BOOK 2 -Chapter One

Moths in the Mountain Pass (Not final version)

Through the forest which kept poor silence, two figures moved dressed for night work.
Wind moved through the high pines in long, hissing sighs, the forest tiring of bearing witness to the quarrels of men. Over the high ridgeline of the mountains, the moon hung low, its recent lumination falling thinly through branches to spill like milk over the forest floor.
The figures, one taller and broader, another but a boy, moved low and quickly, their short cloaks tied up in front of them so to not hinder their progress. Both of these two were armed, though the man, who led the way, held a sword near as long as the boy was tall, whilst his companion brandished only a bow carved of yew. They stalked the ridgeline, their rapid, sideways descent made slow by the sharpness of the incline. Were it not for the hour’s lateness, the howl of the wind, and the deep colour of their clothing, their quarry would surely have spotted them from where they stalked the road below.
Indeed, it was a good night for an ambush.
Tris Morinder crouched against the trunk of a fallen cedar. The roots had torn from the ground, though the tree itself had not made it to the clear path downslope. He nestled himself into them and peered through, Ifarse waiting at his back. He would not have been able to see the path below, and so passed the task to Tris, whose eyes were keener than that of a human man’s.
Below where those two were aptly disguised, a small procession moved, winding between rocks with hurried caution. They were six in number, all wearing travel-stained cloaks over clothing which could have in no way been called fine, at least not to look upon it then. Two of the figures, the one leading the loping traversal of the mountain’s northerly slopes, and the slighter, hooded figure standing fourth in line, bore a lantern each. What flimsy light was offered moved unsteadily as the small group made its journey south-westerly. So entire was the darkness under the thickness of the overhead canopy that they became starkly visible against the night.
Moths circled those lanterns in frantic spirals, bouncing off the iron wroughtings and the mesh which kept them from their desired deaths. Those amongst the hastening group made no move to bat away the irksome little creatures, and that staying of their hands was what betrayed their nature.
Moths were attracted to light as the magi were to magic. It was those nocturnal insects that had since become the calling card of arcanists the world over. They were sacrosanct to wizards, magicians, sorcerers and witches alike. And none revered and respected their presence quite so profoundly as the Malkharim Cultists.
The bugs battered themselves against the mesh of the lanterns with soft, papery taps. Ifarse’s ears would not have been keen enough, Tris knew, but he could hear them. The insects were countless in number, pale winged and fervent, drawn not only by the flame in the lantern.
Tris deftly drew an arrow from the quiver at his hip, notching it against the string.
“Malkharim,” Tris mouthed, turning back to Ifarse.
“This far south,” Ifarse spoke softly back to him. “Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
Ifarse did not speak again for a moment, but Tris could see the working of his jaw, even below the thickening black beard he had grown for the winter months. “That’s three groups this month alone. They never travel this far south.”
“I think these ones are fleeing something,” Tris told him. “Their pace is hurried and unsure. They keep looking behind them as though they’re worried they’re being followed. Look there, the one in the front just did it, did you see?”
“Can’t say that I did, lad,” Ifarse told him. “I’ll have to take your word for it.” He considered the flashing of the lanterns as they passed through the sheltering treeline. “It must be something quite terrible if it’s got a group of Malkharim running like that.”
Tris’ heart was heavy and full in his throat. “Nightghasts?”
“No,” Ifarse said firmly, putting the matter to bed before the panic could arise in Tris whatsoever. “We clear the mountains of nests every summer when the days are long enough. Cullers brought us a cartload of their corpses only at the start of Autumn, don’t you recall?”
Tris did remember the grisly sight, but Ifarse wasn’t wholly right. It wasn’t just one cartload but three that the cullers had brought to the Gates. The stink had carried into the valley for an hour before they arrived. General DeRoth had paid the posse, and then given them extra to haul the carts far away to be burned, covering his nose with his hand all the while.
“Then what?” Tris asked.
Ifarse opened his mouth to answer, but whatever it was he had been about to say was cut short. Down the hill where those six figures went, one of them yelped out. The sound was muffled and unsuccessful, as though spoken through water or a thick castle wall. Tris turned back to where they went.
