The Obsidian Heart Read online

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2013 Mark Barnes

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by 47North – Seattle, Washington

  www.apub.com

  ISBN-13: 9781477807606

  ISBN-10: 1477807608

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2013936768

  Cover illustrated by Stephan Martiniere

  To the family and friends who never questioned that this was what I should do.

  To the storytellers, past and present, who lit the way.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication Page

  CONTENTS

  SOUTHEASTERN ĪA

  SHRĪAN

  BEFORE

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  GLOSSARY OF TERMS

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  SOUTHEASTERN ĪA

  YEAR 495 OF THE SHRÍANESE FEDERATION

  SHRĪAN

  YEAR 495 OF THE SHRÍANESE FEDERATION

  “THERE ARE THREE GREAT RIVERS: THE PAST, THE PRESENT, AND THE FUTURE. NEITHER THE PASSAGE OF TIME, NOR OURSELVES, ARE CONSTANT. WE, LIKE TIME, ARE SUBJECTIVE AND VIEWED WITH AS MANY LENSES AS THERE ARE PEOPLE TO SEE. WE, WITHIN TIME, ARE AT ONCE THE INITIATOR AND OBSERVER OF PASSING EVENTS, SAILORS ON A RIVER OF CAUSE AND EFFECT: THE MOMENT WE HAVE CAUSED AN EVENT, OR WITNESSED ITS EFFECTS, WE ARE SWEPT BY THEM AND LEFT ONLY WITH IMPERFECT MEMORIES OF THE SMALL PART OF THE WHOLE WE HAVE SEEN. NO MATTER HOW MUCH WE TRY, THERE IS NO GOING BACK, AND THERE IS NO SEEING EVERYTHING THERE IS TO SEE. NOR CAN WE BUT GUESS AT WHAT IS TO COME.”

  —From The Three Rivers, by Ahwe, scholar, philosopher, and explorer (First Year of the Awakened Empire)

  It has been almost five centuries since the formation of the Shrīanese Federation, an alliance of the surviving six Great Houses and the Hundred Families of the Avān, who fled the fall of the Awakened Empire and its monarch, Mahj-Näsarat fe Malde-ran, as the result of the Human Insurrection.

  The land within and around Shrīan is littered with the detritus of past empires, echoes of glory and the high watermark of civilisations lost to time, internecine war, and blind ambition. Set against Shrīanese imperialism and the return to days of glory, is the Human governed Iron League, an alliance of nations set on ensuring no new empire rises to seize control. The Humans, also known as the Starborn, remember their days of servitude and are unwilling to bend their necks again.

  Rahn-Erebus fa Corajidin, the leader of the Great House of Erebus, and leader of the Imperialist political faction, is dying, his body failing from the poison in his soul. Neither the powers of his Angothic Witch, Wolfram, nor the cures available to him have brought relief. Shrinking from the thought of dying before he has achieved the heights expected of a leader of his family, Corajidin begins secret excavations of the Rōmarq—a place rich in the ancient and powerful artefacts of ages past, where Corajidin is sure the answers to his illness can be found in the lost works of Sedefke, the greatest inventor, explorer and scholar in history.

  To provide better access to the treasures he wants, Corajidin persuades his people to follow a course of civil war against his peer, Far-ad-din, whose prefecture borders the Rōmarq. It becomes clear Far-ad-din’s forces can not win against the might of the Great Houses and the Hundred Families. Indris, former Sēq Knight turned mercenary, is both Far-ad-din’s general and son-in-law. Driven to serve his father-in-law’s cause through the guilt he feels at the loss of his wife, Anj, Indris urges Far-ad-din to flee for his life, leaving his city of Amnon forever. Once Far-ad-din is safely away, Indris surrenders to the invaders.

  While Indris is kept alive for questioning, he sees that many of those who supported Far-ad-din are executed quickly, and in secret, by Corajidin’s forces. On the verge of losing his own life, Indris is saved by his uncle, Rahn-Näsarat fa Ariskander: the Asrahn-Elect and the Arbiter of the Change, set to oversee the course of the war against Far-ad-din.

