by Rex Jameson
He could see Julian tilting his head in curiosity. He doubted this dangerous minion of Orcus recognized Theodore as a threat. He could take his time. Theodore pointed at the raging inferno behind the vampire.
Julian laughed.
“Really?” Julian asked. “You’re still serving your old master? You actually found time, with all this going on, to kill another Visanthi royal?”
“I made a promise,” Theodore said, nodding. He was stalling—buying time to do what needed to be done. Better to seem completely non-threatening.
“Aethis was a good man,” Theodore said, finally looking up at the pale High Lord of the Mallory estate. “A good friend.”
Julian sat on a bench across the fire and adjusted his barely-there robe and crisped tunic. Behind him, men threw water on Jandhar’s tent with buckets carried all the way from the ocean in a long line. He looked at the sleeping dragon.
“What about you?” Theodore asked, turning the tables. “Haven’t grown tired of serving your master?”
“I wish it was that simple,” Julian said.
“Isn’t it?”
“He’s made me a promise,” Julian said. “He says if he wins this war, he’ll pull my love from the Abyss—restore her to me. I’d do anything for her, even if it means killing you.”
Theodore grunted in acknowledgement.
“You don’t think he will?” Julian asked. “You question his power?”
“Doesn’t matter what I think,” Theodore said truthfully. “I’m not a thinker. I’m a killer.”
“Aren’t we all?” Julian asked with mirth. “What are you still doing here? It’s not like you to stick around a crime scene—not from what I’ve heard, anyway.”
“I have to apply a poultice,” Theodore said, pointing at the dragon. “His wounds are dire. Do you mind?”
“A poultice?” Julian asked, sniffing the air. “Smells like salt.”
“Just common table salt,” Theodore said, raising his hands into the air to indicate he wasn’t a threat.
The vampire laughed. He rearranged part of his tattered, lacy shirt to hilarious effect. The dragons had destroyed his outfit and melted most of it to his body.
“I guess I can wait,” Julian said. “If he’s healed or not, it doesn’t matter to me. Won’t change anything. What makes you think you understand dragon anatomy anyway?”
Theodore didn’t laugh, even though he wanted to. He kept his voice simple and direct. He knew Julian was no longer a man but some augmented creature with untold powers. He knew Julian could tell if he was anxious—that he might even be thinking about emptying Theodore’s veins the same as Theodore had just done to Jandhar.
“I shadowed Jandhar in Visanth for many months,” Theodore said. “Watched him trying to fix them. They seemed more trouble than they were worth, but he kept working at it—trying to grow adult dragons. I cut into a few of the creatures myself, looking for weaknesses. I found a few and then waited for the prince to find me. I had a choice before me—kill him and stop him in the desert, or try to understand him and channel him toward the betterment of Surdel.”
“Seems like you made a poor choice,” Julian said.
“No,” he disagreed. “Jandhar did.”
“You don’t regret anything?”
“I regret lots of things,” Theodore said. “Don’t you?”
The Blood Lord stared into the fire.
“Where is her body?” Theodore asked.
“Whose body?” Julian asked.
Theodore put on his flame-retardant gloves. He wondered if he should have killed the whole camp to stop it from being turned to the other side. Better to fall into the Abyss than feast on the living.
“You mean Jayna’s?” Julian asked.
Theodore nodded.
“Why do you want to know?” Julian asked, leaning forward.
“There are other people who can raise the dead.”
“You mean like the Necromancer? You think I should serve him instead—the man who killed your master?”
“Aethis is not my master,” Theodore said. “Besides, he’s dead. Whatever oaths I swore to him are buried and done with.”
“You don’t serve the Eldenwalds anymore?”
“I serve my people,” Theodore said.
“An idealist,” Julian said. “A man of the people? You?”
Theodore picked up the white-hot pan with the melted salt in it. He kept it in the fire for a moment and motioned with his head toward the dragon. With his other hand, he brought the water flask to his lips and unstoppered it with his teeth. Every motion was slow and calculated to keep Julian in his seat.
