Breaking the Flame

by Christopher Patterson

  Erik felt the ground rumble under his feet. Like a sheet tossed by his mother as she put it out to dry, it seemed to sway and roll and, when he looked up, off in the distance black clouds had built up, with purples, pinks, and whites flashing through their darkness as thunder followed. A blinding lightning bolt struck the ground, so bright Erik was forced to close his eyes, and when he opened them again, he saw a small mountain range, as black as the clouds, and Erik felt compelled to walk towards them.

  But with each step he took, the mountains never seemed closer. He just stayed in the same spot until, ahead of him, a man suddenly appeared, his back to Erik, walking in the same direction in front of him.

  “Hey!” Erik called. “What’s your name?”

  The man never turned around, and he didn’t answer; Erik hadn’t expected him to. Then came an all too familiar smell, that of rot and decay, and he knew they were there. He could hear them. The other man must have sensed them too, and he began to run, only, he never gained any distance.

  “Don’t run!” Erik called. “That’s what they want! Come to me! Stand and fight them!”

  But the man didn’t hear Erik, or he ignored him. Then, Erik saw them, an army of the undead. Some of them were mere skeletons, loosely held together by barely strings of ligament. Others were recently deceased, skin intact save for the yellow and blue and black decay.

  Erik heard the man scream, and the undead laughed. He stopped walking, drew his sword, and readied himself. The other man ran faster, but he went nowhere. There was another screeching cry, a loud thunder bang, and a bolt of lightning struck the tallest, black peak of the distant mountain range. The earth shook. The air heated up. And Erik could only think of a dragon.

  This must be her realm.

  The earth shook again, and this time, the undead came. They ran as fast as they could, moving wherever they wanted to, and the man in front of him didn’t stand a chance. Their boney hands slashed and ravaged his body, pieces of flesh and muscle flying into the air, and Erik smelled new death. Then they saw him.

  “Bring it on,” he said, with the hint of a smile on his face.

  They came, and he cut them down, one after another. An endless stream of the undead. A whole army of the undead. But Ilken’s Blade did its work.

  Erik felt like he had been there for hours, and for the first time, he felt fatigued in this place of his dreams. His shoulders and back ached. Several skeletal fingers made it past his defenses and scratched his skin. One even drew blood but nothing like they had done to the man in front. He heard another cry, this one behind him, and he spun around.

  “By the Creator,” Erik muttered in Dwarvish, seeing a dwarf rush to his side, battle-axe gripped in two hands and naught but a pair of stitched pants on his body.

  The dwarf threw himself into the fray of undead, and the scene gave Erik renewed strength. They fought the undead together and, even though their enemy kept coming, harder and faster, they fought. Erik felt blood run from his body, but it didn’t matter. When he felt his strength wane, the dwarf would cry out, and he would jump into the fight again, reinvigorated.

  Finally, there was another screeching cry, another thunderclap, another blinding flash of lightning, and the undead were gone. The mountain range was gone. The clouds were gone. But the dwarf was still there.

  “Who are you?” Erik asked in Dwarvish.

  The dwarf dropped his battle-axe and put his right hand over his left breast.

  “Baptized,” was all he said.

  When the dwarf removed his hand from his breast, Erik saw a brand, raw and red and new.

  ****

  Bofim had been certain the underground roads of Drüum Balmdüukr were safe and well-traveled, but as Erik walked, he saw few people. A dwarf here or there, but that was it. The well-lit road and uniform walls were monotonous after a while, but he needed to keep going. He needed something to take his mind off the scroll—shoved into the front of his belt—and off his brother, the dwarves, the mountain folk, and his cousin. So, he left his companions behind, keeping going as they slept in a small barracks that were built specifically for travelers into the wall every five leagues or so. Like his dream the last time he slept, he moved onwards, but this time, he progressed.

