Karilyne- Heart Cold as Ice Read online

  KARILYNE:

  HEART COLD AS ICE

  A Novel of The Above

  Van Allen Plexico

  Copyright 2019 by Van Allen Plexico

  White Rocket Books

  www.whiterocketbooks.com

  This book is in memory of Gene L. Davenport.

  A stand-alone novel, this book is also the third volume in the “Above” series and is a part of the “Shattering” saga.

  Cover art by Mark Williams

  The Shattering Saga

  by Van Allen Plexico

  The Above:

  Lucian: Dark God’s Homecoming

  Baranak: Storming the Gates

  Karilyne: Heart Cold as Ice

  Shattered Galaxy:

  Hawk: Hand of the Machine

  Falcon: Revolt Against the Machine*

  The Shattering/Legions Trilogy:

  Legion I: Lords of Fire

  Legion II: Sons of Terra

  Legion III: Kings of Oblivion

  The Legion Chronicles*

  * forthcoming

  The Above

  (higher energy; slower movement)

  Shortcuts (Paths) across spacetime

  - Our Universe -

  The Below

  (lower energy; faster movement)

  Realm of demons; the underverse

  THE ERAS OF THE SHATTERING UNIVERSE

  First Pax Machina

  First Terran Empire

  First Dark Age

  Second Terran Empire

  Terran Alliance

  Second Dark Age

  The Young Empires

  Second Pax Machina

  Shattered Galaxy

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  The Ice Queen and her allies:

  Karilyne, goddess of the ice and snow and former lover of Baranak. Mistress of the world of Stopholod.

  Mirana, a Dyonari warrior and apprentice to Karilyne.

  Binari, a Rao Technologist.

  Davos, mysterious member of the ancient alien race of gray giants that once served as Hands of the Machine.

  Lydia, Templar (warrior-priestess) of the Church of Baranak.

  Erin, Templar (warrior-priestess) of the Church of Baranak.

  Solonis, the seer-god and master of travel through time and space.

  Lucian, the dark god.

  Istari, a Dyonari formerly known as “the Renegade” and now called “the Redeemed.”

  General Marcus Ezekial Tamerlane, called “The Relentless;” former general of Legion I and now co-regent of the Anatolian Empire.

  General Arnem Agrippa, called “The Golden;” former general of Legion III and now co-regent of the Anatolian Empire.

  The Lost Gods,

  Who were found in stasis aboard a wrecked spacecraft, deep beneath the surface of the planet Candis:

  Cevelar, who schemes.

  Kambangan, who commands.

  Borodina, who battles.

  Myhadra, who shines.

  Tharandar, who burns.

  The Dead Gods,

  Destroyed ages ago by falling into the great basin of raw energy at the base of the Fountain in the Golden City; their power and their personas were dispersed across the cosmos:

  Baranak, the golden god of battle and (at the time) de facto ruler of the Golden City.

  Vorthan, formerly the god of toil and labor, later revealed as the deathgod and a universal nihilist; murderer of three-quarters of the gods.

  Hands of the Machine,

  Cloned warriors at the peak of physical perfection, outfitted with extremely advanced and powerful weaponry, and in the service of the great artificial intelligence that enforces its brand of peace throughout the galaxy.

  Condor (Cassius), Tactical command; arms and armor.

  Cardinal (Regulus), Morale/diplomacy/inquisition.

  Canary, Detection/sensor data analysis officer.

  Blackbird, Covert ops/surveillance specialist.

  Others of Note:

  General Yevgeni Vostok, called “The Cold;” an officer in Legion III of the Anatolian Empire.

  Lydain, Seer of the Dyonari Star-City Dalen-Shala.

  Garvael, Sorcerer of the Spire.

  The Six Cosmic Weapons:

  The Sword of Baranak, containing the spirit of one of the Old Gods, before the sundering of the old universe.

  The Knife of Alaria, imbued with a fragment of a black hole.

  The Hammer of Voloron, containing the core of a blue-white giant star.

  The Axe of Ayalis, harboring the power of the entire biosphere of a world destroyed by an unknown cataclysm.

  The Shield of Sevenayis, linked to a neutron star in another reality.

  The Scepter of Mordant, containing the mental energies of an entire race of beings that tampered with forces beyond their control.

  Civilization is like a thin layer of ice upon a deep ocean of chaos and darkness.

  —Werner Herzog

  Some say the world will end in fire,

  Some say in ice.

  From what I’ve tasted of desire

  I hold with those who favor fire.

  But if it had to perish twice,

  I think I know enough of hate

  To say that for destruction ice

  Is also great

  And would suffice.

  —Robert Frost

  Winter is not a season, it's an occupation.

