Wildmane Read online

  Stavark took the horses and left. Mirolah unloaded food from the saddlebags as Orem went in search of wood for the fire.

  Before long, the two of them sat in front of a crackling blaze, stewing potatoes and rabbit meat in a pot. Orem spiced the stew using herbs from a few small bags he kept in the cooking supplies. The aroma set her mouth to watering.

  They sat in silence waiting for Stavark to return and for the stew to be ready. After a time, Mirolah spoke. “Orem, tell me a story.”

  He smiled. “Be careful what you ask for. I have no end of stories.”

  “Tell me about Wildmane. Tell me how the most powerful hero in history died of heartbreak.”

  His zeal faded. “Ah. Well, have you ever heard of the threadweaver Ethiel?”

  “No.”

  “Also known as the Red Weaver.”

  Mirolah snapped her fingers. She had read a story about the Red Weaver just recently; one of the forbidden books by the hearth. “Yes! The Red Weaver killed her father and began a war against Calsinac. Wildmane and Bands foiled her plans. I thought they killed her.”

  “No.”

  “The story said that the Red Weaver was insane, that she fantasized Wildmane loved her. Did he?”

  Orem tossed a stick into the flames. “No.”

  “Did she kill him?” she asked.

  “No. She took the one he loved. She took Bands away.” He cleared his throat and set another stick on the fire.

  “Oh,” she said, and it hurt to hear that. The love affair of Bands and Wildmane was legendary. To have it cut off so didn’t seem right. Legends didn’t usually end like that.

  “How?”

  “The Red Weaver was brilliant. After all, how do you kill someone who will heal from any wound? So she struck him in the heart, took away his reason for living.” He stared at the flames. She watched Orem, and the bright bridge formed between them, just like it had with her and the darkling, and she shook her head to stop it. Reluctantly, it faded.

  Orem, of course, didn’t see the bright bridge, so he kept talking. “There are no legends of Wildmane after that. He left the human lands.”

  “Maybe he disappeared because the GodSpill was gone.”

  The fire popped and crackled, but Orem didn’t respond. They sat in silence, listening to the cicadas chirp in the distant trees. The smell of the rabbit stew was intoxicating, and she wondered where Stavark was.

  “Orem...” she began, but she hesitated. She kept her gaze focused on him, but didn’t say anything for a long time. He let her find her words. “I know I haven’t been very talkative up to now. But I want to know...where we’re going.”

  He sat back and his contemplative mood vanished. He smiled. “We are going to Daylan’s Fountain,” he said.

  She cocked her head. “What’s that?”

  “Almost all of the books related to it in your part of Amarion have been destroyed. The simple folk have their own story, saying the gods took away the GodSpill as punishment for our hubris.”

  Simple folk? That was the story her father had told her. It was story everyone told. How else could the GodSpill have been taken away? He made her sound like a moron. “The GodSpill was a gift from the gods, and the threadweavers abused it. We got greedy and they punished us.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean ‘no’?”

  “That’s not what happened. The gods didn’t give us the GodSpill. Most of them didn’t want us to have it in the first place, but they couldn’t take it away. The GodSpill was an accident, a leak from the Godgate from before humans recorded time. That’s how it got its name. It spilled from the Godgate into Amarion.”

  “How do you know you’re right and my history is wrong?”

  “Because your history isn’t history. Your history is made of the bitter stories of a people who fear what they don’t understand, who would rather burn books than learn from them. My history comes from accounts written by actual historians from an age gone by. Once upon a time, people recorded events. And if you read enough of them, you can piece together what actually happened. Humans are responsible for the rise and fall of our civilization, not the gods. The gods do not really care what we do, and they notice even less. Daylan’s Fountain is responsible for the Age of Ascendance, for all the powerful threadweavers that arose.”

  “So what is it?”

  “It’s the most powerful artifact ever created, designed to pool the GodSpill and send it directly to humans, to use it however they wished. It turned normal people into threadweavers. It turned threadweavers into near gods. The loss of Daylan’s Fountain began the Devastation Years.”

