Suddenly, the boy felt the pain in his leg. It was blinding and intense, stemming from the festering wound and shattered bone in his thigh. He had fallen from someplace high, and his leg had snapped so soundly the shattered bone had torn through the skin to jut into the air.
His father had hired the best surgeons and doctors, but they had been unable to stop the infection. The bone had been set as well as possible, considering that it had fractured in at least a dozen places. Even without the infection, the boy would walk with a limp the rest of his days. With the infection … amputation seemed the only recourse. Secretly, the doctors feared it was too late for even that solution; the wound had occurred high on the leg, and the infection had probably spread to the torso. The father had demanded the truth. He knew his son was dying. And so he had come to Elantris, despite his lifelong distrust of its gods.
They took the boy to a domed building. He nearly forgot his pain as the door opened on its own, sliding inward without a sound. His father stopped abruptly before the door, as if reconsidering his actions, but his mother tugged insistently on the man’s arm. His father nodded, bowing his head and entering the building.
Light shone from glowing Aons on the walls. A woman approached, her white hair long and full, her silvery face smiling encouragingly. She ignored his father’s distrust, her eyes sympathetic as she took the boy from hesitant arms. She laid him carefully on a soft mat, then brought her hand into the air above him, her long, thin index finger pointing at nothing.
The Elantrian moved her hand slowly, and the air began to glow. A trail of light followed her finger. It was like a rupture in the air, a line that radiated with deep intensity. It was as if a river of light were trying to force its way through the small crack. The boy could feel the power, he could sense it raging to be free, but only this little was allowed to escape. Even that little was so bright that he could barely see for the light.
The woman traced carefully, completing Aon Ien—but it wasn’t just Aon Ien, it was more complex. The core was the familiar Aon of healing, but there were dozens of lines and curves at the sides. The boy’s brow wrinkled—he had been taught the Aons by his tutors, and it seemed odd that the woman should change this one so drastically.
The beautiful Elantrian made one final mark at the side of her complex construction, and the Aon began to glow even more intensely. The boy felt a burning in his leg, then a burning up through his torso. He began to yell, but the light suddenly vanished. The boy opened his eyes with surprise; the afterimage of Aon Ien still burned into his vision. He blinked, looking down. The wound was gone. Not even a scar remained.
But he could still feel the pain. It burned him, cut him, caused his soul to tremble. It should have been gone, but it was not.
“Rest now, little one,” the Elantrian said in a warm voice, pushing him back.
His mother was weeping with joy, and even his father looked satisfied. The boy wanted to yell at them, to scream that something was wrong. His leg hadn’t been healed. The pain still remained.
No! Something is wrong! He tried to say, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t speak….
“No!” Raoden yelled, sitting upright with a sudden motion. He blinked a few times, disoriented in the darkness. Finally, he took a few deep breaths, putting his hand to his head. The pain did remain; it was growing so strong that it even corrupted his dreams. He had dozens of tiny wounds and bruises now, even though he had been in Elantris for only three weeks. He could feel each one distinctly, and together they formed a unified frontal assault on sanity.
Raoden groaned, leaning forward and grabbing his legs as he fought the pain. His body could no longer sweat, but he could feel it trembling. He clamped his teeth shut, gritting them against the surge of agony. Slowly, laboriously, he reasserted control. He rebuffed the pain, soothing his tortured body until, finally, he released his legs and stood.
It was growing worse. He knew it shouldn’t be so bad yet; he hadn’t even been in Elantris for a month. He also knew that the pain was supposed to be steady, or so everyone said, but for him it seemed to come in waves. It was always there—always ready to pounce on him in a moment of weakness.
Sighing, Raoden pushed open the door to his chambers. He still found it odd that Elantrians should sleep. Their hearts no longer beat, they no longer needed breath. Why did they need sleep? The others, however, could give him no answers. The only true experts had died ten years previously.
