The Gift of Battle Read online

  Thor closed his eyes, knowing this was one of his tests, one of the monumental moments in his life. He tried to blot out the world, to focus inwardly. On his training. On Argon. On his mother. On his powers. He was stronger than the universe, he knew that. There were powers deep within him, powers above the physical world. This creature was of this earth—yet Thor’s powers were greater. He could summon the powers of nature, the very powers that had created this beast, and send it back to the hell it had come from.

  Thor felt the world slow all around him. He felt a heat rising within his palms, spreading through his arms, his shoulders, and back again, prickling, right down to his fingertips. Feeling invincible, Thor opened his eyes. He felt an incredible power shining through them, the power of the universe.

  Thor reached out and placed his palm on the tentacle of the beast, and as he did, he seared it. The beast withdrew it immediately from his thigh, as if being burnt.

  Thor stood, a new man. He turned and saw the beast’s head rearing itself up along the edge of the ship, opening its jaws, preparing to swallow them all. He saw his Legion brothers and sisters sliding, about to be dragged over the edge.

  Thor let out a great battle cry and charged the beast. He dove for it before it could reach the others, forgoing his sword and instead reaching out with his burning palms. He grabbed hold of the beast’s face and laid his palms on it, and as he did, he felt them sear the beast’s face.

  Thor held on tight as the beast shrieked and writhed, trying to break free from his grasp. Slowly, one tentacle at a time, the beast began to release its grip on the boat, and as it did, Thor felt his power rising within him. He grabbed hold of the beast firmly and raised both of his palms, and as he did, he felt the weight of the beast, rising higher and higher into the air. Soon it hovered above Thor’s palms, the power within Thor keeping it afloat.

  Then, when the beast was a good thirty feet overhead, Thor turned and cast his hands forward.

  The beast went flying forward, above the ship, shrieking, tumbling end over end. It sailed through the air a good hundred feet, until finally it went limp. It dropped down into the sea with a great splash, then sank beneath the surface.

  Dead.

  Thor stood there in the silence, his entire body still warm, and slowly, one at a time, the others regrouped, gaining their feet and coming up beside him. Thor stood there, breathing hard, dazed, looking out at the sea of blood. Beyond it, on the horizon, his eyes fixed on the black castle, looming over this land, the place that, he knew, held his son.

  The time had come. There was nothing stopping him now, and it was time, finally, to retrieve his son.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Volusia stood before her many advisors in the streets of the Empire capital, staring at the looking glass in her hand with shock. She examined her new face from every angle—half of it still beautiful, and the other half disfigured, melted away—and she felt a wave of disgust. The fact that half of her beauty still remained somehow made it all worse. It would have been easier, she realized, if her entire face had been disfigured—then she could remember nothing of her former looks.

  Volusia recalled her stunning good looks, the root of her power, which had carried her through every event in life, which had allowed her to manipulate men and women alike, to bring men to their knees with a single glance. Now, all that was gone. Now, she was just another seventeen-year-old girl—and worse, half-monster. She could not stand the sight of her own face.

  In a burst of rage and desperation, Volusia flung the looking glass down and watched as it smashed to pieces on the pristine streets of the capital. All of her advisors stood there, silent, looking away, all knowing better than to talk to her at this moment. It was also clear to her, as she surveyed their faces, that none of them wanted to look at her, to see the horror that was now her face.

  Volusia looked around for the Volks, eager to tear them apart—but they were already gone, having disappeared as soon as they had cast that awful spell on her. She’d been warned not to join forces with them, and now she realized all the warnings had been right. She had paid the price dearly for it. A price that could never be turned back.

  Volusia wanted to let her rage out on someone, and her eyes fell on Brin, her new commander, a statuesque warrior just a few years older than her, who had been courting her for moons. Young, tall, muscular, he had stunning good looks and had lusted after her the entire time she had known him. Yet now, to her fury, he would not even meet her gaze.

  “You,” Volusia hissed at him, barely able to contain herself. “Will you now not even look at me?”

  Volusia flushed as he looked up but would not meet her eyes. This was her destiny now, for the rest of her life, she knew, to be viewed as a freak.

  “Am I disgusting to you now?” she asked, her voice breaking in desperation.

  He hung his head low, but did not respond.

  “Very well,” she said finally, after a long silence, determined to exact vengeance on someone, “then I command you: you will gaze at the face which you hate the most. You will prove to me that I am beautiful. You will sleep with me.”

  The commander looked up and met her eyes for the first time, fear and horror in his expression.

  “Goddess?” he asked, his voice cracking, terrified, knowing he would face death if he defied her command.

  Volusia smiled wide, happy for the first time, realizing that would be the perfect revenge: to sleep with the man who found her most loathsome.

  “After you,” she said, stepping aside and gesturing toward her chamber.

  *

  Volusia stood before the tall arched, open-air window on the top floor of the palace of the Empire capital, and as the early morning suns rose, the drapes billowing in her face, she cried quietly. She could feel her teardrops trickling down the good side of her face but not the other, the side melted away. It was numb.

