Page 55 of The Laws of Nature (Heirs of the Empire #3)

TOBI

H arok’s legs are visibly shaking as he climbs from the bed and begins to untie the ropes. As each limb is freed Tobi curls it to his body with a soft sigh of relief.

“We have done everything from the book,” says Tobi, dreamily. “Whatever will we do in the evenings now?”

Harok laughs as he removes the last of the rope. Tobi curls up on the bed and as he does, Harok makes a sound like a grunt of surprise and collapses onto the bed. Face down in a strange, crumpled heap. Tobi springs over, “ Irgorye? ” he says, cradling Harok’s face in horror.

Panic jolts through Tobi. Has Harok been poisoned somehow? Has his heart seized?

But when Tobi taps Harok’s cheek, Harok appears to be sleeping. Simply sleeping as if he fell into slumber the instant he freed Tobi.

“Irgorye?” Tobi says again.

Harok does not wake, but he mumbles something. Soft, but Tobi thinks he says, “Diazuul. ”

Harok had mumbled Diazuul once before, when his mind was heavy with sofi.

“Diazuul,’ Harok says again. The way he says it this time is raw. Laced with fear.

As he says it, the chamber door opens behind Tobi. He turns and Yaelin glides into the room.

Tobi jumps back from the doorway, pulling a blanket over himself, thinking that Yaelin would not wish to see her son in bed with his lover, but she waves her hand, gesturing as if his state of undress bothers her not at all, she says, “Please, kushir, stay where you are.”

Tobi frowns at her. “Did you do this? Did you put him to sleep somehow?” He stares at her. Could she do such a thing? Could anyone?

He thinks of how he’d felt during the feast. Magic is real. Here, if nowhere else. And he knows, for certain, he is seeing that magic now.

He looks from Harok to Yaelin. Harok’s mother.

Kushel to Irgo Lal. She has never approached Tobi before.

In fact, she has been so distant for the entire time Tobi has been at Urynwud that he had long decided that Yaelin must disapprove of him somehow.

She has barely said a word to him since the day he arrived.

“It is time. You are ready,” Yaelin says. She speaks Ambolk, but it does not sound harsh. Her voice is smooth and soothing.

“Ready?” Tobi says as Yaelin moves into the room. “Ready for what?”

Yaelin settles herself on a carved wooden chair beside the bed.

Harok’s unconscious naked body is stretched out between them.

“I saw it in you tonight. The power you have has matured. The forest has wound its way into you. You feel it too, don’t you?

You have been here many moons. You have become truly bonded to my son and to this place.

It is time for you to do what Harok brought you here to do. ”

Tobi looks at Harok’s sleeping face. “What? What did he bring me here for?” Tobi feels a strange sick feeling low in his belly. What secret has Harok been keeping from him? “If Harok has something to tell me, he can tell me himself.” Tobi snaps. “Wake him up. Let him speak with me.”

As Tobi looks at Yaelin, she leans forward, and says, “But, you see, kushir, it is my truth to tell. I am the reason you are here in Urynwud.”

“You?” Tobi says. “But I have never seen you before I came here. How could you be the reason I am here?”

Yaelin looks at Tobi for a long time then says, “Kushir, I am sorry for all that has been done to bring you here. And for the task I will ask of you. It will be painful. But it must be so.” She speaks slowly.

Slower than Tobi needs Ambolk to be to follow it, but he supposes Yaelin has no idea how much he has learned.

Tobi swallows. “What task?”

Yaelin leans over the bed and touches the glyph on Harok’s chest. “I made this to protect him but its power has faded. And then he took a wound to it. That made everything worse. He has had to fight so hard. Twenty years he has fought that demon.”

Tobi frowns at her. “Fought what demon? Diazuul? Is Diazuul not slain?”

“Do you know who Diazuul truly is? You should.”

Tobi shakes his head. “Diazuul is your forest demon. Why should I know of him? I am from Azuria.”

“Indeed. And in Azuria, you follow a cruel God.”

“I suppose so,” Tobi says, frowning. He cannot imagine why Yaelin wants to speak of Zai.

“Two hundred years ago,” Yaelin says, “when your ancestor Sarelik Darek left Urynwud, he started a revolution and took power in Azuria. And when he was king, your ancestor commanded that all men worship Zai. Sarelik had Azuria worship that creature as the Solwen did. Harok ended that here. But Diazuul is still a God in Azuria.”

