The Edge of Chaos tw-3 Read online

  The Edge of Chaos

  ( The Wilds - 3 )

  Jak Koke

  Jak Koke

  The Edge of Chaos

  PROLOGUE

  A flare of incandescent blue appeared and was gone, leaving darkness in its wake.

  A flicker of light played against Duvan’s closed eyelids. He turned and pressed his head into the burlap pillow. It could not be morning yet, and he didn’t want to wake up to another day of tilling the fields.

  When we are twelve, he thought, Talfani and I will run away and live with the elves at Wildhome. But that was two summers away, and now he needed his sleep. Papa would make him work hard in the morning. A quick glance across the room to Talfani’s bed showed that she hadn’t stirred in her sleep. Even the worst thunderstorms didn’t wake her.

  Another flash lit the night and cast sharp shadows on the walls of the small room he shared with his sister. Duvan slipped out of his low, wooden bed, instinctively checked the floor for scorpions, and went to the window. “Psst, ’Fani! Wake up! Something’s happening.”

  Outside, the world was transformed. From the window, Duvan could see down the main road of the village. It was a moonless night, which would normally have been black as pitch, but there was a blue fire shimmering in the air.

  Not just the air-in the ground too. Like a thin veil the color of spiderwebs, the fabric of the universe fluctuated in front of Duvan’s eyes. He’d seen this once before: spellplague.

  The remnants of the ancient unraveling of magic, spellplague storms were random and cruel. Striking without judgment the innocent and guilty alike, spellplague destroyed good and evil, lawful and criminal, young, old, human, elf, even the great and monstrous. To some it gave great power and ability, but to most it destroyed mindlessly and without bias.

  As he watched from the window, the gossamer knife flickered its way through the left side of the street, and in a moment the houses there were splayed open like cloven fruit. The earth rent in the rift created by the spellplague’s path, mud-brick and dirt flowing into the sky like an inverted waterfall of rock and trees and splintered wood, carrying people with it.

  The earth shook around him, and he struggled to stay on his feet. But no sound came to Duvan’s ears. Outside, people screamed and cried out in pain and terror, their faces twisted in fear as they ran. But their screams came to his ears as if from a great distance, muffled and faint.

  They’re all leaving, he thought. We need to get out too!

  Abruptly, panic seized him and took hold of his limbs. He found himself running to the doorway. He had to get out!

  “Talfani!” he yelled, and his own voice nearly broke his ears. She stirred in her bed.

  “Duvan?” she mumbled. “What is it?”

  He crossed the room and pushed aside the heavy blanket that served as a door. The imposing figure of his father met him there. “Thank the stars, you are all right,” he said, looking first at Duvan and then at Talfani.

  “All right?” Talfani was out of bed now.

  “Spellplague has struck the village,” Papa said. “Many lives are in danger, but you are safest here.” The worry lines around Papa’s olive-colored eyes deepened. “Stay here until I come for you.”

  Duvan felt his heartbeat slow a little. His breathing evened. Papa would protect them.

  “Duvan,” Papa said, “you are the elder-”

  “Only by a quarter hour,” Talfani protested.

  “True, sweetpea. Still, I am putting him in charge should anything happen.”

  With a glance from Papa, Talfani bit back her retort.

  “Duvan, you’re in charge. Take care of your sister until I return.”

  Papa turned and slipped through the curtain, leaving only the smell of almonds and pipeweed.

  “What do we do?” Talfani asked, and the tremble in her voice sent a chill through Duvan. Of the two of them, she was always the strong and defiant one.

  “We wait,” he said, turning to look his twin in the eye. “We stay and we wait.”

  And so they waited. They held each other against the upheaval when the ground ripped apart. They watched through the tiny window as the spellplague rampaged through their neighbors and the livestock running loose. They waited through the night and into the morning, breathing through their nightshirts when the dust in the air grew thick, and the metallic smell of blood pervaded everything around them.

  Papa never came back.

  By midday the storm seemed to have passed. No movement outside. No sign of anyone, and the spellplague appeared to have receded to small pockets.

