Orenda did not know how to process what she saw as they drew closer to the white speck, because Orenda did not know that death could be beautiful.
This small fragment of reality seemed disconnected from everything around it. It was, unmistakably, a tomb, but the surreal beauty of it was like nothing she had ever seen. It was so still it should have been a painting, or a chalk drawing, all in white. Everything was so perfectly preserved it was almost like walking into a real city, a living city. The white buildings were open for business for the white patrons who lay sprawled out on the street as if they were waiting, at a moment’s notice, to spring back to life. The corpses, because they had to be corpses, were not decayed, not after two centuries, and Orenda didn’t know what to make of that. They looked as if they had been carved from marble. This city was in the same architectural style as the coast, the tall stone buildings should have sparked, but the texture was all wrong. This was not the white of marble or alabaster, this was… unmistakably death. This was the snow Felearn had talked about.
Gareth walked quietly down the empty street with his hands in his pockets, leading Orenda through the stillness, and his boots made no sound, could not press back the silence that suffocated them. Orenda saw his footprints and turned to look back at her own. When she turned back to him, he had removed his mask and was staring into its polished surface.
“This entranceway,” he said, “is where the open market was. Dad used to give us money, every weekend, and we… that’s what used to be here. There were people here. I… There was a dwarven merchant who sold clockwork toys,” Gareth walked to one of the booths. It had been overturned, and the tiny white figures were scattered across the street. Orenda was shocked when he went to pick one up and it disintegrated in his hand.
“It’s all turned to ash,” Gareth said, “And it… it used to be even… there used to be more of it. You would sink into it, when you walked through here. I don’t know if some of it’s blown away, or if it’s been compacted or… I don’t know. It seems like the wind never blows here. I’ve been here since… it just… it seems like the wind never blows.”
“It’s all ash?” Orenda turned to take in the city. It had obviously been thriving once, had obviously been alive once, but now… now it was a fragile testimate to a place long forgotten. “Gareth… I’m sorry.”
“They say,” Gareth said as he stood, “That we were wiped out in a day and a night, but they were wrong. It didn’t take that long. That… I’ve studied it since then. That isn’t how eruptions happen. When the clouds begin you should have a good two days to evacuate. We weren’t stupid. We knew it would happen eventually. We knew why the earth moved. There were… the adults had a plan in place, but it… it happened so fast, Rendy. We didn’t have a day and night. We had hours.”
“I… I watched… he killed my father and…”
Gareth Firefist was ten years old when the Urillians came for their diplomatic mission. He was supposed to meet with them, to be shown off by his father alongside his brother, but Gareth had always been difficult. He had run away, and when he wanted to hide, there was no finding him. Only one person in the whole world knew where to look, as he sat on top of the tallest spire of the temple with his back to the town, looking over the expanse, over the kingdom from his position at the top of the world.
Garon was angry when he landed, but he understood. They always understood each other.
“Dad’s gonna kill you, Gary,” he said, “You missed it.”
“He won’t,” Gareth said, “Not until they leave, at least. Think how it would look.”
“You should have come,” Garon said, “You should have seen royalty. You may never get the chance again.”
“I don’t care about royalty,” Gareth said, and he meant it.
“You don’t care about anything,” Garon accused. “You want to float through life.”
“And so far I have,” Gareth laughed, “But I can tell how badly you want to tell me what they were like, so go for it.”
“I mean,” Garon shrugged, “They were beautiful, what you would expect. They were shorter than most adults, and the lady was so thin she looked like she would float away on the wind. The prince was a little more sturdy, but… I don’t know. If you hadn’t told me he was a prince I don’t know that I would have believed it.”
“Then I didn’t miss much, did I?” Gareth asked.
“It would have meant a lot to dad,” Garon said.
“I don’t spend every waking moment figuring out how to please mom and dad,” Gareth huffed, “I’m the black sheep.”
“You’re too young to be a black sheep,” Garon sat next to him, “You just like to be contrary. Just tell them that you can do it too. Just take the test. Enter the priesthood with me. We’re supposed to do things together.”
“I don’t want to be a priest,” Gareth said, “I’ve been thinking about it and… it just… it doesn’t make sense, Ronnie.”
“What doesn’t?” Garon asked.
