Age of Empyre, page 23
part #6 of Legends of the First Empire Series
Roan’s eyes went wide, and she nodded. “Yes! Yes! Exactly!”
Thank the Grand Mother. I’m still able to reach her.
“That’s it. That’s the problem. Thank you, Gifford. You’re right. I am the victim. I always have been.”
Gifford was surprised this was coming as such a revelation.
Even geniuses have blind spots, I guess.
“I have to stop being the victim,” Roan said with grave seriousness. “There’s only one way to do that. Give me your sword.”
Gifford understood and handed her the blade. “He deserves it, Roan. Remember that.”
Roan stood up and raised the sword in both hands, facing Iver, who continued to cower like a squirrel in a rainstorm. “What you did,” she told Iver in a shaking voice, “to me and my mother during all those years of torture is something that no one should endure.” She looked at Gifford. “Even though I’m married to the most wonderful, loving, caring man in the world—I still have nightmares because I can’t get out from under your shadow or escape my pain. I’ve hated you for so long, and I’ve never realized that in doing so, I was dragging you with me. All my hate was tied with fear, regret, and shame. It all made an unbreakable knot that I would never be able to untie. That’s the weight that I carry. The one I’ve always shouldered.”
She reached Iver, who stared at her with his dark, elongated eyes that didn’t look so monstrous now. They looked terrified.
“Roan, I know I—I know I did bad by you. I—”
“Oh, this hurts,” she whispered.
Gifford wondered if she knew she was speaking aloud.
“Grand Mother of All, give me strength,” Roan prayed.
She dropped the sword and took a step forward. As she did, Gifford saw fresh tears spilling down her cheeks. “Killing you didn’t set me free, so doing it again won’t, either.”
Her light wavered.
“Roan? What are you doing?”
“The hardest thing I’ve ever done,” she said, her words barely audible.
“Roan, I . . . I . . .” Iver stammered.
“Shhh,” Roan said as she came closer and knelt. “Iver.” She said the word gently, as if she were speaking to a child rather than to someone who’d done countless unspeakable horrors. “You were a terrible man. A truly despicable person, but you’re not anymore. You’re dead. And it’s not like I haven’t done my own terrible things. I murdered you even though I could have run away, or at least tried to, but I didn’t.”
She took a steadying breath. “And while you didn’t mean to kill my mother, I killed you on purpose. I wanted you dead, so I took your life.” She shook her head. “None of us are perfect, least of all me. Everyone makes mistakes. The point is to learn from them. Padera used to say, ‘There’s always a better way’ and she was right.” Roan reached out and put her hand to Iver’s cheek. “You see, I finally figured it out. I want to hate you for all the things you did, but that’s just me hanging on to pain. If I wish to be truly free, I have to let it go.” She nodded. “Iver, I—” She took a breath. “I forgive you, Iver.” She leaned in and kissed him. “I truly and honestly do.”
Gifford stared in wonder as Roan put her arms around the carver and held him close as they both cried.
As they rocked, Roan’s light stopped flickering, quit wavering, and began to grow.
By the time they left Iver’s cave, Roan was so brilliant that Gifford had trouble looking at her. He was brighter, too, and together they lit up the open expanse from cliff to cliff.
Together they walked hand in hand back across the frost. As they did, Gifford realized he felt lighter than he had even before Brin left. He was thinking of this and staring across at the base of the pillar when Roan abruptly stopped. Her head was up, her eyes wide.
She pointed. “Look! Look!”
Tilting his head, Gifford searched the blackness overhead and was stunned to see a light.
Together they watched as something bright flashed overhead. It looked like a falling star except that it streaked left to right—from the top of the pillar toward the Plain of Kilcorth.
“Brin,” they said in unison.
“She did it!” Gifford clapped.
“She’s going back,” Roan said. “She’s going home.”
Tesh was groggy and squinting in pain at the bright light.
For a moment, he thought Brin had returned, but the light came from Roan, whom he could barely see amid her brilliance. Gifford, too, looked brighter, but Roan was a star.