There were six of them, sure enough. That being said, it was the one in the rear who caught Tris’s attention upon a second inspection. Whilst their companions hurried, it was that tardy latter figure who stumbled, hands bound before them as they were pulled along. With each step they tried, without much joy, to right themselves and walk evenly over the darkened forest floor. The captor who held the chain which bound their wrists was the tallest amongst the party, broad of chest and arm and with a shaven pate. His skin was as sallow and pale as the moon’s tawdry offerings, and it was only he who wore a sword.
“They have taken a hostage, I think,” Tris said.
“Who?” Ifarse asked. In recent months, there had been a rise in disappearances from the towns and villages skirting the south of the Visan Marches. At first, none had suspected any wrongdoing. It wasn’t uncommon that young folk would run off, hoping to strike it rich in one of the larger cities, explore the world through way of one of the larger ports like Celember or Nerafeni, or pledge themselves to this lord or that with hopes of eventual titles and perhaps a small plot of land.
When bodies, or what remained of them, had been found in the mountains, the investigations had begun.
“I can’t tell,” Tris told him. “They have a bag over their head, or a hood. I’m not sure. They’re being pulled by a warrior. Their hands are bound by chains.”
“Chains,” Ifarse growled. “Tris, are you sure it’s chains? What colour is the metal?”
“I cannot see. The lantern light is changing it. It could be blue, or white? I don’t know.”
Ifarse’s grip on his sword faltered a moment. He looked back the way they came before turning to Tris. His eyes, dark as pools of hot chocolate, were looking sadly at Tris.

“What’s the matter?” Tris asked. Ifarse made no reply, but chewed whatever thought he had thoroughly. Tris misliked when such a demeanour overcame his friend, a man who was not ordinarily dour. To combat the silence, Tris spoke again. “The captive is escorted by someone else. I don’t think he’s a magi, for he wears a sword.”

“Not an uncommon thing,” Ifarse supplied. “Some magi are not schooled in the harmful Schools of the Arcane. Malkharim have been known to use weapons of all sorts. That said, even I can see he is a brute of a man. Few magi I have encountered gain such a build.”
“So, not a magi then?” Tris scoffed, slowly turning his gaze back to Ifarse, who was by then smiling in his defeat.
“Just as you say, I think,” he surrendered. “Likely a hired thug. Or a Guardian.”
Ifarse had said the word as though it were an honorific. He said it in such a way that made Tris feel ill at ease. Regardless of Ifarse’s weary reverence, the man still moved as the others did, looking over his shoulder and casting his eyes about like a rabbit only lately hunted.
A moth struck Tris’ cheek and bounced away down the hill toward the little lantern line.
By then, the Malkharim cultists had reached a narrow throat in the trail. The mountainside was pressing steeply against a sheer drop. It would prove a poor place to fight, but excellent for an aerial ambush. If the offensive was the course of action Ifarse wished to take, their time was thinning.
Ifarse rose slowly from the shadows of the fallen tree. Steel slid free of his scabbard with the quiet hiss of a practised habit.
“I’ll go first, you take out the leader. Like as not, he’s the most powerful and acting as the vanguard. Then focus on the Guardian.”
Tris nodded, an arrow already notched. By the time Ifarse tumbled down the slope, rocks falling loose as he made his way, Tris had already loosed the first arrow.
It punched through the dark cloth of the leading man’s cloak, finding its mark with a grizzly crunch.
The man yelled and fell away into the darkness, lost to the descending mountain pass.
With his felling, his companions turned at once. Ifarse had come upon them, dropping down onto the trail and boots crunching in gravel and fallen branches. His sword swept in a low arc, the second Malkharim turning too late, the blade catching her across the ribs. She spun down into the dirt with a wet cry. A swift kick of Ifarse’s boot was all it took for her to follow her companion downwards.
One of the lanterns fell and moths burst upward in a noisy, pale cloud.
Too quickly, one of the remaining Malkharim thrust out a hand and spoke a word in a harsh, guttural tongue Tris did not know. The air between her and Ifarse seemed to shimmer and shudder like water disturbed by a suddenly changing current.
Ifarse’s cloak began to smoke, even as he advanced toward the next Malkahrim. Orange embers began to eat away at its edges. Soon enough, a shower of sparks fell from Ifarse’s mantle.
Taking note of his sudden predicament, Ifarse twirled about on the tip of one foot, sweeping the other between the legs of the next man. As the cultist fell, his face was met with Ifarse’s armoured elbow. His nose broke under the force. He spluttered out his pain through quickly flowing blood.
