Crusader

balm for your tortured soul, and instead the woman you started to fall in love with lies to you about who she is and you cast her away over it.” He laughed, but it was a sad, pitying sound. “I could not have orchestrated a worse punishment for you than all that.”

“This is pathetic, even for you,” Cyrus said. “Merely reminding me of the less pleasant turns of events that have occurred this last year is hardly the stuff required to break my spirit, though it brings me no joy. But you might consider adding to your list the moment when one of my sworn and chosen brothers tried to kill me himself.”

“There was that, true,” Terian said. “I could also make mention of your decapitation, or the fact that Alaric has yet to send even an acknowledgment of your pleas for aid, but why? The worst of it,” and Terian’s voice dripped with a sort of sad sincerity, “the real torturous prize is not the pain they caused, but the scars they left.” Terian shrugged, as though trying to shake off some unpleasantness or warm up from the chill wind that blew by. “You don’t see it, but you’ve changed, Cyrus. And not for the better. You’ve become a harder, colder sort of person.”

“I’m becoming you, in other words.”

“Yes!” Terian said and clinked his gauntlet while snapping his finger and pointing it as Cyrus. “Your soul is calloused, my friend, and all those things that you carried with you into the Realm of Death-the illusion of what you were fighting for, the idea of a future with Vara-you walked out of the gates of Sanctuary on the journey here without any of them. Whoever you were last year-when I was your friend-that man is gone. I don’t even recognize the one in front of me anymore.”

“Yet still you’ll kill me when this is done?” Cyrus asked.

There was a twist in Terian’s face, the hint of something unpleasant as his face stretched, lips pursed, in a sort of pained grimace. “Perhaps. Not until this is over, but … perhaps.”

“Then it really doesn’t matter how I’ve changed, does it?” Cyrus asked, and let his hand drift over the crenellation, let it settle as the first snowflake drifted down by the aurora’s light; clouds were moving over now, the red and orange had begun to be covered by tge dark, grey shapes drifting across the sky, threatening to overcome the entirety of it. “I’m still the man you want to kill.”

“Maybe,” Terian said, and the first flakes came down to rest upon his armor, soft symbols next to the spikes and edges of that which protected him from harm. “But the other Cyrus-the one who killed my father-I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to see him bleed his righteous life out in front of me, suffer for what he’d done.”

“And now?” Cyrus looked at him expectantly. “You think I’ve suffered enough?”

“I don’t think you have any idea how much you’ve suffered,” Terian said, turning away from him as the snowfall intensified. “I don’t think you have any idea how much you will continue to, as the man you are now. The changes you’ve made, that have happened to you, this jading, this winnowing of decency-I don’t know how to explain it other than that-you’re an empty man, walking forward with each step following a path laid out long ago.” The dark knight smiled, but there was no mirth in it. “What do you even believe in anymore?” He gave Cyrus a ghostly grin across the rampart.

“Duty,” Cyrus said. “Loyalty. To my brethren in Sanctuary. I believe I unleashed this scourge that is costing a great many people their lives, and I aim to correct it.”

“And what after that?” Terian asked, but his head was bowed and he no longer looked at the warrior. The snow had begun to accumulate now, just a little bit, a faint white dusting, but it came down heavily enough that all the land was cut before him, and Cyrus could see only a hundred feet off the wall at best. “What will you do if you fail?” He blinked and turned his head to Cyrus. “What will you do if you succeed? Where will you go? What will you fight for?”

“I’ll go home,” Cyrus said, but he didn’t feel it, not really, not in the emptiness within. “I’ll fight whoever next crosses the path of Sanctuary-just like I always have.” He turned away, brushing the wet snow from his shoulders as he began to make his way back to the tower. “What about you, Terian?” he asked as he walked away. “You’re no longer welcome in Sanctuary, unless Alaric finds some measure of deep pity for you. What will you do? Where will you go?” He turned and looked back, but the dark knight was all shadow now, just an outline, a silhouette in the rising frenzy of the snowstorm as it blew around him. “What will you fight for?”

“The same thing I have been since the days when I lost all my belief and care, like you have,” Terian answered, the wind muffling him as he spoke. “Myself. And I’ll go wherever the road takes me.” He turned away, and the next words were nearly lost to the wind. “If I’m not much mistaken, it won’t be that long before you do exactly the same.”

Chapter 80

The snow had come heavily, all through the night. Cyrus did not sleep, but he lay down next to Aisling in the tower room, the fire crackling and shedding warmth now. The sweet smell of wood smoke harkened him back to thoughts of Sanctuary, but he found less comfort in them than he would have imagined. A dull, gnawing feeling ate at him from the thought of it, of going home, he realized. The smell of meat pies came back to him, whether from thoughts of Sanctuary or memories of the days before, when he was a child in a home of his own, with a mother and father, he knew not which. Alone. It’s how I lived, from the day Belkan dropped me at the Society to the day I … what? Made my first prayer to Bellarum? Met Narstron? Perhaps. Married Imina? He grimaced. Doubtful. She knew I felt the call to war more than to stay with her. From the day I …

There was the flash again, in his mind, of blond hair, of a sword in motion, laying open foes on a battlefied. Of a sharp voice and sharper wit, of her fluid motion in a fight, and of her face … oh gods, her face …

From the day I joined Sanctuary. Even the echo of the words only in his mind was as loud as any battle; it resonated in the quiet night of his chamber, and even the presence of Aisling against his side, almost purring, was no consolation.

Dawn found him unrested, and he wondered if he had shut his eyes at all after returning to bed. Terian’s words rattled in his head, thoughts of the man he was plagued him, of who he had been.

He rose, ate breakfast with the others in a somber feast in a room at the bottom of the stairs, the brothers quietly bringing them porridge. No one spoke, not even Martaina, though she looked to be of a mind to say something at one point. When finished, they filed outside. The courtyard had filled with snow during the early morning hours, and still it came down heavily, lying already in drifts up to mid-calf on the women, Cyrus noted upon seeing Aisling slip into it. She cringed and he knew that wet slush had fallen into her leather shoes, low as they ran to the ground.

The horses were saddled and waiting, and the same stable boy brought Cyrus his reins. He took them wordlessly, the lad’s shining face not adding any brightness to an already dim mood. The snowfall was lighter now than it had been last night, but the crunch of it underfoot, the way it drowned out all the distant noises and made the land still and quiet was deeply unnerving, especially before battle. The remnants of his cinnamon porridge, sweetened with cream, still hung on his moustache and beard, and he could taste the sugar still lingering on his tongue. He pulled tight his cloak again once he was on Windrider’s back, and the horse started off right away, without even a prompting from him, heading toward the north courtyard, following Longwell’s lead in this case.

Briyce Unger and Milos Tiernan were already waiting, having a quiet conversation with aides behind them, ahorse. As Longwell approached they each gave a nod of courtesy and were off, toward the gate north, out through it and then the second gate beyond, where the world opened up before them. The snowflakes forced Cyrus’s eyes to squint every few minutes. He blinked them away when needed, but a few minutes later they would return, and he would brush them off his face. It was a steady path to madness, he was certain, but his coat began to become wet, and his armor chill, the inside padding saving him from the worst of the cold.

They rode out, and the army of Galbadien joined them past the forest road, falling into line behind them. Others rode out from the east as well, the other armies of Actaluere that had filtered up. Cyrus rode at the front- the tip of the spear, he liked to think of it-with the Kings and his own command. He looked back and wondered, trying to see through the snow, stealing a look at the army of Actaluere.