  Indris is surprised when both himself and his comrade, Shar-fer-rayn, are pardoned for their part in the civil war. His relief is short lived, as he suspects Asrahn-Vashne, leader of the Federationist political faction, will want Indris to repay the debt of his pardon. That night, overcome by the nearness of death, Indris becomes involved in a tryst with an unknown woman and, after a single night of passion, wakes to find her gone.

  Mari, Corajidin’s warrior-poet daughter and a senior member of the Feyassin—the Asrahn’s elite personal guard—is shocked that her father wants to continue his ransacking of the nearby wetlands. The glow she felt after her assignation with a nameless lover the night before fades rapidly, as she listens to her father’s schemes to rise to even greater heights of power. She is even more shocked by how sick and aged her father has become, as well as his obsession with the words spoken to him by the oracles: that Corajidin is destined to become the father of empire, and the leader of his people. Despite Mari’s urging him to find another way to cure his ailment, Corajidin renews his efforts in the Rōmarq to the find the answers he needs, as well as the weapons of past civilisations that may aid him in fulfilling his destiny. Corajidin’s young wife, Yashamin—of an age with Mari—is one of Corajidin’s most vocal supporters, wanting to see her husband as the most powerful man in Shrīan. Corajidin’s sons, the witch-trained Kasraman, and the deadly swordsman Belamandris, are enlisted more fully in his plans.

  Hesitant to become drawn into Shrīanese politics and the vendettas of the Great Houses, Indris plans to leave Amnon—the city filled with nothing but painful memories. It is his friends Shar, Hayden and the Wraith Knight, Omen, who convince him to stay long enough to pass on what they know about Corajidin’s activities in the nearby Rōmarq. Before leaving Amnon, Indris speaks with his uncle, Ariskander, and the Asrahn-Vashne. He reveals that he and his comrades had been investigating the illegal excavations in the Rōmarq and their belief that it was forces working for the Erebus who were responsible. Vashne and Ariskander ask Indris’s help to locate and return Far-ad-din, so the truth of Corajidin’s falsehood and corruption can be more fully understood.

  Though initially prepared to allow events to unravel as they would, Corajidin is thwarted when he is informed that, rather than Vashne stepping down from his post as Asrahn at the end of the year—the Magistratum is considering allowing the well-loved monarch to remain as Asrahn indefinitely. Corajidin is furious, yet it is his Master of Assassins, Thufan, as well as Wolfram and Yashamin, who convince Corajidin to take matters into his own hands and to seize power before it is too late.

  Mari is drawn deeper into her father’s schemes when she is asked to help in Vashne’s assassination. She is surprised to discover Indris, the man she had a one-night romance with and the child of the Great House of Näsarat she h
ad been taught to despise, would be present during the proposed attacks. Yet she questions what she had been taught, as well as her father’s ambitions. During the assassination attempt, Mari decides to distance herself from her family’s grab for power, and takes no further part in it. Her inaction leads to her brother, Belamandris, being badly wounded in a battle with Indris, and causes her father and his colours to reveal themselves to Vashne and Ariskander. Though Vashne, his wife, his daughter and one of his sons are killed, and Ariskander and another of Vashne’s sons are kidnapped, Indris and his comrades manage to escape. Mari seeks to absolve her guilt by presenting herself to the Feyassin she betrayed, taking responsibility for Vashne’s death. She knows it is something she may not survive, and is beaten almost to death in retribution.

  Indris, badly wounded in the assassination of Vashne but saved by Shar and Ekko, wakes to find his old Sēq teacher, Femensetri, has healed him of his wounds. She, like Vashne before her, tries to remind Indris of his duty to his people, as well as to himself. It is at a place of peace, in the heart of troubled Amnon, that Indris and Mari are once more reacquainted.

  Indris’ and Mari’s feelings grow, despite the enmity both have been taught to feel for each other’s Houses, and despite the guilt he feels over his long missing wife. Driven by a sense of obligation and duty, Indris goes into streets of Amnon to see what kind of place Corajidin and those who fly his colours would make of the world. Seeing the harsh truth, and unable to deny what he must do, Indris and his friends agree to help find Ariskander—the man intended to take Vashne’s place as leader of Shrīan, as much as Corajidin would have it otherwise. He also agrees to try and find Far-ad-din and bring him back, to further thwart Corajidin’s play for the highest office in the land.

