Maximilian watched the crimson-cloaked man ride slowly toward him. Serpent's Nest rose behind him, a great blue-tinged granite massif that reached forever into the sky, and Maximilian found it difficult to keep his eyes on the man despite the fact that he'd spent most of the night standing, silent, studying the mountain.
But he needed to concentrate on Aziel at the moment. He was the last remnant of Ishbel's life as Archpriestess of the Coil, and Maximilian wondered how Ishbel was feeling. He glanced at her--she was pale, all her attention on the man riding toward them.
Maximilian looked back to Aziel. He was impatient to kick his horse up that rising road and actually enter the mountain--he'd been unable to eat this morning for his combined excitement and nerves--but Aziel deserved the respect of his attention, if only for the next few minutes.
Axis had eyes only for the mountain. He'd heard enough about Aziel to know that the man was not likely to be harboring a concealed weapon or any ill-intent toward Maximilian, so he felt free to study Serpent's Nest itself.
Serpent's Nest...Elcho Falling.
It was huge, easily as big as Talon Spike had been, and unusual in that it rose precipitously out of relatively flat plains. There were no foothills, no surrounding mountains.
Just this one great peak. Blue-hued and slab-faced, great granite cliffs and turrets projecting forever into the sky and backed, in the east, by a vast gray ocean rolling away into infinity.
The Mountain at the Edge of the World.
It reeked of magic. Axis could feel it stirring the hairs at the back of his neck and trailing soft fingers down his spine. It wasn't overt, but Axis had known magic much of his life, and had wielded enough of it, to be able to sense its presence.
Stars, he thought, what will this place be like when Maximilian awakes the Elcho Falling within?
He glanced above, and could see that the Icarii wheeling overhead had their eyes firmly fixed on the mountain.
He wondered if they thought the mountain would prove home for them.
Ishbel could scarcely contain her emotions. Aziel was close enough now that she could see every feature of his face. He'd aged, she thought, since last she'd seen him. His face was more lined, his eyes more pouched, and he wore an air of fatigue that generally only the very elderly shouldered.
His eyes were locked on her, and for the first time Ishbel realized that Aziel had loved her, probably since she'd been a girl, and that sending her away to another man must have been a nightmare for him.
What a fool I was then, she thought, and tried to smile for Aziel, and failed, miserably.
Josia stood in the top chamber of the Twisted Tower at the window. From his vantage point he could see Maximilian's combined forces arrayed before him, the pitiful figure of Aziel on his horse approaching them, and beyond that the rising bulk of Elcho Falling.
But Josia had no eyes for Maximilian and his forces, or for Aziel, or even for the mountain.
Instead his eyes were fixed on the rolling gray seas beyond.
Aziel pulled his horse to a stop a few paces from Maximilian's.
"Maximilian Persimius," Aziel said. "Welcome...I suppose."
That drew a small smile from Maximilian. "We have disturbed you from your home," he said. "I am sorry, Aziel. It was not my intent. There was no reason for the members of your Coil to have left. I am sure there would have been room within the mountain for all."
"That is kind of you," Aziel said, "but none of us could stay. Our god is gone, our purpose destroyed, and our lodgings are about to become the home of something much greater than we ever could have been."
"Aziel," Ishbel said, edging her horse a little closer to Maximilian's. "Stay, please. Don't go."
Aziel looked at her. Ishbel was almost unrecognizable from the woman he'd sent away. That woman had been repressed and unhappy, a complete naঠin the ways of the world and of her own heart. Now she looked very different. She affected clothes and a hairstyle that flattered and accentuated her natural beauty, and she held herself with both confidence and dignity.
Ishbel had grown up.
He realized he was staring, and he smiled for her, and inclined his head. "I can't stay, Ishbel. I am sorry. I
do not think Maximilian can have his new home soiled by the remaining presence of members of the Coil."
"He will not mind!" Ishbel said.
Aziel looked back at Maximilian. Yes, he would mind. Very much.
