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The wall appeared to consist of featureless blue-tinged marble, within which
were set at regular intervals a series of recesses, each roughly ten yards
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wide. Set back in each recess a yard was a flat expanse of what appeared to be
blue crystal. The crystal rose but five yards, and the space above the crystal
was empty all the way up to the high stone ceiling.
If I might ask& Honored Councilor?
It is the Hall of the Last Myrmidons or the first. The white-haired man s
steps echoed softly in the vastness as he turned toward the first recess on
the right.
Without questioning, Edyss followed, until the two stood before the flat
crystal.
Shine the light-torch and see what you will see.
Aellyan Edyss turned the light-torch upon the crystal wall. The crystal had
looked far darker in the dimness and from a distance, but it was almost clear,
and only lightly shaded with the merest hint of blue.
On the left side was a small alcove, set into the crystal itself, an alcove
roughly the shape of a man, but without any figure inside. Farther back in the
solid blue crystalline mist, embedded within it, was a shape, one with massive
blue leathery wings folded back, and with a long cruel blue crystal beak. The
eyes were also of blue crystal, and they glittered like gemstones or the blued
crystals that had powered the lost skylances of the original Myrmidons. For
all their glitter, for all their stillness, they held a dark intelligence.
Set just below the thick neck and above the shoulders that anchored the wings
was a blue leather saddle.
Is this a mausoleum?
No. Just before the Cataclysm, the head of the Myrmidons created this. The
crystal blocks the passage of time, of anything. When the crystal is
dissolved, the pteridon will be as alive as it ever was, waiting for his new
master and rider.
How do I release them? Edyss turned to the councilor.
You must agree to bind yourself to the pteridon, as its master and rider, for
so long as you both shall live. That is all.
And none have agreed to do that?
None have united both Illegea and Ongelya before you, and there has been no
need. As the guardians of the grasslands, and the protector of the Vault, we
do not wish to see Lyterna fall under the Praetor and the iron bootheels of
Lustrea or the Lord-Protector of Lanachrona. There may be another such as you,
but he has not come forward to claim the heritage, and you have.
Another item caught the attention of Edyss. Is that& a skylance of the
Myrmidons? He gestured to the
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shimmering blue length of metal set in a holder beside the arrested figure of
the pteridon.
The white-haired guardian smiled. It is. Each skylance can only be borne and
used by the pteridon s rider. It draws its power from the sun and the world,
but the ancient texts state that it will take several weeks to regain its full
potency.
What of& Edyss frowned. Do pteridons mate?
The texts are silent on that, but I would judge that they do not, but are
creatures created by the ancients from beyond.
Not by the Duarches or their minions?
The Duarches used what they found, and they used it as wisely as they knew
how, but most was a legacy from the ancients. All that has endured is what
they created anew the high roads, a few buildings
Except for these pteridons, Edyss stated. Are there any more?
Not that we know. Just these twenty. You must use them wisely.
I will do what I can. That is all any man can do.
That is what the Legacy requires. The councilor raised his hand. We do not
have all the words of the
Legacy, but these are those we do have. He cleared his throat and stated, In
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those ages, then, will rise a leader, who would reclaim the glory of the past,
and more, as he would see it, in the sun, to make sure the dual scepter will
always last.
Is there more? asked Edyss, honest curiosity in his voice.
There is, but we do not know those words. They were writ in the stone, once,
there. The councilor pointed his light-torch back to the wall above the
passageway through which they had entered the hall.
But long before we found this hall the words of the two stanzas below the
ones I recited were chiseled away. It is said that the Legacy was a long work,
with sections chiseled and spread all over Corus, so that none would know all
the words until Corus was once more united.
Aellyan Edyss smiled. Then we must begin. He walked toward the man-shaped
alcove. Is this the one for the leader?
It is.
Aellyan Edyss stepped into the alcove, and the crystal block embracing the
pteridon and the skylance began to glow.
The councilor swallowed and watched as the crystal shimmered, then dissolved
into a thick blue mist.
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10
In the chill of a Sexdi morning,in the darkness two glasses before dawn, the
two squads rode quietly eastward from Emal, hoofs sometimes clicking on the
frozen clay, at other times crunching and packing the new snow that would have
been hoof deep, had it fallen more gently. Instead, the wind had swirled the
dry white powder into knee-high drifts in places, and left the road clear in
others. The gale that had buffeted Emal earlier in the week had died down to a
light but bitter wind out of the northwest, with but a hint of the
iron-acridness of the Aerlal Plateau.
While he was wearing the fleece and nightsilk undervest, Alucius still wished
he had on his nightsilk skull mask. Instead, he wore the heavy black wool
scarf and carried two rifles, a perquisite of being the captain, since he knew
that he d have little time to reload in the darkness if they found the
raiders.
The patrol on Tridi had found nothing, not even any signs of tracks, nor had
those on Quattri and Quinti, but Alucius had decided that Twenty-first Company
would keep searching until they found those who had been traveling the back
roads. The patrols would also keep the company alert and those troopers who
weren t patrolling on a given day thankful for the comparative warmth and
rest.
The two squads with Alucius were second and third squads, and Anslym and
Faisyn rode beside
Alucius, Faisyn on the left, Anslym on the right. The column was already
almost ten vingts east of Emal, within two or three vingts of the hamlet of
Tuuler. On the south side of the road, down a gradual slope, was the River
Vedra, its frozen surface also covered intermittently with swirled snowdrifts.
Through a darkness illuminated slightly more than normal by the half-disc of
Selena, Alucius continued to scan the road ahead, the frozen river, and the
snow-covered bottomland fields to his left both with his eyes and his
Talent-senses.
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