The Demon Lord

by Peter Morwood

  They had laid the hunter’s body in a dramatic sprawl at the foot of a tree, head against the root they would claim killed him, and his long limbs hung loose in the unconnected way of all dead things. The beautiful deep fur of his coyac was going dull on one shoulder, soaked with drying blood that would turn the fine pelt harsh and spiky.

  The coyac he had been wearing all the time…

  “Domne diu! From man to wolf and back again, he stayed fully dressed.” Aldric spoke that obvious fact as if it was remarkable, and it was. Every book and old tale said the same thing, that before any human transformed to a werewolf they stripped stark naked, bare even of rings or chains or jewels. Were-magic whether to wolf or any other animal was a skin change. While this was…

  “He was a shape-shifter?” Aldric had seen it before. Duergar Vathach had prowled Baelen Wood beyond Dunrath in the form of a wolf, and changed men into crows to act as his spies.

  “An unwilling one,” said Gueynor.

  “Crisen did this to him simply because he struck an insolent soldier who wasn’t even in the Overlord’s service yet?”

  “My uncle let you see him, Kourgath, so you would understand what you had to do.” Gueynor watched him as she spoke. The moon’s pale light washed all colour from his face and transformed it to a mask of metal, flint-eyed, with shadows deeply etched. Then he moved, and it was as if the mask had never been. “Because he hoped… No, not hoped. He knew you would kill him.”

  “Ai, gev’n-au tsepanak’ulleth.” Aldric felt tired, and sick, and old as Death. “He used me as his release from life. It’s an honourable, charitable act.” He glanced up towards the mocking moon. “So what makes me feel so filthy?”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  That same full moon hung in the sky at midnight, its pale face licked by tongues of drifting cloud, but not a glimmer pierced the heavy velvet curtains across Sedna’s windows. Her only illumination was the wan yellow glow of six black candles, each one man-high and thicker than a strong wrist. They stank.

  As her white-robed form moved through the incense-spicy air, smoke from many censers swirled and billowed in her wake. Patterns of power writhed across the dark red floor under her bare feet, and for many minutes Sedna compared each symbol and inscription with its original in the vellum pages of an ancient grimoire. At last she cleared her throat and began to read aloud in a rapid monotone, tracing each sentence with a grisly little gold-tipped wand made from the spine of a kitten.

  “There had best be purpose to this playacting,” said someone well beyond the pools of candlelight. “I grow weary of it.” Without inflection, irritation or impatience, the words were still heavy with assurance born of rank and power, and armour clicked and rasped as one of the soldiers who enforced that power shifted uneasily. “Don’t think this waste of time impresses me,” the voice continued. “You aren’t indispensable. There are other sorcerers, most far more skilled than you.”

  Sedna paused in her reading to shoot a reproachful look into the shadows, and the dry, artificial chuckle she got in response made her bolder.

  “More skilled perhaps, Eldheisart Voord, but no more obliging, not with the Empire looking over their shoulders. And certainly no faster. This ritual – my playacting, as you’re pleased to call it – is part of the spell. And part of our safety, too. Mine, yours, everyone here. Best not to forget it.” That nervous rustle of armour was repeated, and a cold smile thinned her lips as she returned to the incantation.

  “Your safety, spellmaker, not mine,” said Voord. “Best not to forget that. Tonight’s performance is for Lord Crisen alone.”

  It was as if he had stabbed her with a pin. The insolence vanished like a burst bubble and, for just an instant before she controlled it, stark fear in her voice betrayed whatever well-concealed raw nerve Voord’s words had touched.

  “No! Not tonight of all nights!” Then she collected herself and continued as calmly as if the outburst had never taken place. “This is just preparation for tomorrow. It’s not for now, at full moon of the summer solstice. I thought you understood that, Crisen. Tell him what I told you!”