  —Sinclair Lewis

  PROLOGUE

  There is a part of this story that my lady Karilyne would never share with you. But I fear it is critical to understanding what she and I faced and accomplished in our contest—our running battle—with the warped god Cevelar and his human lackey and all of their followers and soldiers. And since she will not tell you this part, I have chosen to amend it to the record here myself. I hope she will not view this action as a betrayal, for my devotion to her is strong as ever; as strong as it was that day in the Golden City of the gods, when she found me trespassing there and, instead of slaying me, received me into her service as her apprentice.

  The brief story I must relate begins ages ago, just before the murders of three-quarters of the gods by the deathgod Vorthan—and Lucian’s subsequent efforts to avoid false conviction and execution for that monstrous crime.

  In those days Baranak had asserted effective rule over the Golden City and all of its affairs, though he never went so far as to claim to be its actual ruler. I believe he did not desire power for its own sake, beyond the considerable native amount he already possessed, nor did he wish to cover himself in the flimsy trappings of office. He merely wished to see his beloved City run wisely and well. Unfortunately, as god of battle, he was scarcely suited to that task, and he required much assistance and advice in order to adequately do the job.

  The long-simmering romance between my lady and the golden god of battle, Baranak, had cooled somewhat during that time, for reasons personal and private and not particularly relevant here. She had retreated to her ice palace on the frozen world of Stopholod, there to brood and nurse her grievances. The god of wisdom, Malachek, who also had served the golden god well in the past as a source of prudent counsel, similarly had a falling-out with Baranak and removed himself to his own castle on his own world, keeping well clear of the politics of the City.

  Thus separated from Karilyne and the good judgment she had long provided him, Baranak found himself rudderless, commanding the dwindling number of gods who remained in the City in an increasingly belligerent and bellicose manner. Yet he himself could not or would not see this problem. Despite the well-known and unpleasant consequences Lucian suffered ages earlier in his own rebellion, another revolt of one sort or another seemed imminent. Who would have led it an
d who would have participated in it? Would Baranak have survived it? These are questions we can never answer now, for one simple reason: because another god chose that moment in history to intervene.

  That decision changed everything.

  Solonis, whom you may have encountered before and whom you will shortly meet again in my lady’s account, styles himself “the seer god.” But this is a misnomer. He “sees” the future only because he constantly visits it, experiences it and tampers with it firsthand. And the same is equally true of the past. Indeed, he has carried himself up and down the timestream so frequently that it is no longer possible to tell to what era any particular physical incarnation of him belongs. After numerous dealings with him, I consider him to be simply the time-traveler god, hand of the Fates, instrument of Destiny.

  But by whatever appellation or title Solonis uses, he has made a habit of meddling in the actions and affairs of gods and mortals alike. And this tale is no different.

  He came to Baranak there in their Golden City and impressed upon him a tale of two great looming crises he had witnessed in the future, either of which could spell doom for all of reality.

  He spoke of a “Shattering” event involving renegade gods and invading hordes of aliens.

  He told of an encroaching wave of destruction brought on by a handful of his brother and sister gods, who had chosen foul chaos and death over order and life.

  He spoke of two coming days of destruction, and of how the avoidance of each of them would require great effort and greater sacrifice.

  And he told of how Baranak himself was fated to perish in battle, not surviving to see either of those conflicts through.

  Baranak surely took this news hard. Not only would he—the immortal god of battle—die, but because of his death he would not be present later to fight off this looming threat to all of creation. What, he asked Solonis, could possibly be done about it?

  And there Solonis found he had so very easily maneuvered the golden god into his snare. For that was precisely the question he had wished Baranak to ask.

  “I have in my journeys up and down the timeline found a possible solution to these approaching crises, great Baranak,” Solonis told him.

  “Then by all means share that news, that we may take such actions as are needed to safeguard our City and the mortal worlds now and for all time,” Baranak replied.

  Solonis then laid out some small portion of his plans, while keeping his true motives hidden. Together, he said, they would travel into the future, where likely weeks or months of labor would be required to see things through. Then Solonis would bring Baranak back to this present time, where he could resume his duties in the City. To this the golden god reluctantly agreed.

  Thus Solonis led Baranak out of the palace and to his Time Tomb, the time travel conveyance he had constructed long ago—or long afterward, depending on one’s point of reference. Once it had been a simple stone sarcophagus, carrying him forward and backward in time. Later he had rebuilt it as the Fates dictated, into a transparent box capable of holding up to a dozen human-sized individuals. Such a conveyance would prove most useful later on, as will soon be made obvious.

  Together Solonis and Baranak traveled to the mortal realms beneath the Above, and far into the future, to a time of human and alien empires spanning many dozens of stars. To a time, I now realize, just before the birth of Lucian’s descendant, Dorion Colicos. There, in the process of many other actions and machinations, Solonis contrived to introduce the golden god to the mortal woman, Andrelara, a soldier in the ranks of one of the human empires. Andrelara, a woman Solonis had carefully selected for this purpose after much study and consideration.

