Tales of the Three Kingdoms: Silver Falcon Falls

After about three li of glorious speed, our cavalry charge faltered. The horses grew tired and unwieldy, and the excitement one could generate with a battle-cry burned off like so much enamel on a mosaic in the City of Lanterns. The burst had taken us down out of the passes in the east and across the barren fields outside the City of Lanterns, which had blazed beside us.

In fact, had anyone been alive in that valley, it must have been quite a sight, eleven-hundred multihued horse, riding at full speed, silhouetted against the fires of an Empire at dusk. Whether the dusk was natural, or the result of the flames of the City of Lanterns, I could not tell. When we gained the western mountaintops, though, rising above the smoke, I saw that it was true night, with clear stars and a full moon, as if the turnings of Heaven were indifferent to the destruction of the land beneath it.

As soon as our horses' hooves had hit the uphill on the western side of the city, and the wind no longer streamed in the manes of our horses, the western passes began to narrow to no more than a rocky trail through the mountains, passing through intermittent chasms or gorges. I had called a halt to the charge and ordered the formation of a travel column, two by two.

Any wider and we'd have found our horses more of a hindrance than a help.

Now, beneath our hooves crunched gravel and dust and the remnants of a once-great people, who had inhabited a once-great city, now a City of Ash.

From here, Dreadwolf's trail was easy to follow.

There were shattered pots, spilt grain, even trinkets of gold, silver, and bronze, evidence of the wealth and resources Dreadwolf had pilfered from the city and evidence of his haste to gain distance. And if there was any question as to how he had convinced the entire population of the City of Lanterns to leave for the City of Tombs… there was the occasional body.

Most were old people, deemed, no doubt, too slow or too frail to keep up with the itinerant populous. Some were men who might have fought back. Still others were women, cursed by their beauty in such a time as this.

River looked at these bodies for a long time as we rode past them, and the way she sat in her saddle beside me, I could tell that she thought about them for long after. I didn't know if I should look with her, searing the image into my mind as she did, no doubt, or pull both of our eyes away from it. I didn't know what I should say, or if there even was anything I could say to protect what little was left of our souls after everything we had seen, everything we had allowed to happen, and even in some cases, the things we had done.

In the end, I chose silence, to allow River to come to me in her own time, which she eventually did, after riding for about half of the night. Fatigue, it seemed, had broken down her stoic, frozen barrier. That, and the first family we had seen butchered in one another's arms, parents defending their children with their own flesh and bone when all else had failed.

"I will kill him," River whispered just past midnight, "for this and for everything else."

I was silent for a long moment. I had time to formulate my response, as the bodies of the family were still hours old and we would not catch up to the ones that had killed them for a while yet. "I will help you," I said, finally.

River looked at me sharply. I could almost see the gorgeous woman past the layers of silk and steel; her deep, dark eyes, her skin like moonlight, her hair like shimmering shadows dancing in currents at the bottom of some silent mountain lake.

"And what of the cost?" she asked.

I thought about it for a moment, as our horses hooves ate up distance along the mountain track. Local peaks stood to left and right of us, but for the moment the full moon lit our way. My River was dark; I knew that. She had a dark heart when it came to protecting the ones she loved and her mind often wandered the streets of a cold, dark city. No doubt the prolonged separation from our child had left her in a darker mood still. But I could also tell that something else was undercutting her resolve.

"There is no objective worth the life of you or little Ang. But short of that… There's no price I wouldn't pay to end Dreadwolf's reign."

River's helmed and shadowed gaze returned to the trail ahead and stayed there. The two riding behind us were Flashammer and the young officer who served as River's voice and executive officer.

"I won't insult you by asking if you'd give your life in battle if it meant a better world for me and Ang," her gaze flicked to me only briefly. "But if the death of Dreadwolf somehow meant the end of your own ambition…"

I laughed bitterly at that. "What can they do? Take my lands? They've done that already. All except for Iron Tower and the few dozen peasants who placed their ultimate trust in my father. Will they strip me of rank?"

My fist bunched around the bronze pendant around my neck.

"This doesn't mean anything until we stop Dreadwolf anyway. I'm a Noble Officer in this Coalition only. Noble Lion's a Grand General only as far as his allies are concerned. As far as the actual Imperial system goes, we're all rankless rebels playing at titles… until we can regain control of the court. So I'm already basically rankless and landless. What more can they take from me if not my life and my family? As you say, I would gladly give the former for the latter. And nothing can make me give up the latter willingly."

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"But could you give this up in pursuit of Dreadwolf?" She nodded behind her to the column of soldiers following us.