  “So what really happened?” she asked, failing to keep the edge of sarcasm out of her voice.

  “Have you ever heard of Daylan Morth?”

  “No. Was he related to Zilok Morth?”

  “His great-grandson, several times removed. Daylan Morth was the most powerful threadweaver ever.”

  “More powerful than the Red Weaver and Zilok Morth?”

  “Undisputed.”

  “Why haven’t I heard of him, then?”

  “Because he didn’t try to conquer a kingdom or build his reputation. Daylan was a gentle soul. The reason he first studied threadweaving was because his wife was dying of a disease for which there was no cure. Within six months, he learned enough to heal his wife.”

  “Six months?”

  “Impressive, right? Remember this was also before the Age of Ascendance when everyone could do simple threadweavings, and powerful threadweavers could do almost anything. This was during the Age of Awakening. Using the GodSpill required painstaking study and sacrifice, and even then it was only accessible to those with inherent talent. Only a select few ever achieved the status of threadweaver.

  “Daylan realized he had a gift that he could turn to the advantage of others. If he could heal his wife of a wasting disease, why not all people? For years, he traveled, curing all who were sick. He also raised buildings that would never weather or need repair. He created places of learning and sheltered the poor.

  “However, it did not take long for him to realize that his efforts, as meaningful as they were, were only the efforts of one man. He would never be able to visit all of the villages that needed him. So he left his philanthropic travels and began working on a master weaving. He wanted to teach everyone how to wield the GodSpill, but how could he give aptitude to everyone? He labored for years looking for the solution. In the end, he created Daylan’s Fountain, the artifact that funneled GodSpill of Amarion to each and every human.

  “Suddenly, you didn’t need aptitude to be a threadweaver. Menial tasks became a thing of the past. People’s imaginations burst into reality. Powerful empires—conclaves of threadweavers working in concert—rose in just decades. The humans of Amarion left the fields, the construction of houses, the laying of roads, to the GodSpill, commanding it to do their work. Instead, they spent time creating art and architecture, studying and writing histories. Daylan Morth’s creation worked beyond his wildest dreams. He single-handedly created a golden age of humankind.

  “That was how it began, at least. It lasted almost two hundred years. By that time, the empires of the Age of Ascendance were vast and so powerful that it is difficult for us to imagine what they were like.”

  “The ruins...” she said. Beyond the Bracer were miles and miles of tumbled stones. In some places, the ruins stretched on seemingly forever.

  “There were kingdoms beyond count along the western coast of the Inland Ocean. They were all constructed by GodSpill and they toppled the moment it vanished.” Orem paused, reached back, and grabbed some wood from the pile he had collected. He threw more fuel on the fire. “You have heard of the GodSpill Wars?”

  “Of course,” she said. “It’s what led up to the gods finally deciding we weren’t worthy to wield the GodSpill.”

  “Well, it led up to the end of the GodSpill, at any rate. The Age of Ascendance lasted for two hundred years. That’s a long ti
me. In that much time, many threadweavers in Amarion felt that the power of the GodSpill was their right, not a privilege. It took just one fight between kingdoms to start the wars. The Twelve Points of Justice, an empire comprised of twelve cities working in concert, made the first attack. They worshipped the god Oedandus, and they were offended by the—as they saw it—lack of morality of their neighbor to the south.”

  “Who did they attack?”

  “It was called the Seawave Empire, a hedonistic culture dedicated to creating art, pursuing pleasures of the flesh, and utilizing mind-altering drugs to further expand their knowledge of the GodSpill. There were many disagreements between the two empires. The disagreements turned to threats, the threats to violence. Once Twelve Points struck, it was as if a dam had burst. Seawave’s allies swarmed to its defense. One of the historians described it, saying all the venom within the people of Amarion spilled out. Entire cities were razed to the ground in a day. The air filled with a haze of crackling fire and smoke. Fierce battles were waged. Insidious unnatural diseases felled entire conclaves of threadweavers. Entire cities were washed away as the ocean unnaturally rose up to drown them. Threadweavers committed atrocities that would make you sick. I won’t describe to you all the horrors, but thousands died.

