Five Hundred Years After (Phoenix Guards) Read online

  She didn’t see the assassin, but was convinced that he could not have gone far. She stood there, outside of the room housing the dead Emperor, and reflected.

  For those readers too young to have experienced it, when an Emperor dies, it is not at once apparent; to be sure, everyone will feel, more or less, according his nature, a certain emptiness or hollowness; and so when, perhaps days or weeks later, he learns that the Emperor passed away on thus-and-such a date, he will say, “Ah, that is what it was.” But there is no trumpeting of the event within the mind, no reason to be certain, and, thus, there was no reason for Adron to feel the sudden sense of foreboding that came over him as he stood in the tent, matching stares with Tazendra, while Khaavren, Aerich, and Pel looked on.

  He shook his head, and said, “It is gone; I don’t know what it was. Yet, I fear—”

  “What have you done?” said Khaavren, who, though not a sorcerer, had felt distant echoes, as it were, of the sensation that Tazendra, Nyleth, Sethra, Adron, and others had felt upon the release of Mario’s spell.

  Adron blinked, as if he’d forgotten the Captain was there. “I fear—”

  “What have you done?” said Khaavren again, and dropped his sword, which fell to the wooden floor of the wagon with a dull thud. Khaavren would have followed it, but Aerich and Pel caught him and helped him to a seat.

  “Are you all right?” said Aerich.

  Khaavren nodded dumbly and reached for his sword. Pel put it into his hand. “I do not,” began Khaavren, choked, and said, “I feel weak.”

  Adron leaned his head out of the tent and called for his physicker, who appeared at once, stared at the hole in the back of the tent, and said, “What has—”

  “Tend to this man,” said Adron.

  “Your Highness is kind,” said Aerich.

  Adron shook his head, stared at the flashing lights on the mosaic of purple stones, and frowned. The entire shape of the board appeared to be changing now—to grow in three dimensions, as if the ominous power of the spell were reaching out, growing, taking on a life of its own.

  The physicker unbound Khaavren’s hand, tsk’d at its condition, and said, “He will need stitches. I have everything here.” He addressed Khaavren kindly, saying, “With the Favor, sir, we shall save your hand.” Khaavren, for his part, only heard the words, as it were, from a distance.

  Sethra did not have to wait long to find the assassin; in fact, she did not even have to look; she had been standing outside of the Portrait Room but a short time when, his face now cleaned of grime, and dressed in simple Jhereg colors, he walked around the corner toward where Sethra was standing. On his arm was Aliera.

  “You!” cried Sethra.

  “To which of us are you speaking?” said Aliera sweetly. “And are you waving that around because you intend to use it, or merely to emphasize a gesture?”

  “What have you done?” said Sethra, in a voice as cold and hard as ice.

  “Come and see,” said Aliera, and, still holding Mario’s arm, they walked into the Portrait Room. The mist had, by now, entirely dispersed. Without a pause, Aliera strode up to the throne; ignoring the body which had slid to the ground, three knives still protruding from it, and around which courtiers and servants stood, remaining a good distance away, but unable to keep from staring.

  Someone said, “The Consort must be informed,” to which someone else replied, “You may have the honor.”

  The Orb was once again floating—only now above the Emperor’s body, emitting grey for mourning while it interrogated the Cycle and searched, in its own way, for the new Emperor; Aliera disengaged her arm from Mario and took the Orb into her hands, saying, “I claim the Orb and the throne in the name of my father, Adron e’Kieron. The Reign of the Phoenix is over, and the Reign of the Drag—” she stopped, and a puzzled look crossed her features. The Orb began to emit red sparks. Aliera let go, but it stayed where it was, only now there were blue and green sparks as well, and these became brighter, larger, and more frequent. Then, abruptly, it stopped, and became the Orb again, glowing white and angry.

  Aliera looked at Sethra and said, “What have you done?”

  “I?” said Sethra coldly. “I have done nothing, more’s the pity. I would suggest that you take the matter up with your father, but I very much doubt you will have the chance.”

  “What do you mean?” said Aliera.

