The Past's Skybound Bane (The War Eternal's Ashes Book 2), page 18
Movement on the dirt trail leading to her family’s homestead caused Syra to crouch, then pull the longbow from her shoulder and nock an arrow. She counted three figures lurking in the shadows beneath a copse of trees, not far from her hill.
It would be an easy shot from here. A second downed thief would likely have the burglars avoiding Syra’s farm and her family for good.
She hesitated. What if the silhouettes were just the neighbours’ children playing? It wouldn’t be the first time they’d strayed onto her family’s property. She lowered the bow just a little, straining to see details.
A man strode from the copse of trees, still following the trail, and Syra let out a long sigh of relief that she hadn’t loosed an arrow. The newcomer wore the red robe of a priest, and sunlight reflected from the shining armour worn by the two men following him as they, too, emerged onto the trail.
Hope rose in Syra’s heart. Ever since two red-robed men had come to ask after the locals’ woes the previous winter, only the village chaplain had been there to support the community through their troubles. And this priest had brought Knights of the Flame: perhaps they were here to deal with the vegetable-ruining burglars once and for all!
Her curiosity getting the better of her, Syra shouldered her bow and clambered down the side of the hill, crossing the field toward her home. It had rained recently, and the mud sucked at Syra’s boots. She arrived at the homestead well behind the priest and the two Knights.
A sixth sense, the sourceless awareness that something was wrong, stopped her before she climbed from the mud onto the road where it met the porch.
“...would never!” exclaimed her husband from inside the farmhouse. “We’re Phoenix-fearing folk here. Ask anyone!”
“We have.” The priest’s accent was southern, and his tone was one of distaste. “Still you hold to your pretense of innocence?”
“We paid the tax twice, and it damn near beggared us. We’ve been framed, I tell you!”
“Your co-conspirators covered for you at first, but they soon gave up your name under questioning. You plotted to ambush the tax collector, and steal the monies rightfully owed to your saviour the Emperor. This is why you had no trouble paying when the replacement arrived.”
“That was our own money! It took us ten cycles to save. I’m no thief, nor is anyone under this roof!”
“The Phoenix is ever forgiving.” The priest’s triumphant tone was in harsh contrast to his words. “Such difficult times will stoke desperation in even the most upstanding of believers. I am sure you won’t mind proving your repentance for your thievery by producing the money. Hand over your ill-gotten gains to me, and I’ll ensure they reach the Emperor’s coffers. Perhaps His Imperial Majesty will be lenient.”
“This is absurd!” The wrenching despair in her husband’s voice had Syra’s heart leaping into her throat. “I thought the priesthood was here to comfort and protect us, not to serve the Emperor in his avarice. He never wanted our taxes, he wanted our lands!”
“Be warned, conspirator: your words border on treason.” This voice was new, harsh, and unyielding, and it accompanied the sound of a blade being unsheathed.
“By what right do you threaten my family? We’ve done no wrong. I’ve served the Empire loyally for the twenty-eight cycles of its existence—”
“Thirty-three.” The priest’s voice was frigid. “The Empire has existed for thirty-three cycles. Only its enemies denied the Emperor’s divine right to rule for the five cycles He fought to reunify His people.”
“I’m no enemy to—”
Syra flinched as a wet gurgle replaced her husband’s voice. Inside the home, a heavy object tumbled to the floor with a muted thump. The sights and sounds of the world receded, and Syra’s heartbeat filled her ears. She tried, and failed, to form another thought, as though her mind were protecting her from some horrific realization.
A stone half-submerged in the mud of the field became the all-consuming focus of Syra’s vision. She stared at it without comprehension as, distantly, the priest gave some order or other to the Knights. The flecks of dirt and the divots on the stone’s surface etched themselves into Syra’s memory. The mud in which it rested seemed very close. At some point she’d fallen to her knees: when had that been?
“Mama!” screamed a voice: her daughter’s. “Mama!!”