  As Corajidin continues his drive for power, Mari and Indris work together to find and return Ariskander: Indris, motivated by a deep sense of what he secretly feels is his failed obligation, as well as admiration for his missing uncle; Mari, because she wants to save her father from the doom she clearly sees coming. Indris and his comrades set out into the monster-infested Rōmarq, the marshlands that hold the ancient ruins of lost civilizations, to rescue Ariskander. Mari remains in Amnon—a spy in her father’s own household—with newfound allies who fight to maintain order. Mari finally realises her father will not be stopped: his obsession with survival justifying his callous actions, time and again. When he talks of allying himself with the exiled covens of the witches, she knows she cannot save him. She allies herself irrevocably with Indris.

  While spying on her father and those closest to him, Mari finds an unexpected ally in Thufan’s son, Armal. It is Armal who reveals that Vahineh, Vashne’s daughter, managed to escape the purge on her House and was later captured. Though Armal dies in an ambush in the streets of Amnon—he and Mari killing their attackers—Mari frees Vahineh and guides her to safety with their allies.

  Indris and his friends trek through the Rōmarq, the haunted lands of the vanished Time Masters; survive dangerous battles with malegangers, the hideous marsh-puppeteers and the rat-folk Fenling. During their trek they fight off a party of Fenling who have joined with Thufan and Belamandris. Indris shoots and critically wounds Thufan, and uses his mystic abilities to thwart Belamandris and the Fenling from their pursuit, sending Belamandris and Thufan back to Amnon. Indris and his comrades arrive in Fiandahariat, a Time Master ruin, soon after but fail to save Ariskander from Corajidin’s spite: Ariskander is executed and has his soul bound into an Angothic Spirit Casque. Indris manages to recover the casque, but Corajidin escapes. Indris rushes back to Amnon where he, his friends, and his allies defy Corajidin’s ambitions.

  Vahineh, knowing of Mari’s involvement in the death of her father, mother and brothers, tries to recruit Mari to enact vengeance on Corajidin. Mari refuses, but a maddened Vahineh decides instead to have her revenge by killing Yashamin, and tells the recovering Thufan that it was Corajidin who was ultimately responsible for the death of his son Armal.

  Seeing his plans falling apart around him, Corajidin attempts to flee Amnon. Refusing to admit defeat, he formulates a plan to gather his colours and to make a stand elsewhere. Betrayed by Thufan, his own Master of Assassins, Corajidin is nearly killed, but not before he sees his beloved son, Belamandris, mortally wounded.

  Though Indris, Mari and their allies are victorious, it is not without cost. Mari is outcast from her own family. There is no clear candidate to lead Shrīan, and the Iron League now sees a weaker Shrīan, easy to conquer. The Great Houses and the Hundred Families know their struggle has only begun.

  Camped far from Amnon, recovering from his near-mortal wounds, Corajidin’s supporters swear their loyalty as Wolfram makes good on his promise to find Corajidin the allies he needs to make his future a reality. As the storm clouds gather, Corajidin broods over his dying son as he is introduced to the Emissary, a servant of powerful and enigmatic masters. The Emissary promises Corajidin much: power, majesty and long life. He accepts it all, wants it all, though part of him wonders how the Emissary came to be, for though now she is the servant of dark forces, she once was Anj-el-din, Indris’s missing and presumed dead wife.

  And now…

  “WHILE I MAY CALL MY MISTAKES OPPORTUNITIES, TO OTHERS THEY MAY BE SEEN AS DISASTERS.”