“Brin did it,” Gifford told them, “and Roan has figured out how we can, too.”
“There isn’t anything pressing us down. The weight is what we carry,” Roan explained. “We have no bodies, but our spirits are crushed by our regrets, our hate, our guilt. We’re like people who have reached the bottom of a lake by holding heavy rocks. To get out, all we need to do is drop the rocks.”
Tesh looked at Tressa, who reflected his skepticism.
“It’s true!” Gifford said. “Roan forgave Iver, and when she did, her light—well, you can see for yourself. Then . . . then she made me do it.” Gifford frowned. “Trust me when I say it’s not easy. You can’t just say it. You have to mean it. You have to accept and believe. It’s not—well, it’s culling hard is what it is, but not really, you know?”
Tesh and Tressa shook their heads.
“What I mean is that . . .” He looked helplessly at Roan, the way he used to when he couldn’t find a word without an rrr sound.
“He means that doing it isn’t physically hard, but it requires admitting you are wrong about something you have always known you were absolutely justified in. That’s the battle. You have to fight yourself, sometimes against your own sense of identity. You must sacrifice your pride and dignity as well. It all feels so horribly wrong, like spring giving way to winter, or water falling up. That’s what makes it difficult. It goes against everything you believe, but worse, it goes against everything you want to believe. And yet once you do it, when you let yourself fall, when you give up fighting and just accept that you aren’t going to hate anymore—as terrible as that feels to do—the pressure disappears, and you realize it was an illusion. That the hate only existed in you, and keeping it is the same as cherishing an addictive poison that’s making you sick. Looking back, it doesn’t even make sense. But getting there, crossing that chasm—it just seems too wide to jump until you look back and see it was only a crack.”
Tesh sat up straighter.
“So, what?” Tressa asked, her voice groggy, her words slurred. “We all have to give Iver a hug or something?”
“No,” Roan said. “You have to discover what’s weighing you down and let go of it. It will be different for everyone.”
Tesh sat back, considering this. It didn’t take much study for him to find his burden. He hated the Fhrey, the Galantians, and Nyphron. Roan was asking him to just forget what he’d lived most of his life for.
No, not forget—forgive.
Roan wanted him to kiss Nyphron and say, “Hey, look. I know you murdered my family, my whole clan, burned our homes to the ground and laughed while you did it, then started a war letting my people die to serve your selfish ends. But so what. That’s all in the past—friends?”
“You’re insane,” Tesh told them both. “I can’t do that.”
“Neither can I,” Tressa said.
“You can.” Roan knelt down, nearly blinding them. “You just won’t. But if you don’t, you’ll stay here. Think about the logic of that. You’re willing to let them punish you further? To give them the power to ruin you for eternity rather than forgive? Where’s the sense?”
“Not everything makes sense,” Tesh threw back.
“Yes, it does. If it doesn’t, you’re probably not looking at it right.”
Tesh was shaking his head. What she was asking was impossible. Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t. “It’s not like I can just turn it off. I’ve lived my whole life hating them. You’re asking me to do magic here, to just wave my hand to erase my memory.”
Roan shook her head, making the light shift back and forth. “No, actually that would be too easy. You have to remember. You have to really think hard and pull up all those horrific memories by the roots and then scatter them to the wind.”
“You’re asking me to unmake myself.”
“You’re more than hate, Tesh,” Gifford told him.
Tesh wasn’t at all certain about that. Everything he was had grown from that wellspring. His skill as a fighter was born out of his desire for revenge. His leadership of the Techylors, his fame, his respect came from his need to kill those who had butchered his people. He had always planned to win the war, to slaughter every living Fhrey. And when they were all gone, he would find Nyphron and explain how he had returned the favor of annihilating his tribe and burning down his house. Then, and only then, would he kill the focus of his pain. He could never give that up, never forgive Nyphron and the rest of the Fhrey. Never.
“Tesh.” Roan inched closer so that he had to close his eyes. She took his hand in hers.
