Angel's Truth (Angelwar Book 1) Read online

‘It is a quote from The Names of Salvation,’ he explained, ‘the Holy Book of the church.’

  ‘Galandor’s work,’ she sighed. ‘I sense his hand in this.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Tol admitted. ‘The priest is said to have met Galandor on the eve of his battle with Demmegrahk.’ Tol held his peace for a moment, but curiosity won out. ‘What does it mean?’

  Kalashadria ignored the question. ‘The way they reacted, bowing and obsequious – are all your kind liable to act like that?’

  ‘Pretty much,’ Tol said. ‘Certainly everyone who worships the Maker, and round these parts that’s just about everyone.’

  ‘I do not like it.’

  ‘Right, that’s our biggest problem.’

  The angel’s lips twitched in a half-smile. ‘No, I suppose not.’ She was silent for a moment, watching the departing figures, now only a vague smear in the distance to Tol’s eyes. ‘You did not react in such a manner.’

  ‘I was kind of busy trying not get killed by a demon.’

  ‘But even afterwards. You did not seem at all impressed.’

  ‘Takes a lot to impress me,’ Tol said. He grinned. ‘Build me a Sky Hammer, then I’ll be impressed.’

  Kalashadria’s expression softened. ‘You don’t even know what one is.’

  Tol leaned in close. ‘Just what it sounds like.’

  42.

  Tol judged they entered Mosswood around its south-western edge, a speckled sea of green and white that stretched into a dark smear far ahead. A partial banishment of sunlight by the wood’s proud fir trees left the ground frozen and hard, smudges of snow littering the earth like lilies. They walked in silence, Kalashadria wearing a thoughtful frown that she did not care to speak of. No surprise there, Tol thought as his eyes flicked over the trees he passed, most trunks blanketed by black-green moss, its edges frilled with frost and ice.

  ‘Why grasp the sword’s hilt when you could not draw it?’ Kalashadria asked out of nowhere. ‘When I told you of their approach it was the first thing you did.’

  Tol frowned. ‘Why wouldn’t I be able to draw it? It’s hardly heavy. Sometimes I forget it’s on my hip at all.’

  Something cold brushed Tol’s arm and spun him around. He glimpsed the angel’s furious expression then felt her frozen fingers against his chest. She slammed him backwards against a tree, a half-pound of snow dropping unceremoniously upon his head.

  ‘I have no time for games, human,’ the angel snarled, her face inches from his own. ‘Tell me true: have you drawn Galandor’s blade?’

  Tol swallowed, his heart hammering beneath Kalashadria’s cold fingers as he felt the full wrath of an angel. ‘Why?’ he asked. ‘Would it make a difference if I had?’

  ‘Answer me.’ The fingers pushed Tol harder against the tree and he heard a soft crackle, the ice against his back shattering under pressure.

  ‘I tried after I escaped Icepeak,’ he said, unable to look away from her; her expression was both beautiful and terrifying. ‘I thought moisture had gotten into the scabbard and frozen the blade in place.’

  The angel sighed, releasing her hold on Tol and stepping back a pace. ‘I told you,’ she said, voice heavy with exhaustion, ‘it is not merely a sword – not as you know it. The blades of the Anghl’teri are far more than that.’

  Tol rubbed his chest, sure a bruise was already forming. ‘If I had drawn it – if – would that have been bad?’

  ‘Almost certainly.’

  She watched him carefully, and though Tol tried not to let his thoughts show, he feared the angel could read him as easily as tracks in deep snow. Her expression softened slightly. ‘A needless concern, perhaps, but I had to be sure; I cannot imagine Illis’Andiev allowing itself to be wielded by any human.’ She smiled tentatively, softening the blow. ‘Even one as stubborn as you.’

  ‘It’s a sword,’ Tol scoffed, ‘not a person.’

  ‘It is both,’ the angel whispered.

  A poor joke, that was Tol’s first thought, but Kalashadria’s heavy tone and serious face washed it away like dirt in a deluge. She looked so very grave. And, he reminded himself, she’s fast heading for one. Their time together was running out, and Tol realised there would never be time enough to ask all the questions that were darting through his mind. But when she dies, my quest must continue. And, it seemed, this sword that was more than a sword sounded dangerous – and not just to the people he stuck it into.