Syra looked up. Three men were walking away from the farmhouse, their backs to her. The rushing sound in Syra’s ears gave way to the roar of flames. She glanced to her right: smoke billowed from the roof of her family’s home.
Someone should get some water to douse the flames, Syra thought distantly. And dear little Mery needs someone to comfort her. Where are ma and pa? They always comfort their granddaughter when I’m not near…
Syra tried to stagger to her feet, but her legs gave out and she fell sideways into the mud. Her shaking limbs refused to gather the strength to do more than hold her head above the surface.
“Was the mother there?” the priest shouted over the crackle of the fire.
“Just two older ones, likely the grandparents,” replied one of the Knights.
“Search for her. She’ll be out working the fields or some such. Show no mercy: this entire family conspired to steal from the Empire.”
“What of the girl?” This was the first time the other Knight had spoken. His voice carried a note of uncertainty. “She can’t be older than four.”
“An orphanage will raise this child properly, and she will be guided by the light of the Flame. Know that we have done a good thing this day: the girl will be clean of her parents’ sins.”
“Might we not have taken them for trial at—”
“It is done.” The priest’s tone brooked no argument. “Find the woman, and make painless her rebirth into a new life. Beware: she is a desperate criminal, and will be armed with a bow. Hesitate, and she’ll take your life.”
How do you know that? was the only thought Syra could form. Her mind shied away from anything else. How do you know I’ve a bow…?
Tears leaked from her eyes into the mud of the fields. Phoenix save, he was right. My husband was right. The bandits were sent by the Empire… and they all reported to the priest.
Syra lay submerged in the mud, powerless and unable to rise, as the red-robed man carried her daughter away. For hours, the Knights tried and failed to find her out in the fields. By the time they gave up, it was dark, and nothing remained of her family home save embers.
Syra’s eyes were bloodshot and dry, as though she would have cried but had long since exhausted all her tears.
“The rest you can imagine for yourself. The families who’d borrowed from the Emperor’s money-lenders to pay the first tax had their farms taken in lieu of payment. Those who, like my family, had been putting money aside for a rainy day… well, when I began to meet other survivors, they all had much the same story to tell. Eventually, those of us whose families were slaughtered and our land seized by this priest and his Knights, we banded together. We had no trouble finding others willing to join us: these lands hold many with too much pride to be reduced to serfs on land owned by our families since the time of our grandparents’ grandparents. That’s how this ragtag group came to be. We aimed to protect others from our fate, slay the red-robed devil if he ever returned… but we soon found we’d not enough food to eat. We’ve been forced to turn to banditry to stave off starvation while we wait for the bastard to show himself.”
A chill rested in Melody’s chest, as though her heart had frozen solid. It was a cold whose directionless burn was akin to fury, yet infinitely more dangerous, as though her deepest Res were poised to afflict the next person who made himself her enemy with a frostbite of the spirit.
“I know one thing.” Melody’s voice was calm on the surface, but the cold in it had the two youths who’d been with Syra sidling away uncomfortably. “That man and his brutes: they may have worn the uniforms… but he was no priest, and they were no Knights. If I survive my mission, the Church in Risingtown will end this charade. I swear by the Flame in my heart, you’ll have your farms back, even if I have to turn this Empire on its head.”
“Right up until ya walk outta here an’ call the Void’s Rim guard ta hunt us down.” Tonel glared past Syra. The hatred in his eyes burned like a brand against the core of cold inside Melody, and she flinched. “An empty promise befittin’ a cruel Church’s witch! We oughta end ya right here.”
“You swore.” Syra stepped into his way, and grabbed up her spear, holding it like a staff. “I’ll give you a right thrashing if you go back on it, and that’s an oath of my own!”
Tonel hesitated.
“Ha! Tonel’s willin’ ta forgive ya anythin’, Syra, bein’ as he’s sweet on ya.” The dark-bearded bandit Gelen grinned, an ugly expression without a hint of genuine pleasure to it. “I ain’t promised nothin’.”
Syra swung her spear about, but Gelen was already lunging past her at Melody, his long dagger unsheathed and raised to point at her eyes.
