Valiant

Chapter 45: The Twilight Dance

"Answer truthfully and we may spare your lives."

My knees grind against the gravelly caldera- pinpricks of cold as sure as the snow falling gently through the night. The gag stretching my jaws tastes of dirt and saliva, and my hands are bound tight behind my back with chaffing rope. 

I kneel within a large ring of staring, fur-clad barbarians and enormous, gleaming bonfires. Gusts of warmth and whispers blast against my chilled, armor-bare skin. Nora kneels beside me, bound for the second time today, and still irradiating smug strength of will and undiluted insolence. Her eyes dance with light rage. 

I glare defiantly into the eyes of the man I am kneeling before. His cold, black eyes shine like beetles among ragged white locks. The wrinkles on his face betray his age, and the headdress of antlers and feathers on his head betrays his authority. The curved, jagged knife at his hip betrays nothing. He looks fragile and implacable. Fiercely intelligent.

Hands push the gag down over my chin, leaving a trail of wet spit on my chin, and my snarling teeth bare to the elder barbarian in my fiercest expression of defiance. Instantly, I surge upward to my feet. Flint spears level at me as I rise, and the painted savages wielding them whoop back and forth to each other, making wild hand gestures. 

"Where is Beck?" I ask, leveling my voice as much as possible. 

The wizened old barbarian grins, and spreads his arms, reminding me for a split second of Jaandar. "It is to him you speak. Now, Silverknight-" at this word, the barbarians around the ring rage and shove each other in agitation. "-how dare you come here? Was it not enough that you take our beloved chief prisoner? Was destroying the last magick of the land not sufficient for you?"

Before I can open my mouth to speak, something hard and small collides with the small of my back, and my world is fire for an instant. My eyes haze over, and my legs collapse to a kneel once more. I bite my tongue to keep from crying out. 

From her knees, Nora speaks so the entire caldera reverberates with her voice. "We claim the right of the Snow Trials, by request of Theinai."

Instantly, a fist connects with the side of my head, and hornets now swarm behind my eyelids. The caldera erupts with laughter and jeers, and the some speak in their strange language. Tears rise in my throat, but I choke them down, refusing with every ounce of my will to be weak.

"You dare invoke the Rholit'kaui before the Twilight Dance?" Beck keels over in mirth, shaking like an autumn leaf. "I'm afraid that our laws don't apply to outsiders. Especially you, Daughter of Castellan. No, I sentence you to trial by Blood."

Instantly, I surge upward, slipping free of the calloused hands that shackled my arms for an instant, before they clamp down over my biceps again.

"Are you insane?" I roar, letting anger flood my voice. I pit my legs with all my might against the force of my guards relentlessly grappling me down. I remain standing. "We come in peace and you sentence her to death! She has done nothing wrong!"

Beck's eyes flash over to me with a wild glee, sensing weakness like a chess master. "You care for this one, Silverknight? Then I shall enjoy watching her suffer even more." At this, Beck raises his hands above his head and yells something strange, to which the gathered crowds cheer and yip like wild dogs.

A beastly man steps forth from the shadows like a nightmare. His hair is grizzled, and hangs down about a gaunt face, which is nearly hidden by a beard. His chest is completely covered with coarse, black hair and white scars, some two fingers wide at a glance. He carries an enormous, black war hammer that looks like the head was cleft from a mountain top. Arms as big around as cannons heft this weapon with no more effort apparent than holding a bucket of warm milk  This man's bulging, bloodshot eyes shone with the kind of immortal, paralyzing wrath that would make Orik shit his pants and flee.

Nora sits quaking as the titan stalks toward her. I rip upward with all of my strength, but cannot tear myself free. "This is madness!" I rage, throwing my body to and fro with everything I possess. Beck positively prances with glee.

Nora. Sweet, innocent Nora, whose only crime was trusting me. The beast's hammer rises over her shivering, paralyzed form with methodical slowness, ready to kiss the caldera through the girl's body. My ever-tingling hand pulses insistently, calling me subliminally in its unknowable language.

"Please!" I plead, positively molten with fury and helplessness. "Take me instead! She's innocent!"

Another innocent person whose blood will be on my hands. Tears of anger splash from my eyes onto the caldera floor. Beck laughs at me then, and I notice his teeth. White and golden, all of them, gleaming in the twilight.

The hammer glimmers, still rising over Nora's quietly sobbing body. People jeer and call out for her blood.

Enough.

The tingling in my hand erupts with my consciousness, now burning, seething with pain. Someone screams behind me, and I am free. The world is spinning now, and people are screaming, pointing at me. 

Then, I am hurtling toward the man like a comet, pounding my legs against the stones until they feel fit to shatter. A terrible, irresistible heat follows me, devouring my skin, but never deeper. I am vaguely aware of a harsh, cackling glow surrounding me. A scream from my stomach rips open my jaws and declares my agony to the world. 

The hulking man wrenches his head around at me, and his eyes appear to glow reflectively as my light dawns upon him. The idiot has the nerve to swing his hammer at me. And it collides with the entire left side of my body.

My bones do not crumple into dust. My insides do not liquefy. Instead, I feel an intense tug on my spine, and heat on the side of my face. Something splashes across my vision, scorching orange and yellow into the earth- molten iron.

Too late to wonder. I stalk towards the man, a halo of fury enveloping my body in pure light. The brute drops his hammer and scampers backwards, crying out as he spikes the red-hot handle of his now-useless hammer down and cradles his sizzling hand. 

"Please," pleads the giant as I stand over him, trying desperately to shield himself from me. His forearms turn as red as lobsters in the effort.

"This woman," I bellow over the furnace-like roar in my ears, to all within earshot. "Is under my protection!" With this, I plunge my hand downward, and quicker than the man can react, my hand is resting on his face.

He squeals and thrashes away from my hand, gripping his sizzling face with both of his hands. The scent of burnt hair and seared meat stab upward into my nose. Steam rises from the angry, red weal on the man's face.

Heat and power swirl around me, specters of world-shaking fire. I can feel my anger build and build, and my skin burns with it, seething and raging into the world in this ghastly aura. It is more than that, I realize with horror. I am on fire!

Suddenly, I am thrust backward in time. I hear the sizzle of flesh and the walls racing with flame. Hideous black smoke hides the ceiling of the cabin. Faraway wailing makes the hairs on my neck rise.

I close my eyes, heart racing, and try to breath, but he is there. Paulo, with his blank, dead eyes. White tongues of flame race around his body, and tears reach my eyes. I can feel my anger fading, but the heat surrounding me begins to burn hotter. The priest speaks, and his voice comes from everywhere.

"You left him to die by fire, and now fire will consume you too."

The fiery halo turns inward, and I can feel my flesh melting off my bones. The very substance of my being vibrates so furiously, that I can feel it coming undone. I cry out, and my tears turn to steam on my cheeks.

Suddenly, a hand touches mine, cool and soft. I open my eyes, and there is Nora, wading  through the light around me like water. I look into her eyes, and find no fear, only the fierce determination that so lights up her gaze.

"Raphael, you must come back."

Her voice is strong and clear, summoning my thoughts from chaos, and cooling me down like a summer breeze from Vindr's back. I train my eyes on her, and hold back tears for all I am worth, but they fall anyways. Each drop sizzles, as the glow around me dims.

I try to breathe, and the breaths come in shaky bursts. My tears no longer burn, and my body tingles, cool and bare. I shiver, hypersensitive to the gales and snows, like a newborn babe. Nora cradles my body in her arms, holding me close in her embrace. She smells of mountain flowers.