  ‘Three mercenaries tracked me through the North Forest after I escaped Icepeak,’ Tol said. ‘I managed to surprise them, dropping from a tree on the first and ending him with my dagger.’ It still seemed so fresh in his mind, as if it had occurred only yesterday, but days had passed since that time, and Tol knew he was no longer that same young boy dreaming of nuns. ‘I took his sword and killed the second, but the blade was stuck fast, I couldn’t budge it… It was the first time I prayed, leastways the first time I meant it… I pleaded with the Maker and the sword came free… I used Galandor’s sword.’

  Tol expected anger, fury, but instead Kalashadria’s expression softened, equal parts pity and surprise. She collected herself in scant seconds, the mask slipping back into place. ‘Perhaps it was chance,’ she said, her words sounding more hopeful than reasoned to Tol. ‘A single occasion might be discounted were you in such danger as to have no other recourse but Illis’Andiev. Yes,’ she said, this time with more conviction. ‘That must be what transpired, I am sure of it. Do not worry,’ she said, seeing Tol’s worried frown. ‘There should be no lasting ill effects.’

  Tol slumped back against the tree. No lasting ill effects? She makes it sound like a cursed thing, this sword that bears both a name and – if she speaks true – a soul. He cast his mind back to his journey across the north. ‘The second time was outside Karnvost when the demon came. I had the blade half-out though I knew by then it wouldn’t work against it.’ Tol knew now that it would, that if he had attacked the demon there was a chance that he could have killed it with Galandor’s blade. And then she wouldn’t be dying in front of me. ‘If I’d known it was an angel’s blade…’

  ‘Draw it,’ she commanded. ‘Now.’

  Tol grasped the hilt carefully, pulling the blade free with a hiss of scraping steel and letting the point drop earthward, its tip inches from the frozen ground, the third point of a triangle beside he and Kalashadria. The angel leaned forward, gently brushing the flat of the blade with one finger, her eyes closed as if she was concentrating.

  Tol waited. A second passed. Then another. And a third. The moment stretched on, the bitter wind of the new year weakened by the stout firs but still raising goosebumps as it caressed his skin.

  Kalashadria’s eyes opened as the wind died. ‘It has chosen,’ she said hoarsely. ‘Illis’Andiev has chosen a new master.’ Her eyes bored into him, stripping every hard-earned layer of protection away, every jest, every disdainful dismissal he could have brought to mind. Gone. Suddenly Tol was a frightened nine-year-old boy, leaving his home for a mystical fortress where knights were forged in sweat and blood and ice.

  ‘You must be remarkable indeed for the blade to have chosen a human, Tol Kraven.’ Kalashadria tilted her head, her eyes still fixed upon Tol’s own. ‘Blessed or cursed, I am unsure which.’ She turned on her heels and strode away, deeper into the woods.

  It’s just a sword, Tol tried to tell himself. Somehow, though, he could longer believe it. He ran his fingers along the blade’s flat, pausing where Kalashadria’s finger had rested. He closed his eyes. Nothing. Nothing happened. He sighed, sheathed the weapon and hurried after Kalashadria. More damned questions, he thought. Every time I learn something she saddles me with another riddle, another nonsense to twist my mind. At least fighting the Band of Blood Tol had known the rules. Now, it seemed, they changed with frightening regularity – as soon as he came close to comprehending what they were, they again shifted, a dance where his partner was always a step ahead. Which is why I never liked dancing. Which wasn’t to say, of course, that he di
dn’t like what followed the dancing.

  He caught up with Kalashadria easily, myriad questions flitting through his befuddled brain. What was so important about the sword? How could it choose him? What did that even mean? And, most importantly, was it going to kill him? Maybe, Tol thought, it will change me, make me into an angel. The idea sounded grand, soaring through the sky and descending upon his enemies with his shining sword. Sounded perfect, in fact, until Tol realised that in becoming an angel he, too, would sicken from the poisons in the air – banishment, in effect, from his own world. Perhaps that’s why she looked at me with such pity.

  ‘It will change you,’ Kalashadria said, her voice calm and even. It was almost as though she had read Tol’s thoughts.

  ‘Will I grow wings?’

  She laughed, trembling with humour until a glance showed her he was not jesting. ‘Become as I? No.’

  ‘Then how will it change me? I don’t understand.’