“The whole thing,” Gareth explained, “Like… they tell us two different things. We learn in class that teleportation spells don’t exist, but in the holy texts people teleport around the world in a matter of seconds? Humans turn into animals with the phases of the moons? There were once three moons and one of them crashed into the planet? I mean… that just doesn’t… science. None of it does. And neither does elves being split as a punishment. No just god would punish kids for stuff they had nothing to do with.”
“You don’t understand it,” Garon said.
“So I can’t be expected to explain it to anyone else,” Gareth said, “I can’t be a teacher if I don’t understand it myself. I can’t be a priest. Besides, you’re supposed to be chosen by Thesis. You’re supposed to be called. I wasn’t.”
“That’s not true,” Garon said, “You have to take the test. You have to walk through the sacred flames and see if it lets you in the chamber of the staff. You know that you-”
“Ronnie,” Gareth said seriously, “I… I don’t think Thesis exists. I’ve been thinking about it, and I… I’m-”
“You have to have faith,” Garon said, “That’s the whole thing. You have to believe things that you can’t prove are true.”
“You can’t just choose to believe something,” Gareth argued, “You either do or you don’t. It’s not that easy. All I’m saying is… what if it’s not true? What if there is no god?”
“Gary,” Garon looked concerned, “Of course Thesis exists. He’ll take care of us. You need to tell them that you can do it too. They need to know that you’ve been chosen.”
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“Ronnie,” Gareth said, “We’ve both started school. Think about it. There’s no god picking and choosing. I can only do it because you can do it. We have the same magic signature, so the spell on the sacred flame reacts the same way.”
“That’s not true,” Garon argued, “Thesis-”
“Thesis is no more real than Niccoli!” Gareth said, and he meant to say more, but he was cut off by the loudest boom either of them could imagine.
The world went black, not the kind of darkness that one felt on a moonless night, the kind of darkness in a windowless room when the lamp had been snuffed out.
“Ronnie?” Gareth asked, and slowly the world around them began to light up as people began to cast flames in the city below. Gareth had never experienced snow before, and did not associate the white stuff falling from the sky with it.
“Dad?” Garon screamed into the scry he had cast, “Dad?”
“Ronnie,” Shiron’s form flickered in the flame, “Ronnie, find your brother NOW. You have to- where are you two?”
“I found him!” Garon shouted.
“Get out of the city,” Shiron told him, “Something went wrong. Your mother never came out of the sacred chamber. Take only what you can carry, and go to your godmother’s house. Stay calm. Everything is fine. But do what I say. I’ll find your mother and I’ll meet you there.”
“Dad?” Ronnie said, “Dad, what’s happening?”
“Ronnie,” Shiron said, “I love you. Tell Gary I love him. Do as I say. I’ll meet you at your godmother’s. Don’t dawdle. Go now.”
“Ronnie!” Gareth jerked him to look towards the peak of the mountain, “Look!”
Lava moved slowly. He knew from school that lava moved slowly. He also knew that there should be no lava at all. They had run drills; they knew what to expect; they should have time- but there was no time. It was coming for them, and it flowed almost as quickly as water. The world around them was suddenly so loud, and when he looked down he didn’t understand the chaos he was seeing.
“We have to find dad,” Garon said, unrolling his carpet. He hopped onto it and held out a hand. “Gary, come on!”
“That’s not what he said,” Gareth argued, “He said to go to aunty Krothy’s.”
“Something’s wrong,” Garon argued.
“Of course something’s wrong!” Gareth shouted, and choked on the ash falling from the sky.
“I’m going to find dad!” Garon said, “You can come with me or not, but that’s what I’m doing.”
“We have to stay together!” Gareth decided, took his hand, and allowed Garon to pull him onto the carpet.
Gareth didn’t understand the chaos inside the temple. This was their home; they lived in the high priest’s chambers with their family, and this was supposed to have the safety of a childhood home.
So why were there corpses? Why were the lower ranking holy people splayed out on the floor, gushing from wounds? Why had the internal structures collapsed in some places? Why were sacred flames eating away at the carpets and wall hangings? Why was the place filled with smoke? Why were there sounds of metal against metal? Why did it smell like burning flesh? Why was it so difficult to breath?
“Come on!” Garon drug him by his hand as he ran. They had, both of them, always been fast and agile. They had always played the sort of games that children their age played, had always been gifted with the boundless energy of youth, and they wove their way through the chaos that was once their home. Gareth didn’t know why Garon was running towards the awful sounds, running deeper into the smoke and danger. Anyone with sense would run the other way.
