The Cursewright's Vow

Chapter 18: The Doyenne's Counsel, Part 2

 It was a subdued group that resumed its journey along the road, a morose silence falling over them until they had passed out of view of the wreck of the Blackspur. The road began to climb precipitously, and Ammas made frequent stops as they passed more disused shrines. The cursewright seemed to have a purpose to it, though: at many of the shrines wild rosebushes had bloomed in reds and yellows, savoring the last of the summer warmth. Where they found such bushes he directed Casimir to collect a few blossoms, mindful of the thorns, and soon the boy had collected a small, colorful basketful of the flowers. 

"That ought to be enough," Ammas said when the basket began to overflow, though enough for what he didn't say. By then the sun had begun to wester, and they stopped for a brief supper amid the roses. The dark gray clouds had begun to scatter, leaving behind a lovely orange twilight through which glittered a dizzying array of stars.

As the road became steeper, the ruins on either side of them took on a different character: less hollowed and abandoned buildings than empty frameworks of stone that had been stripped of metal, glass, or tile. They reminded Denisius of the Briarcliff ruins and Carala of the Maathinhold, though their design was of a more antique vintage than the former and not quite so ancient as the latter. Vines and stunted trees had grown wild among the tumbled stones, and more than one structure had almost disappeared under a carpet of green.

Ahead of them a grassy butte loomed upward, the road climbing toward it almost like a ramp, the land on either side beginning to fall away. The road was flanked with battered sandstone obelisks, quarried, Ammas told them, from the Scorched Desert during Lady Terazla's last campaigns against the demon-haunted tribes that had once lurked there.

"The stars here are strange," Carala murmured. She was no master of astrology, certainly not of the sorcerous varieties studied by Ammas's former colleagues that embraced the arts of mastery of weather and other esoteric matters, but she had studied enough to know they had not ventured far enough from Talinara for the night skies to have changed so dramatically. The sun had not yet fully set but she could see immense trails of stars almost like shining rivers against a field of purple velvet, along with countless more solitary celestial bodies that made the shapes of constellations whose names she couldn't guess.

"Autumnsgrove was always an abode of astrologers and others who studied the worlds beyond," Ammas said. He leaned on a newly fashioned walking stick as he led them, the airy spirit caged at its crown illuminating the road before them. "Doyenne Sulivar has maintained its virtues, though it's less tame than it once was."

Unsure what that meant, Carala kept a little closer to Denisius.

The road ended in what was clearly a man-made plateau, sculpted and shaped through arts unknown to any of them. Broken plinths stood in a tumbled disarray, marking places where statues had once stood: luminaries of Autumnsgrove, Ammas told them, the bronze figures carried away by the Emperor's armies to be melted down for some more suitable purpose. A magnificent arch led from the plateau to the immense surface of the butte itself. 

In the twilight could be seen a great stand of cypress trees, dark and glossy. Wordlessly Ammas led them through the archway single file, with Casimir at his side. Beyond the arch the temperature seemed to plummet. All of them fixed their cloaks and tunics more tightly about their shoulders, save Barthim, who stated he found the chill air bracing. An overgrown path led through the cypress trees, silent and still. No nightbird sang, and even the sound of the wind itself seemed muted, fierce though it ought to have been up here. Once the path had been illuminated by rows of iron braziers that ran along either side, but they had been long since extinguished. Some of them appeared to have been stripped their metal fittings, leaving only their stone bases. As they made their way through the cypresses, a mist began to creep along the ground, cool and opaque, thick enough to hide their legs almost to their knees. Casimir and Carala looked as if they might soon be lost in it.

The cypress trees proved to be a sort of fence, their serried ranks pierced at the far end of the path by an arch identical to the one that had opened onto the butte. Beyond this arch stood an immense forest of dead trees, blackened and twisted as if by fire. A hush fell among them as they followed the winding path through this blasted thicket. The ruins under Munazyr had been oppressive and forlorn, but there was something almost menacing about these trees, as though they knew the pain in which they had been destroyed, and hated any living thing for it.

Denisius made to draw his sword, but Ammas shook his head. "Make no hostile sign," he murmured. "My presence should protect you, but Doyenne Sulivar keeps her own counsel on who she will allow entry to this place."

At the middle of the dead grove lay a clearing that was rank with cattails and kneehigh grass, a once lush garden choked with weeds and debris. Another plinth, grander than the ones on the plateau, dominated the center of this ruined place. Millions of stars wheeled above them in the night sky, bright enough to see clearly. Whatever statue had mounted the plinth had been carried away, though it must have been enormous to the point Carala wondered how anyone could have plundered it. Perhaps it had been broken down right here and carted away in pieces.

Ammas knelt by Casimir's side and murmured in the boy's ear. Nodding, the cursewright's apprentice strode forward to the broken plinth, kneeling before it and nearly disappearing into the mist as he did so. Reverently he lay the basket of roses at the plinth's base, taking a few of the blossoms and scattering them on its surface, though he had to stretch up a bit to reach. Hurriedly he returned to Ammas's side. The cursewright nodded approvingly and returned to his feet, standing silently, seeming to wait for something.

He did not have to wait long. The mist began to coalesce before them, no longer merely opaque but thick enough nearly to look solid. Slowly it resolved into a human shape, a mist-woman stooped and shrunken, a figure of Ammas's height but withered with age. Cloaked and hooded, its face remained unseen save for a gleam of eyes. 

When it spoke, it spoke on the wind, a susurrus carried on the chill air. There was a malice in those words that froze Carala down to her bones, and for the first time she found herself questioning Ammas's wisdom in bringing them to this place. 

"It seems you remember some of the proper rituals, Ammas Mourthia, whatever ragged souls you bring to me."

Ammas bowed deeply. "Doyenne Sulivar, I ask for your hospitality. I bring a client to whom I have sworn my service, and my apprentice who would seek your approval."

"And these others?" Malice had given way to a cold amusement.

Ammas straightened. "These are my friends, Doyenne Sulivar. I vouch for their trustworthiness. They helped save me and my client from the Yellow Death below Munazyr. They are as sworn to her aid as I am."

"Is that all?" chuckled the mist-woman. "I suspect there is more to it than that. Very well, Ammas. Autumnsgrove is open to you and your companions." The figure clapped its hands together, a deafening crash of thunder rolling across the sky. 

In a flash the disused braziers that lined the clearing thrust fire into the air, coming alive, shattering the illusion of ruination that concealed this place. As the mist-woman dissipated, scattered by a gust of wind, the dead trees seemed to spring into life, a life of eternal autumn where their trees rioted in gold and crimson and orange, rustling in the night wind. The broken plinth where Casimir had laid the flowers now appeared finely preserved, mounted with a colossal statue of a grim-faced woman in robes, brandishing to the night sky a dagger very like the one Ammas bore but of a more antiquated style. 

The weathered plaque at the statue's base could now be read: ILSETH BLACKSPUR, THE LADY TERAZLA. Around the base a marble stair wound down and down, deep into the earth, lit by brightly shining lamps.

All of them, save Ammas alone, stood breathless, flabbergasted by the truth of what remained of Autumnsgrove. In this part of the world the trees had only begun to show the first blush of autumn, but here on this isolated mesa, thanks to enchantments laid down hundreds of years before, autumn lasted forever, crisp and cool and whispering of endless roads to wander before winter settled over the land. Seeming to pay no heed to this miracle, Ammas led them down the stair, murmuring to the airy spirit to quench its light.