  “It couldn’t have been worse if Dervon the Dead had risen again. It was as if Daylan Morth had created a coin of benevolence that had flipped over, revealing rage, ambition, and cruelty on the other side. But it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the death bringer who followed: Harleath Markin.”

  “I’ve never heard of him.”

  “There are almost no accounts of him, but I found an obscure journal of a threadweaver scribe that referenced him. Harleath was from the Seawall Empire, which had been all but destroyed in the war against Twelve Points. From what I can tell, Harleath’s was a crazy suicide mission. And he was responsible for the loss of the GodSpill.”

  “How? How did he do it?”

  “We don’t know. There aren’t any accounts of what he did afterward. After all, the GodSpill was gone. The threadweavers were dead, so there were none to record what Harleath did, and no witnesses. In fact, nobody recorded history for quite some time after the great dying. The single reference I found to Harleath was before he left, penned by the scribe of Harleath’s conclave—where he was not considered a threadweaver of much consequence, actually—along with two dozen other references to threadweaver activities. The entry mentioned, in a clipped, barely-tolerant tone, that Harleath had come up with a plan to “stop the GodSpill Wars,” and that he was planning to ride to Daylan’s Fountain the following day. The scribe had made a footnote that Harleath was always experimenting with new ways of using GodSpill, most of which failed, and essentially dismissed his adventure as rubbish. Shortly thereafter, the Fountain stopped working, and GodSpill vanished from the lands.”

  “The great dying...” she finished for him.

  “Yes. The start of the Devastation Years,” he said. “Everything that was imbued with GodSpill died. When Harleath and his threadweavers worked their spell, it killed them. It killed all the threadweavers in Twelve Points, the Seawave Empire, and every other threadweaver empire in Amarion. Creatures reliant on GodSpill fell: unicorns, lyonars, bakkarals, gliffets, pegasi... Those touched by GodSpill became deathly ill. Anyone who even dabbled was at risk. The only people who survived were those who had never used GodSpill.”

  “It wasn’t the gods,” she whispered.

  “It wasn’t the gods,” he echoed her words. “It was a man who thought himself a god. And the powerful threadweaver empires fell in a day. The remaining population of Amarion, pitifully few, stunned and sickly, regressed from ascendancy to subsistence and, well, we were easy prey for the swords of invaders.”

  “The Sunriders...” The word lodged in Mirolah’s heart. That was how her parents were killed. “But now the GodSpill is returning,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And I can see it?”

  “I think you can do it.”

  “But I can’t. All I see is a brightening in the air. I can’t make anything happen.”

  “Did you start writing entire pages the first time you picked up a pen?”

  “You’re saying I need practice.” Her only attempt to harness GodSpill ended with Fillen’s death. The idea of trying that again made her ill. “The monster...” she said. “Was it hunting me because it senses the GodSpill inside me?”

  “I don’t know the answer to that, but I think yes. There was no other reason for it to be in that alley other than coincidence, and since GodSpill started leaking back into the lands, I don’t believe in coincidence. We must stay vigilant, or more creatures like that darkling may find us.”

  “I tried to send it away,” she said.

  He sat forward, interested. “The villagers said you did send it away. What did that feel like?”

  “I... It didn’t feel like anything. I’m not even sure I sent it away. The bright bridge formed between me and the darkling. I remember somehow touching the monster across that distance, but it was only a touch. What happened to the monster after it leapt at me was so forceful, so powerful. Something grabbed hold of it. I never thought about the monster bowing. I just wanted it to go away.”

  “Maybe you just don’t understand how it works yet. Maybe the creature bowed to you because you are so powerful.”