  But Sethra only shook her head. Iceflame was still in her hand, though, and, knowing she had but seconds to act, she raised it and called upon the power of Dzur Mountain.

  Inside Adron’s tent, the physicker looked up and said, “I’ve done what I can, we shall have to—what is it, Your Highness?”

  For a look of confusion was spreading across Adron’s features; in fact, more than confusion, it was almost as if, without actually growing, he was becoming larger.

  “I do not know,” said Adron. “The spell cannot have worked so quickly.”

  But the effect continued, until Adron had almost the aspect of a minor deity, and yet it continued, and then, abruptly, his expression changed. “By all the Gods,” said Adron. He did not cry it loudly, but conjoined with the look of terror on his face as he stared at the mosaic, the soft oath was all the more stirring. Even Khaavren opened his eyes and seemed to take some interest in the proceedings.

  It was Aerich who said, “What is it?”

  “The Emperor,” whispered Adron. “Someone has killed the Emperor.”

  Khaavren, for his part, blinked; surprised, in fact, at the sudden swelling of emotion in his heart. But the others frowned and said, “What of it?” by which they meant, not that they were not concerned, more or less, at the idea of someone having managed to kill His Mjaesty, but, rather, that this news did not by itself account for Adron’s extreme reaction.

  His Highness said, “Don’t you understand? My spell was intended to fight its way into the Orb, wrest control of it away from the Emperor, and put it under my control. But someone has killed the Emperor, and so—”

  “You,” said Tazendra, startled “are now the very Emperor that your spell is attempting to win control away from in order to give it to you. How peculiar.”

  “I believe,” said Adron, attempting to laugh, “that I shall be remembered as having the shortest reign of any Empror in history.” Then he shook his head. “Too fast, too fast. I cannot control—”

  He broke off and began to tremble.

  Outside, shouts indicated that the Lavodes had broken through, and were coming to stop Adron’s spell; too late, too late.

  Adron looked at those in the tent and said, “You, my friends, do not deserve to die. Moreover, someone must be left to tell history of my folly.”

  “How,” said Aerich, standing suddenly. “Someone left?”

  “How,” cried the physicker, who was, in fact, a Vallista, not a Dragonlord. “Die? I have no wish to die.” He bolted from the tent without another word.

  “It is too late,” said Adron, “but I still have some seconds to act, and more power at my disposal than any sorcerer has ever had. Come, Duke, you have been my friend; if you love me at all, give me your hand that I might save you and those who are dear to you.”

  “Here it is.”

  “Ah, my daughter!” cried Adron with sudden pain. “The Orb itself! Sethra, can you hear me? You must save the Orb, and you must save my daughter!”

  Adron now seemed to glow like the Orb itself. The purple stones on the board flashed like cold fire, racing around the pattern so fast they appeared to flicker; and the pattern itself, now, seemed to fill the room, enveloping them all in its presence; indeed, Tazendra began to feel an odd sensation, as if she were actually inside the Orb.

  “You others, take the Duke’s hand if you value your lives. Yes, like that.”

  “I do not believe I can stand,” said Khaavren.

  “You can,” said Aerich simply. “You must.”

  The Tiassa looked into his friend’s face, nodded, and with help rose to his feet. He was
still unsteady on his feet, but there was no question, from Adron’s tone and Aerich’s look, that the matter was serious, and so, supporting himself by leaning on Pel and Tazendra, gripping Aerich with his bandaged hand, he remained standing.

  In the Portrait Room, Sethra said grimly, “I hear, and will do as Your Highness asks. If I can.”

  She still held Iceflame high, but now she walked toward Aliera, who waited next to the Orb. Aliera felt Mario tense suddenly; she said, “Bide. I do not understand what is happening, but do not attack her.”

  “Very well,” said Mario.

  “What did my father want?” said Aliera.

  “He wants me to save you,” said Sethra. “I will try, but I must, above all, save the Orb, and that is not easy.”

  “Can I help?”

  “No, little Dragon,” said Sethra, something like amusement crossing her features. “You cannot help.” Sethra placed her left hand on the Orb; her right still held Iceflame pointing up at the sky.