  The part of the tunnel he was now in wasn’t as straight as before, and it continued to curve slightly to the left then the right. Erik took several more steps and then stopped, pressing his back hard against a wall so that someone would have had to be only several paces away to see him. He listened, intently, remembering the tracking lessons both his father and the dwarves had taught him. From the direction he had come, the sound was ever so slight, but he heard them; whispers and light footsteps. They were getting closer. He felt gooseflesh rise along his arms and a tingle at the back of his head. They were closer still, their voices seeming a little more rushed, their footsteps faster as they sought to catch up with him. And then they came into view.

  Six dwarves rounded the slight curve in the tunnel, almost running, but when they saw Erik, pretending to drink from a water skin, they slowed to a leisurely walk. Erik hung his water skin back on his belt and gave the dwarves a slight nod and a smile. They returned the gesture, although he felt as if they eyed him cautiously.

  “Good day,” Erik said in Dwarvish.

  “Good day,” one of the dwarves replied, seeming surprised Erik spoke their language. Bofim had explained it wasn’t so strange to see men traveling this road, the one they called Handelstrat, but bid Erik be careful since it wasn’t too common. He figured it might calm these dwarves if he spoke to them in their native language.

  “Are you traveling to Lagern?” Erik asked, speaking of the small dwarvish town that many used Handelstrat to reach.

  “No,” the same dwarf said, stopping only for a moment to speak with Erik, “further.”

  “I’m going to Lagern. Perhaps I could travel with you?” Erik lied with a feigned smile, “until we reach it.”

  The dwarf gave the other five a concerned look. One whispered something, inaudible and in a different language—one Erik thought he had heard before—to the one speaking.

  “No, thanks,” the dwarf replied. “Don’t mean to be rude. We are in a rush.”

  “No problem,” Erik said, lifting his water skin again as a salute and then pretending to take another drink.

  Then, the smell broke into his senses. It was so slight, he almost missed it, but it was there, nonetheless—the stink of rot. It wasn’t necessarily pungent, more like the rotting spot on an apple that was otherwise good, but it was there. However insignificant, it was the smell of death.

  Erik let his water skin drop, its strap still attached to his belt, as his hand withdrew Ilken’s Blade just as a broad-bladed short sword swung towards his face. His blade of Dwarf’s Iron easily swatted the short sword away, knocking it out of the dwarf’s hand. He meant to jab at the attacking dwarf, but one of the other ones swung a club at him, and he had to move quickly to get out of its way. As Erik looked to each of the six dwarves, they quickly surrounded him, weapons ready, darkness in their eyes.

  The first one came at him again, jabbing with that short blade and reaching for the scroll case in his belt at the same time. Erik moved, stepped aside, bringing his blade across the dwarf’s ribs. He cried out as the clubber attacked. Erik gripped Ilken’s Blade with two hands, chopping the club in half and then removing the dwarf’s head from his neck. The smell of death intensified.

  Erik felt something smack against the back of his leg and turned to see a dwarf yielding a quarterstaff. But before he could attack, the short sword jabbed at his face. He dodged another clubber, swatted away the quarterstaff, jerked away as another hand reached for the scroll case, and felt the tip of a dagger graze his hip. The dwarves closed in, and as they chuckled, they reminded Erik of his dreams … the dead.

  Ilken’s Blade shattered the quarterstaff as the dwarf tried to block Erik’s attack, and the sword sunk deep into a meaty shoulder. Blood spraye
d the wall as Erik removed his blade and then jammed it into the dwarf’s belly. Intestines spilled when Erik ripped his weapon away to block the edge of an axe, but then he slipped on a slick of blood and went to one knee.

  The dwarf with the short sword tried to take advantage of Erik’s position, but he blocked another attack and swiped at the dwarf’s leg, exposing muscle. Erik brought his blade down hard with a mighty grunt, but the dwarf with an axe blocked him. Standing, Erik squared off with the axe wielder. The dwarf giggled devilishly, taunting Erik in that language he thought he had heard before. As the dwarf spoke, Erik heard distant laughing. The dead. The torches that lined the walls seemed to dim a little. It was the language he heard in the halls of Orvencrest. It was the language Patûk Al’Banan spoke when he read the scroll. It was the language of the dwomanni, the language of the Shadow.

  “The Shadow is not welcome here,” Erik said, swinging at the dwarf and missing.

