‘What is it you want, Demon Woman?’ he asked Askari.
‘She is not a demon,’ Skilgannon told him. ‘She is a Reborn.’
‘I know what she is. She is evil. We brought her back. We thought she would tell us the wonders of her age. She told us nothing. Landis begged her, and she laughed. Vestava questioned her, and she said she could not remember. Give her time, she asked us. Then she rode out and gathered an army. The days of blood and death began. I know her. I know her too well.’
‘You are mistaken, priest. This is not the Eternal. She is one of her Reborns, and is, with me, trying to end her reign. We need to find the silver eagle and its egg.’
The old man laughed. ‘You cannot find the eagle, warrior. It floats so high that the sky is no longer blue. It moves among the stars.’
‘But it sends power here,’ said Skilgannon. ‘To feed the egg.’
The old man lifted a gnarled hand and rubbed at his face. ‘I am so tired,’ he said. The hand was webbed, the knuckles grotesquely distorted.
‘What is happening here?’ asked Skilgannon.
‘We made an error — a dreadful error. We tried to move the Temple outside time. Just a few seconds, so that she,’ he said, pointing at Askari, ‘could not steal more artefacts. We had discovered a series of hidden tunnels below the temple. There were artefacts there. Terrible artefacts.’ His misshapen face turned towards Askari. ‘She knows this. Weapons that deal death over great distances. There were also scrolls and documents that spoke of even more ghastly devices. Aye, and maps which showed where they were hidden. She wanted them. It was not enough for her that she had corrupted our work. She desired even more power, even greater weapons. We could not allow it. We sought to hide the temple from her. At first we thought we had succeeded.’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘Instead we merely slowed time within these walls. What followed was more horrible than you could imagine. We began to change. Our structures became unstable. Bone continued to grow. Many of the brothers died, others became deformed. It was slow at first, and we did not realize what was happening. Once we did we tried to change the spell. It only made matters worse. The wards around the temple increased in power. After that everything happened so swiftly there was no time to escape. Some of the brothers managed to reach these higher levels, where the mutations slowed for a while. Gradually they all changed, reverted to beasts, and tore one another apart, or fled below to join the packs that roam the lower levels.’
‘Yet you survived,’ said Skilgannon.
Lifting his grotesque hand the old priest pulled clear a golden chain, hanging from his neck. Upon it, in a golden clasp, was a black and white crescent, part crystal, part stone. T carry the Abbot’s Moon,’ he said. Idly he stroked the crescent. ‘Its power is almost gone. Once it shone, white and bright. It sustained me.’
‘It has been five hundred years,’ said Askari. ‘How do any creatures still live here?’
‘Five hundred years, is it? Not when each day outside passes in under an hour. By my reckoning it is fifteen years since we cast the spell — though my mind is not what it was, and I could be wrong. For a while we could leave and bring in supplies. When more of us became beasts we began to feed on each other.’ His head drooped. ‘We believed we were the keepers of knowledge, that we could lift the world from its savagery. Instead we became savages. The mutation in our bodies also made us long-lived.’
‘Why did you not just end the magic?’ asked Skilgannon. ‘That would surely have stopped the horror of the Eternal.’
The deformed priest looked bemused. ‘End the magic? How would one accomplish such a feat? We tried to change the spell. We knew it was destroying us. But the more we meddled with it, the worse it became. A few months back we made our last attempt. All we succeeded in doing was accelerating the process. Now there is no food, my people are dead, or changed. They feed on each other.’
‘Listen to me, old man,’ Skilgannon urged him. ‘The eagle feeds the magic. It comes somehow through the Mirror of Heaven. Where does it then go?’
‘Magic does not go, warrior. Magic is.’
‘Where is the holiest place here?’ asked Askari.
The old priest gave a cackling laugh. ‘That you of all people should ask that! How amusing. Evil seeks holiness.’
‘Is there such a place?’ Skilgannon pressed him.
‘The Crystal Shrine. The Great Abbot built it, I believe. That is where we used to meet and pray, and heal the sick.’
‘Is it close, this shrine?’ asked Skilgannon patiently.
A distant scream sounded. Then another. Their interlocutor seemed not to notice. He stared at Askari.
‘Where is the shrine?’ asked Skilgannon. The old man did not reply, but his gaze shifted to a far door on the western wall. ‘Let’s go!’ said Skilgannon.
The priest stumbled to his feet. ‘No!’ he shouted. ‘She must not go near it. She would defile it!’
‘Listen to me!’ said Skilgannon, taking the man by the arm. ‘Try to understand. She is not Jianna! She is Askari, a young woman from the mountain lands south of here.’
‘She might once have been this Askari you speak of. Not now. I am not fooled. I see beyond the flesh. I see the aura of her soul. She is Jianna. She is the Eternal.’
Skilgannon turned slowly towards Askari. She was standing behind him, her sabre in her hand.
‘The twisted magic here has driven him mad,’ she said.
‘No,’ said Skilgannon softly. He sighed. ‘I knew something was wrong back on the road when I looked at you in the moonlight. My heart almost stopped. I think I knew then. I just didn’t want to believe it. How did you do it, Jianna?’
He thought she was going to deny it. Instead she merely smiled. ‘Decado gave one of Memnon’s jewels to the girl. It connected me to her. All I had to do was die. It was most painful. Much like this. .’
As she spoke her sabre lunged forward, spearing Skilgannon’s chest. He staggered back, and tried to draw his own swords. Strength seeped from his body and he fell heavily. Jianna leaned over him. ‘Do not fret, my love,’ she said. ‘I will have you Reborn. Perhaps by then you will have put aside notions of destroying me. And now I must go. Memnon is waiting for me.’
With that she walked past the old priest, and through the far door.
As the sun rose the Drenai warriors filed out onto the road, forming up in ranks, twelve men across and seven deep. A little way back a second phalanx formed, ready to rush to the aid of the first when needed. Stavut had been placed at the rear of the second group, along with the less experienced of the Drenai. These were the younger men, new to the front line. Stavut glanced at their faces. Many were nervous, but all stood ready. From their high vantage point Stavut could see the Eternal Guard forming up below. In their black and silver armour they looked invincible, and the inspirational speech Druss had given the night before seemed suddenly hollow and unconvincing.
Stavut felt the weight of the chain mail on his shoulders, and sweat was beginning to trickle down his neck. How odd, he thought. Water is running freely from my skin, and yet my mouth is parched and dry.
It was then that he realized his bladder was full. He swore. ‘What is it?’ asked the man beside him.
Stavut told him, and the young soldier smiled. ‘Me too. It will be the same for every man here.’
‘Why?’ asked Stavut.
‘According to Gilden it is the tension and the fear. It tightens the muscles around the bladder. The feeling will go away once the battle starts.’