A God's Plea (Legend of Tal: Book 4) Read online

  CONTENTS

  World Maps

  A Note on Appendices

  Prologue

  Fate’s Embrace

  Cradle of Fire

  The Call to Arms

  An Invitation to Dance

  Lament

  Yuldor’s Servant

  The Legacy of Dragons

  Blood & Song

  Faefire

  Ashes

  Passage I

  Sojourn

  What Is Yet to Come

  Master of the Weald

  Corruption

  Oasis

  Sun-blinded Fools

  From Sand to Sea

  The Hidden Ally

  The Smuggler’s Faith

  Passage II

  The Watery Way

  City of Stilts

  The Sorcerous Science

  Oath

  Blood & Sand

  Crumbling Foundations

  Any Cost

  Honor Among Thieves

  The Charred Coast

  Sha’aval

  The Choice

  The Queen Comes

  Mortality

  Passage III

  Falling Shadow

  Bonds Reforged

  The Ruins of Lethyranth

  Hunted to Hallowed Halls

  A Dance With Darkness

  The Old One

  Master of the Kael’dros

  Flee

  Endless

  Clashing Horns

  A Toast Among Friends

  Salvation

  Above

  The Vagaries of Fate

  Fury’s Flames

  Passage IV

  To Divine Skies

  A Proposal

  The Path to Ikvaldar

  The Sentinel’s Gate

  Pilgrimage

  Miasma’s Touch

  Paradise

  The Master of Time and Material

  Starkissed

  All That Is Lost

  The End in the Beginning

  Heart’s Drum

  Shattered

  Awakening

  Song’s End

  Soar

  Divine

  More Than a Man

  The War Below

  Homeward

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  A Series To Read Next

  Appendix A

  Appendix B

  Appendix C

  Appendix D

  Books by J.D.L. Rosell

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  If you'd like to download these maps, just click or tap here.

  A NOTE ON APPENDICES

  You can find appendices on the characters, creatures, and world of Legend of Tal located near the end of the book.

  PROLOGUE

  THE LIES OF HEATHENS

  To Your Supremacy, Father Hush—

  You may already know what I divulge in this letter, for I understand you are a well-informed man. Yet I find it my obligation to ensure you understand the events transpiring here in Halenhol, and how they might distress the entirety of our order — nay, our very religion.

  His Majesty, King Aldric Rexall the Fourth, has received a summons from the most unexpected of sources: the Sun Emperor himself, one "Zyrl Netherstar." Foolish as his name might be, his power is potent, and his reach far indeed. I fear he has significant resources that may gravely harm the Westreach should he be ignored.

  Impossible as it seems, the traitor Tal Harrenfel is caught up in this confusion. Somehow surviving his flight into the East, he has gone to the capital of the Empire of the Rising Sun and allied himself with Netherstar. His companions are in the palace with him, those who survived — for it is said the warlock Kaleras the Impervious proved to be less than his name.

  At any other moment, I would not fear our noble King receiving an invitation for a treaty from an enemy. But these are not ordinary times. For to His Majesty's hands I delivered a heretical tome, one duplicated by none other than Harrenfel himself.

  I must confess, I have read the contents of these pages myself, though I found no pleasure in it. They are rife with lies and false prophecy, and its author speaks of things she should not. Yet something in them appealed to His Majesty, for he took a great interest in it. He questioned me at length as to my knowledge of its truth and meaning. I professed it — through quill and parchment, of course — to be lies and deception, as is everything Harrenfel touches. But somehow, I do not think His Majesty was satisfied with the answer.

  I fear he may believe there to be some truth in these heathen words. I fear he means to answer Emperor Zyrl's call to arms.

  But I leave further speculation to your hallowed head, Your Supremacy.

  Your most humble and loyal servant,

  Brother Causticus of our Order of Ataraxis

  FATE’S EMBRACE

  Deep in the land of the dawning sun, set in the heart of a shadowed empire, a man sparred in a courtyard.

  Six men surrounded him, lashing with wooden staves, yet the man rebuffed all their attacks. He was like the wind as he turned and struck and parried: everywhere at once, yet never where his opponents retaliated.

  He fought like a devil and a deity.

  He fought like he struggled to survive.

  His challengers continued as long as they could, but the sun had barely risen before they yielded. The man lowered his stave and breathed in the sorcery that sustained him. He could not ask more from them.