Tobi blinks. “You believe what your husband Irgo Lal did? That Zai is a face of Diazuul?”

“It is not a matter of belief,” Yaelin says. “It is the truth.”

“But Zai is nothing like Diazuul. Our laws, the Book of the Rules, are not followed here. Irgo Lal and Emperor Erond argued over it.”

Yaelin gives a small smile. “Diazuul does not care about your Book of the Rules. In Azuria there are cruel punishments done in the eyes of your God Zai for even small crimes, floggings, mutilation, castration. You even punish people for who they take to bed. But that is nothing to do with Diazuul. He will gain his power through fear, whether that be blood sacrifices or imperial cruelty. It does not matter so long as his darkness is worshipped. But Sarelik Darek’s revolution, even the Azurian Empire, was all part of Diazuul’s plan.

Azuria’s reverie made him stronger. As Azuria conquered more lands and charged those people to take Zai as their God.

His power only grew. He grew so strong he could influence men in Urynwud to do his will. ”

Tobi swallows, then says, “If Zai truly is the same demon that Irgo Harok killed. Zai is dead?”

Yaelin smiles again. A more unpleasant smile.

“You think a God who was worshipped by an Empire could be killed by my son? An ordinary mortal man? Of course not. Harok did not kill Diazuul. It was all folly. No one should have even attempted such a thing. Such a foolish thing.” Yaelin shakes her head sadly.

“Harok did exactly what Diazuul wanted him to do.”

Tobi frowns, trying to shape Yaelin’s words into the story he has been told. “But he had no choice, surely. Harok was made a blood sacrifice. He had to slay Diazuul to survive.”

“He did not slay Diazuul,” Yaelin says with a small flash of anger.

As if she is growing impatient “And he did not need to. Harok had many supporters in Urynwud. He was the rightful Irgo. Lal’s son and named as heir.

Vahul was a cruel usurper. Many were disgusted about the way Vahul treated Harok.

Harok could have taken Urynwud back without allowing Vahul to name him as the sacrifice and have him cast into the pit.

Just as Lal could have refused to allow the Blood Priests to sacrifice him.

But Harok wanted his vengeance. He relished the idea of suffering those trials and leaping into that pit alive to slay the demon.

He let it happen. Pretending to Vahul that he was the same honourable man his father was.

Because he wanted to be cast into that pit.

” Yaelin shakes her head. “And he was simply carrying out Diazuul’s own plan.

Diazuul uses what men truly desire to twist them to do his will.

Sarelik Darek wanted the end of the Hevelikar.

Lal wanted to prove he was the meeting of the two great faiths of the forest. The Blood Priests wanted rid of Lal and his ties to the Verilissia.

Vahul wanted to usurp his brother. Harok wanted his vengeance.

All of them did what they wanted to do in service of Diazuul and his plot to rise again. ”

Tobi frowns. “I’m sorry. I do not understand. What happened to Diazuul? What did Harok do?”

Yaelin says, “The Verilissia had been aware of the presence of Diazuul hidden among the roots of Susal-ur-Bellan for a long time. Long before Urynwud was built. It was the Verilissia who constructed the magic that kept him trapped in the pit below the sacred tree and prevented him from rising for thousands of years. Even when he convinced the Solwen he was their God, we kept him trapped. But through Sarelik Darek’s actions he grew strong.

He began to influence the Solwen further.

He had them make blood sacrifices to him, but that too was just part of his plan.

He did not care about receiving such sacrifices, only what they would do.

What they would allow Diazuul to do. What they could cause my son to do.

Harok was rash, just as Diazuul knew he would be.

And because of him, doing that demon’s will, Diazuul is close to freedom.

Despite all the efforts of the Verilissia, Diazuul rises. ”

Tobi shivers again. He wishes he still felt sure that Diazuul was just a story.

That all Gods are just some kind of trick.

But he is sure now that all Yaelin says is true.

There really is a demon. A demon who grew strong by being worshipped as a God.

First by the Solwen and then by all of Azuria.

A demon who influenced the Solwen somehow to make blood sacrifices.

Who manipulated things so Lal was sacrificed and his cruel brother took charge of Urynwud.

All so Harok would leap into that pit and…

“So what did Harok do? How did he help Diazuul to rise?”