Ifarse struggled with the cloak, his hands burning as he tried to loosen it from its fastenings.
The witch who had started the blaze from afar, done so with only an uttered word, turned her sights on Tris. He had missed her ankle with his next arrow only by inches, and that error had been enough to expose his position.
By where he crouched, moss and decayed wood, dried by the southern sun, began to hiss and smoulder. She had missed him just as he had her. Her mistake had given him time to notch another arrow.
The witch needed to make no move, however. Whilst she returned her attentions to Ifarse, who had released himself from the fiery cloak, it was the Guardian who made for Tris’ position.
To the look upon the man was a horror that Tris had only seen once, when the swarm of nightghasts had fled Fort Hethlan to scatter themselves over the countryside in their nocturnal hunting. What should have held colour in his eyes were only widened pools of blackness so absolute that no light from any source glimmered. What little skin was exposed was taut and sallow, paler than any living human being had any right to be. As he pulled himself up the hill, strong arms working quickly as a pursing dog’s, his mouth was pulled back into a snarl, fanged teeth bared.
Tris threw himself aside, the arrow releasing at the last, panicked second.
“Careful, Tris!” Ifarse barked. “Get back! Nemortis!”
The creature let out a squealing snarl as the arrow struck. Tris could not see, but heard as its body tumbled back down the slope toward where Ifarse fought.
Ifarse advanced quickly on the last of the Malkharim. His blade flashed twice in the dimming lanternlight. The woman staggered back, clutching at her throat, trying to whisper the words to save her. She collapsed, and Ifarse ended it with a quick thrust to her chest.
The last, the man with the broken nose, arose with a weapon drawn. It glinted not in the light as Ifarse’s own tool did, but stretched gnarled and ugly from his hand. It was a wand, a thin rod of blackened bone capped with copper.
Tris felt the hairs rise on his arms, even from that distance.
The air shimmered again from the tip of the wand as the man chattered quickly in the language Tris did not know. Where previously the forest had been silent except for the skirmish, suddenly the air was alive as though a hive of enraged bees were set upon them. Yet it was not bees that came, but moths.
They moved as one, hurling themselves down. Wings crackled in the air as they plummeted towards the burning cloak.
“Ifarse,” Tris called out. Already, the moths had set themselves ablaze and were beating at Ifarse, ignorant of the thrashing of his sword.
They fell apart like shards of a burning pyre. Ifarse, burnt and growling his injury, brought his heel down into the cackling man’s crown and made quickly for the rising creature.
Tris let fly one more arrow, this one punching through the Guardian’s armour. The creature was in no way hindered as it fell upon Ifarse in a clash of steel.
The swords moved too quickly for Tris see. Ifarse backed away under the unrelenting brutality of the creature before him. Each slash and strike was a frantic storm, met with whimpers and shouts.
Blackened eyes were wild beneath the Guardian’s hood. He did not even blink when Ifarse’s sword finally bit deep into the meat of his shoulder.
Ifarse wrenched it free, and the creature squealed.
For a moment, they stood there panting, breath mingling in the cold air of the evening.
Tris’ next arrow struck true.
Its hands twisted into gnarled knuckles and grizzly talons, clawing at the shaft of the arrow. The tip protruded haphazardly from its throat, having punctured through from the top of its head. The sight of it made Tris sick to look upon.
By rights, it should have sagged and fallen, left there to die with its companions. Rather, the creature skittered and struggled, clambering away on all fours and yipping its curses as it vanished into the night.
A call came through the night from the last of that party, the woman whose hands were bound, hidden behind a boulder. “Soran!”
Tris did not know the word, the gentleness of the consonants mixed with the breath of the vowels, but took it to be the name of preternatural creature which had fled, leaving its charge to her fate. But why had she called out to it with such desperation, as though she hadn’t wanted rescue?
Tris, stunned at the unnatural resistance of the thing he had seen, made his way cautiously down the way.
Ifarse grunted and groaned as he slumped, trying his best to remove his armour. One of his arms was injured and he flexed his fingers through the remains of his gloves. He was oblivious to the last of the party.
She was several paces down the trail, her hands still bound by the curiously coloured chains. Behind a boulder, she was lowered, cowed there and unsure in her rising. Her hood had fallen away.