So, Raoden slept, and with that sleep came dreams. He had been eight when he broke his leg. His father had been loath to bring him into the city; even before the Reod, Iadon had been suspicious of Elantris. Raoden’s mother, dead some twelve years now, had insisted.
The child Raoden hadn’t understood how close he’d come to death. He had felt the pain, however, and the beautiful peace of its removal. He remembered the beauty of both the city and its occupants. Iadon had spoken harshly of Elantris as they left, and Raoden had contradicted the words with vehemence. It was the first time Raoden could remember taking a position against his father. After that, there had been many others.
As Raoden entered the main chapel, Saolin left his attendant position beside Raoden’s chamber, falling into place beside him. Over the last week, the soldier had gathered a group of willing men and formed them into a squad of guards.
“You know I am flattered by your attentiveness, Saolin,” Raoden said. “But is it really necessary?”
“A lord requires an honor guard, Lord Spirit,” Saolin explained. “It wouldn’t be proper for you to go about alone.”
“I’m not a lord, Saolin,” Raoden said. “I’m just a leader—there is to be no nobility in Elantris.”
“I understand, my lord,” Saolin said with a nod, obviously not seeing the paradox within his own words. “However, the city is still a dangerous place.”
“As you wish, Saolin,” Raoden said. “How goes the planting?”
“Galladon has finished his plowing,” Saolin said. “He has already organized the planting teams.”
“I shouldn’t have slept so long,” Raoden said, looking out the chapel window to notice how high the sun had risen. He left the building, Saolin close behind, and walked around a neat cobblestone path to the gardens. Kahar and his crew had cleaned off the stones, and then Dahad—one of Taan’s followers—had used his skills with stoneworking to reset them.
The planting was already well under way. Galladon oversaw the work with a careful eye, his gruff tongue quick to point out any errors. However, there was a peace about the Dula. Some men were farmers because they had no other choice, but Galladon seemed to find true enjoyment in the activity.
Raoden remembered clearly that first day, when he had tempted Galladon with the bit of dried meat. His friend’s pain had barely been under control back then—Raoden had been scared of the Dula several times during those first days. Now none of that remained. Raoden could see it in Galladon’s eyes and in his bearing: He had found the “secret,” as Kahar had put it. Galladon was in control again. Now the only one Raoden had to fear was himself.
His theories were working better than even he had expected—but only on everyone else. He had brought peace and purpose to the dozens who followed him, but he couldn’t do the same for himself. The pain still burned him. It threatened him every morning when he awoke and stayed with him every moment he was conscious. He was more purposeful than any of the others, and was the most determined to see Elantris succeed. He filled his days, leaving no empty moments to contemplate his suffering. Nothing worked. The pain continued to build.
“My lord, watch out!” Saolin yelled.
Raoden jumped, turning as a growling, bare-chested Elantrian charged from a darkened hallway, running toward Raoden. Raoden barely had time to step backward as the wildman lifted a rusted iron bar and swung it directly at Raoden’s face.
Bare steel flashed out of nowhere, and Saolin’s blade parried the blow. The bestial newcomer halted, reorienting himself to a new foe. He moved too slo
wly. Saolin’s practiced hand delivered a thrust directly through the madman’s abdomen. Then, knowing that such a blow wouldn’t stop an Elantrian, Saolin swung a mighty backhand, separating the madman’s head from his body. There was no blood.
The corpse tumbled to the ground, and Saolin saluted Raoden with his blade, shooting him a gap-toothed smile of reassurance. Then he spun around to face a group of wildmen charging down a nearby street toward them.
Stunned, Raoden stumbled backward. “Saolin, no! There are too many of them!”
Fortunately, Saolin’s men had heard the commotion. Within seconds, there were five of them—Saolin, Dashe, and three other soldiers—standing against the attack. They fought in an efficient line, blocking their enemy’s path to the rest of the gardens, working with the coordination of trained soldiers.
Shaor’s men were more numerous, but their rage was no match for martial efficiency. They attacked solitarily, and their fervor made them stupid. In moments the battle was over, the few remaining attackers dashing away in retreat.