“What he did is why you are here.”

“Why I’m…”

“The Hevelikar were descended from those five princes who destroyed the Bellator. The race of demons that once ruled this world. Diazuul is a descendant of those demons. A remnant of that great fight. Sarelik Darek married a Hevelikar woman. You descend from that union. You have that ancient fae blood in you.”

“I know that,” Tobi says. “I have fae blood because I am descended from the Hevelikar who claimed to be fae. I have the silver in my eyes. It is a well known story.” Tobi pauses. “And because of that you think I can slay Diazuul? That is why I am here? Are you planning to cast me into that pit?”

Yaelin shakes her head. “Diazuul is not in that pit.”

“Diazuul is not slain and not in that pit? Then where is he?”

“Diazuul’s own body was part of the prison that kept him trapped in the roots of Susal-ur-Bellan.

The magic that bound his body to that tree.

Harok slayed that body and freed Diazuul’s spirit.

It rose out of that pit when Harok did. Inside him.

Diazuul took his body. The demon is still inside my son. ”

Tobi stares at her. “Harok is a demon? Harok is Diazuul?”

Yaelin nods, but says, “Not entirely. The creature shares his body. It lives within him like a curse. He is strong. He has fought that demon inside him for more than twenty years. I carved that mark on his chest so his body could be Diazuul’s new prison, locking that creature inside.

But Harok is a mortal man. And no man’s body can have the power of that sacred tree.

My marking is growing too weak to fight Diazuul.

The demon will find a way, soon, to take full control of him. ”

“What will happen to Harok then?”

“He will die. He will die and his body will live on, only as Diazuul.”

Tobi is shaking. He doesn’t know where to begin with his racing thoughts.

All this time Harok has been part demon, fighting a demon trying to gain control of him.

He looks down at Harok’s face. Since he was sixteen summers.

He‘d had to find a way to fight it. He’d let his mother carve that mark on him, but how much had that helped?

How much had been Harok’s own iron will.

I am strong Irgo.

He’s said it like a mantra. He had to believe it true. “What can I do? You said I can help him. What can I do?”

“You can help him. It had to be you. With your blood. A descendant of the five fae princes. Bonded to my son by sharing his bed. Believing the truth of what you do. You can end Diazuul.”

“How?” Tobi says, his voice sounds desperate. He feels so lost. He understands little of this, but if he can help Harok, he will. He will do whatever Yaelin commands of him.

Yaelin speaks even more slowly. As if she wants to be sure Tobi understands every word. “The only way to stop Diazuul rising again in Harok’s body is to kill Harok.”

Tobi stares at her. “No,” he says. “No. How could that work? Wouldn’t that just free Diazuul again?”

Yaelin shakes her head. “Not if it happens in the right way. If Harok dies whilst he is in control of himself, whilst his will is controlling Diazuul, the demon will not be able to leave his body. It will be trapped inside. And die with him. But it is not a simple matter. The demon has great power to protect the body that contains it. He has kept Harok alive, not allowing him to die. But he cannot fight against you. If you were to kill Harok with the same sacred blade that he used to slay the demon, Demonica, the great sword of the forest. Harok will die and take that creature with him.”

Tobi looks to the end of the bed, where Harok’s shed clothing lies. His sword and belt are laid beside his breeches, cloak and harness. “Demonica,” Tobi says softly.

Yaelin nods. She rises from her chair and collects the sword.

She glides back over to the bed and presents it to Tobi saying, “It must be you, kushir.

Unless you do it the demon will take him over completely.

And when that happens it will be too late.

I do not know how much time there is left.

You're the last hope for all of Urynwud. You must slay Harok and the demon inside him.”

Tobi looks at the sword and shakes his head. “I will not,” Tobi says. “I cannot.”

In response, Yaelin simply lays the sword on the bed beside Tobi. “You are his kushir. Bound to obey him. Only you can protect him from being taken by that demon, kushir. Only you can destroy what lives inside him. And save him.” She turns away and walks to the door.

Tobi stares at her back “You really expect me to kill him? He came for me. He saved me from the Exceli.”

Yaelin turns in the doorway. “And why do you think he did that? He saved you so you could do this for him,” she says. “He always knew, this was what you were here for.”

As the door closes, Tobi looks at Harok.

Harok’s eyes open.