"I will be staying," said Ishbel, "and if I stay, then I cannot see why--"
"You are so far removed from what you once were," said Aziel, "that no stain of the Coil remains about you. Ishbel, I need to go. Besides, I fancy seeing my home again."
"Aziel, the world is at war! Armies gather about us, and to the south--"
"Let him go, Ishbel," Maximilian said quietly.
She stared at Maximilian, her face stricken, but she fell silent, and eventually dropped her eyes to her hands gripping the reins of her horse.
"There are servants within the mountain," Aziel said, addressing Maximilian once more. "They are not associated with the Coil. We have made as much as possible comfortable for you, but we had few hands for the task, and there was no means possible to prepare chambers and beds for your entire force. I am afraid that while there will be space and chambers enough for them, they may have to make their own beds."
"I am grateful for what you have done, Aziel, thank you," Maximilian said.
Aziel looked at Axis. "You are Axis SunSoar, I believe?"
Maximilian apologized for not introducing Axis and StarDrifter, and made good his error.
"Such legends," Aziel said, smiling and nodding his head at both men. Then he addressed Ishbel once more.
"I loved you, Ishbel. I needed to say that. I love you still--all the more reason, I think, for Maximilian to want me gone." His eyes were twinkling merrily now. "Be happy, Ishbel, and don't revert to the woman you once were--too scared to take life in both hands...and too scared to love."
He gathered the reins of his horse. "Maximilian," he said, "the mountain is yours. Raise its ghosts, people its corridors with memory, and unwind its terror into the sky. And respect it, for without that, the mountain will murder you."
Without waiting for a response, Aziel pushed the dozing horse into a walk and turned its head for the road westward.
"Aziel!" Ishbel called, but she made no attempt to move to his side, and Aziel rode on through the ranks of silent armed horsemen, until eventually he reached empty road.
CHAPTER TWO
Serpent's Nest
As soon as Aziel had gone, Maximilian gave the order to enter the mountain, and for the next half an hour Axis concerned himself with moving the army forward. Inardle alternatively rode at his side or out to outlying units to relay his orders. Axis kept an eye on her, but was not worried about either her fitness or her reception. The Isembaardians and the Emerald Guard had never had a problem with her, and the Icarii had accepted her in the five days since StarDrifter had made his dramatic apology. It was a grudging acceptance, and overlaid with coolness, but at least Inardle and the Icarii had managed to get themselves to a point where they were prepared to consider the possibility of mutual regard if not outright friendship.
Inardle was also much better physically. She'd recovered well from the bruising and swelling of her arm and shoulder, although the wing still gave her, and Garth, some concern. Garth said the tendons were healing better than expected, but he was noncommittal when Axis pressed him privately about whether or not Inardle might fly again.
Maximilian and Ishbel rode ahead, and entered Serpent's Nest's first. Axis was some fifty or sixty paces behind them, and he and Inardle rode into Serpent's Nest together.
It was extraordinary.
Axis hadn't known quite what to expect. They'd had the opportunity to study Serpent's Nest for two days before actually arriving--it had appeared as a purple smudge on the horizon two dawns ago--and all he could make out of it was its massiveness...and the
sense of magic that pervaded it. Today, as they'd ridden to their meeting with Aziel, Axis had seen the road sloping its way up the lower part of the mountain to a set of two huge wooden gates, but not much else apart from the world of rock that extended skyward.
But once through the gates...
Axis' first impression was of a deeper sense of magic. The second was that he and Inardle had ridden into a forecourt that was already far too crowded. They pulled their horses over to a far side and sat looking around.
The gates led into a semicircular forecourt, its straight back wall being formed by the mountain itself.
There were three large arched openings in this wall, and Axis spotted Egalion walking out of one of them.
He called the captain of the Emerald Guard over.
"Egalion? What is beyond those arches?"
"Another court, much larger than this one," said Egalion. "And beyond that are gates and doors and archways leading to stables, kitchens, corridors...I don't know what else. It's huge. Ishbel is in the far court, trying to direct people and horses." He grinned. "She's losing her temper."