  ‘You have a stout heart, Tol Kraven,’ Kalashadria told him, genuine sympathy etched in her features. ‘Perhaps that is why Illis’Andiev chose you. As to how you will change, I cannot say because I do not truly know. Such weapons as the one you bear were never intended for any but my own kind, not such pri—not for a species as young as yours. Illis’Andiev will serve you well as long as your heart stays true, of that much I am certain. Beyond that,’ Kalashadria shrugged, ‘the steel has no equal upon this world; it shall never rust nor melt nor shatter in battle. Drop it in the ocean and it shall endure. Dip it in a volcano and hammer it for all you are worth but it shall never again be tempered. Drop a mountain upon it and the edge shall still sunder silk strings in twain. The rest… the rest you will learn in time.’

  ‘That’s it?’ Tol shouted. ‘You go on about how the sword’s going to change me, how I’ll never be the same again, and then all you tell me is I don’t need a whetstone to sharpen the bloody edge? Does this amuse you, woman?’

  ‘No, Tol, never that. There is no humour to be found in your inheritance of Illis’Andiev, none at all, but the answers you seek, they are not mine to give. I am sorry.’

  Tol’s shoulders dropped in the face of such pity, such sadness. Here I am, shouting at an angel for a gift I don’t understand after she’s saved my life and is now feeling her own slipping away. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t have shouted.’

  ‘The anger,’ Kalashadria said with a nod. ‘I understand. I only wish there was something I could do to ease your burden.’ She hesitated, and for a moment the angel looked undecided, caught between opposing armies. ‘Can we still be friends, for these last hours?’

  ‘Friends?’ The idea hadn’t occurred to Tol. Could a mistress and her subordinate ever be friends?

  ‘I have none other, save Alimarcus.’

  How is that possible? he wondered. How can anyone not love this proud creature, her defiant exterior and those split-second moments that show the tenderness underneath, a gentle spirit hidden beneath layers of armour? ‘I would like that,’ he said. ‘I would like that very much.’

  By unspoken agreement they resumed their journey, but this time the silence was a comfortable blanket.

  *

  Kalashadria’s pace dwindled as morning gave way to afternoon, her breathing more laboured with every step. Eventually Tol could stand it no more and called a halt to their march.

  ‘You must rest,’ he told with a forcefulness he would never have presumed even a day ago. ‘Rest now else never reach the pass.’

  Surprisingly, a single look at him was all it took. ‘A short rest,’ Kalashadria agreed. ‘If I fall asleep you must wake me before the sun sets.’

  He nodded. ‘Fine.’

  They found a spot where the snowfall was sparse, and Kalashadria settled against a nearby trunk as Tol again collected firewood, despite her protestations. ‘I can build a smokeless fire, you know. Even if that demon’s searching for us, the fire will not draw its gaze.’

  Kalashadria acquiesced with a taut nod. ‘You would know more of such things than I.’

  ‘I know something the mighty Kalashadria does not?’ Tol grinned.

  ‘One thing,’ she said. ‘It is hardly cause for celebration.’

  ‘I will teach you,’ Tol promised, but by the time he returned with another armful of kindling, the angel had already fallen asleep.

  Tol worked quickly, building the fire and coaxing it to life with whispered curses. This done, he sat beside Kalashadria and removed Angel’s Truth from his tunic. Galandor might have been strong enough to return to heaven while mortally injured, but Kur Kraven’s revelation of demons staying on Korte for days at a time gave him one last, terrible hope that there might be some cure – however temporary – for her condition. And if the price was blood, it was one he would willingly pay.

  *

  As dawn’s pale glow smeared the sky crimson, brave Galandor finished outlining his bold plan. Insane, perhaps, but such a grand mischief as he asked us to perpetrate might be the only hope for our people to be free from the tyranny of the Gurdal and their demon masters. We left his tent and spoke in dry, cracked whispers, each man deciding for himself whether such a crime could truly be justified, even if it prevented the Gurdal from ruling over all Korte. Seven men swore to do as the angel bade, our eyes finally turning to the last, most solitary member of our blood-stained band. The warrior was quiet for long minutes as the blood-red smear of dawn spread across the sky.

  ‘I can take no part in this endeavour,’ he said at last. ‘Nor will I stand in your way,’ he added quickly as Kur stirred. ‘This thing you set in motion, its currents will not reach the shores of my homeland, not in a hundred years. For those of the isles, a different approach must be sought.’