With nothing but cold emptiness in her heart, Melody raised the Phoenix emblem in her hands. Her chill thoughts flowed out like quicksilver to sense the minds of Syra, of Tonel, and of her assailant. She dove through the surface of his psyche and deep into his self without touching his thoughts. Holding his warm, vulnerable life’s force in her hands, she tried something new.
Gelen went limp and collapsed sideways mid-stride, colliding bodily with Syra and knocking her over.
Everyone froze. A blinding nimbus of white light shaped like an immense candle flame rose sky-high from the symbol on Melody’s palm. Moving as though entranced, Melody knelt and placed two fingers on Gelen’s neck. She paused, her chilled heart sinking.
Then, after what seemed like too long, Melody felt a pulse beneath her fingertips, followed by another.
“He’s… he’s just asleep,” she choked. Her emotions returned all at once, and tears of relief blurred her vision. The light in her hand dimmed but remained lit, its steady flame-shaped peak rising twice her height into the air.
“Phoenix save, what…?” Peering out from under the unconscious man’s bulk, Syra’s bloodshot eyes were wide, her expression slack as she stared unblinking into the brightness.
“A miracle,” whispered the youth who’d asked about Melody and Ticker’s journey. “They’re pilgrims, an’ the Flame answered their prayers.”
“Raw magic. I heard o’ such from a learned man once,” muttered a man near the cart, his eyes shining with reflected light as he fixed his rapt attention on Melody. “Ashen hells, wit’ such a gift she coulda killed us all fer the impudence o’ standin’ in her way.”
Syra allowed the spear to tumble from her hands. She shrugged off the unconscious bandit’s weight and stood. “Are you… a prophet?”
“I am.” Melody was conscious of twenty-three pairs of eyes watching her. She’d been the focus of far larger crowds in the past, but the mixture of fear and intrigue in their gazes sent an uncomfortable thrill racing up and down her spine to join with the warmth in her belly. “We don’t want any trouble. Ticker and I will move on, and we can forget this ever happened.”
“I knew it.” Syra reached out to clasp Melody’s hands in hers, pressing them together over the silver emblem. “I knew divine grace still existed in this world!”
Melody stepped back, unnerved by the fervour shining in Syra’s eyes. “I…”
“Please, help us,” begged one of the two who had been holding Ticker, releasing the Fiend Hunter and falling prostrate to press her forehead to the road’s dirt. “You’re what we’ve been waiting for: a prophet guided by the Flame. You speak with the Phoenix’s voice. You can save us from the pretenders!”
“I’ll pay whatever it costs. I’ll repent, unto death if I must.” Tonel’s red-rimmed eyes were fixed on Melody’s with a feverish intensity, and Syra moved back as the bandit leader dropped to his knees in front of the priestess. “I’ll give my life ta the Ashtender’s judgement, if ye’ll jus’ forgive the rest, an’ help them. They only killed innocents on my orders. Some, like Syra, even refused. Them t’ree, they volunteered ta go out alone an’ put their necks on the line, offerin’ folks a choice ta give over their goods peaceful-like.”
Tonel’s pain, and his sincerity, struck Melody like physical blows: with her holy symbol clutched between her hands, she had never released the connection it offered to the human beings around her. The weight of their combined suffering threatened to crush her… but this was a weight she was used to, had trained all her life to bear unflinching.
“My children,” she whispered, her quiet voice clear to the ears of all present, for even the autumn wind hushed to hear her, “No one need give up his life: all are forgiven freely by the Phoenix, Flame, and Ash. Be at peace, and unafraid.”
As Melody spoke, the calm in her spirit flowed outward to soothe the hearts of these desperate, hurting folk. Their pain abated, and so too did hers.
The glow faded from Melody’s Phoenix emblem, and a vision passed through her mind. In it, the white-clad woman who Melody suspected of being Melianne stood on the Old Road under a black sky. Her back was to Melody. Beyond her rose a mansion which was somehow familiar, though Melody was certain she had never seen it before. The whole tableau filled Melody with a sense of peace and belonging, as well as a sourceless melancholy. Attached to these feelings came the clear impression of an elderly, smiling woman with a cloud of grey hair and a red-and-brown robe.