  *

  Eldheisart Voord Ebanesh already understood a great many things, including her significant omission of Crisen’s title. He withheld comment on that just yet, but tucked it away for later reference. And he was far more aware of what had frightened the sorcerer – the witch, he corrected himself – than she imagined. On this night of all nights, except its dark twin at midwinter, enchantments would work crookedly if at all. They would be made doubly treacherous by the lowering presence of the swollen moon. It influenced the tides and the ravings of madmen; it made dogs howl and…

  And it created other things that howled at night.

  For all the time and care she spent over drawing circles and sigils on the floor, a summoning like the one Sedna was preparing could still fail completely. But with the triple influence of midnight, moon and solstice, the charm could be only partly successful, warping out of true as it took effect. If that happened, the thing Summoned might not be the thing expected, and those so-specific wards and holding patterns would be ineffective against it. That was a piece of information Voord wasn’t meant to know, but like so much else it was already filed away in his cold mind as potentially useful.

  “Sedna’s right, of course,” Crisen said over the eldheisart’s shoulder, and from the warmth of his tone he was favouring her with an indulgent smile. “All this is for tomorrow. We’ve been much more careful since—”

  “Since the last time your amateur conjuring went wrong,” Voord finished for him. “We have a proverb, back in Vlech: ‘The best time to stop playing with a knife is before you cut yourself, not after.’ A fumbled attempt at shape-changing, wasn’t it?”

  “How did you—?”

  “How do I ever? There are ways of learning anything, sooner or later. Instead of a changeling you could control, you created a werewolf with no control at all. Then you tried to hide your blunder by letting yet another wolf loose in the woods. That wasn’t very clever, since between the two of them they’ve slaughtered about thirty of your taxpaying peasants.”

  “What’s a peasant more or less?” Crisen’s dismissive comment made Voord stare at him, wondering how he could be so stupid.

  “In such numbers? What do you think? It makes certain people wonder. When they wonder they ask questions, and they decide in advance what answers they want. Then they do what’s necessary to get them. Your father’s rank won’t save you from that.”

  “I’m a peasant, Crisen.” Though Sedna didn’t raise her voice it carried clearly enough, and Crisen Geruath grunted as if something had hit him.

  “You’re what I choose to tell the world you are.” The declaration came out too loud and too fast, and when Voord glanced at his companion it was as well the eldheisart’s expression was hidden by the shadows.

  “We need a private word,” he said, and tugged Crisen’s sleeve between finger and thumb in an exaggerated, fastidious manner as he led him from the room. In the corridor outside, Voord stared in silence for long enough that Crisen looked away, then tapped him hard on the chest. “Your priorities, my lord, have become confused.”

  The two men were both of similar height, but there any resemblance ended. Crisen’s waist was thick from much good living, his florid, heavy-featured face already wore a network of cracked veins on nose and cheeks, and his unnaturally black hair was cut in the height of fashion at the Imperial court two years past. Voord looked austere by comparison, whiplash thin in both face and body, and though his skin was tanned by military service his cropped hair was so fair it was almost white. His thin mouth had a disdainful twist which he seldom tried to conceal, and it was more pronounced now than usual.

  “What do you mean?” Crisen tried to bluster, but doing it to best effect meant noise and he retained enough sense to know this conversation needed kept low.

  “You know well enough. Tell me, how much do you skim off the Alban stipend to your fathe
r? Thirty per cent? Forty?” Crisen cleared his throat nervously and looked furtive. “More? Father of Fires, how much more?”

  “Last time,” the admission left Crisen’s mouth with the reluctance of pulled teeth, “I had to take twelve to the score.”

  “Had to…?”

  “I needed money!”

  “So you stol— You subtracted more than half the gold your father receives from Rynert of Alba, and he didn’t notice?”

  “He shouldn’t be getting any at all. The Albans keep paying, and receive precisely nothing in return. They still believe he supports Ioen and Goth—”

  “Is that why they sent an envoy in near-secrecy to find out precisely,” Voord threw back the word with relish, “how King Rynert’s gold is really being used?” He glanced back to where Sedna still read and chanted, and that look spoke several eloquent phrases. “Or misused. You’d be better served spending more on your soldiers and less on your… amusements.” Crisen stared at him but said nothing. “They seem an unnecessary distraction.”