  And with thoughts of my Lady Karilyne distant and cold, and with much encouragement from Solonis himself, great Baranak soon found himself in love with her. She, in turn, came to love him.

  Tall and strong Andrelara was, fair and blonde-tressed and lovely, but hard as steel. A good match in every way for the great god of battle. She knew him not by that identity, however; she saw him only in his mortal guise as a leader of a distant stellar faction, there to work with her own government. At the insistent urging of Solonis, Baranak never shared with her his actual identity—for the Fates, he said, had shown him that Andrelara should never and must never know. For the future timeline to be preserved even as the future crises were averted, this had to be the case.

  Andrelara produced a son and a daughter with great Baranak. And with her he remained until her untimely death and their majority, at which point Solonis returned Baranak to his own time and place. As for the mindset and feelings of the golden god at that moment, we can only speculate.

  Well had Solonis planned all of this, and well had he prepared, and for all the years going forward he kept an eye on those two grown children of the god of battle. For it was known that the gods could not conceive children with one another—only with a mortal. Had Baranak remained enamored of Karilyne until the all-too-swiftly-approaching day of his death, he would never have produced offspring. And his offspring, as Solonis well knew, were absolutely critical to the survival of all of reality in the days and ages to come.

  Here is the twist that even the great god of battle never grasped: It had never been Baranak that Solonis desired as his agent, there in the far future, when those great apocalyptic crises were fated to arise. No, the golden god was needed back in his own era, to deal with his own set of challenges, and he would be long-dead by the time of the Shattering event and the entropy crisis.

  What Solonis had in mind was the assistance not of Baranak himself, but of his grandson, Gallus, whose tale will be elsewhere told; and of his great-great-grandson, who grew up to be a mighty soldier himself, in the III Legion of the Anatolian Empire. And to them Solonis would later return, bringing with him word of their cosmic destinies.

  Wheels within wheels. It was always so, when dealing with Solonis. Never have I trusted him, even as I have been swept up in his Machiavellian plans myself, on multiple occasions.

  And now you know the story of how Baranak came to have offspring, despite his deep and abiding love for the Lady Karilyne; and of the critical importance of those children—something I believe it is important to understand, but which I doubt my dear lady would ever wish to include in the formal records of these times.

  And with that business settled, we can now turn to my mistress, the Ice Queen herself, as she picks up the tale, beginning at the moment she first awoke in that cold and tiny prison cell.

  Respectfully submitted,

  —Mirana of the Dyonari,

  apprentice to the Lady Karilyne

  ONE

  And then that deep, endless night faded and I was awake—though the cold stone beneath me made me wish I were still asleep, still wreathed in reassuring dreams and not dark, disturbing reality.

  My eyes open, I rolled over and sat up.

  The black of sleep had vanished, but now I found myself surrounded entirely by gray; only the faintest of dim, ambient lighting allowed me to see anything at all.

  Instinctively my hand went for my sword at my hip. Instead, my numb fingers brushed only the cold silver metal and black leather of the warrior’s garb I always wore; that which was a part of my Aspect. My sword and its scabbard were missing.

  Not panic—not yet, if at all, I being who I am—but a measure of concern took root within my mind and began to grow.

  I spoke the question aloud: “Where am I?”

  My voice came back to me as a flattened echo; it sounded hollow to me. Unreal. It put me further into a state of unease.

  My first and instinctive reaction is always to go on the offensive. Lacking my sword, I reached out again, patting the hard surface on either side of me. As I suspected, my axe was missing as well.

  My axe.

  Anger rose within me now. I had been disarmed against my will.

  Was I imprisoned? Had I been abducted? Was I being detained somehow? If so, by whom?

  Questions. I hate
questions. I prefer action—direct, unyielding action. Mysteries to me are an annoyance. Show me my objective, reveal to me my adversaries, and I will deal with them in short order. But this…

  Infuriating! Impossible! Was I not Karilyne, goddess of the Golden City, silver lady of the icy wastes, respected by all and rightly feared by most?

  I took some slight comfort in the fact that I at least knew who I was. But—how had I come to be here, in this tiny cell?

  That I could not remember.

  Enough of this.

  I stood and looked about. The grayness extended in every direction. It was like being lost in a dense fog bank at twilight. Walls, floor, ceiling—all were utterly obscured. Only the bench-like raised stone surface upon which I had lain was visible, and it appeared hazy and indistinct despite being so close by.

  Effectively blind, I raised my right arm in front of me, moving my hand about. I felt nothing, touched nothing. Frowning, I turned in a slow circle until my fingertips brushed against more of the cold, smooth stone to my left, this time in the form of a wall. Closing my hand, I rapped my knuckles against it. Hard. Solid.