The vision passed in the seconds it took for the manic light to fade from the eyes of the farmers-turned-bandits, and the wind to rise from its lull. Melody’s lingering sensation of being intimately connected to everyone present ceased.
“Merciful One, I owe you an apology,” Syra murmured. Her expression was that of a woman waking from a dream. “I robbed you. I forgot… we all forgot who we were.”
“Your children needed you to do whatever it took. Your daughter still does.” In the clarity which had followed the vision, Melody’s instincts were screaming at her that this wasn’t safe: that these people could at any moment decide they needed these supplies more than she did. Despite Melody’s surge of fear and mistrust, though, her priestly training won out. “Your daughter… what’s her name?”
“Miryena. Miry for short.”
“I promise I’ll have her found and returned to you… but there’s something I must do first. Allow me to leave here in peace.”
“We’re done robbin’ folk.” Tonel rose on shaking legs and pressed the pouch of coin into Melody’s free hand. “You oughta go on, an’ keep what we ain’t yet eaten.”
“No. You’ll receive the rest of the food, with my blessing.” Melody mounted the cart, and gestured for Ticker to resume his seat. “We’ve enough in our packs, and the funds can buy more when we reach Void’s Rim.”
Ticker collected his weaponry from the youths who’d been with Syra, then heaved himself into the driver’s bench at the front of the wagon. “We need ta talk,” he grunted.
“Later.” Melody sat up stiffly as men and women approached and pulled the remaining sacks of trail rations from around her with whispered, shamefaced apologies. No matter what her heart said, her body seemed determined to treat the reformed bandits as a threat. “When we’re alone.”
Ticker cracked the reins. “Ya don’ gotta tell me twice. Glad ta be outta here.”
The horse whinnied softly, and the wagon pulled away from a dazed-looking knot of farmers and their children huddled around three sacks of food, where before there had been nearly a score of bandits.
“An’ not a drop o’ blood spilled,” Ticker whispered to himself, glancing back with a shake of his head. “Ashen hells.”
Chapter Twelve
Ticker crouched over his fire pit with a flint and steel, trying not to grow too frustrated at the kindling’s stubborn refusal to catch.
The sparks from his latest attempt gave rise to a small flame which spread to fill the pit, and he gave a grunt of approval. In the shadows of dusk, the dancing light illuminated the tents he’d set up, the log he’d dragged over to chop the driest parts off of, and the metal tripod standing over the now-lit fire.
He stood with a groan and hung an iron pot by its wire handle from a hook at the tripod’s peak. “Soup’ll be ready in an hour or two.”
“Mm.” Melody had yet to move from the mud-streaked red cushion she’d brought with her. She knelt, her hands clasped in front of her face in the traditional position for prayers of supplication.
“So…” Ticker sighed and rocked back on his heels, seating himself heavily on his rotting log. “Ya gonna keep prayin’, or we gonna talk about what ya did back there?”
“I performed a miracle, in the name of the blessed Ash.”
“Ya did the impossible,” Ticker corrected sharply. “Ain’t nothin’ miraculous about it.”
Melody’s eyes snapped open, and she glared at Ticker. “Which of us is the priest here?”
“I don’ give a damn if yer the Flame-Anointed Speaker himself.” Ticker stood in a rush. “I know what I saw, what I felt! ‘Twere like I’d no choice but ta believe in yer righteousness an’ holiness.”
Melody stood as well, her expression cold. “Would you rather not believe?”
“O’ course not.” Ticker met her chill stare. “Yer missin’ my point on purpose.”
“They had reason to trust me.” Ticker could hear Melody’s voice shaking with her effort not to shout. “They knew my heart, felt my genuine wish for peace!”
“Or they felt somethin’ designed by magic ta seem like all that,” Ticker muttered.