This was shocking. Roan never touched anyone except Gifford. With his eyes closed, her small hands felt like . . . they reminded him of . . .
“You promised Brin,” she said.
Tesh opened his eyes, and was once more blinded by her light. He jerked his hands away and pushed back, shoving himself down the wall.
“Tesh?” Roan called at him out of that horrible light.
“That’s not fair!” he said, his voice louder than he planned.
“But you did promise.”
“Shut up!” he shouted.
“If you get out, there’s a chance you’ll see her again,” Gifford told him.
“I’ll never see her again! We’ve been here forever. She either succeeded and is back on Elan, probably married with kids, or dead and back in Rel with her parents—her parents and mine. And I’ll never see any of them—ever.”
“It’s not too late,” Roan told him. “I just saw her—I just saw Brin.”
“You’re lying!”
“Roan never lies,” Gifford reminded him.
Tesh knew that, yet he couldn’t help himself. He was trying to hurt her—hurt Roan.
What am I doing?
Roan moved close again. “I saw Brin race across the top of the Abyss, heading for Rel. You can’t mistake her light. I think she succeeded, so she’s going home.”
“We’ll never catch her.”
“If she stops at Mideon’s castle—which she might, if only to see if we got out or to look for Moya—there might be a chance, if we hurry.”
“No.”
“You promised,” Roan said.
“Quit saying that!”
“Do you think Brin knew you were lying to her?” Tressa asked.
Tesh cocked his head sharply and glared, feeling strangely betrayed. “So all the stories are true. You really are a bitch, aren’t you?”
“Absolutely,” Tressa replied, with no smile, no hint of humor.
“What about you? What great hate is keeping you here?” Tesh fought back, feeling terrible the moment he said it, and worse when he saw Tressa’s eyes brimming with tears. He ought to know better. He was facing the same pain. This wasn’t a game. The anguish they were experiencing was deep and cruel. Tressa wasn’t one for tears, so seeing her eyes glisten showed just how deeply he’d wounded her. But misery was a sickness that insisted on spreading, and, like a drowning man, he was willing to shove her under to lift himself up.
Tressa looked down at her hands and mashed her lips together, swishing them around in an attempt to fight the tears. Then she squared her jaw as best she could. “I was expelled from Clan Rhen, punished for years, made invisible and untouchable for the unforgivable crime of turning a blind eye while my husband murdered Reglan and then tried to do the same to Persephone. All those people, the self-righteous geniuses—they figured it all out. Put all the pieces together and found me guilty.” She looked up at each of them. “They were all wrong.”
“So you hate them?” Gifford asked.
“Of course I do,” Tressa said. “I despised everyone on that dahl for as far back as I can remember. Not for anything that they did, but because they couldn’t see the greatness in me. The kicker is . . . they still don’t see me for what I am.”
Gifford glanced, confused, at Roan and Tesh.
“You don’t see it, do you?” Tressa shook her head, frowned, and looked at Roan. “Even the genius hasn’t figured it out.
“Konniger wasn’t responsible for Reglan’s death, nor did he plan to kill Persephone.” Tressa sighed. “My husband was an idiot who needed help pulling his shirt on in the morning. You have no idea how many times the man nearly choked to death because he couldn’t manage something as simple as swallowing. He had no ambition and no mind for planning. But I was tired of living in the pit that Konniger’s sister called a house. I wanted the lodge and all those fine things beneath its roof. I longed for people to see me as grand, to be respected. That’s why I married Konniger in the first place. I didn’t love him. But I knew he could get me what I wanted, and I wanted to be Second Chair. Honestly, I wanted to be First Chair, but I just didn’t think that was possible. Little did I know . . .”
“What are you saying?” Gifford asked.
Tressa smirked in disbelief. “You still don’t get it? It wasn’t Konniger at all. It was me. I killed Reglan, Holliman, Hegner, and Krier. I even tried my best to kill Persephone. I tried real hard. Konniger did the grunt work, of course, but it was all my idea. I had to force him, threaten and guilt him into it. Oh, the hours I spent belittling his manhood, his courage, not that he was all that strong to begin with. The man was a fool, but good with an ax. That’s why I picked him. He was the perfect tool to get all I wanted.”