  “The Shadow is already here,” the dwarf chided. “Give us the mistress’ treasure, and we’ll let you live.”

  The dragon. She sent you.

  And as he thought those words, he heard a distant, familiar laugh.

  Erik blocked two more axe attacks before driving his blade, hilt deep, into the dwarf’s belly. Even as he died, the dwarf reached for the scroll case stuck in Erik’s belt. He pulled away quickly, swatting the dying hands to the side. He watched as the three remaining dwarves closed in on him. The dwarf with the short sword limped forward, clutching at his leg wound with one hand.

  “Are you ready to meet the Shadow?” the dwarf asked. “Your brother met him.”

  Erik laughed.

  “No, he didn’t,” Erik replied. “But you will. I hope you enjoy eternity rotting in darkness.”

  “I look forward to it,” the dwarf hissed, smiling and exposing already rotting teeth.

  Just then, a hand axe thudded into the dwarf’s chest. He reeled back with a cry and died before he hit the ground. Erik turned to see Bofim and Beldar rushing to his aide. They made short work of the remaining two dwarves, Beldar demolishing the face of the axe-wielding dwarf with a ball and chain, and Bofim removing the other dwarf’s head with his axe, but only after chopping off one arm at the shoulder and the other at the elbow.

  “What are you doing here?” Erik asked.

  “You had been gone a while,” Beldar replied. “We felt like something was wrong.”

  “It is a good thing we did,” Bofim added.

  “Aye, that it is,” Erik said. “They were just waiting for the right time. I saw others on the road, but these ones … I smelled them. They wanted the scroll, the Lord of the East’s treasure.”

  “What do you mean?” Bofim asked.

  “They kept reaching for the scroll case, and they smelled rotten,” Erik replied. “And then they spoke a language that I have only ever heard in two other times. Balzarak said it was the language of the Shadow. The language of the dwomanni.”

  “Hush, Erik,” Bofim said, not in a scolding manner but one of caution. “Not so loud here.”

  Beldar bent down to the dwarf that had carried the short sword, ripping open his shirt.

  “What are you doing?” Erik asked.

  Beldar ignored the question, exposing the dwarf’s left breast and a large mound of scarred skin like a burn that had been cut and disfigured. Erik remembered the dwarf in his dream and how he had touched his left breast. Beldar gave Bofim a concerned look.

  “What is that?” Erik asked.

  “Baptism,” Bofim replied.

  Erik then remembered an argument between Threhof and Turk. Turk had mentioned the word, baptism. He had said he had been baptized, but Erik had no idea what that meant.

  “It is the symbol of a warrior, Erik,” Beldar explained. “Everyone’s baptism is a little different, but after each one of us survives the test …”

  “Is it a dream?” Erik asked. “A vision? A field of dead grass with a red sky and purple lightning and black clouds? And a mountain range that is as black as coal?”

  Beldar and Bofim just stared at him for a while. Then, they argued, still speaking in Dwarvish, but so quickly and softly, Erik couldn’t hear what they said. Then, Bofim stepped forward.

  “How do you know that?” he asked.

  “I’ve been there,” Erik replied.

  “How?” Bofim asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “It doesn’t matter right now,” Beldar said. “But yes, you are right. After we survive the test—the vision—we are branded on our left breast. To mutilate the symbol of baptism is to denounce not only your status as a warrior, but your people. The mutilated mark of baptism is usually the mark of an exile. There is only one reason a dwarf would choose to mutilate their mark.”

  “The dwomanni,” Erik said.

  “Yes,” Bofim replied. “The Shadow.”

  Chapter 33

  Andragos was not having a good day. He stood waiting in the hall of the Lord of the East, disgusted at the sight of the naked men and women who caressed each other, lounging in the luxury of the ruler of Golgolithul. The Lord of the East finally appeared from behind his curtain, followed by his two witches, and sat in his seat. Andragos’ displeasure increased; he hated those bitches. They were both beautiful, although he suspected it was some sort of enchantment. As far as he could tell, they were almost as old as he was.