  There was a flash, so that Aliera, Mario, and the assembled courtiers were momentarily blinded. Mario felt that he was slipping away in a direction he had not known he could move, and he reached out for Aliera; Aliera felt a sudden wrenching she could not describe, and she reached out for Mario. Sethra reached out for them both.

  In the tent, Adron looked into Aerich’s eyes and said, “Remember me, Duke.”

  “I shall not forget Your Highness.”

  “And you others, do not fail to tell what happened to any who ask.”

  “We shall not—Your Majesty.”

  “Then farewell and—”

  “Yes?” said Aerich.

  Adron smiled for the last time. There was a single bloody stain on his shoulder where Khaavren had touched him, and his face was glowing with power and, indeed, majesty.

  “Don’t tell them that I meant well.”

  Aerich found no words to say, and in that instant it seemed to him that the world around him ceased, for a moment, to exist.

  Chapter the Thirty-fourth

  Which Treats of Adron’s Disaster,

  And the Fall of the Empire.

  EVIL, HEROISM, DISASTER, TRIUMPH, HORROR, and love—these together represent the summit of human emotion, and the apex of our tale.

  We ought to assure the reader that, except in a very limited way, the work he holds in his hands has no pretensions of being a history of Adron’s Disaster and the Fall of the Empire. We are following the lives of certain personages, and some of them, indeed, were involved in these great events, but it is only in the course of following these characters that we are witnessing the Disaster; at the point when we began this tale, in fact, we, knowing where we would end, made the decision to summarily omit any references to children, babies, or even pets (with the exception of certain unimportant fishes) who may have come to our attention—it is possible that the reader noticed this omission. Yet we do not apologize. It is our contention that to have included such pitiable characters, knowing they were destined only for destruction, would have been, historically accurate or not, to have given in to the basest, lowest form of literary theatricality; readers who wish to inform themselves (or, indeed, torment themselves) by reading of such horrors are directed to entire rooms in the Adrilankha Public Library which are filled with such accounts.

  What we wish to make clear, in other words, is that we do not consider ourselves required to detail, nor will we indulge ourselves by detailing, building by building, person by person, horror by horror, all that was entailed in this, the mightiest catastrophe in the history of the Empire.

  Is it not sufficient to contemplate the Imperial Palace, with all her history, character, and beauty, gone forever in the drawing of a breath, with all of her nobles, princes, guards, discreets, jailers, and servants vanishing beneath a tidal wave of amorphia to become, in fact, this selfsame amorphia, and so lose every semblance of structure, humanity, and personality they once possessed?

  There can be no doubt of the speed with which it occurred, for there were innumerable witnesses—witnesses who became refugees, with their own stories to tell of racing against the growing flood of amorphia which not only threatened to engulf them, but did engulf, according to each witness, at least one friend, lover, or family member—that is to say, no one close enough to see the destruction of the city escaped by more than a hair’s breadth; thus none failed to see others who, for lack of speed, lack of alertness, or lack of fortune, did not escape.

  Fittingly, it was Adron himself who died first—whether the mosaic of purple stones destroyed him, or whether, grim as such a thought might be, he destroyed it; they nevertheless went together, dissolving into the component energy of all matter: amorphia. We have called this fitting; is it, then, the judgment of the historian that Adron was evil? To be sure, he perpetrated the most profound tragedy since the mythical catastrophe which freed man from the enslavement of the Jenoine (which later was a tragedy, of course, only from the point of view of these Jenoine, or those who feel all life of equal value); but was he, in fact, evil?

  The historian believes he was; for what can evil be but the willingness to cause untold misery for one’s own desires? Were we convinced that his motives were as selfless as, in the last instant, he claimed to Aerich they were, we might, instead, consider him a fool; yet this historian at least believes that central to his actions was rage—rage so strong that it overrode all of his concern and his caution; rage so strong that it destroyed the Empire.

  The reasons for this great anger, that is, how much of the mixture was for the ill-treatment of his daughter and how much for the ill-treatment of the Empire, we cannot know, nor do we care; his caution abandoned him and he acted, not from thought, but rather from his own hatred, and so destroyed, first himself, then the city, then the Empire.