  From The Darkness Without by Sedefke, inventor, explorer, and philosopher (751st Year of the Awakened Empire)

  DAY 347 OF THE 495TH YEAR OF THE SHRĪANESE FEDERATION

  Indris sat in the shade of a faded awning on the balcony of the Iron Dog, eyes narrowed against the glare from the sun-seared granite of the Caleph-Avānweh. The dark borders of the balcony and flapping awning became a picture frame around a frenetic, colorful world. The city of Avānweh, cupped in the meshed fingers of hills and valleys between snow-capped mountains and the shimmering mirror of the Lakes of the Sky, teemed with people. Visitors had gathered from over land and sea in the vivid hues of a fistful of nations for the New Year’s Festival with its troupers, dramatists, martial tournaments, sporting events and the famous Näsiré Flying Carnival.

  He smiled at the procession of people, the colour and shape of the crowd, even as he relished the solitude of his seat. It was like watching the world perform, with thousands of interwoven stories he could watch if only he went out amongst the crowd. But here, in the shade and comfort, he could just… be.

  Sipping the last of his sharbat, Indris stretched his legs out under the table. The chipped old glass was cool and rough in his hand, bubbles and small cracks floating in the translucency. The flavours of yellow lotus petals, orange and pineapple were refreshing.

  The Iron Dog was mostly empty during the day, patronised by a few hard-bitten nahdi in quiet conversation with their silk-draped factor, a tall man who talked his clients through a handful of letters of offer. One or another would glance up at Indris curiously before returning his attention to where his next employment was coming from.

  Indris rubbed a worn corner of his tanj board. Unfolded it was almost a metre wide, with seven hundred and sixty-nine hexagonal tiles laid out like a large six-petalled lotus flower. With twenty-seven pieces per player and up to six players a game, tanj was not for the faint hearted. The pieces from this morning’s game remained where they had been abandoned, little effigies caught mid drama before their story had been fully told. The game had been interrupted when Mari had to keep an appointment with an armorer. Shar, Hayden, Ekko, and Omen had left too. He suspected they were looking for any excuse to do something other than play a game invented as not only a metaphor for the rules of sende, but the complex and fluid relationships between the Great Houses and as a tool for strategic thinking. His friends got annoyed when he won, and even more annoyed when he played badly to make the game, and their time together in peace, last longer. So now he had time alone, a rare and precious gift neither to be overlooked, nor wasted.

  Rummaging around in his satchel, Indris took out his journal, brush and ink, and a few small pieces of wood and p
recious metals. He caught the attention of the housekeep and ordered another sharbat, and bread and vanush—a ground paste of eggplant, herbs and spices. Opening his journal he looked at his most recent sketches of things he wanted to build, or improve. Rough sketches of a new Tempest Wheel, made more efficient by the placement of different metals in a long screw, rather than a series of platters. Some half thought out formulae to make travel along the outer edges of the Drear safer. Even the designs for a new one-person wind-boat he had named the Skylark—an agile clockwork eagle, powered by disentropy. There were a few older projects, discarded as too hard at the time, which he had not looked at in a long while. One in particular, a Drearjammer, piqued his interest again as pieces of the puzzle around his original design fell into place. So many things to do, he thought, but where to start?

  A figure took the seat opposite him, head covered by the deep hood of an over-robe. Indris’s hand dropped to the hilt of his dragon-tooth knife, the move hidden by the table. She, for he took the stranger to be woman from the long slender fingers and softness of her hands with their shadows of blue veins raising the pale skin, was tall. Her over-robe was toned dark sand, patterned with brown vines and tiny yellow flowers. The hooded head was tilted down, a thick braid of dark hair coiling free of the obscuring hood.

  “Mari’s game plan is Ancestors awful for a warrior-poet,” the woman said in a sharp voice, which Indris recognised with shock. “Hayden is waiting to get the game over, knowing he can’t win. Ekko plays like he’s hammering nails and Shar’s game is elegant and beautiful, as I’d expect. I’ve no idea what Omen thinks he’s doing. But, he’s dead and the dead don’t make so much sense when they’ve lingered so long.”

  “Femensetri.” Indris looked around to ensure nobody had overheard. She folded her hood back to reveal fine features, dominated by the brilliance of her opal-coloured eyes. Her mindstone was covered by what passed for a fringe, though it was more the artless hang of hair that needed to be trimmed.