  Yet it was not enough.

  Soon, he would not fight men of flesh and blood. He would not stay his hand then, nor would his enemies show mercy. They would come for him with fire, tooth, and claw. They would seek to break him.

  He could not allow that.

  The man exhaled the fears and doubts that hounded him. Unburdened, he delved into a realm that no mortal should touch.

  He descended into sorcery itself.

  It was a place of light, warmth, and walls, all brimming with potential. It whispered promises from deep within the beating heart of its core.

  It sought to draw the man into ruin.

  He hovered there, beholding the light, flirting with the idea of entering it. He did not want to die. His friends and his beloved tethered him to the World above.

  Yet he was tempted all the same.

  The man faced oblivion for a time, then resurfaced. If he could defeat this flaw in himself, anything might be possible. The mad god that awaited him was distant, unknowable. This temptation was an enemy he understood and could fight.

  Yet he had not smothered the desire. As he walked away from the courtyard, his shoulders sagged.

  He went to the one who helped him press on, the one he most feared to lose, and found solace in forgetting.

  In a garden both near and far, a youth listened to a song.

  It was a song unlike any other, both terrible and wonderful. A song encompassing all life had to offer, all the vileness and beauty, the pain and the joy.

  A song born of the World. The song of its creation.

  For a time, the youth held the Worldsong in his mind, learning its ebbs and flows, its parts and its whole. He listened, then reached for it, like a child putting a hand in a river rapids.

  The current swept him away.

  It was a tempest, full of forging and fury. The youth tried to restrain it, but it was beyond him. He was flotsam floating through it; a passenger, not the captain.

  But the youth would not be cowed.

  He spoke sorcerous words, and they harnessed the Song, molding its furor. A killing power swept through the youth and into the garden surrounding him. It was meticulously managed, this refuge: topiaries trimmed, gr
asses shaved, flowers pruned. A thing of contrived beauty.

  In one wave, the youth turned the green to brown.

  Opening his eyes, he beheld what he had done and felt a cold hand press on his chest. The Song had lulled him into complacency, but he had to maintain his guard. The price of any lapse surrounded him. It was full of killing sounds, and he had touched one of them.

  But life, too, lived in the Song. And so the youth closed his eyes, listened, and spoke different words.

  Energy coursed through him and filled the shriveled plants. It was slower, this rebirth, but it soon took root. Leaves shivered and stems trembled as they turned yellow, then green, then became plump with vitality. The withered petals fell, and new ones blossomed in their wake, showing cheery faces once more.

  The youth opened his eyes. As he saw what he had done, he smiled.

  It was a hymn of happiness and sorrow, this Song. Their task would make him touch upon both, but he had accepted this. Fear had fled, and only the one who was once a devil remained.

  He was strong. Resolved. He had accepted the price.

  The youth closed his eyes, and with the quieting of his doubts, he listened again.

  Tal gave a contented sigh as he slumped back onto the bed.

  Ashelia nestled into the crook of his arm. They were quiet for a few moments, their breathing the only sound filling the dark bedchamber. He reveled in the warmth of her body pressed against his, the slight stickiness where their skin touched. How many times had he dreamed of this over the years?

  A dream fulfilled. Silence knew he had few enough of those to treasure.

  "Why are you smiling?" Ashelia levered herself up onto one elbow. Her springy hair had worked free of its braids during their activities and made a frizzy halo about her face as she stared down at him.

  Tal brushed her hair back, to no avail. "At your prim appearance."

  She raised an eyebrow. "Not much of a flatterer for being named Pearltongue."

  "Fine words aren't the only reason for that name."

  Ashelia rolled her eyes and Tal grinned like a boy. Without warning, she pushed him back down and kissed him. He regretted when she pulled away.

  "Did you know?" she murmured.

  "Know what?"

  She traced a finger over his chest. His skin tingled after its passage as if she cast sorcery over him, though her glamour was no spell.

  "How this would turn out," she continued. "Where we would end up. What you were… destined for."

  "Destined?" He laughed as he captured her hand. "Fate is forged in my experience. If anyone should know that, it is I. But all I know of my future is that it's wound up with you, my mangrove bloom."

  Her gray eyes were bright in the gloom. "You have me — at least until I must fetch Rolan from Falcon. But you know that's not what I mean."

