, slouched wearily in his saddle, his long gray hair flowing out behind a kingly war helm.
In answer to her silent call, he whirled as if she had slapped him. His mouth parted in surprise, and he glared at her.
The mask of kindliness fell from his face.
The One True Master raced toward Iome, its feet a blur.
“Noooooo!” Gaborn screamed, veering to block the monster’s path.
He raced forward, weapon in hand.
For an instant, Iome watched them both, frozen in pain. Gaborn bounded toward a creature part light, part shadow. The One True Master blurred, her whip snapping like fire. Gaborn cried out, stumbled, and ducked beneath the lash.
Iome charged toward a Dedicate, a huge reaver that lay as if asleep. She cocked her arm back, preparing to stab with all her might.
The iron javelin ripped from her hand as a reaver swatted at her, missing by inches.
Gaborn shouted, “Iome, flee!”
The room shuddered. The ground rolled beneath Iome’s feet, and stones rained down from the roof as another temblor struck.
“Gasht!” a spell hissed from the monster’s onyx staff. Gaborn took two steps forward and sprang high in the air as a dark green cloud flowed forward. He hurled his javelin.
The monster twisted to her side. The javelin glanced off her skull. Gaborn was still flying toward the beast, and hit it with a sickly thud, then fell away like a broken doll.
“No!” Iome cried.
The One True Master regarded Gaborn for a second, dismissed him, and turned toward Iome.
In her mind, Iome heard Gaborn’s last words, as if he shouted them anew. “Iome, flee!”
The reavers circled Iome all around, their features twisted and cruel. She frantically peered toward the far corners of the room. Even with a dozen endowments of sight, she couldn’t see how to escape.
There was no pain where Gaborn went. He’d smacked into the bony head-plates of the monster. Then nothing.
He woke in a realm as light as day. All about him were fields, brown from the farmer’s plow, the rich soil spilling from the ground. Hills rose in gentle humps in the distance, with oak trees sprawling on their sides. There was no wind, no sun, only a sourceless light that shone above. Ravens cawed and wheeled overhead, their raucous cries full of malice.
Tender shoots shot from the ground all about him, as if the soil could not hold the abundance of life.
The ravens dove and tore at them, drawing the seeds from the soil, ripping the pale roots.
A dozen yards away, a man-shaped creature slumped upon a large stone, his back toward Gaborn. He wore a shapeless robe of gray, and gray hair spilled down his back. But where he should have had skin, Gaborn saw only sand and pebbles.
The Earth Spirit sat before him. “I am but fruit to the crows of fortune,” he muttered. “They hover on jeering wings. My stones cannot fell them....”
Gaborn went to the creature, rested a hand upon its shoulder. It turned to face him.
The Earth Spirit wore the face of Raj Ahten, but no eyes peered from its head, only empty sockets.
The Earth looked at Gaborn helplessly, threw up its hands. “The ravens. The ravens feed....”
Gaborn saw the Earth’s torment.
“Why do you wear the face of an enemy still?” Gaborn asked. “We should be friends.”
The Earth took on a pained expression. “You turned from me.”
“No,” Gaborn said, “only once, in a moment of weakness. But never again will I turn from you. All that I am or ever hope to be, I give to you.”
The pebbly face of the Earth Spirit began to shift. It took on a new form. Gaborn’s father appeared for a moment, and then his face became young. Gaborn thought that the Earth might be showing him his own face, or the face of his father as a child, but then realized that it had revealed the face of Gaborn’s son. The pebbles and grains of sand flowed once more, and Iome was smiling up at him.
Gaborn felt something within him ease, and saw that he was bleeding from a wound to his chest, but instead of blood, light flowed out. He let it flow. All around him, the crows began to caw and flap into the air, wings exploding into the sky.
39
A Tree Beneath the Shadows
No tree or plant can grow in daylight alone. Given only light, a seed will not germinate, roots will not take hold. It takes a balance of sunlight and shadow. Men, too, grow their deepest roots in the darkness.
Gaborn woke and scrambled to his feet, heart hammering. His ribs felt like broken twigs. The great reaver was chasing Iome, scrabbling on powerful legs as it scrambled over a knot of its precious Dedicates, crushing them.
The effect of its curses putrefied flesh and set wounds to festering. Now dozens of reavers nearby rasped loudly as they sought to breathe. But with the apparent slowing of time, the sound came as an ominous drone.
Iome ran from the monster. Its ghostly runes still glowed, but darkness seemed to flow beneath its feet, obscuring the view. Gaborn wiped tears from his burning eyes.
Iome ducked between two reavers that seemed to move at a crawl, seeking to use them as cover. But Gaborn knew that she couldn’t hide for long. The reaver queen raced toward Iome at blinding speed.
Gaborn could feel death approaching her.
Gaborn reached down, picked up Erden Geboren’s ancient reaver dart.
The One True Master waded over its own Dedicates, grinding a pair of them beneath her.
“Strike!” the Earth warned.
Gaborn shouted a battle cry and lunged forward, bounding twenty yards to a stride. The reavers around him were dark monoliths, almost motionless. He darted between the legs of a large Dedicate and plunged his spear into the One True Master’s hind knee.