Sustenon completed the circle of the room, walking quickly and deliberately, meeting Erik face to face, so close Erik could feel his breath.
“No,” he said. “You put a baby in her belly, and then you left. And now, because you have now failed the Lord of the East for a second time, she will die. Your baby will die. Your family—mother, father, sisters—they will all die.”
Erik cried out as if he stood over their bodies. He didn’t try to hold the tears back anymore. Sustenon was right. Erik had failed everyone he loved and, because of him, they had already, or would all lose their lives. And here he was, still very much alive.
“What did they ever see in you, Erik?”
“I don’t know,” Erik replied amidst sobs. “I never wanted this. I never wanted to be a leader, or a fighter, or anything.”
“No, no, no!” Sustenon yelled. “Don’t make excuses. I hate excuses. You say you never wanted any of this, but how do you feel when people call you Dragon Slayer? Troll Hammer? Wolf’s Bane? Hero? You delight in it, don’t you? You say you never wanted any of this, but you welcome it with open arms!”
Sustenon stepped back, opening his arms with a sarcastic smile on his face.
“What could they have seen in you?”
Erik closed his eyes, the vision of Simone in his mind’s eye. She looked beautiful. But then he remembered the way she looked in his dream. Bloody. Her belly open. His baby gone. Bruised. Beaten. Raped.
“You, the leader, son, husband, cousin, brother,” Sustenon continued, “you’re nothing but a coward. Your family will die, Erik, because ... of ... you.”
“I would do anything to save them,” Erik muttered, more to himself than anyone else.
“What could you do?” Sustenon said, exasperated. Then he gripped his chin gently with his thumb and index finger as if thinking. “What could you do? You are such a failure and a coward. Perhaps the Lord of the East would forgive you, perhaps he would at least spare your wife and your baby if your final act was one of bravery. Maybe …”
Sustenon stopped, crossing one arm along his belly and resting his other elbow on his hand.
“Maybe, he would forget your failure if he knew that you recognized your immense shortcomings, and acted to save your family,” Sustenon suggested.
“What could I do?” Erik said.
He couldn’t stand to look at his accuser because he spoke the truth. Erik’s shame weighed on him like a boulder, and he cried and shook his head in despair.
“You could redeem yourself Erik by taking your own life,” Sustenon said quietly as if coaxing a reluctant child. “End it. End the pain. End the misery. Be brave, just once, and own up to your biggest failure … your life.”
Sustenon snapped his fingers, and Erik collapsed to his knees. When he raised his head, Sustenon had something in his hands, and he extended it to Erik. His golden-handled dagger.
“Take it, Erik,” Sustenon said. “End it all.”
Erik’s arms became free, and he grabbed the dagger. He looked at it with tired, worn eyes. Then, he looked at his hands. The dagger fell from his hands, clanking on the floor.
“I didn’t think so,” Sustenon said, shaking his head before he looked up to his men, waiting by the entrance to the room. “Take him away.”
49
Erik sat on his hill. The branches of the willow tree seemed to droop lower than usual, and the night sky was starless. He stared out over the grassy plains, a gentle wind causing the tops of the grass to flutter. There were no dead. The mountain range in the distance, the black and ominous clouds that sprouted purple lightning, they weren’t there either. The man was gone too, the one he knew but, then again, didn’t. Erik was alone, and that’s how it should have been. He didn’t deserve anyone.
Erik stared down at his dagger. It was odd that it was in his dreams. It never had been before. A part of him thought it couldn’t be in his dreams, but here it was, in this place he had visited so often. Even his dagger didn’t want to have anything to do with him. When he was lonely, he could count on his dagger, but he hadn’t heard from it since it saved Nafer. What a waste? Nafer still died.
You’re a fool. People called you a hero, and you started believing them. You’re no hero.
He wondered what would happen after he died. Had he actually passed away? Would he now spend all eternity in this place alone? Maybe if he wasn’t yet dead, when that happened, would he wander with the rest of the dead, those who lived wretched and meaningless lives? Would a golden carriage come to get him? Would he join his brother? He doubted it very much. He wasn’t worthy of joining his brother. Befel was the true hero.