  Duvan heard Talfani’s stomach groan, and he realized that he was hungry too.

  “I can’t hear anyone,” he said. “But my hearing is all messed up.”

  “It’s gone quiet,” Talfani said, and tears welled in her eyes. “Earlier I was praying to Selune that the screaming would stop, and now it has. Now it has, and I’m more afraid.”

  Duvan took her into his arms. Talfani was his same size-tall enough to rest her chin on his shoulder-and her hair was as black as his, her skin the same deep brown tone. His eyes were black, though, while hers were lighter, and rare-golden yellow-brown.

  “Selune was not here tonight,” he said. “She did not hear your call. The screaming stopped for another reason.”

  “I’m hungry,” she said. “And I miss Papa.”

  “Me too, ’Fani. But I promised I would take care of you, and he said we should stay here.” For the time being, she nodded and accepted that answer.

  “Want to play tiles?”

  Talfani looked at him, puzzled and surprised.

  “To pass the time while we wait.” They played for several hours, and no one came. It remained eerily still. Finally, they slept.

  When he awoke, it was light again, and Talfani was in his bed next to him. His stomach was empty and growling. He nudged her. “We need food,” he said. “I’m going to go out and find some. You stay here.”

  “No,” said Talfani faintly. “Don’t leave me alone.”

  So he stayed that time, and the next time she slept too. He waited for another day until his hunger clawed at his gut. And because he didn’t want her to face what he suspected was outside the curtain of their room, he went when she was asleep.

  “We need to eat,” he whispered to her, all serene and peaceful against her burlap pillow.

  No response.

  “I will come back soon.” He slipped from the bed and pulled on his sandals, then stepped to the doorway and pushed aside the heavy curtain.

  Where before there had been hallway and the rest of their small house, now there was nothing but rubble and dirt, with sporadic patches of spellplague shimmering like will-o’-wisps among the destruction. Their bedroom stood alone, spared by the storm.

  Duvan stood transfixed and uncomprehending. He took measured breaths, trying to fight down the panic. But it was his stomach that brought him back and reminded him of his need. He stepped through the doorway and caught one last glimpse of Talfani, sleeping and restful, before the curtain fell between them.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Commander Accordant Vraith suppressed a shiver of excitement. Everyone was here-her assistants and guards from the Order of Blue Fire, all the carefully chosen pilgrim volunteers, and perhaps even the sharn were watching from their hidden vantages, beyond the veil of the Plaguewrought Land.

  Everyone was in place. The ritual could begin shortly-the ritual of borders.

  Vraith stood at the edge of the world. On one side, a serene, sunny afternoon bathed a grassy field in bright yellow warmth, broken only by the shadows of a smattering of clouds and floating earth motes. Quiet and peaceful and ordinary.

  One the other side, the world was endin
g. Behind the border veil that marked the edge of the Plaguewrought Land, everything was in upheaval. The land beyond the veil was one of the few locations where the beloved wild magic-the anarchic, extra planar force that had changed Toril forever when it first tore asunder the rules and ways of magic-was constant and contained. Inside, unstable ground flowed at random up into the sky, or down, or sideways.

  An ocean of blue fire-what the unenlightened masses called spellplague though it was only the remnant of that glorious event-surged and pulsed behind the border veil. Though no match for the Spellplague that had struck Toril a hundred years ago, the blue fire promised power unbound by the laws of nature. Raw power.

  And in between-the border. The veil that separated these two worlds seemed fragile and hardly up to the task of holding in the most powerful force in all Faerun, but it nonetheless managed. The border stretched up into the sky, like an undulating, prismatic curtain-a translucent sheet blowing in a wind, covered in an oily sheen that reflected a rainbow of light.

  Borders existed in all worlds-edges of nature that formed the margins between darkness and light, between heat and cold, between order and chaos.

  Between life and death.

  And it is time to move this one, Vraith thought. Time to give the blue fire a little more room. Against the backdrop of the Plaguewrought Land, Vraith drew herself up and prepared to address the pilgrims who had been chosen for her first ritual. As an elf of diminutive build, Vraith had to work to maintain the aura of authority she commanded.