They all stared in silence.
“I had so desired to put that smug Persephone in her place. I planned it for years. I figured out how I could maneuver Konniger into the position of Shield. Then, after killing her husband, all I had to do was threaten Maeve and she declared Konniger would be Reglan’s successor. We had to tidy up a bit, of course. Holliman Hunt had to die because he knew too much. But I got my chair. Then the Fhrey came and everything started to fall apart. I convinced my husband to kill Persephone. I gave Konniger his cloak and sent him on his way. But as it turns out, he was as inept at murder as he was at swallowing.
“Persephone knew. I saw it in her face when she came back. And what did she do?” Tressa’s voice was cut off by a closing throat and a shuddering battle against tears. “She made up a story about how Konniger died a hero, fighting the bear. Said it right out loud in the courtyard. She did it to be nice to me. No one believed her because it was such a blatant lie. When people saw through it and sensibly blamed me anyway, Persephone told them not to.”
Tressa was losing her fight with her tears as one slipped over the brim and slid down her cheek. “Even after all I did, that bitch, protected me.” She wiped her face and nose, a sour expression squeezing her cheeks. “So if you want to know who it is I hate, if you haven’t managed to work out this little puzzle, it’s really quite easy. It’s me. I despise everything about myself. I hate that I was so greedy that I took lives and ruined others. I hate that I returned true kindness with suspicion and anger because I couldn’t believe it—because I would never do such a thing as be helpful for no reason. I hate that I only ever thought of myself, and never even got anything for my single-minded efforts. So you see, I’m not leaving—because unlike the rest of you, I belong here. I deserve this. I want this.”
Tressa then whirled on Tesh. “So you—you little culling fool—you have no excuse.” She added a nasty, taunting whine to her voice and said, “So the Fhrey killed your family—so what? They killed a lot of families. What if a pack of wolves had killed them? Would you devote your life to hunting wolves? And what if it was starvation or sickness? Or what if your mother had fallen in a well, or your father through thin ice, what then? What then, Tesh? People die—people die all the damn time.
“You know what else does that? The sun comes up. It rains. Leaves fall. Not here, of course, but back on Elan. Some of it is good, and some of it is terrible, but that doesn’t mean you throw your life away. Ask yourself this, hero: The revenge you’re after, who is it for? Not your family, not your clan. They’ve all put it behind them and are happy in Rel. So who is it really for? Who would ask you to throw your life away, to toss eternal happiness aside for their petty desires of revenge? Ask yourself if a person like that deserves such a sacrifice?” Tressa took a labored breath. “I can tell you with firsthand knowledge they don’t. Because I am that sort of person. I know I’m a bitch. That’s why I can’t even stand up.”
They heard a cough, and in that dark quiet, it rang as loud as a gong. Looking over, they saw a large drooping man who dragged himself toward them, using the wall for support.
“Iver?” Roan said, surprised.
Tesh watched her. He didn’t know the circumstances between them, but from the earlier comments, he gathered they weren’t friends.
“Just thought you ought to know,” the man said with effort. “It’s snowing, so I think they’ve seen your light, or maybe Brin’s. I don’t know.”
“Who?”
“The Typhons,” Iver said with the same miserable tone one might expect from a man delivering home the dead body of a loved one.
Something was strange about this plump man whose bottom was bigger than his top. His eyes were black and long and, as far as Tesh could tell, empty. He didn’t approach but kept his distance.
“Always snows before they come. We hide in the little caves so they don’t eat us.” Iver’s voice had an odd quaver. “Light attracts them.”
Gifford looked at Roan, his eyes edging toward panic.
“This cave here,” Iver said, looking around. “It’s too big. They can get in. That’s why no one took it. You can come to my cave if you like. Can’t even get a finger in there. Maybe it will help.”