  “No. It was struggling. It wanted to kill me. Something forced it to bow, almost like it was...”

  “It was what?”

  “Like it was making fun of me.”

  He paused, then said, “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “You asked me what I felt. That’s what I felt. What if someone made the darkling go away? Someone not me. Is that possible? What if they were making fun of me?”

  “There is no one else. Believe me, I have looked. You are the only one I have found with even a glimpse of threadweaver aptitude.”

  “What about the raven with the blue eyes?” she asked.

  “What raven with blue eyes?”

  19

  Zilok Morth

  Zilok Morth’s raven landed quietly on a cliff overlooking a sandstone wasteland. Bulbous rock formations as large as hills rose up from the sandstone floor, and there was no life in sight, not so much as a lizard or a blade of grass.

  The raven shifted from claw to claw, scratching the stone and looking at the one object in the center of the valley that was of human make.

  Daylan’s Fountain thrust defiantly at the sky, a two-hundred-feet tall square tower, thin and delicate, that tapered gradually as it rose. Near the top, four spikes jutted out horizontally, one from each corner. The last few feet of the spire ended in a swirl of metal meant to represent a flame. The Fountain was only ten feet wide where its base met a round slab of black marble. Arcane symbols decorated every inch of the Fountain, but the base was smooth and unmarked.

  Suddenly, a darkling loped across the sandstone toward the tower. Sunlight flashed off its shiny skin and rippling muscles, and it stopped just before the tower, crouching low. Its small, round head raised and its long teeth snapped twice. It sniffed the air, turned toward the raven, and its tiny blue eyes glowed malevolently. After a long moment, it turned, touched the wall of the tower, and vanished.

  Zilok Morth hovered in front of the raven over the expanse of air. A normal onlooker would not have seen him: a trim, well-dressed man with a rapier at his hip, neatly combed black hair, a black goatee, and dark eyes. They would have seen nothing, for Zilok Morth had no physical substance in this world.

  If the onlooker was conversant with the threads of the world, then they could not help but feel his presence. Then, they would have beheld two burning, disembodied eyes, but not much more unless Zilok wanted them to.

  “He is here, Sef,” Zilok said. “We have found our leash master.”

  The raven cawed and shifted back and forth on its claws.r />
  “My apologies.” Zilok waved his hand.

  The air around the raven shimmered. The black bird smeared like a watercolor painting in the rain. It blurred and stretched into a tall, dark blob, then coalesced into the form of a tall man with long muscles, lean and ropey. He wore breeches of black leather, but no tunic. Instead, a crosspiece of studded leather was strapped over his chest in an “X.” He was hairless from head to waist, and his eyes were milky white.

  “He made the Fountain his home. That takes some doing.”

  “Yes, my master.” No expression crossed Sef’s gaunt face as he spoke.

  “He is building. Do you see it, Sef?”

  “Yes, my master.”

  “He’s using Difinius’ trick. He has created an imaginary space within the Fountain. There is an entire castle in there.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  “I find myself liking this interloper more and more.”

  “He is powerful, my master.”

  Zilok Morth laughed. It echoed only within Sef’s mind. “Was that a caution, perhaps, Sef? You think we should step lightly here.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  “We must keep our wits, but we must always step boldly. Fear is the herald of failure.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  “Let us bring him to us.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  Zilok focused his concentration on the Great Tapestry. It was thick and bunched here at the Fountain, as if someone had tied a rope around the middle and cinched it tight. Ah, Daylan, my grandson, you could have been something startling. What a shame you chose the life you did.

  Zilok singled out the threads he needed. He tugged one and changed the color of the other.

  A darkling came flying out of the Fountain, emerging from the closest facet as if it was an illusion. The darkling howled and struggled against Zilok’s will. It clawed and scraped at the air, but to no avail. Zilok brought the beast up to the ledge where he and Sef waited. He set it down. The darkling thrashed, glaring at Sef in rage, but it did not see Zilok. Sef kept his milky eyes focused on the Fountain.