Erik hadn’t really thought about how many had lost their lives because of him. It wasn’t just the dwarves that had died on their first journey or men like Vander Bim and Drake. It wasn’t just Befel or Bryon. No. It was thousands; the people of South Gate. He was to blame for every single life lost to dragon fire. And since he released the dragon, how many more should blame him for their deaths in the future? Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands? The dragon would eventually kill everyone in the world, and it would all be because of him.
Sustenon’s words rang through his head. Do something brave. He wasn’t brave. He was a coward, the worst kind of coward who pretended to be brave. What did anyone ever see in him? What did his parents see in him? He was a terrible son, nothing compared to his older brother. He couldn’t run a farm. He couldn’t carry on the Eleodum name. And because of him, the Eleodum name would cease to exist. His sisters? How could they look up to him? He only hoped and wished they would marry men that were the opposite of him.
He thought of Turk and the other dwarves. Demik had given his life, specifically for Erik. He was a warrior, and Erik was nothing. His stomach twisted when he remembered the dying look in Demik’s eyes. And poor Turk … he had put so much trust in Erik, in men, in Erik as a representative of men. Better he would have left with the zealot mayor Fréden.
Finally, he thought of Simone, his wonderful wife. She was far too beautiful for him, and yet he was the one she waited for; the one who married him. He buried his face in his hands. She had wasted so much of her life on him. His child would be better off without him. His father, Rikard would help raise the child, and his father-in-law, Brok. His child would be better off because of his death. In fact, it wouldn’t even be his child. Some other man, a real man, would come along and raise the baby. Thank the Creator.
Erik looked to the sky. The Creator. He must be looking down on him with utter disgust. Maybe this last act of bravery would please him. Maybe.
Dream Walker.
The voice was a whisper on the wind, and Erik looked out over the field of grass.
Dream Walker. Why do you let a deceitful man sway you so?
I am nothing.
“The Friend of Dwarves, a coward?” said the voice, and now it was no longer in his head.
Erik looked up and saw a cloaked man standing amongst the grass. He lifted the cowl, and it was the old man from Eldmanor.
“I am a coward. I am no friend of dwarves,” Erik said. “If anything, I am an enemy of dwarves.”
“Wolf’s Bane? Troll Hammer? These names are given to cowards?”
“The deeds of other people that I have taken credit for,” Erik replied.
“Dragon Slayer?”
“The dragon wouldn’t even be awake if it wasn’t for me,” Erik said.
The old man laughed.
“If you believe that, you truly are a fool, Dream Walker,” he said. “You are a faithful son, husband, and father. Does that make you a coward?”
“They’re better off without me,” Erik replied.
The old man laughed again, but there was a hint of sadness, even pity in the sound. Erik didn’t want pity, so he shook his head before he looked down at the ground.
“Dream Walker.”
Erik lifted the golden-handled dagger and gripped it, blade pointed at his chest, with both hands.
“N
o more talk,” Erik said. He could feel the tears in his eyes. “No more.”
He plunged the blade into his chest. His whole body felt on fire and then nothing.
Erik woke. A single candle sitting on a small table at the end of his bed was the only light in the room, and it glowed with an eerie green flame. He sat up. There was nothing else in the room—just the bed, the table, and the candle. No. There was something else next to the candle. He squinted his eyes and saw his dagger, the handle glinting in the flickering flame. Everything else was gone—Ilken’s Blade, his shield, his armor, his haversack—but his dagger was there. How?
He stood and crossed the room and grabbed his dagger.
“Speak to me,” he said, sitting back down on the edge of the bed.
Nothing.
“Why would you speak to me?” Erik asked. “I’m not worthy.”
He stared at the ground for a long time and then looked at the dagger again.
“One last act of bravery,” he said, gripping the handle of the dagger with both hands and pointing the blade towards his chest. “One last act of bravery to compensate for a life of cowardice.”