“Do you mind?” Theodore asked, trying to keep his tone as normal as possible.
Julian stood up quickly, showing off his blurring speed. Theodore could barely follow his movements. The man was fast. He motioned with his hands toward the dragon and started walking over to meet Theodore there.
“It’s hot,” Theodore said mildly. “You might want to stand back.”
“I’ll survive,” Julian said with a confident, humored grin.
Theodore nodded again cordially. He grabbed a nearby bucket that one of the courtiers had left from putting out the fire on Jandhar’s tent and emptied his water flask into it. The reaction needed as much water instantaneously hitting the molten salt as possible.
He had an idea. Something that might put the vampire even more off guard.
“Would you mind?” he asked, handing Julian the metal pan that held the salt.
Julian shook his head and chuckled. “I’m pretty sure this day couldn’t possibly get any stranger… I’ve gone from fighting paladins and pikemen to practicing dragon medicine…”
Julian’s hands sizzled as he grasped the metal rod. It burned away his skin but the flesh grew back over and over again.
“It’s hot,” Theodore reiterated humorously.
Julian cursed and chuckled. “Yeah, I’m gathering that.”
“I’m glad we had this chat,” Theodore said, smiling. “It’s good that we’ve met like this.”
“OK, this is getting painful,” Julian said. “Do I just throw this onto the dragon?”
“Yes,” Theodore said as seriously as a scholar at the Kingarth Library. “We do it on the count of three. If you throw the salt onto him, I’ll pour the water at the same time.”
Julian passed the metal handle from hand-to-hand, and his skin continued to sizzle. He hissed. Theodore motioned for the vampire to move to the other side of the creature. He made another gesture for a sideways throw toward the creature’s neck.
“OK,” Julian said. “Quick count. Do it.”
“1…” Theodore said, looking directly into Julian’s eyes, willing him to participate in this. “2… 3…”
The Blood Lord tossed the salt, and the dragon roared briefly just as the water hit. But the effect was instantaneous. A huge fireball blew outward, igniting the liquid inside of the creature’s neck and combusting Jahgo’s entire head. The blast channeled just as Theodore had wanted it to—just as he had motioned for the vampire to shape it.
Julian flew backward. He rolled and then gaped up at the headless dragon. Its shoulders slumped slowly to the ground, and the vampire seemed to slump with it. All cockiness and bravado was gone now. The skin on his palms seared and sizzled from the molten pan before growing back.
Theodore drifted back into the shadows behind the fire.
“He’s going to kill me,” Julian whispered. “He’s going to rip my arms off and beat me with them.”
“Don’t worry,” Theodore whispered, “You’ll grow them back.”
Julian’s ears perked up as he turned toward Theodore’s place in the shadows. Theodore ran as softly as he could toward the sound of fighting. Plate-on-plate. Metal-on-bone.
He ran for three or four minutes, never looking back. He strained his ears for the sound of Julian coming, but he caught nothing obvious. The vampire must have stayed frozen in shock and dread.
As he neared the woods, Theodore tripped over something hard. He thought it might have been vines, but on inspection, he realized it was a man, but not a human corpse. This lump had been an undead. Grimy. Smelled awful. Someone had bashed its head in with a rock or a hammer.
He quickly scattered its guts all over his body, hoping to mask his smell from Julian. He strapped a few slimy bones across his chest and shoulders with pieces of leather from his tunic. He tried to be quiet and listen for rustlings, but as he tied the last piece of leather, a plated glove grabbed him by the throat.
A knife was in Theodore’s hand in fractions of a second. He stabbed and he stabbed, finding some slots between the plates at the man’s armpit. The knight didn’t flinch. A visored helm peered down at Theodore in the darkness. He closed his eyes as he fought against the death grip around his throat. He heard the visor open.