Saolin cleaned his blade efficiently, then turned with the others. They saluted Raoden in coordination.
The entire battle had happened almost more quickly than Raoden could follow. “Good work,” he finally managed to say.
A grunt came from his side, where Galladon knelt beside the decapitated body of the first attacker. “They must have heard we had corn in here,” the Dula mumbled. “Poor rulos.”
Raoden nodded solemnly, regarding the fallen madmen. Four of them lay on the ground, clutching various wounds—all of which would have been fatal had they not been Elantrians. As it was, they could only moan in torment. Raoden felt a stab of familiarity. He knew what that pain felt like.
“This cannot continue,” he said quietly.
“I don’t see how you can stop it, sule,” Galladon replied at his side. “These are Shaor’s men; not even he has much control over them.”
Raoden shook his head. “I will not save the people of Elantris and leave them to fight all the days of their lives. I will not build a society on death. Shaor’s followers might have forgotten that they are men, but I have not.”
Galladon frowned. “Karata and Aanden, they were possibilities—if distant ones. Shaor is another story, sule. There isn’t a smear of humanity left in these men—you can’t reason with them.”
“Then I’ll have to give them their reason back,” Raoden said.
“And how, sule, do you intend to do that?”
“I will find a way.”
Raoden knelt by the fallen madman. A tickle in the back of his mind warned him that he recognized this man from recent experience. Raoden couldn’t be certain, but he thought that the man had been one of Taan’s followers, one of the men Raoden had confronted during Dashe’s attempted raid.
So, it’s true, Raoden thought with a crimp in his stomach. Many of Taan’s followers had come to join Raoden, but the larger part had not. It was whispered that many of these had found their way to the merchant sector of Elantris, joining with Shaor’s wildmen. It wasn’t all that unlikely, Raoden supposed—the men had been willing to follow the obviously unbalanced Aanden, after all. Shaor’s band was only a short step away from that.
“Lord Spirit?” Saolin asked hesitantly. “What should we do with them?”
Raoden turned pitying eyes on the fallen. “They are of no danger to us now, Saolin. Let’s put them with the others.”
Soon after his success with Aanden’s gang, and the subsequent swell in his band’s numbers, Raoden had done something he’d wanted to from the beginning. He started gathering the fallen of Elantris.
He took them off the streets and out of the gutters, searched through buildings both destroyed and standing, trying to find every man, woman, and child in Elantris who had given in to their pain. The city was large, and Raoden’s manpower was limited, but so far they had collected hundreds of people. He ordered them placed in the second building Kahar had cleaned, a large open structure he had originally intended to use as a meeting place. The Hoed would still suffer, but at least they could do it with a little decency.
And they wouldn’t have to do it alone. Raoden had asked the people in his band to visit the Hoed. There were usually a couple of Elantrians walking among them, talking soothingly and trying to make them as comfortable as possible considering the circumstances. It wasn’t much—and no one could stomach much time among the Hoed—but Raoden had convinced himself that it helped. He followed his own counsel, visiting the Hall of the Fallen at least once a day, and it seemed to him that they were improving. The Hoed still groaned, mumbled, or stared blankly, but the more vocal ones seemed quieter. Where the Hall had once been a place of fearful screams and echoes, it was now a subdued realm of quiet mumblings and despair.
Raoden moved among them gravely, helping carry one of the fallen wildmen. There were only four to deposit; he had ordered the fifth man, the one Saolin had beheaded, buried. As far as anyone could tell, an Elantrian died when he was completely beheaded—at least, their eyes didn’t move, nor did their lips try to speak, if the head was completely separated from the body.
As he walked through the Hoed, Raoden listened to their quiet murmurings.
“Beautiful, once so very beautiful….”
“Life, life, life, life, life….”
“Oh Domi, where are you? When will it end? Oh Domi….”
He usually had to block the words out after a time, lest they drive him insane—or worse, reawaken the pain within his own body. Ien was there, floating around sightless heads and weaving between fallen bodies. The Seon spent a lot of time in the room. It was strangely fitting.