  The first thing to happen, an instant before the dissolution, was: The Orb vanished. In the long, complex, and mysterious history of Sethra Lavode, the historian doubts that she ever performed an act more courageous, more difficult, and more vital than, with full knowledge of what was about to happen, standing in the Portrait Room and sending the Orb to the one place in all the world where she knew, however all-encompassing the impending disaster proved, even should it destroy every speck of life on the world (which, in fact, she was not certain was not the case) the Orb, at least, would be safe; in other words, to the Paths of the Dead.

  That, having accomplished this feat of unheard-of skill and daring she then, for no reason other than friendship, remained where she was long enough to collect Aliera and attempt to also bring her along to a place of safety is to know that out of all the heroes with which history is here and there dotted, there is at least one, and here we mean Sethra herself, who has proven before the very eyes of history that her reputation is not undeserved—that is, she consistently proves, ever and anon, that she still has all of those facets of character which won for her the renown she enjoys.

  Nevertheless, however much skill she displayed in this last action before the fall of the Empire, however much courage it took to carry it out, it was not, at least in the most complete sense of the word, entirely successful.

  To teleport—that is, to transfer from one place to another, arriving whole and well—was not, even then, entirely unknown in the annals of sorcery. To be sure, there had never been a certain, confirmed case of its being done successfully, but there were, in the first place, rumors; and, in the second, enough close failures to make the rumors believable (as well as to permit anyone who witnessed the gruesome results of such a failure to drink without paying for a score of years). As recently as the past Athyra Reign, in fact, a mere seven hundred years before the events we have had the honor to relate, the wizard Tigarrae of Plainview published a three-volume work on the subject, in which he claimed to have successfully teleported himself from one end of his test chamber to the other. To be sure, an attempt, after the publication of his work, to repeat the experiment before witnesses resulted in failure and death for T
igarrae; yet the work stands, even today when such uses are commonplace, as an excellent manual for students in the magical sciences.

  And, we should add, it was far from unknown then for small, inanimate objects to be transferred from one place to another—indeed, as long ago as the Sixteenth Dzur Reign, the Warlord, Shenta e’Terics, while engaged in a campaign far to the southeast, speaking to the Court Wizard through the Orb, received by this method certain maps which he later claimed to have been decisive in bringing the campaign to a successful conclusion.

  The notion of teleporting someone else from one place to another had only been seen in the most outlandish of popular ballads and plays; certainly no sorcerer or wizard, even the great Norathar the Sorcerer, Court Wizard during the Seventeenth Dragon Reign, had ever seriously discussed such a thing. That, under the most adverse of conditions, and the greatest possible press of time, Sethra managed such a thing even in part stands as one of the greatest tributes to a wizard of whom, even then, it was said, “She redefines the possible each day of her life.”

  Even such a triumph cannot remove the sorrow engendered by the tragedy—indeed, nothing ever can as long as man’s memory shall endure. Yet, even the awful destruction and suffering, the memory of which will always haunt us, cannot detract from the honor Sethra Lavode deserves from us all. Similarly, that today she has vanished from sight, perhaps for all time, does not detract from the honor. And that she is now, again, seen by many as a figure of horror or evil is as great a shame to us as Adron’s Disaster is—or ought to be—to the proud e’Kieron line of the House of the Dragon.

  The Disaster—

  Even as Aliera vanished, and Sethra with her, the overwhelming power of the amorphia devoured the Dragon Gate, scarcely noticing as it destroyed the ten thousands of souls before the gate. Nyleth the Wizard, Rollondar e’Drien, Lady Glass, Roila Lavode even as she set foot onto the spell-wagon—all were utterly destroyed. Did Roila frown as she saw the countenance of the unhappy physicker as he rushed from the tent to his doom? We do not know. For her, for the assembled Lavodes, it was over in an instant; Molric e’Drien, Adron’s loyal chainman, lay bleeding from several wounds pinned beneath his fallen horse, proud that his father was triumphant, ashamed that he had not fought better for his commander; he would never meet his brother.