“Open your eyes!” the man with the low, baritone voice said.
Theodore opened his eyelids wide, and the man sighed appreciatively.
“You’re not undead,” the man said, releasing Theodore. “Your eyes aren’t green fire. You’re free to go.”
Theodore pulled his knife out of the man’s armpit, where a blackness spread in the dark night. In the dull orange light from the fires, he could see a gash across his assailant’s jaw. It was affecting the man’s speech.
“Who are you?” Theodore asked.
“My name is Clayton,” the man said. “Who are you?”
The forest came alive with more men in armor plating. They walked out in the open, looking north.
“Where are you people from?” Theodore asked.
“Perketh,” Clayton said.
“Then you’re undead?” Theodore asked.
“No,” the knight insisted seriously. “We’re Reborn. We’re Ashton’s Army. We’ve been fighting the undead here for most of the night. Not many left here anymore though. We plan to head south to see who we can save. You’re welcome to—”
“I’m on your side then,” Theodore said, “but I have to go north just a bit. My own people need me.”
“Orcus is north,” The knight said.
“I have a place underground. I’ll be OK.”
Clayton offered his plated hand, and Theodore took it.
“Fare well,” Clayton said, “and good luck.”
Theodore considered these Reborn for the first time. Perhaps they weren’t like Orcus’ minions. Perhaps the Necromancer might not be part of the demon lord problem. Perhaps Ashton was true to his supposed origins. Maybe a descendant of a god.
“You too,” Theodore said finally.
24
We Have to Stop Meeting Like This
Ashton walked behind his demon escort Frederick. He hadn’t taken the Eye off since he purchased the leather patch from the humorous merchant couple from Corinth. The world was so different with the strange jewel in front of him—more understandable and predictable. And everyone looked different.
Before he had donned the Eye, Frederick seemed evil, brooding, and an unsalvageable, irredeemable demon. Now, Ashton only saw sadness and anger, overwhelmingly directed inward. Ashton sometimes caught glimpses of tournaments and heroic deeds outside of Perketh, but they would be bombarded and overwhelmed by butchery within the castle—of Edward Vossen and King Aethis Eldenwald—or of falling through the darkness of the Void. Ashton tended to look away from these visions, which tormented him almost as much as they appeared to torture his companion.
There was one unmistakable truth in his visions into the mind of this creature. The shadow demon pulled from the Abyss was at least part human—part of the Frederick who had once existed on Nirendia.
It was during Ashton’s contemplation of Frederick that an overloaded horse-drawn cart with a lone driver clopped to a stop in front of him. The man holding the reins waved him over with a wary look.
Frederick approached the driver with a hand on his sword pommel, but Ashton waved him off. The man wore a well-tailored, leather tunic and cloak, but he had the whiskers of a man who had been without a shave for a few days. He seemed tired but harmless, and Ashton was eager for a conversation with a normal person after peering into the mind of his tortured companion for the past two days.
“Are you coming from the west?” the driver asked, looking over Ashton’s shoulder at the road and rolling countryside.
Ashton nodded. “Yeah, from Kingarth.”
“Dark times,” the man said with an exaggerated sigh. “Undead to the south. Demons attacking Mallory Keep. Orcs rumored all over the place.”
The Eye reddened the world in Ashton’s right eye.
“What does that mean?” Ashton asked aloud but intended the question only for the Eye.
“I have no idea,” the man said, “but I’m not sticking around to find out. Packed everything I had and headed west. I’d rather be closer to the capital and the King’s Guard.”
Crimson lines shot across Ashton’s vision back toward the east where the man had come from. The Eye told him a name too. Albert Frost.
“You seen any patrols?” Albert Frost asked. “You’re the first people I’ve seen today.”
The Eye flashed another red image. He could feel its earnest wish to aid him in investigating the man. Ashton subtly shook his head once to indicate that he wasn’t consenting to the intrusion.