  A light snoring punctuated the air, and Volusia glanced over her shoulder to see Brin lying there, still asleep, his face bunched up in an expression of disgust, even in sleep. He had hated every moment he had lain with her, she knew, and that had brought her some small revenge. Yet still she did not feel satisfied. She could not let it out on the Volks, and she still felt a need for vengeance.

  It was a weak bit of vengeance, hardly the one she craved. The Volks, after all, had disappeared, while here she was, the next morning, still alive, still stuck with herself, as she would have to be for the rest of her life. Stuck with these looks, this disfigured face, which even she could not bear.

  Volusia wiped back the tears and looked out, beyond the city line, beyond the capital walls, deep on the horizon. As the suns rose, she began to see the faintest trace of the armies of the Knights of the Seven, their black banners lining the horizon. They were camped out there, and their armies were mounting. They were encircling her slowly, gathering millions from all corners of the Empire, all preparing to invade. To crush her.

  She welcomed the confrontation. She did not need the Volks, she knew. She did not need any of her men. She could kill them on her own. She was, after all, a goddess. She had left the realm of mortals long ago, and now she was a legend, a legend that no one, and no army, in the world could stop. She would greet them on her own, and she would kill them all, for all time.

  Then, finally, there would be no one left to confront her. Then, her powers would be supreme.

  Volusia heard a rustling behind her and out of the corner of her eye, she detected motion. She saw Brin rise from bed, casting off his sheets and beginning to dress. She saw him slinking around, careful to be quiet, and she realized he meant to slip out from the room before she saw him—so that he would never have to look upon her face again. It added insult to injury.

  “Oh, Commander,” she called out casually.

  She saw him freeze in his tracks in fear; he turned and looked over at her reluctantly, and as he did, she smiled back, torturing him with the grotesqueness of her melted lips.

 
“Come here, Commander,” she said. “Before you leave, there is something I want to show you.”

  He slowly turned and walked, crossing the room until he reached her side, and he stood there, looking out, looking anywhere but at her face.

  “Have you not one sweet parting kiss for your Goddess?” she asked.

  She could see him flinch ever so slightly, and she felt fresh anger burning within her.

  “Never mind,” she added, her expression darkening. “But there is, at least, something I want to show you. Have a look. Do you see out there, on the horizon? Look closely. Tell me what you see down there.”

  He stepped forward and she laid a hand on his shoulder. He leaned forward and examined the skyline, and as he did, she watched his brow furrow in confusion.

  “I see nothing, Goddess. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

  Volusia smiled wide, feeling the old sense of vindictiveness rise up within her, feeling the old need for violence, for cruelty.

  “Look more closely, Commander,” she said.

  He leaned forward, just a bit more, and in one quick motion, Volusia grabbed his shirt from behind, and with all her might, threw him face first out the window.

  Brin shrieked as he flailed and flew through the air, dropping down all the way, a hundred feet, until finally he landed face first, instantly dead, on the streets below. The thud reverberated in the otherwise quiet streets.

  Volusia smiled wide, examining his body, finally feeling a sense of vengeance.

  “It is yourself you see,” she replied. “Who is the less grotesque of us now?”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Gwendolyn walked through the dim corridors of the tower of the Light Seekers, Krohn at her side, walking slowly up the circular ramp along the sides of the building. The path was lined with torches and cult worshipers, standing silently at attention, hands hidden in their robes, and Gwen’s curiosity deepened as she continued to ascend one level after another. The King’s son, Kristof, had led her halfway up after their meeting, then had turned and descended, instructing her that she would have to complete the journey alone to see Eldof, that she alone could face him. The way they all spoke about him, it was as if he were a god.

  Soft chanting filled the air heavy with incense, as Gwen walked up the very gradual ramp, and wondered: What secret was Eldof guarding? Would he give her the knowledge she needed to save the King and save the Ridge? Would she ever be able to retrieve the King’s family from this place?

  As Gwen turned a corner, the tower suddenly opened up, and she gasped at the sight. She entered a soaring chamber with a hundred-foot ceiling, its walls lined with floor to ceiling stained glass windows. A muted light flooded through, filled with scarlets, purples, and pinks, lending the chamber an ethereal quality. And what made it all most surreal of all was to see one man sitting alone in this vast place, in the center of the room, the shafts of light coming down on him as if to illuminate him and him alone.

  Eldof.

  Gwen’s heart pounded as she saw him sitting there at the far end of the chamber, like a god who had dropped down from the sky. He sat there, hands folded in his shining golden cloak, his head stark bald, on a huge and magnificent throne carved of ivory, torches on either side of it and on the ramp leading to it, obliquely lighting the room. This chamber, that throne, the ramp leading to it—it was more awe-inspiring than approaching a King. She realized at once why the King felt threatened by his presence, his cult, this tower. It was all designed to inspire awe and subservience.

  He did not beckon her, or even acknowledge her presence, and Gwen, not knowing what else to do, began to ascend the long, golden walkway leading to his throne. As she went she saw he wasn’t alone in here after all, for obscured in the shadows were rows of worshipers all lined up, eyes closed, hands tucked in their cloaks, lining the ramp. She wondered how many thousands of followers he had.