She was younger than Tris had expected. Still a few years older than him, her hair fell in a mess of red waves about a round face muttered with freckles. Her little teeth were clenched, her eyes wild and flooded.
“Stay back,” she gasped, the words coming somewhere between a bite and a sob.
To Tris’ back, Ifarse struggled to rise.
“You have nowhere to go, girl,” Ifarse grunted, hissing out his pain. “Surrender yourself to us. For your own sake.”
Ifarse stepped forward, supporting himself on the meagre rise of the outcropping.
The woman’s eyes, a fantastical emerald shade, darted quickly about the surrounding forest. No argument came from her, but her small mouth hardened as she too struggled to rise.
Tris followed her line of sight. Deeper down the path, another shape moved hidden against the bulk of a rising tree. They were not the only ones who had been tailing that group. Tris swallowed and turned back to the witch, his eyes wide with pleading. If she did not relent, these moments would be her last.
“We are hunted,” the girl said hoarsely. “The Everflame slaughtered half a group not a fortnight past. We only wanted to find somewhere safe.” She looked down to her friends where they lay scattered, the flow of blood having stilled by then. She went to her hands and knees and crawled to the man with the broken nose. She touched his face lightly and made the most pitiful sound Tris had ever heard. “I was to give all my magic for them.” She spoke the words as though they hurt coming out. “They would have been safe from all this.”
“The Everflame?” Tris moved to her, pondering the words. Ifarse whistled once, sharp and quick. Tris stopped and matched his friend’s gaze. Quickly motioning his head back towards the darker forest, Ifarse reminded Tris of the eyes upon them.
“I am sorry for your loss,” Ifarse replied without an ounce of sympathy, “but you must surrender. It’s over. Coming with us and answering to the general may spare your life.”
“You cannot give your word for that.” The witch spat and snarled as she looked up at Ifarse, eyes afire.
Tris moved forward again. “No,” he confessed, “but if you refuse, you will die here.” He looked back to the forest. The shape was no longer against the far tree and he could not spy her again. “Please.”
Something in his voice must have struck her strangely. “If I go with you,” she said darkly, “and your general hands me over to the Everflame, even the pyre will seem a mercy. Have your hidden one strike me down if you can.”
Seeing the woman clearly instantly became a challenging feat. Tris could only spy fragments of her. The movement of her hair, the flash of her pale skin, all hidden in the periphery of his sight. As she went away into the dark pursuing the foul creature that had moved like a twisted animal, she became unnoticeable. An arrow hissed through the dark and struck the trunk of a tree several yards before Tris.
“You should not have done that.” Ifarse was upon him quickly. He seized Tris’ shoulders and bore down on him. “You foolish boy! You little…” he stopped then, the faintest crunching of gravel disturbing the otherwise silent night.
“You have loosed a murderer back into the world.” The voice came, thick with northern flavours, rasping through her damaged throat.
Tris stepped back, Ifarse’s grip falling slack.
“Or a witness,” Ifarse told the newcomer quickly, only the barest quiver left in his voice. “If she reports back to her kind they will know this area is not safe to pass.”
Ifarse sheathed his sword as he turned.
Fleet was only a half decade older than Tris. Thin as a blade and more battleworn than one her age had any right to be, she struck an impressive figure in her dark leather armour. No cloak hung from her, the fluttering could disturb the silence of her movement, snag on a branch and slow her pace.
Her eyes, dark as a moonless night, studied Ifarse a moment, before turning back to Tris. She paid Ifarse no mind.
“Mercy is a luxury, Tris. It is not one that she would have afforded you, were the roles reversed.” Fleet told him.
“Yes, Fleet. I’m sorry. I will do better next time.”
The young woman often took a few moments to reply, her face hard and unreadable, as though she were utterly perplexed that the boy had dared to speak to her. “There will be no next time. Ifarse, see that this boy is suitably punished for his foolishness. I will speak with General DeRoth and have him moved. Perhaps the kitchens or stables.”
“But, Ma’am,” Ifarse began. He stopped right away. Tris made no protest. Second only to the General, Fleet’s word was law at the Gates of Armistice. “As you say.”
Neither Tris nor Ifarse spoke as they made their way back to the Gates, lead by Fleet and her silent footsteps.
At their backs, the forest swallowed the dead and ne by one, moths fell into the last of the pitiful flames.