  Whatever her size, they could not deny her magical prowess. That was her power. That was what she brought to the Order of Blue Fire and its secretive masters. This ritual would be her glorious ascension. Her rapture.

  This endeavor’s success would not only be a triumph for her, but for all involved. For the volunteers, to be personally accompanied and baptized in the spellplague by one of the leaders of the Order of Blue Fire was an honor, to be sure. But no exposure to the spellplague was without risks. And when Vraith had explained the risks, these five pilgrims had seemed unconcerned. Perfect.

  If all goes well, she thought, their devotion and commitment to the cause will be rewarded. Vraith knew that, for it had been promised by a sharn, a true prophet of the Blue Fire, that had come to Vraith in a dream.

  Hadn’t it? Vraith was sure it had … in its oblique and awe-inspiring way.

  “We are ready,” she said, raising her voice to an evangelical pitch. “Pilgrims, gather around me.” She spread her arms wide as if she would embrace them all.

  The pilgrims approached, each garbed in simple white robes. They had been chosen for their devotion as well as their constitution, for this ritual would tax their physical endurance.

  Vraith took each pilgrim one by one, placing them in a tight semicircle next to the border veil. She avoided looking at their faces as she arranged them. Their identities didn’t matter to Vraith-they were pieces in a game. Pawns, interchangeable and easy to lose for the greater good.

  When each of the pilgrims was in position, an arm’s length apart, the five of them forming a tight half-circle with end points nearly touching the border veil, Vraith carefully unsheathed a ceremonial dagger from its jeweled scabbard. The dagger’s razor-sharp blade shimmered with blue magic. Beyond the semicircle stood the guard contingent, ready to keep the peace or fight any creatures that might appear.

  “May the Blue Fire burn inside you, each one,” she said as she made a small incision in the palms of their hands, one by one. “May you find your rapture.”

  Inside the veil, chaos ravaged the land. Outside, the mid-afternoon sun shone warm The sound of the surging plagueland was a muffled roar behind the veil, and the late-summer smell of the blue fire leaked through: decaying flesh and rotting oranges.

  But the blue fire itself remained contained within. Like a caged beast, the spellplague remnants raged inside the Plaguewrought Land, its pale blue and white energy like sheets of gauzy lightning. Wild and alive, that power spoke to Commander Accordant Vraith, urging her to set it free of its bonds, for the blue fire would purge all of Faerun of its weak and frail. In the wake of the baptism by spellplague, only the chosen survived and were made stronger for it.

  “Take the hand of the person next to you,” Vraith said. “Palm to palm so that you become bonded to each other through blood-a single, unifying thread.”

  The pilgrims complied, seemingly entranced.

  A deep, throbbing ache resounded in Vraith’s sternum as her spellscar activated. The world shifted in front of her eyes, colors fading to red and black as tendrils of magic-invisible to all but herself-snaked forth from Vraith’s chest and touched the threads of the pilgrims’ souls, starkly evident now to her enlightened vision.

  Vraith started the ritual, weaving the filaments of these souls into a new curtain, something matching the mesh of the border veil. her assistants brought forth powdered metals, bottles of swirling residuum, and dangerous salts that burst into flame as they came into contact with Vraith’s magic. It was a delicate and exhausting spell, lasting hours as she painstakingly crafted a new border and tied the souls of the pilgrims into the shifting, prismatic membrane that held back the blue fire.

  Vraith rejoiced in her work, nudging the edge of chaos just a tiny bit. The plaguelands surged and crashed like an angry ocean of raw magic behind the veil, and now that raw, blue fire leaped from pilgrim to pilgrim.

  Come on, Vraith thought. Hold fast.

  But the life force of the pilgrims flared brightly and guttered out. Each unit lasted mere moments. Not enough time to finish the ritual. Not enough time for anything but burning and death.

  Vraith felt, more than heard, the screams and terrified cries of agony as the pilgrims came apart, burned from the inside by the chaotic fire. As she came out of her casting trance, Vraith disentangled herself from the frayed threads of the spell she had woven. She recoiled as the border curtain collapsed back to its previous spot.