  One of them, Kimber, wore a black dress that hugged her waist, two strips of cloth barely covering her breasts. Her hair was crystal white, her skin was pale, and her eyes blue and piercing. The other one, Krista, who wore a white dress that looked identical, but her hair was as black as ebony, her skin a deep brown, and her eyes an emerald green. They stood on either side of the Lord of the East, each resting a hand on his exposed shoulders, as he wore simple, black leggings that plumed at his ankles and covered his navel.

  Much to Andragos’ further chagrin, the Lord of the East’s other advisor appeared from behind the curtain as well. He was a weathered, old man, small and bent, his back twisted at an unnatural angle. His olive skin and almond shaped eyes gave him away as a man originally from the Isuta Isles, although Andragos knew he had been living in Háthgolthane for at least a hundred years. His thin, white hair spilled haphazardly over his black robes and his equally thin beard, also a pure, snow white hung in tangles.

  He chooses the council of this foreigner over mine, Andragos thought, guarding his mind in a place where others could easily read the thoughts of a lesser man.

  “You summoned me, Your Highness,” Andragos said.

  “Yes, I did,” the Lord of the East said. “I am upset, Andragos.”

  “Oh, and why is that?” Andragos asked, but his visions had already spoken to him.

  “The scroll has been opened and read,” the Lord of the East said.

  “Yes, Your Highness,” Andragos said.

  “These mercenaries now know what is on that parchment,” the Lord of the East said. “They know of the power it has.”

  “It is doubtful,” Andragos said. “It is unlikely they could even attempt to read the language in which it is written.”

  “They have betrayed me,” the Lord of the East insisted.

  “As I suspected,” Andragos replied evenly. “It is why I thought we should use the Soldiers of the Eye for this task. We can’t trust mercenaries.”

  The Lord of the East, who had been lounging in his chair with one leg over an armrest, unslung his leg and leaned forward. The light in the hall dimmed, and Andragos felt his ruler scanning him, scanning his mind.

  “You have grown powerful, Your Highness,” Andragos said, “but might I ask why you think it prudent to try and read my thoughts.”

  “You forget your place, Andragos,” the Lord of the East said.

  “Apologies,” Andragos replied, “but, perhaps if you would heed my counsel a little more.”

  “Your counsel was appreciated, my old friend,” the Lord of the East said as he stood, “but I am in a new s
eason and, therefore, in need of new counsel.”

  When the Lord of the East—Syzbalo—was just a boy, Andragos was his teacher, his counselor, his doctor, his everything, but in a few short years, these two bitches and this old foreigner had replaced him as the Lord of the East’s chief counsel. Andragos was a black mage—the names men had given him for an age were true—but the magic these new advisors gave the ruler of Golgolithul was different, darker than anything Andragos had ever touched. They knew things, discovered things, and they had twisted the Eastern Emperor’s mind.

  “Did you know what the dragon scroll was?” the Lord of the East asked, stepping down from his dais onto a lower step.

  “I had heard of it, yes,” Andragos replied, still keeping his tone flat despite his worsening mood.

  “Then why not mention it to me?” the Lord of the East asked.

  Andragos didn’t answer.

  “Do you see, Andragos,” the Lord of the East said, “Melanius came to me with its whereabouts the moment he learned of it. My sweet Kimber and Krista advised me on how to find it, where it might be, even helping draft the map. And it has been found. All you did was issue the instructions.”

  “I have often wondered how such things … the location of a lost dwarvish city and the mystery behind such a powerful weapon lost by time, could be so easily discovered,” said Andragos.

  “You are a fool, Andragos the Black Mage,” Melanius, the old, Isutan advisor croaked, pointing a long, bony finger at the Messenger, “if you think such information came so easily. There is a price. A high price.”

  “Clearly,” Andragos replied, irritated that this man, a wizard as he was, would speak to him in such a way. Was he even needed anymore?

  Kimber glared at Andragos as she turned and spoke to Krista in an ancient tongue that predated Old Elvish; Andragos wondered where they learned such a language.

  “Why don’t you speak your mind out loud, witch?” Andragos said.