  “For all their supposed secrecy, you could still find out what the Albans are doing.” It was blatant flattery and an attempt to evade the issue, but Voord was having none of it.

  “Of course I could find out.” He didn’t say how.

  “And directly you warned me, I sent a troop to deal with the envoy. They were disguised as…” Crisen saw Voord’s expression and his voice trailed to silence.

  “As bandits. Yes, so I heard. How theatrical, and how useless! They still botched that simple task!”

  “They killed the Vreijek guide.”

  “But they weren’t sent after the Vreijek guide, were they? And I forbade killing. It’s difficult to question a corpse. Was that your intention – or your hope?” Voord paused just long enough for his implied accusation to sink in, but not long enough for Crisen to make up a coherent excuse. “Because it’s only difficult, not impossible. Now, thanks to the bungling of your bandits, the Alban hasn’t just eluded us, he’s vanished. And he was no ordinary courier.”

  “What was he?”

  “That ceased to be your concern when your men lost him!” Voord’s control cracked and his quiet voice became an angry rasp. “If it was ever your concern at all!” He took a long, calming breath and began calculating his odds with less emotion than an abacus. “Your father remains ignorant of all this, I take it? And I do mean all this.” Crisen nodded. “Then something may yet be salvaged, if I…” He broke off. “Go away. Go get drunk, go get some sleep, but get away from here and give me peace to think!”

  Unaccustomed to such abrupt dismissal under his father’s roof, Crisen tried to gather enough nerve to assert himself, but Voord snapped his fingers and took away the chance. His honour guard were standing in silence further down the corridor, and ten quick paces brought them level. Flanked on either side by mailed troopers, Crisen Geruath held his tongue.

  “Tagen, Garet, esauda moy,” said Voord in the Vlechan dialect Crisen didn’t understand. “Inar Crisen ya dar boet’cha vaj. Najin iyelos doestal svoda. Najin ostyu. Slijei?” The armoured men saluted with a precise double click and closed in. Crisen looked frightened, just as Voord hoped. Frightened people were obedient people. “Your escort will see you safe and uninterrupted to your room. Good night, my lord.”

  When he could no longer hear their cadenced footsteps, Voord opened the door of Sedna’s chamber a finger’s width and watched her complete a diagram with carefully poured white sand, each line stark against the red-dyed wood of the floor. She crossed the room as she had done so many times before to check the pattern against its original in the grimoire, balanced now on a spindly lectern. Voord spent a few seconds in appreciative study of how the candlelight made her thin robe translucent, then shrugged. The Vreijek woman didn’t like him so seduction or persuasion were pointless, and raping her involved too much effort, noise and risk of interference. He couldn’t spare the time.

  The key of the heavy door was within easy reach on its usual small shelf and Voord lifted it down, turning it over in his hands once or twice. “Such a waste,” he muttered. “If you’d listened when I warned you, I wouldn’t need to do this. But you had to be inquisitive, so I have to take precautions. Curiosity kills more than cats.”

  He closed the door and locked it. From the outside.

  *

  Although he would never admit it, Voord was as frightened as Crisen Geruath. The sensation was unfamiliar, made worse by its novelty. Usually he had no reason to fear anyone or anything, and was more usually the cause of fear in others, but tonight the events he thought he controlled were overtaking him. That, too, was novel.

  “Damn her!” he snarled softly. “Damn him! Damn them all to the black Pit!” Voord wasn’t given to profanity, he seldom needed it, but he often made promises and his voice had a dark thread of sincerity running through it now. His damnations weren’t a threat so much as a hint of things to come.

  He had ordered four of Crisen’s retainers into the Deepwood on a certain errand late last night. Three of the horses had returned, but not a man of the four, nor the item described with such care to their weasel-featured leader, the self-styled Eldhertag Keeyul. Voord held reservations about anyone so insistent on using Drusalan military rank after leaving the Empire’s service, but gave him the benefit of the doubt. Now he was sure he should have heeded those doubts and sent a squad of his own guards instead. Hindsight gave a remarkably accurate view of things.