  A wave of exhaustion weakened her knees, and as her spellscar diminished, the wind was knocked out of her. Struggling to breathe, she looked over the aftermath. What a failure!

  At her feet, the remains of the pilgrims still smoked and smoldered. Inadequate, she thought, and weak! Vraith stepped away from the bodies and composed herself. After a minute her breath returned, and she yelled, “Get them out of my sight!” The venom in her voice surprised even Vraith.

  As Jahin, the genasi wizard who currently served as captain of the guard, moved to obey her, Vraith took a few deep breaths. The noxious aroma of singed flesh coiled in the air, contaminating it. She needed to think. How had the ritual failed? It was the first test; some degree of failure was to be expected. But the deaths of all five pilgrims was catastrophic.

  These pilgrims were too frail. The blue fire was discriminating of course-it would not spare just anyone. She couldn’t count, it seemed, on the pilgrims lasting long enough for the ritual to complete. If only there were a way to give them strength so that they could remain exposed to the blue fire a little longer without dying.

  Vraith drew herself up and turned away from the remnants of the pilgrims. The entourage of Peacekeepers-the Order of Blue Fire militia-was busy cleaning up the smoking remains, but she didn’t have to oversee that. And as she walked toward her carriage, Vraith’s mind was already concentrating on the next test ritual, on how she would change things.

  She turned to her assistant, Renfod-an ebony-skinned human cleric in the pale blue robes of a Loremaster Accordant of the Order. His short, graying, black hair receded over his forehead, and cataracts dulled his brown eyes a little.

  “We need to pay a visit to the monk,” she said.

  Renfod arched his brows. “Brother Gregor?”

  Vraith nodded. “He’s been working on something. The pilgrims whisper he has a potion that will grant them safe passage through the Plaguewrought Land.”

  “Gregor hasn’t been eager to join the Order,” Renfod said.

  Vraith cl
imbed into the coach and sat on the blue silk cushions. At least she was permitted some degree of comfort in this otherwise revolting backwater of a place. “We don’t need him to join the Order,” she said. “We just need enough of his draught to protect our volunteers.” She gestured toward the blackened remains on the ground.

  Renfod grimaced. “Quite so,” he said. “And yet, such reliance on an unbeliever is risky.”

  “You leave that to me,” Vraith said. “I am all too familiar with such risks.”

  Renfod leaned in close, his masculine odor almost palpable as he whispered, “Indeed you are.”

  Vraith smiled at the remembrance of their intimacies. He had used her for advancement, and she had been quite willingly used.

  Renfod stepped back from the carriage and said, “As you wish, Commander. We shall persuade the monk to join in our cause. I am sure he will be made to understand our need.”

  “Duvan?”

  From the recesses of his consciousness, Duvan felt someone shake his shoulder.

  “You said to wake you when the manticore flew off. It’s gone now.”

  Chills from the dream memory shivered across his skin as he came awake, dreams of the Blue Fire fleeing his mind. It had been more than ten years since his village had been hit by the plaguestorm, and still it haunted his dreams. His unfortunate decision to leave Talfani to find food made him shudder with anguish. He missed her still.

  Duvan yawned and tried to shake off the remaining images of nightmare death from the cobwebs of his mind. “Thank you, Beaugrat. Get the climbing gear ready.”

  Duvan heard the plate mail-clad warrior retreat and begin barking orders to the other hirelings-Seerah and the mage whose name Duvan could never remember. Duvan wasn’t good with people, which was why he’d let Beaugrat pull the team together. Beaugrat was a part of Tyrangal’s security force, and though he was new, he knew to listen to Duvan.

  Brushing dirt and jungle insects off his black leather pants and tunic, Duvan stood and stretched. Duvan had tanned all of his leather himself, and he had inlaid the hide with fragments of broken dragon scales, which Tyrangal had managed to obtain for him. The result was remarkably supple for its strength, despite the armor’s current travel-worn state.