Axis chuckled. "I'll stay out of her way for the time being, then. Inardle, would you go and try to get some sense of where she's sending people? Of where are stables and dormitories, where halls and chambers? Of where people are actually going? We'll meet up again...ah, find us a chamber, would you, if you can dare Ishbel's temper? And send me word once you have one, and we can meet there once all this fuss has died down."
She nodded, riding her horse toward one of the archways leading to the court beyond. Axis watched her go, checking her wings and shoulder for any frost.
But there was none, and, satisfied that she was in no immediate discomfort, Axis looked back to Egalion.
"Can you send a unit of your Guard to assess the defenses, Egalion? So far as I can see, this is the only entrance to the mountain, but I need to be sure."
Egalion nodded, and strode off.
Axis went back to his silent study of the mountain as men and horses moved about him, and Icarii dropped down from the sky to land on wall tops and ridges.
It looked like a mountain at first glance. There appeared to be little above the structures of the forecourt and archways save slabs of rock.
But if he narrowed his eyes, Axis could almost see the structure beneath. The "mountain," the rock, was a falsehood.
Elcho Falling waited.
Axis jumped down from his horse, then led it through the confusion of the forecourt, under one of the arches, and into the even greater confusion of the inner courtyard.
It took five or six hours to sort everyone out. Axis saw Inardle from time to time, either talking with Ishbel or various commanders within the ranks of the Emerald Guard and the Isembaard contingent. She stopped at one point to confer with Ezekiel, and laughed at something he said, and Axis was glad that she was relaxed enough, and confident enough, to smile with the Isembaardian general.
The chaos of the inner courtyard gradually abated as various units were assigned, and then directed to, quarters within the mountain. Axis met Inardle briefly on the steps of the main staircase leading deeper into the mountain, where she gave him directions to a chamber she'd managed to obtain for them.
"What do you think?" he said to her, nodding about them.
"Of the mountain?"
"Yes."
She smiled again, transforming her face. "It's excited."
"You're excited, I think," he said, returning her smile.
"Yes, I am, but the mountain is as well. It knows Maximilian is here."
"Perhaps. Has everyone found quarters?"
"Yes. Aziel left servants here who have been scurrying about leading people to chambers and dormitories. Ishbel has been a help, too. Axis, the mountain is huge...there are doorways and corridors and vast chambers everywhere. What Maximilian brought with him today will take up only a hundredth of the space available, if that."
"I'm going to find Egalion, and then Maxel. Get some rest, Inardle. You are starting to look tired."
All her diffidence returned. "I'm not so tired."
"Get some rest, Inardle." Axis touched her cheek, then ran lightly down the stairs, calling out to Egalion, who was crossing a far corner of the courtyard.
Axis found Maximilian in the early evening in a massive space deep in the mountain. The chamber was floored in smooth buffed stone and had a great domed roof of roughly chiseled rock. When Axis entered, closing the door quietly behind him, Maximilian was standing in the center of the space, looking at a far wall where hung chains and ropes.
The floor just beneath the restraints was discolored.
Maximilian turned very slightly as he heard Axis walk up behind him. "It is very quiet here," he said.
"Very peaceful. Very still."
"What is this place?" Axis asked.
"It is the Coil's Reading Room," said Maximilian. He nodded at the restraints hanging from the wall.
"That is where Ishbel caused her victims to be chained, and where she disemboweled them, and where they died in agony while Lister pretended great wisdom and beneficence and spoke to her through the windings of their bowels."
Axis looked at Maximilian curiously, not sure how to respond.
"Oh, I have made my peace with Ishbel's past, Axis," Maximilian said. "I stand here and feel...slightly saddened, I think, that this is what Elcho Falling came to for so many hundreds of years."
"What will you do with it?" Axis said.