  She finally stopped a few feet before his throne and looked up.

  He looked back down with eyes that seemed ancient, ice-blue, glowing, and while he smiled down at her, his eyes held no warmth. They were hypnotizing. It reminded her of being in Argon’s presence.

  She did not know what to say as he stared down; it felt as if he were staring into her soul. She stood there in the silence, waiting until he was ready, and beside her, she could feel Krohn stiffening, equally on edge.

  “Gwendolyn of the Western Kingdom of the Ring, daughter of King MacGil, last hope for the savior of her people—and ours,” he pronounced slowly, as if reading from some ancient script, his voice deeper than any she’d ever heard, sounding as if it had resonated from the stone itself. His eyes bore into hers, and his voice was hypnotic. As she stared into them, it made her lose all sense of space and time and place, and already, Gwen could feel herself getting sucked in by his cult of personality. She felt entranced, as if she could look nowhere else, even if she tried. She immediately felt as if he were the center of her world, and she understood at once how all of these people had come to worship and follow him.

  Gwen stared back, momentarily at a loss for words, something that had rarely happened to her. She had never felt so star-struck—she, who had been before many Kings and Queens; she, who was Queen herself; she, the daughter of a King. This man had a quality to him, something she could not quite describe; for a moment, she even forgot why she had come here.

  Finally, she cleared her mind long enough to be able to speak.

  “I have come,” she began, “because—”

  He laughed, interrupting her, a short, deep sound.

  “I know why you have come,” he said. “I knew before you even did. I knew of your arrival in this place—indeed, I knew even before you crossed the Great Waste. I knew of your departure from the Ring, your travel to the Upper Isles, and of your travels across the sea. I know of your husband, Thorgrin, and of your son, Guwayne. I have watched you with great interest, Gwendolyn. For centuries, I have watched you.”

  Gwen felt a chill at his words, at the familiarity of this person she didn’t know. She felt a tingling in her arms, up her spine, wondering how he knew all this. She felt that once she was in his orbit, she could not escape if she tried.

  “How do you know all this?” she asked.

  He smiled.

  “I am Eldof. I am both the beginning and the end of knowledge.”

  He stood, and she was shocked to see he was twice as tall as any man she’d met. He took a step closer, down the ramp, and with his eyes so mesmerizing, Gwen felt as if she could not move in his presence. It was so hard to concentrate before him, to think an independent thought for herself.

  Gwen forced herself to clear her mind, to focus on the business at hand.

  “Your King needs you,” she said. “The Ridge needs you.”

  He laughed.

  “My King?” he echoed with disdain.

  Gwen forced herself to press on.

  “He believes you know how to save the Ridge. He believes you are holding a secret from him, one that could save this place and all of these people.”

  “I am,” he replied flatly.

  Gwen was taken aback at his immediate, frank reply, and hardly knew what to say. She had expected him to deny it.

  “You are?” she asked, flabbergasted.

  He smiled but said nothing.

  “But why?” she asked. “Why won’t you share this secret?”

  “And why should I do that?” he asked

  “Why?” she asked, stumped. “Of course, to save this kingdom, to save his people.”

  “And why would I want to do that?” he pressed.

  Gwen narrowed her eyes, confused; she had no idea how to respond. Finally, he sighed.

  “Your problem,” he said, “is that you believe everyone is meant to be saved. But that is where you are wrong. You look at time in the lens of mere decades; I view it in terms of centuries. You look at people as indispensable; I view them as mere cogs in the great wheel of destiny and time.”

  He took a
step closer, his eyes searing.

  “Some people, Gwendolyn, are meant to die. Some people need to die.”

  “Need to die?” she asked, horrified.

  “Some must die to set others free,” he said. “Some must fall so that others may rise. What makes one person more important than another? One place more important than another?”

  She pondered his words, increasingly confused.

  “Without destruction, without waste, growth could not follow. Without the empty sands of the desert, there can be no foundation on which to build the great cities. What matters more: the destruction, or the growth to follow? Don’t you understand? What is destruction but a foundation?”

  Gwen, confused, tried to understand, but his words only deepened her confusion.

  “Then are you going to stand by and let the Ridge and its people die?” she asked. “Why? How would that benefit you?”

  He laughed.

  “Why should everything always be for a benefit?” he asked. “I won’t save them because they are not meant to be saved,” he said emphatically. “This place, this Ridge, it is not meant to survive. It is meant to be destroyed. This King is meant to be destroyed. All these people are meant to be destroyed. And it is not for me to stand in the way of destiny. I have been granted the gift to see the future—but that is a gift I shall not abuse. I shall not change what I see. Who am I to stand in the way of destiny?”

  Gwendolyn could not help but think of Thorgrin, of Guwayne.

  Eldof smiled wide.

  “Ah yes,” he said, looking right at her. “Your husband. Your son.”

  Gwen looked back, shocked, wondering how he’d read her mind.

  “You want to help them so badly,” he added, then shook his head. “But sometimes you cannot change destiny.”

  She reddened and shook off his words, determined.