BooksBarbecue
Back Legacy of Ash Save as PDF
Chapters (95)
  1. Cover
  2. Copyright
  3. Dedication
  4. Map
  5. Dramatis Personae
  6. Fifteen Years Ago
  7. Endas, 25th day of Wellmarch
  8. One
  9. Two
  10. Three
  11. Four
  12. Maladas, 26th day of Wellmarch
  13. Five
  14. Six
  15. Seven
  16. Eight
  17. Nine
  18. Ten
  19. Lumendas, 1st day of Radiance
  20. Eleven
  21. Twelve
  22. Thirteen
  23. Fourteen
  24. Astridas, 2nd day of Radiance
  25. Fifteen
  26. Sixteen
  27. Seventeen
  28. Eighteen
  29. Nineteen
  30. Jeradas, 3rd day of Radiance
  31. Twenty
  32. Twenty-One
  33. Twenty-Two
  34. Twenty-Three
  35. Twenty-Four
  36. Twenty-Five
  37. Endas, 4th day of Radiance
  38. Twenty-Six
  39. Twenty-Seven
  40. Twenty-Eight
  41. Twenty-Nine
  42. Thirty
  43. Thirty-One
  44. Maladas, 5th day of Radiance
  45. Thirty-Two
  46. Thirty-Three
  47. Thirty-Four
  48. Thirty-Five
  49. Tzadas, 6th day of Radiance
  50. Thirty-Six
  51. Thirty-Seven
  52. Thirty-Eight
  53. Thirty-Nine
  54. Forty
  55. Forty-One
  56. Forty-Two
  57. Forty-Three
  58. Lunandas, 7th day of Radiance
  59. Forty-Four
  60. Jeradas, 10th day of Radiance
  61. Forty-Five
  62. Forty-Six
  63. Forty-Seven
  64. Endas, 11th day of Radiance
  65. Forty-Eight
  66. Forty-Nine
  67. Fifty
  68. Fifty-One
  69. Fifty-Two
  70. Fifty-Three
  71. Fifty-Four
  72. Fifty-Five
  73. Maladas, 12th day of Radiance
  74. Fifty-Six
  75. Fifty-Seven
  76. Fifty-Eight
  77. Fifty-Nine
  78. Sixty
  79. Sixty-One
  80. Sixty-Two
  81. Tzadas, 13th day of Radiance
  82. Sixty-Three
  83. Sixty-Four
  84. Lunandas, 14th day of Radiance
  85. Sixty-Five
  86. Sixty-Six
  87. Lumendas, 15th day of Radiance
  88. Sixty-Seven
  89. Sixty-Eight
  90. Tzadas, 20th day of Radiance
  91. Sixty-Nine
  92. Acknowledgements
  93. Discover More
  94. Extras
  95. Meet the Author

He stood in the lee of the unfinished palisade, forearm propped against timber and eyes staring southwards. His torn surcoat was filthy with soot. It seemed to Josiri that he needed the palisade’s support every bit as much as Josiri required Anastacia’s.

“This was the only way,” Viktor continued. “The old way. Fire to kill a witch, and send her spirit howling into the Raven’s embrace. Every house. Every field. Every soul she ever touched.”

Still Josiri didn’t turn. He could almost see the ghosts of the dead crowding the ashen fields. So many lost to the flames, and all of them staring at him with accusing eyes. And one above all, dearer to him than all the rest, though he’d never truly told her as much.

“And Calenne?” asked Josiri. “Where is my sister?”

Seconds scraped by, accompanied by the distant crackle of flames and the desperate double-thump of Josiri’s heart.

Viktor straightened. His arm fell to his side. “I’m sorry.”

Without another word, he strode away, a black shadow against an amber sky, leaving Josiri amid the remnant of his shattered world.

Tzadas, 20th day of Radiance

Tzadas, 20th day of Radiance

A phoenix shall blaze from the darkness.

A beacon to the shackled;

a pyre to the keepers of their chains.

from the sermons of Konor Belenzo

Sixty-Nine

Sixty-Nine

The fires raged until there was nothing left to burn. For five days, flames haunted the horizon, consuming field and forest, hearth and home. The dead. The living. Everything in between. All gone in a conflagration worthy of fable. Of what had once been the jewel of the Southshires, only charred stone remained. Acre upon acre of ashen wasteland unfolding across the Grelyt valley. The Southshires would go on, but Eskavord and its neighbouring hamlets were no more.

Even Kurkas, no stranger to the cruelties of war, had sought every excuse he could not to look upon the sight while the fires raged – while living and dead were offered up to the flames. Hundreds of thralls, motionless and sightless, shepherded into cleansing coruscation. They hadn’t screamed, hadn’t uttered a sound. That was almost worse.

Only now it was over had Kurkas gathered the resolve to make the long, stumbling walk up Drannan Tor, and fulfil a promise given to an old enemy.

[[He doesn’t want to see anyone. I thought I’d made that clear.]]

Anastacia emerged into the sun-dappled glade. The tangled plaits of her wig would never be the same again, but she’d patched the worst of the tears in her dress. Still, the tatterdemalion aspect remained, lending her the air of a vagabond queen more than a well-to-do lady.

Kurkas drew to a halt, glad of the respite. Pain he didn’t mind – it meant the parts and pieces were still there – but the stiffness? That couldn’t fade fast enough.