Ah. Now I knew what she was driving at. It had been something we had discussed in the past, back in that grim winter at Iron Tower, when we had first adopted Ang, when we had first become not only parents, but the only thing standing between what was left of the village around Iron Tower, and the small armies of bandits that prowled the countryside once my father's power had broken down.

She was talking about her Mandate. It didn't pick and choose who it killed when she called upon it. Her abyssal demons didn't check banners and colors. The Xang Liu Mandate drowned anyone unlucky enough to be nearby when River made her summons. It had spared me and Windstopper and Brass Bell, once. But there had been no rhyme or reason to it, and River had even expressed the feeling that one day, when she called upon it, her Mandate would claim even her own soul to add to the ranks of the army of darkness.

That possibility haunted me far more than my own death, and its the only reason I had held her back at the Weeping Wall. It was one of many reasons I hadn't wanted her to face the Demon, before we had exhausted every other option… namely Flashammer's speed and Windstopper's strength.

My eyes flicked to the woman beside me, and I realized that she was still waiting for a response.

"You think we'll need to? After breaking through Frost Giant, and the Demon, you think Dreadwolf still has something up his sleeve that will require us to call upon your Mandate?"

"You're no good at numbers without your ivory tablet."

I smiled and patted my small saddlebag. "Right now I'm glad for five jin of jerky and hard tack rather than that same weight in ivory. Besides. I have you to do all my thinking for me, don't I?"

River didn't put much effort into faking her smile. This was talk for a husband and wife, safe at home with their child, not for a leader and his officer far from supply lines and support.

"Noble Lion brought a hundred thousand men into Wolf Cage Pass," she said, "and sent fifty thousand more to hold the rest of the fronts around the capital. Dreadwolf brought nearly three times as much to bear, thanks to his own wolves and his control of the Emperor's edicts. Six-hundred-thousand fighters arrayed against one another. The last time there were this many was the rebellion almost seven years ago now."

"You're right. I'm no good with numbers unless I can see them."

"Just trust my arithmetic."

"With my life."

"Then trust this. Seven years ago, no one knew about Carver, Hogbarrell and Poorboy. Seven years ago, the three rebel generals unveiled their own great powers. Dozens of other lesser Mandates were made known to the world the last time war broke out at such a scale."

I nodded. She had read over the records of the Yellow Scarves Rebellion, as had I, and I could see where she was going. "But so far, the only new Mandate was Frost Giant's. And maybe a handful of lesser ones belonging to those who didn't last very long against the Demon."

River nodded. "Six-hundred-thousand soldiers fighting for their lives and so far we've only seen two great Mandates from our enemy. One was formerly unknown, but we knew the Demon's well. Even if we were very, very lucky, it would be foolish to think Dreadwolf didn't have at least one more great Mandate waiting for us."

"I take your point."

"So. Now you know why I ask. But you haven't answered my question. I'm asking if you would sacrifice your own ambition to stop Dreadwolf. Because so far, from what I've seen from the Coalition East of the Pass, the other lords are all assuming the wolf will fall, and they're carving up the spoils while the damned creature is still snapping at us."

I nodded at that, accepting the mild chastisement even though I knew my wife was directing it more at my peers than at myself. "If you're asking if I would plunge this tiny army into certain death and defeat, just for a chance at killing Dreadwolf, I am insulted. Not for my own sake, but on their behalf. Every single one of these soldiers knows the cost of donning that armor every day. Every single one of them knew what they were signing up for when they followed us west. Everyone knows our purpose here. If you're asking if they would all die to end this chaos… the answer is undoubtedly yes. My question to you is: if we find the opportunity to make that trade, are you able to call upon your Mandate so far from the Blue River."

River didn't answer, but simply turned her gaze up ahead. I scowled but said nothing.

Our horses followed the trail which took us around another bend, as the mountains to either side of us began to level out. We found ourselves in a saddle of earth and stone, a bowl between several mountaintops, where a lake had formed with the collected rainfall.

"I don't need the river, I need only lost souls."

Looking out over the wide, still lake, reflecting the crown of jagged stone and the moon above, I tried to imagine what that meant. "And…"

"Oh yes. I can feel them. Even here."

I looked upon the still dark waters of the small lake and suppressed a shudder. Surely River's shadows did not live beneath the water. Surely she called them from some other plan of existence. The water was merely a conduit, right? A dark entryway between this world and the world of shadow? It didn't seem like the right time to ask and, honestly, I didn't want to know just now.

I turned toward Flashammer and River's Executive Officer. "Water the horses. Have the men rest while they can. No fires. No noise. We're moving again at the end of the next watch."

Both horsemen behind me turned to deliver my orders down the line, as quietly as they could.

"Oh, and Flashammer?"

"Mm?"

"Have them see to their weapons and armor. There's a fight coming. And I don't think it's one we'll win so easily this time."