  A rejection, then, but I saw what the others did not. Behind val Sharvina’s eyes a plan was already forming, and few could match the cunning of the desert snake, his mind as fast as his blade.

  ‘What will you do?’ I asked of him.

  ‘A mirror to your own brotherhood, I think. Our cause shall, to outward eyes, be ever different to your own. At its heart, though, we shall strive as one to defeat the Gurdal and their savage masters.’

  ‘So you’re going to do exactly the same thing as us, but call it something else?’ Kur said gruffly. ‘What’s the bloody difference?’

  ‘The difference,’ val Sharvina said, ‘is that I do not need a religion to bind the warriors of my nation into a brotherhood. The nation shall be our cause; I will find a way to bind us to our king – and him to us. In serving our nation we shall fight many foes, but at the heart of our order shall be the knowledge of the Gurdal and their masters’ plan.’

  ‘Well why didn’t you just say that,’ Kur grumbled.

  ‘I thought I did,’ the Sudalrese warrior replied with a smile.

  ‘Well, now we have that straight,’ Kur said, carefully avoiding val Sharvina’s twinkling eyes, ‘we need to move on to the more important business of the day.’

  ‘Is this about the offerings?’ I asked. ‘I have already said you cannot have all the wine.’

  ‘The pigeon-man,’ Kur said with a jerk of his head towards Galandor’s tent. ‘I got no problem doing the deed, but that fellow’s stronger than he looks.’ Kur paused and looked to each of us in turn. ‘Reckon it might take seven good men – and a Sudalrese – to pin him down and force the cure on him.’

  ‘There is no guarantee it will work,’ val Sharvina said carefully, knowing by now how quick my friend’s mood could change.

  ‘He says he needs no cure,’ I added, ‘only time.’

  Kur stared me dead in the eye and snorted. ‘Your brain fall out your arse in the battle, did it? He lied, about that and maybe other things, too. I’m not of a mind to let him prove me right by dying though, not after all the trouble we went through to save him. You want to wait and see who’s right?’

  ‘Kraven is right,’ val Sharvina conceded. ‘We must act, and we must act as one.’

  In minutes we ha
d found a large cup, and each man shed his blood into its cracked cradle until the cup was nearly full. Kur, in some rare gesture of consideration, topped up the contents with wine. We were nervous, perhaps more so than in the hours before the battle. An act of mercy, but also treachery. As the details haunt me still these days later, I cannot write of what happened within the angel’s tent, except to say that the deed was done. The angel’s fury was fierce as when he faced the demon, yet even though I think he could have killed us – all of us, if he so chose – he understood why we had acted thus and, I like to hope, perhaps even forgave us. But that look of betrayal upon the angel’s face as we held him down is one I shall never forget.

  I fear that it will haunt my dreams for years to come.

  *

  Tol closed the book with a heavy sigh. He knew what he had to do.

  43.

  Two days after his capture, Kartane found himself marching eastward through Mosswood, the sharp points of the Demon’s Teeth looming ahead and blocking out the sun. He supposed that most people would mark the passage of time by the angel’s sighting or the demon’s incomplete defeat, but to Kartane his freedom was a more precious commodity. To have it cruelly snatched away mere days after regaining it made the loss of liberty all the more painful. Still, he thought, at least I saved her. The boy, too, he reckoned, though Sarah’s life was more important than one of the abbot’s students, more important to him than the whole church if he thought about it. And, contrary to what his new gaolers might think, Kartane thought about such things often. And usually with regret.

  If I hadn’t met her after reading that damned book, he thought, things might be different. If the terrible truth hadn’t shattered him somewhere deep inside, somewhere he had long thought dead, Kartane might never have taken such a foolish risk. She was worth it, though, he thought. He smiled. If anyone was worth it, she was. Korwane ought to share some of the blame too, he should have known better than to leave the book in his rooms. Those big bold letters on its cover had been too much for his younger brother to resist. And so here I am, Kartane thought, imprisoned, escaped, and captured again. The younger Kartane – and, if he was honest, that man had died after opening the damned book – would have called such a twist of fate divine, the Maker’s own hand at work, but the older Kartane knew better. There is no God. There is no justice, except by my hand.