They left the Hall a solemn group, quiet and content to keep to their own thoughts. Raoden only spoke when he noticed the tear in Saolin’s robes.
“You’re wounded!” Raoden said with surprise.
“It is nothing, my lord,” Saolin said indifferently.
“That kind of modesty is fine on the outside, Saolin, but not here. You must accept my apology.”
“My lord,” Saolin said seriously. “Being an Elantrian only makes me more proud to wear this wound. I received it protecting our people.”
Raoden turned a tormented look back at the Hall. “It only brings you one step closer …”
“No, my lord, I don’t think it does. Those people gave in to their pain because they couldn’t find purpose—their torture was meaningless, and when you can’t find reason in life, you tend to give up on it. This wound will hurt, but each stab of pain will remind me that I earned it with honor. That is not such a bad thing, I think.”
Raoden regarded the old soldier with a look of respect. On the outside he probably would have been close to retirement. In Elantris, with the Shaod as an equalizer, he looked about the same as anyone else. One couldn’t tell age by looks, but perhaps one could tell it through wisdom.
“You speak discerningly, my friend,” Raoden said. “I accept your sacrifice with humility.”
The conversation was interrupted by the slap of feet against cobblestones. A moment later Karata dashed into view, her feet coated with fresh sludge from outside the chapel area. Kahar would be furious: she had forgotten to wipe down her feet, and now she was tracking slime over his clean cobblestones.
Karata obviously didn’t care about slime at the moment. She surveyed the group quickly, making sure no one was missing. “I heard Shaor attacked. Were there any casualties?”
“Five. All on their side,” Raoden said.
“I should have been here,” she said with a curse. During the last few days, the determined woman had been overseeing the relocation of her people to the chapel area; she agreed that a central, unified group would be more effective, and the chapel area was cleaner. Oddly enough, the idea of cleaning the palace had never occurred to her. To most Elantrians, the sludge was accepted as an irrevocable part of life.
“You have important things to do,” Raoden said. “You couldn’t have anticipated Shaor would a
ttack.”
Karata didn’t like the answer, but she fell into line beside him without further complaint.
“Look at him, sule,” Galladon said, smiling slightly beside him. “I would never have thought it possible.”
Raoden looked up, following the Dula’s gaze. Taan knelt beside the road, inspecting the carvings on a short wall with childlike wonder. The squat-bodied former baron had spent the entire week cataloguing each carving, sculpture, or relief in the chapel area. He had already discovered, in his words, “at least a dozen new techniques.” The changes in Taan were remarkable, as was his sudden lack of interest in leadership. Karata still maintained a measure of influence in the group, accepting Raoden as the ultimate voice but retaining most of her authority. Taan, however, didn’t bother to give orders; he was too busy with his studies.
His people—the ones who had decided to join with Raoden—didn’t seem to mind. Taan now estimated that about thirty percent of his “court” had found its way to Raoden’s band, trickling in as small groups. Raoden hoped that most of the others had chosen solitude instead; he found the idea of seventy percent of Taan’s large band joining with Shaor very disturbing. Raoden had all of Karata’s people, but her gang had always been the smallest—if most efficient—of the three. Shaor’s had always been the largest; its members had just lacked the cohesion and the motivation to attack the other gangs. The occasional newcomers Shaor’s men had been given had sated their bloodlust.
No longer. Raoden would accept no quarter with the madmen, would not allow them to torment innocent newcomers. Karata and Saolin now retrieved everyone thrown into the city, bringing them safely to Raoden’s band. So far, the reaction from Shaor’s men had not been good—and Raoden feared that it would only grow worse.
I’ll have to do something about them, he thought. That, however, was a problem for another day. He had studies he needed to get to for the moment.
Once they reached the chapel, Galladon went back to his planting, Saolin’s men dispersed to their patrols, and Karata decided—despite her earlier protests—that she should return to the palace. Soon only Raoden and Saolin were left.