"Before I raise Elcho Falling," Maximilian said, "Ishbel will need to unwind the taint of the Coil from the mountain. She will cleanse it, so that Elcho Falling can rise anew. This chamber, and anything that has any association with the Coil, will be destroyed."
"Where is Ishbel now?"
"Gone visiting her old haunts, I believe. Gone to sit in empty chambers and reflect."
Then Maximilian smiled, that sudden, unexpected expression which lit up his face. "But enough of the past. What has Egalion said?"
"About the defenses?"
Maximilian nodded. "And stores, and whatever it is we need to maintain a possible siege in this place--although unless Armat arrives within the next day or so I doubt Serpent's Nest will need to contend with a siege."
"Well, the news is mostly good. The only entrance into the mountain is via the gates we entered by, unless Armat wants to set his men to weeks of mountain climbing. The gates themselves can be shut, barred, and bolted, and each has a strong metal portcullis which can be lowered into position to reinforce it. The gate access to the inner courtyard likewise. The mountain is easily defensible--Armat would lose most of his men just trying to get them in the gates."
"So he'll need to talk us out with sweet words."
"Very sweet words."
"And stores?"
"Egalion says the mountain is extraordinary. The cellars and basements are packed with dry goods and salted and smoked meats and preserves. There are also wells deep under the mountain which will provide fresh drinking water for many months, if not years. Even the horses are well provided with hay and grain stores. I have no idea where Aziel would have--"
"The mountain provided them, Axis."
"Well, if it could do this as Serpent's Nest, then I can only expect that as Elcho Falling it will wrestle Armat to the ground for us, as well."
Maximilian laughed, the sound ringing through the cavernous chamber. "Don't get your hopes up, Axis."
"When will you raise Elcho Falling, Maxel?"
"In two or three days. I'm not going to waste time."
"BroadWing tells me that Armat is perhaps that distance behind us."
"Then he will get a good showing for his arrival, eh? Have you heard anything of Georgdi?"
"Yes. One of the Icarii scouts reported him two days to the south. He has perhaps twenty thousand men with him, Maxel, and, knowing the Outlanders, they'll be exceptional fighters. Stars alone knows where Georgdi found them--the man is extraordinary."
"Then p
ray he gets here before Armat, because I doubt Armat will be kind enough to just wave Georgdi's twenty thousand through the ranks of the besiegers."
"Have you heard anything about Eleanon and the Lealfast?" Axis said.
Maximilian nodded. "Eleanon contacted me briefly earlier today. He says he is bringing the Lealfast fighters in this evening."
Axis grunted.
"Be careful with Eleanon, Axis."
"What? I shouldn't hurt his feelings? I will be as careful as needed, Maxel, but I won't coddle him. He'll have to accept BroadWing's command, and somehow, somehow, they're going to have to be ready to fight within the week if Armat does what we expect. It isn't long enough to transform them into usefulness. Oh, don't look at me like that. I will be careful enough."
"Have you heard from StarHeaven, Axis? It has been a week, surely, since she left."
"Just occasional reports as she and her companions flew south. They should be in the area of the Salamaan Pass now." Axis paused, shifting a little uneasily on his feet. "I should hear from her soon."
"Let me know once you do, Axis. I do not like this silence from the south."
Axis nodded. "Do you need me anymore tonight?"
Maximilian smiled. "No. Go back to your Lealfast lover. Her wing...?"
"Is healing, but we still do not know if she'll be able to fly again."
Maximilian nodded. "Good night then, Axis."
CHAPTER THREE
Serpent's Nest
Inardle stood at the balustrading on the balcony of the chamber she'd acquired for herself and Axis. It was very high up the mountain, and she stared below her, mesmerized by the space, the fall, the lift of the wind as it rose into the twilight. She shifted closer to the railing, sitting down on it, leaning out a little, spreading her wings, wondering if she dared heal herself for long enough so that she could snatch a few moments' flight into the--
Suddenly someone grabbed her arm and hauled her back to safety.
"Stars, Inardle! What were you doing?"