“No,” Ashton said, “sorry. We haven’t seen any patrols. I think everyone is holed up at the castle, preparing our defenses against the undead.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” Albert said. “Hard to believe, but I guess it’s necessary.”
Ashton looked over the man’s wagon. It was filled with furniture, but not all of it for a man who lived by himself. There was a woman’s vanity with what looked like a burlap-covered mirror. Mattresses for several children. The Eye showed him an image of five and a blonde wife. The Eye flashed red again.
“Your family following you?” Ashton asked.
“No,” Albert said. “These are my sister’s family possessions. She and her husband are traveling by a faster coach to Celtus to get our old family home in order. Maybe you saw them on your way here.”
“No,” Ashton said.
He began to feel sick as the Eye quickly peppered him with imagery. Children slept in corners on dark carpets. The wife lay in a field next to another man. He realized quickly that none of them were sleeping. They had been stabbed to death. The carpets beneath the five children weren’t carpets at all but wooden floors coated in thick, dried blood.
“I don’t understand,” Ashton said.
The Eye seemed to take this as a request for more information. The world faded into a torrent of images from the ocular device. The man’s life unfolded right before Ashton.
Albert and his beautiful wife Samantha get married in a Chapel of Cronos. Their first two children are born and both were brown-haired like their father. An image of a blond man lightly touching the wife’s arm as the two pass each other in a market. A girl is born, this time with hair so blonde that her locks are practically white. A boy. Then another girl. Samantha grows more distant. Small problems become shouting matches.
“You alright?” Albert asked.
“Yeah,” Ashton said, though he couldn’t focus on the man through the torrent of imagery and the sick feeling in his stomach.
Albert finds his wife and her lover in the market. Talking intimately. She’s smiling. He confronts her at home, and she tells the kids to pack their things. She leaves the house. Albert sees her lover in his yard. He picks up a carving knife from a wooden block beside the front door and heads back to the rooms of his youngest ones first. He’s so angry.
Blood everywhere. Children scream. It reminded Ashton of the march of the Red Army, but he wasn’t there to resurrect the slain family. He felt nauseous.
Frederick had moved next to the driver from the other side. His sword blade glimmered from the two inches that were exposed from the scabbard. The Eye offered a glimpse of what the shadow de
mon wanted to do. An image of a headless man on a bouncing cart as spooked horses galloped west. Ashton closed his eyes and looked away from the man.
“Stop it,” Ashton said.
“I don’t mean to pry,” Albert said. “I’m a private person myself. I don’t want anyone in my business either. You just look… sick. Like you might throw up.”
Ashton nodded.
“I’ll be on my way, then,” Albert said. “My sister will be in Celtus. With any luck, I’ll find a King’s Guard escort in Nydale.”
The Eye flashed images of the murdered children again. Ashton imagined the King’s Guard arresting Albert.
“Yes…,” Ashton said, “with any luck.”
“Thanks for the chat,” the man called. “Be careful on the way east. They say orcs and devils are heading north!”
“It seems that devils are heading west too,” Ashton muttered.
As the man’s cart grew smaller to the west, the Eye flashed more scenes to Ashton. A homed pigeon had arrived for Albert’s sister Charlene, informing her of the murder of her sister-in-law and all of her nieces and nephews. She brewed a special stew, laced with nightshade berries for her traveling brother. Albert would not survive a night sleeping under her roof.
Ashton felt better and worse at the same time, and the feeling persisted as they walked east. Three other parties of travelers greeted them, but he refused conversation—only nodding and quickly moving on. He didn’t want to know what types of people they were. It was better to assume they were good and leave it alone.
As they reached the town of Suway, he found himself covering his face and eyepatch and looking away from the crowds of people. Ashton wondered if Albert had risked driving his cart through the heart of the city and the merchants and good citizens who might have been as suspicious as he was. The Eye showed him a dirt path north of town that looped back toward the east. Albert had avoided potential notice and justice by taking the side road.