50
Bu awoke to find Bao Zi, staring down at him. Sitting up, he looked about and discovered he was in a prison cell. Sir Garrett was there, leaning against a wall, unconscious. His face was badly bruised and his breathing shallow. Blood caked his beard, long and unkempt from lack of grooming and shaving. There were other men in the same cell. It was large enough for several dozen men. There was no door in the prison bars and no lock.
“Where are we?” Bu asked.
“Dungeons,” Bao Zi croaked.
“Is it just you, Garret, and me?”
“No,” Bao Zi replied. “Andu survived. He’s in the cell across from us.”
Bu stared over and saw his sergeant, still and lying on the floor. The dwarves were over there, as well as the other man Erik Eleodum was with. But he didn’t see Erik.
Bu’s head hurt, and his vision was blurry. He tried rubbing the heels of his hands against his eyes, but that only made the pain worse.
“What happened?”
“Magic,” Bao Zi replied. “This is a cursed place.”
He nodded to another cell, one cattycorner to theirs. Bu stood, shaky at first, and, when he finally regained his balance, walked to the bars. He stared in the direction that Bao Zi had indicated and then took an involuntary step back. A spider … a giant spider was locked behind those bars, and when Bu looked at it, it hissed and spines along its legs rattled. Saliva dripped from its mouth, and Bu could see its fangs protruding as its two feelers fiercely rubbed together.
“Something’s excited it,” Bu said, and then he saw why.
Two creatures—that’s all Bu could call them—walked down the hall. They were large, lumbering bipedal things. Their skin was all gray and ashen. One had four arms, two sets on top of one another, while the other had three, its third arm sticking out of its chest. Their faces remotely resembled a man’s, although the one with four arms had no nose, no ears, a bald head that looked like lumpy dough, one eye half a hand’s span lower than the other, and a mouth that was entirely too big for its head. The other had wild hair that hung in long, dirty clumps. Its nose looked more like a pig’s snout, and its mouth was too small for its face, with cat-like eyes and pointed fox ears, complete with black tufts of hair. Two people followed them, both men, naked, and their skin was the pallid green color similar to the soldiers they fought outside the keep of Fealmynster. Erik had called them possessed … and that was how they walked.
The two lumbering creatures held no weapons, but when they stood in front of the cell containing the giant spider, the eight-legged creature backed away, apparently afraid. The four-armed beast produced a key from its pocket and a door formed in the bars, bearing a large lock. It opened the door. It looked at the two possessed men. They didn’t say anything. They simply walked through the open door, at which time, the four-armed monster shut the door with a loud bang. The door disappeared, as did the lock.
A line of silvery spider silk struck the first possessed man in the chest, throwing him against the bars of the cell, but the man didn’t seem to notice. He just stood there, arms by his side, and let the spider stand over him and spin him into a cocoon of webbing. It dragged him into the darkness of the cell and did the same thing to the second man.
“Damn the gods,” Bu cursed.
As the lumbering, multi-armed creatures walked by, they looked at him and laughed.
“An ártocothe,” one of the dwarves said. Bu was surprised he spoke Shengu.
“What is that?” Bu asked.
“The spider,” the dwarf said. “It’s an ártocothe. You have seen them before, yes?”
“Yes,” Bu replied. “In the mountain. They attacked our camp.”
The dwarf nodded.
“We found their lair,” the dwarf said, his voice carrying a hint of pride. “We burned their nest.”
“How is he?” Bu said, nodding to Andu. He didn’t really care, but making small talk helped time pass.
“Not good,” the dwarf said. “He is near death. In here,” the dwarf shook his head, “he won’t last much longer.”
“He’s a fool,” Bu said, albeit a loyal fool. Bu still didn’t like the man. He remembered him as a sniveling, pompous prick captured when Patûk had Aga Min destroyed. Any man worth the title of nobility, as Andu was—even if he was from a small house in Golgolithul—would have died before letting himself be put in chains.
