David Farland - The Wyrmling Horde

Prologue

RUNES OF COMPASSION

This is Understanding's House,

I've seen these doors before,

Though when or where, I don't know.

In dusty rooms, like ancient tombs,

I studied endless lore.

For what or why, I don't know.

Yet soon I learned too much,

Like a child lost in war.

Lost in horrors

I hope you'll never know.

A song of Mystarria

In all of his dreams, Fallion had never dreamed with such intense clarity. He dreamed that he was soaring above the Courts of Tide. He was not riding a graak, nor did he wear a magical wing. In his dream Fallion's arms stretched wide, holding him aloft, like some seagull that hangs motionless in the sky, its wingtips trembling as the wind sweeps beneath them.

Nothing below obstructed his view.

And so he glided over houses where the sweet gray smoke of cooking fires floated lazily above thatched roofs, and Fallion darted above a palace wall, veering between two tall white towers where a guard with his pike and black scale mail gaped up at Fallion in astonishment. Fallion could see each graying hair of the guard's arched eyebrow, and how the man's brass pin hung loose on his forest-green cape, and he could even smell the man's ripening sweat.

Fallion swooped low over the cobbled city streets, where fishermen in their white tunics and brown woolen caps trudged to their dank homes after a hard day working the nets; the young scholars who attended the House of Understanding stood on street corners arguing jovially while sipping tankards of ale, and a boy playing with a pet rat in the street gaped up at Fallion and pointed, his mouth an O of surprise.

"The king has come!" the child cried in surprise, and suddenly the people looked up in awe and rejoiced to see Fallion. "The king! Look!" they cried, tears leaping to their eyes.

I must be dreaming, Fallion thought, for never have I seen the world so clearly.

There is a legendary stream in the land of Mystarria. Its icy waters tumble down from the snowfields of Mount Rimmon, beneath pines that guard the slopes, along moss-covered floors where huge marble statues of dead kings lie fallen. The stream's clean flow spills into forest pools so transparent that even at a depth of forty feet every water weed and sparkling red crayfish can be seen. The enormous trout that live there "seemingly slide through the air just by slapping their tails," and all of them grow fat and to a ripe old age, for no fisherman or otter can hope to venture near in waters so clear.

So the stream is called the Daystar, for it is as clear and sparkling as the morning star.

And that is how preternaturally clear the dream came to Fallion, as clear as the waters of the Daystar.

He longed to continue dreaming forever, but for one thing: the air was so cold. He could feel frost beginning to rime his fingernails, and he shivered violently.

This frost will kill me, he thought. It will pierce my heart like an arrow.

And so he struggled to wake, and found himself... flying.

The wind rushed under him, cold and moist, and Fallion huddled in pain sharp and bitter.

He could feel a shard of steel lodged below his ribcage, like a dagger of ice. Drying blood matted his shirt.

He struggled to wake, and when his eye opened to a slit, it was bright below. The wan silvery light of early morning filled the sky. He could see the tops of pines below, limbs so close that if he had reached out he could almost have touched them.

Where am I? I'm flying above a forest.

In the distance he could descry a mountainno, he decided, a strange castle as vast as a mountain. It was built into the sides of a black volcano whose inner fires limned the cone at its top and spewed smoke and ash.

All beneath, along the skirts of the volcano, a formidable fortress sprawled, with murderously high walls and thousands of dark holes that might have been windows or tunnels into the mountain.

There was no fresh lime upon the walls to make the castle gleam like silver in the dawn. Instead, the castle was black and foreboding. A few pale creatures bustled along the walls and upon the dark roads below, racing to flee the dawn, looking like an army of angry ants. Even a mile away, Fallion could tell that they were not entirely human.

Wyrmlings, he realized.

Fallion shivered violently, so cold and numb that he feared he would die. His thoughts clouded by pain, he struggled to figure out what was happening.

He was not flying under his own power. He was being borne by some great creature. Huge arms clutched him tightly. If a stone gargoyle had come to life, Fallion imagined that it would grip him so. He could hear powerful wings flapping: the wind from each downstroke assailed him.

Fallion could not see his captor, but he could smell the arm that clutched him. It smelled like... rotten meat, like something long dead.

Fear coursed through him.

I'm in the arms of a Knight Eternal, Fallion realized, one of the dead lords of the wyrmlings. And he began to remember...

The battle at Caer Luciare. The wyrmling warriors with their sickly pale skin and bone armor had attacked the mountain fortress, a fortress so different from the one he was going to. The limestone walls of the fortress had been glistening white, as clean as snow, and in the market flowers and fruit trees grew in a riot along the street, while leafy vines hung from the windows.

The wyrmlings had come with the night. The pounding of their thunder drums had cracked the castle walls. Poisoned war darts had pelted down in a black rain. Everywhere there had been cries of dismay as the brave warriors of Caer Luciare saw their plight.

Jaz! Fallion thought, almost crying aloud, as he recalled his brother falling. A black dart had been sprouting from Jaz's back as he knelt on hands and knees, blood running from his mouth.

After that, everything became confused. Fallion remembered running with Rhianna at his side, retreating up the city streets in a daze, people shouting while Fallion wondered, Is there anything I could have done to save him?

He recalled the Knights Eternal sweeping out of dark skies. Fallion held his sword at guard position, eager to engage one, heart hammering as the monster swept toward him like a falcon, its enormous black long sword stretched out before ita knight charging toward him on a steed of wind.

Fallion twisted away from the attack at the last instant, his blade swiping back against the tip of the Knight Eternal's sword. Fallion had meant to let his blade cut cleanly into flesh, but the Knight Eternal must have veered at the last instant, and Fallion's blade struck the thick metaland snapped.

As his tortured blade broke, Fallion had felt pain lance just below the ribcage. A remnant of his shattered blade lodged in his flesh. He fell to his knees, blood gushing hot over his tunic as he struggled to keep from swooning.

Rhianna had called "Fallion! Fallion!" and all around him the noise of battle had sought to drown out her voice, so that it seemed to come from far away.

Struggling to remain awake, Fallion had knelt for a moment, dazed, while the world whirled viciously.

Everything went black.

And now I wake, Fallion thought.

He closed his eyes, tried to take stock of his situation.

His artificial wings were folded against his back. He did not know how to use them well, yet. He'd worn the magical things for less than a day. He could feel a sharp pain where they were bound tightly, lest he try to escape.

I dare not let the monster know that I am awake, Fallion realized.

Fallion's sword was gone, his scabbard empty, but he still had a dagger hidden in his boot.