  “Damned Jouvaines,” he said aloud, aware his oaths were becoming as repetitive if still less crude than those of any common soldier. “Damn Crisen!”

  There was grim satisfaction in knowing it would happen sooner or later, fulfilled in a more literal way than most curses. Few men meddled with sorcery in the slapdash manner that Crisen did and lived long afterwards. What he did was madness. A Geruath family trait, it seemed, for the old man was hardly what Voord considered sane. Such insanity in the Overlord didn’t concern him overmuch – a man could be stark raving mad and rule the Empire without creating comment, it had happened once or twice – but when that same madness encroached on Voord’s neatly ordered schemes, somebody would have to suffer.

  If Crisen’s peculiar experiments with that huntsman hadn’t been so slapdash, his own more esoteric researches in the small, select part of Sedna’s library would have gone unnoticed long enough for discovery to be unimportant. At least the Jouvaine showed enough wit to waken him when Sedna’s suspicions became action. The woman knew something of what was going on behind her back, behind the backs of everyone in Seghar, Voord was certain of that. He had been certain for at least three days now, more aware of a wrongness in her attitude than even Sedna herself. A man became observant after supervising enough interrogations, learning to spot the signs of deception and concealment. She had seldom spoken to him, and what little she said was always bright with a false, brittle gaiety that betrayed her as much as any signed and witnessed confession.

  Voord had watched her perform many incantations through the concealed peepholes drilled not long after arranging Sedna’s introduction first to the Lord’s son then into the citadel, secret lessons that taught him far more about sorcery than Sedna would have done willingly. He made those spyholes with his own hands, not trusting anyone else with either the task or the knowledge of their existence. His match-making too was a masterstroke, giving him influence over Crisen Geruath that would advance both their careers but Voord’s most of all. It was a pity, having brought such a useful couple together, that he would also have to be the agent of their permanent parting. The echoes of his own brief, ugly chuckle startled him in the quiet, moonlit corridors and he fell silent, thinking once again of what he was about to do.

  Voord reached the door of Sedna’s library all too quickly. Anticipation was sending repeated shivers down his limbs and not because he expected this to be pleasant, so it took three tries and two mistakes before he found the tile where Sedna hid her key. He had seen her opening the door just once, b
ut once was enough. Since then the eldheisart had entered when it pleased him, and until this latest time he had escaped detection. After tonight, that would no longer matter.

  The library was pitch-black inside, darker even than the incense-heavy cellar where he had left the Vreijek sorcerer, and Voord fumbled for his tinderbox. He had no wish to enter that gloomy embrace unprepared. Flint and steel struck together, and despite his vaunted self-control he caught a short, shocked breath as the flash of sparks reflected from polished metal, glass and fine gold leaf. To his guilty mind each small glitter seemed to be the accusing, unwinking gaze of creatures waiting in the shadows. He laughed once to show them how little he cared about them and heard instead the dry cough of a dying man.

  After that, Voord didn’t laugh again.

  Like Sedna before him he only felt at ease once every lamp and candle was lit. If any dark places remained, the tiny bright-eyed things would hide there to watch him, and Voord wanted no witnesses at all. There was another, more practical reason for him to flood the room with light. He had read that illumination was an extra ward against… His mind shied from naming it, and as he touched fire to the last lamp he wished there were more.

  With rugs and furniture dragged aside to make a clear space on the floor, Voord went to work with a piece of chalk from his belt-pouch. The complex linked symbols meshed one into another, forming a pattern close-knit as any coat of mail. It served the same purpose, protection from harm, and any sorcerer looking at its interwoven curves and angles would have recognised what it protected against.

  Then fled at once.

  Voord didn’t go near the steel cabinet until the circle was complete, then withdrew a slender metal probe from a hidden pocket – hidden because the shape made its purpose clear to world-wise eyes – and used it to work the lock’s tumblers. The first time had taken him almost half an hour and five different lockpicks; now it was as if he owned a key.