  His smile slipped away, and his eyes traveled to the curtained window. "I know."

  Silence descended upon them, as swift as night in wintry mountains. Tal hoped she wouldn't break it. To speak of what must come brought that fate closer. He already felt the delay of each day during the months they'd spent in the Sun Emperor's palace. He needed nothing more to drag him to his purpose.

  But Ashelia had sunk her teeth in now, and like a huntsman's hound, she rarely let go.

  "Tal," she chided softly. "Don't bandy about life and death. Talk to me. This may be our only chance."

  "What do you want me to say? That I knew I was different from the beginning? I did, but not in that way. All I knew was that I was a warlock's bastard. The son my father never wanted."

  Tears surprised him, and he blinked rapidly as he glanced away.

  "At least, he didn't want me then. I was different from the beginning. But of what flowed through my veins… I was never touched by power until after I'd left Hunt's Hollow. Adolescence or adversity brought it out during the years in the Avendoran army. Sometimes, when I needed to move quicker, or needed to heal from a beating in the training yard, I felt… something. Warmth. Relief. But always, I found an excuse. Only when my company was ambushed did my sorcery come on so strongly I could no longer deny it."

  "What happened then?"

  "Hard to say. Enemies surrounded us. My body seemed to burn from within, like I'd swallowed molten metal. Then my senses expanded. I heard and saw everything around me. I smelled the piss on the craven soldiers' trousers, and the shite on the dead ones. The wounds I had taken wove shut. There was no longer a barrier between what I wanted to do and my body's capabilities. Everything became possible."

  Tal smiled bitterly toward the ceiling. "And what did I do with my newfound power? I cut down any who stood in my way and ran. I left my comrades to die. I betrayed the friends and mentors who ushered me into manhood. I became a damned deserter."

  Ashelia's hand brushed over his brow, as if to smooth away the lines there, then brushed over his hair. The white streak had faded during their time in the palace, his renewed sorcery slowly mending his old wounds. Yet even the force of his blood couldn't turn back time, and age had carved its mark upon him.

  "So much guilt," she murmured. "When will you learn to put it down?"

  He met her gaze and flashed a twisted smile. "When I fulfill my destiny."

  To kill a god, he thought as she ran a hand through his hair. Or be killed by him.

  "Some things are more important than duty." Ashelia whispered the words, as if afraid to speak them. "Not higher callings, maybe. But no less vital."

  Tal looked away. He felt what she meant, wanted to speak the commitment she needed to hear. But she deserved more than a broken oath.

  He said the only thing he could.

  "If it's in my power to return to you, Ashelia Starkissed, I will. By the false gods, the dark Deep, and the uncertain heavens, I'll find my way back."

  Her smile was more eloquent than any response, yet still, she gave one.

  "You had better. Or I will drag you up from the hells myself."

  Tal grinned, then abruptly rose and pinned her to the bed. Ashelia pretended to protest, her eyes betraying otherwise.

  "You don't have to fetch Rolan yet, do you?" he breathed.

  Her laughter was like birdsong, sweet and high, until he repressed it with a kiss.

  CRADLE OF FIRE

  Garin was listening to the Worldsong when Ilvuan came to him.

  He sat in his usual garden. With spring fully upon them, the flowers bloomed and filled the air with scents ranging from sweet to spicy. Though it was tame and cultured, the garden made for a welcome change from the stone, carpets, and finery elsewhere on the grounds.

  Hunt's Hollow had none of those things. Its nicest rugs were those laid out for festivals and rolled up as soon as they were over. Only the forge was built with stone, the other buildings in town being made of timber and brick. But it hadn't lacked for greenery, and though the garden smelled far pleasanter than the East Marsh, for Garin, it was the closest reminder he could find of home.

  So, he often sat on a marble bench before a fountain and, with the falling water providing a blanket of noise, he would close his eyes and listen.

  He would seek the Song.

  No longer did he think of it as belonging to the Night. Even if Ilvuan hadn't told an alternate story of the Night, declaring the mythical figure not to be the embodiment of evil, but the savior of humanity, Garin knew the Song that flowed through all things to be beyond morality. It simply was, just as the World was. The Worldsong contained all things: good and bad, peaceful and perilous. It could harm as well as heal, and what its power did was up to the listener. In the hands of a wise wielder, it could be harnessed for good.

  Garin had learned how to do just that.