Sacred Fire

“What is it?” he hissed.

Beldinas’s head turned toward him. “We’re here.”

Cathan heard a rustling. He turned toward the sound, Ebonbane coming halfway out of its scabbard. Nothing was moving in the brush; no, the brush itself was moving, vines parting and slithering aside, saplings bending out of the way. When it was done, a new path led up into the woods. A statue of a woman stood beside it, made of alabaster that the elements had long since worn faceless, and spotted with rusty moss. Whether the statue honored a queen, priestess, or goddess, there was no sign. At its base, inlaid in onyx, was a line of faded words.

Sa, Oparbor, they read. Tair apod ni, iufubud, partum ana bolio tam unfifat.

Hail, Traveler, Turn back, if thou art not righteous, for only death awaits thee.

“Come, my friend,” Beldinas said. “The Peripas lie ahead.”

The knights and Scatas formed a protective ring, crossbows ready, as they climbed the path. The woods grew thick, but the trail remained clear, blanketed with pine needles. The going was never difficult. Nary a tree root hindered their way. Cathan wondered what lay ahead. Robbers had come this way in the past, to plunder the Vaults. What end had they suffered? Would he meet the same fate? He was a secret traitor, after all… how could he pretend to be the righteous traveler demanded by the mysterious statue?

Beldinas walked on, confidently, as they passed deeper into the wild, across a small stone bridge that spanned a spring-swollen brook, then through a cleft in a cliff of pink stone, steadily up and up, the chasm so narrow at one point they had to walk single file, turning sideways to maneuver around bulges in the rock. Cathan began to wonder whether Idar’s men could ever hope to find this place-even though Revando claimed to have a map, and had sent them overland.

Then they reached the end of the crevice, and the Forino Babasom stood before them.

At first it was a feeling more than anything else-only the sense of some great structure looming before him in the gathering night, perched on a shelf of rock among the trees. As the company drew closer, two tremendous pyramids of white stone emerged from the dark, their stepped sides eroded to curving humps. Hanging creepers were draped around them, dotted with golden, night-blooming flowers the size of shields. Cathan had never seen their like before. It took him a moment to realize why he could see anything at all: The blooms glowed softly, like the moon-crickets kept by Karthayan nobles.

The portico between the two pyramids was wide, and he saw that a stream flowed beneath it, spilling in a series of short cataracts before pouring over the cliff in a rope of silver foam. The columns flanking the Vault’s doors were old, stout, and plain. And there were two statues, strange figures he’d never seen before, carved in crude ancient fashion from crimson stone: lionesses with the bodies of women sprouting from their necks. Their arms were gone, and one had lost its head; the other’s face was beautiful and frightening, wild-featured, and sharp- toothed, with discs of gleaming turquoise for eyes. Staring at the statue, Cathan found himself thinking, oddly, of Fan-ka-tso, the six-armed in the Hall of Sacrilege, and all the icons he had destroyed back when he was counted among the Divine Hammer. Several of the knights signed the triangle, whispering prayers. “Nomas cefud op coitas e sifasom fupulfo…”

Protect us from heathens and their idolatry…

“Be still,” said Beldinas. “These are no heathen idols. They are the Iudulas, the guardians set by Symeon to watch over the gates of the Vault They are blessed by power of the Kingpriests.

“You must approach them, my friend.”

Cathan looked at the Lightbringer, saw only the light that mantled him, then peered up to the Forino’s entrance. The statues loomed; the one head seemed to be staring at him… seemed almost to smile. Every part of him wanted to refuse.

As he started shakily up the steps, he glanced at the surrounding trees and suppressed the thought that Revando’s shape-shifting magic must already be at work. He saw no sign of his confederates. He steadied himself and moved on. There was no way of knowing if all the elements of the plot were in place. Besides, he couldn’t take his eyes off the smiling statue for long. He reached the balcony and looked past the statues, trying to see through to the doors beyond.

The statue blinked.

He didn’t have enough time to reach for Ebonbane, for already, the creature had risen and leapt from its pedestal, moving with a grace that belied its stone form. It hit the ground to his left with a knee-weakening thump, then swiped its paw lazily, slamming him face-first to the ground. The breath left his lungs in a whoosh, and he lay gasping, clutching his side. Below, he heard the knights shouting, but what they were saying he couldn’t guess. The ringing in his ears made their words indistinguishable.

Wait, he tried to say. All he could manage was “Whh-hhh.”

“Thief!” the statue spoke, in a voice equal parts snarl and earthquake. He sensed it standing over him, felt its slit-eyed stare, its killing hunger. He wondered how long it had been since the creature had a foolish intruder to hunt. It pinned him down with one paw, then lifted another, baring obsidian claws. “None who live may enter this place! For all who dare, there is only one fate.”

Cathan couldn’t draw breath to speak. The pressure of the lioness’s weight upon him made white stars burst in his head. Its eyes blazed like blue suns, boring into him. There was no malice there, no cruelty; only deadly intent. It had been waiting here for centuries; this was its only purpose, the reason the clerics-and mages-had crafted it. Even now, worn by age, its arms long gone, it clung to its responsibility. The stars in Cathan’s vision shifted to black. The Iudulo’s fangs gleamed in the bloom-glow. They took on the color of blood.

No, he thought. Not like this. Paladine, if ever you favored me, give me strength.

Summoning every last bit of energy, he managed to wrench his body slightly out from under the lioness’s grasp. Whooping like a drowning man, he dragged in a breath. “Don’t,” he choked. “Remember your geas! What did Symeon say?”

The creature’s polished brow creased. For a moment it didn’t respond. Then, with a shuddering snarl, the statue spoke-not in the voice it had used before, but in that of an old man. It must be the voice of Symeon himself, relating his own words through this warden beast.

“Nisi firno at ifeso big pironit e nisit. Sifat.”

No living man or woman shall enter and survive. So be it.

Cathan nodded, part of him wanting to shriek with relief: The legends had been accurate, after all. He saved his breath, however. Every word was precious, and he chose them with painstaking care.

“Look … at me,” he gasped. “Are these the … eyes … of one … who… lives?”

That was all he could manage to say. He resisted the urge to close his eyes and pray, and focused his stare on the lioness. The statue gazed back, its puzzlement growing as it met the empty gaze of the Twice-Born, the gaze no man but Beldinas had been able to meet for more than a brief moment, for the past forty years. In his eyes was death, a shadow of the after-world that clung to him… the afterworld he’d lost when the Lightbringer resurrected him. Now the Iudulo peered deep into him, searching behind the forbidding surface.

Silence. The statue wavered… wavered…

“No,” said the Iudulo, lifting itself off him. “They are not living eyes.”

Air had never hurt so badly. Cathan curled into a ball, retching as his breath slashed his lungs like razors. It was a long time before he could draw a proper breath again, longer still before he retrieved the strength to raise his head. When he did, he saw that the lioness was back on its perch, exactly as before. Its eyes were stone once more, coldly staring sightlessly into the night.

He shivered. It had been waiting here for him, all this time. He could sense it. He had never felt so much like a pawn on the gods’ khas board.

A hand touched him, nearly scaring him to death. But the hand glowed, and he saw Beldinas, bent over him, head bowed. The Kingpriest murmured a prayer, summoning Paladine’s power to speak the healing prayer. “Palado, ucdas pafiro…”

Cathan felt warmth, and light, and all the pain went away.