“We are all fools,” the dwarf said.
“He deserves to die,” Bu added.
“Most of us deserve to die,” the dwarf replied.
Bu shook his head. This dwarf thought he was some sort of philosopher.
“Where is Erik Eleodum?” Bu asked.
“How do you know his name?” the dwarf asked.
“It’s hard not to,” Bu replied. “Dragon Slayer. Troll Hammer. Friend of Dwarves.”
“I suppose,” the dwarf said.
“He killed Patûk Al’Banan,” Bu said.
“You were there,” the dwarf said, “weren’t you? When we stole back the scroll?”
Bu nodded.
“You were too, then?”
The dwarf nodded.
“I don’t recognize you,” Bu said. “All you dwarves look the same to me. I was surprised Erik Eleodum killed Patûk. I thought that man would live forever. It seemed even death was afraid of him.”
Bu gave a quick laugh.
“If any man could have killed him,” the dwarf said, “it would be Erik.”
“Is he dead?” Bu asked.
The dwarf shook his head.
“Where is he?” Bu asked.
The dwarf looked upwards.
“Up there. The wizard took him. I saw them carrying him into the keep as I was waking up from whatever magical force knocked us out.”
“What do they want with him?” Bu asked.
“I don’t know,” the dwarf said with a shrug. “He’s a remarkable man. He’s the one that wounded a dragon.”
“He killed my father,” Bu said.
“Come now,” the dwarf retorted, “we both know Patûk Al’Banan wasn’t your father. There’s little point in pretending in here.”
“Nonetheless,” Bu said, “he was a mentor. He was like a father.”
“He was a brutal man,” the dwarf replied, “a cruel man.”
“Still,” Bu added, “I plan on killing Erik Eleodum. And his family.”
“Good luck with that,” the dwarf said. He muttered something in Dwarvish to someone else in his cell. A tall man stood up and came to the bars. He was muscular but lean with long, brownish-blond hair. His eyes squinted as he stared at Bu.
“If you plan on killing Erik,” the man said in Westernese, “you’ll have to kill me first.”
“My pleasure,” Bu replied, also speaking Westernese. “Can I have your name before I kill you?”
“Bryon. Bryo
n Eleodum.”
“His brother?” Bu asked.
“Cousin.”
“I must say, you’ll have to kill me as well,” the dwarf said.
“And your name, master dwarf?”
“Turk Skull Crusher.”
The three other dwarves in the cell also stood.
“I suppose I would have to kill them also,” Bu said.
The man—Bryon—nodded with a smile.
“It seems Erik would be a hard man to kill,” Bu said.
“It seems that way,” Bryon replied.
He watched as the lumbering monsters walked back between the cells. He heard some creature whining, and then it banged on iron bars, its voice changing to a deep, reverberating roar.
“Sounds like a snow bear,” Turk said.
“Why would a snow bear be trapped down here?” Bu asked.
“Why would an ártocothe be trapped down here?” Turk said. When Bu didn’t say anything, the dwarf added, “The wizard who controls this place was banished from Gol-Durathna for performing magical experiments on people. I am sure they are here for that purpose. We are most likely here for that purpose. The possessed soldiers, those hulking deformed things that serve as prison guards, I am sure they are all the results of his experiments.”
“I’d rather die,” Bu said.
“Aye,” Turk replied.
“If I only had my sword,” Bryon muttered.
“Your sword is so special it would help you now?” asked Bu, his tone clearly mocking. “Nonsense.”
“It’s elvish.”
“Elvish? As in magical?”
“Aye,” Bryon replied.
“Magic or not,” Bu said, “what good would it do you here?”
“The blade burns,” Bryon replied, “with a purple heat. It can melt flesh and bone alike ... iron too.”
“I remember your cousin wielding a magical sword like that when he killed Patûk.”
“That was mine.”
“Good for you,” Bu replied. “Too bad you’ll never see it again.”
Dragon Sword: Demon's Fire Book 1 Page 32