“Ronnie, we have to go!” Gareth pulled against him, but Garon wanted to move forward more than he wanted to move back. Gareth did not have the strength of his convictions.
“Go!” The boys heard the voice of their father, but he wasn’t talking to them, “Evacuate, get outside! I’ll hold them off! Move quickly! Take the evacuation route!”
“Dad!” Garon called and darted through the chaos in that direction.
They entered the chamber of the priest council, and Gareth took in the scene before him, committing it, against his will, to memory. He had been wrong- the smoke wasn’t coming from the furnishings. A thin woman was standing in the place his mother should be, holding her staff high, casting so fiercely her eyes were glowing. Some sort of plant had sprouted and covered the room. It was on fire, and was billowing out black smoke that choked him. Smoke didn’t normally choke him. Something was wrong with it.
The table behind her had been overturned, and Gareth saw that the room was littered with people he used to know, who used to be people, who used to be alive. He didn’t understand. They were the most powerful mages in the country.
“There he is!” Garon said, and pulled Gareth away from the scene. Shiron was standing in a corner; he had burned a hole in the plant matter and was ushering a group of survivors, mostly low-ranking holy people, teenagers only a little older than the boys themselves, out to the relative safety of… anywhere else.
The fighting had so far not reached him- he was hidden and staying out of the scuffle- and Garon hugged the wall of what Gareth knew had to be poison to make his way to him, shouting as he went, like a fool.
“Dad!” Garon shouted, and Gareth knew the soldiers would hear him.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Shiron asked in a rage that scared Gareth. His father was a holy man, a stern man, but he never cursed, and never looked at them with that terrifying emotion in his eyes, “I told you to leave!”
“Where’s mom?” Gareth asked.
“Go!” Shiron demanded, “Go now!”
“Ruvean!” Came a voice that would haunt Gareth’s nightmares, “I got it. It’s over.”
The smoke was nothing against the light that shone through the room. The creature easily towered over them, and the very ground below them trembled at his presence as the Emerald Knight came striding from the room of the sacred test. In his left hand he held a sword that Gareth did not know was important, and in his right-
In his right hand he held by the shoulder the inanimate object that had once been Gareth’s mother. The Emerald Knight held the lifeless corpse of the greatest fire mage on all of Xren as if it was nothing to him. He tossed her onto the podium beside Lady Glenlen and spoke to her, but Gareth did not register what he said. He only had the same thought as Garon, running over and over in his head, but he did not, as Garon did, speak it aloud.
“Mommy!” Garon shouted, and Gareth felt the hand he was still holding heat up.
“Go!” Shiron grabbed Garon by the shoulders and shoved both his sons behind him, “Go, now!”
“Mom!” Garon begged, as if it was a complete sentence, and Gareth knew what he meant and agreed with him.
“Go!” Shiron shoved them toward the opening he had made, but he saw their faces and turned to see what they were looking at behind him. As his attention diverted, Gareth felt their exit close with the powerful earth magic that had conjured it.
The Emerald Knight was upon them, and Shiron brandished his staff. A flame leaped from him, surrounding himself and his children, but the Emerald Knight was not looking at the boys, didn’t seem to register them. His focus was on Shiron, and, in hindsight, Gareth believed that it was purely on the headdress that identified him as a member of the priest’s council.
The shield did nothing.
The sword hit their father at an angle, and Gareth remembered that he did not scream. He looked over his shoulder at them, and the expression on his face burned itself into Gareth’s memory.
There was so much in his eyes. Love. Horror. Regret.
Then his body slid apart at the angle it had been cut, and Gareth was covered in something wet, thick, and sticky.
It was only then that the Emerald Knight seemed to notice him.
The monster took a step back, sword still raised, and looked around the room. Gareth was frozen. It was obvious that something was going to happen in the next second, and whatever it was, it would decide their fate forever.
“You monster!” Garon stepped forward and grabbed Shiron’s staff from where it had fallen, “I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you! I’ll fucking kill you!”
The Emerald Knight stared at him as the staff began to glow, then he calmly reached down, took the staff easily from Garon’s grasp, and stared at it as if it meant something.
“I once…” The Emerald Knight said, “I… that is…”
He looked around the room again and his gaze lingered on Lady Glenlen. Then he reached out his hand, and the light from his chest intensified as the curtain of plant matter behind them parted. The helmet tilted as he looked down at them. He threw the staff through the opening he had created and spoke again.
“Run.”