“Yet here we are,” Astarra said. Shiver considered reaching out and quelling her staff’s fire, but he didn’t want to risk angering her even further. He had sensed more to Raythen almost since the beginning, but he had seen no need to pursue it, until now. He knew better than any that the past was immutable. Whatever Raythen had previously done to incur the wrath of Thelgrim and its king, it needn’t define his future.
“This isn’t a problem,” Raythen was saying, tone at once angry and defensive as he faced down Astarra. “They won’t keep us here for long.”
“Then why are they keeping us here at all?” Astarra asked.
“My father will want to speak to me,” Raythen said. “That’s all. We’ll be on our way soon enough. Just let me do the talking.”
“You’ve been saying that since we set out,” Astarra snapped. “Look where we’ve ended up? A dungeon in a Dunwarr citadel!”
“You don’t know anything about my father,” Raythen said. “And I know more than I’d care to. If you think you can argue your way out of here, be my guest. But you won’t scorch your way out. Stone doesn’t burn.”
The words drew Astarra’s attention to her ignited staff. She closed her eyes, took a breath, and the fire simmered and died.
“We are still no closer to establishing why Thelgrim has been cut off, or why the streets are empty,” Shiver said, silently thankful that Raythen had managed to restore a degree of calm to Astarra. “I believe doing so to be a priority. You should ask your father when you see him.”
“Honestly, I half thought all this was because he’d died,” Raythen admitted. “But it seems not.”
“So, our plan is just to wait and let him have a little catch-up with his father?” Astarra asked incredulously.
“Right now, something along those lines would seem most prudent,” Shiver said. “We are in no position to further antagonize our hosts.”
He’d been silently weighing his options since the Dunwarr had accosted them in the tunnels. The entire venture was under threat, but he knew better than to completely abandon the option of diplomacy. He’d seen where that led to enough times before.
In truth, he was still recovering from the attack on the Hearth Road, and not only physically. He had sensed it coming, but a part of him had doubted it was actually going to happen. The souls he had felt around him had been kindred spirits, even beyond the simple fact that they were fellow deep elves. Somehow, he knew them. He thought they were just going to watch the strange trio pass. He hadn’t anticipated any sort of attack, let alone the furious assault that had befallen them.
He could still feel the soul of the one he had killed clinging to him, fading but still present, like a slow chill that worked itself all the way into the bones and couldn’t be shaken off. It had happened so fast. The flash of steel in the dark, the glittering of eyes, black like his own. The response had been reflexive on his part, a warding hand, a word that only truly belonged in the coldest, deepest glaciers of the far north.
The elf had hissed a word of his own as his heart had stopped beating and his lips had frozen shut.
“Daewyl.”
Shiver tried to banish that particular memory, tried to forget the chill he had summoned, the death he had inflicted. He had no use for such a memory. It had been self-defense. Just as it had been self-defense so many times before, and as it would be so many times again.
“Shiver!”
He looked up, sharply, and wondered at what point he’d sat down with his back to the wall. Both his companions were staring at him, and Raythen had risen from the bench. He tried to make sense of what happened, but could not.
“You fell,” Raythen said, answering the question Shiver didn’t want to ask.
“It was a memory,” he said, using the craggy wall to haul himself back up. Raythen took a step towards him, then seemed to think better of it.
“You seem to have a lot of memories,” Astarra said.
“Not enough,” Shiver said, wincing slightly as he regained his feet. “That’s the problem.”
“Why are you here?” Astarra continued. “What do the locks mean? Why are they so important that you would risk coming to Thelgrim when it seems like the Dunwarr must be on the brink of a war with the deep elves?”
“The locks are… arcane in nature,” Shiver said, not wanting to be drawn but sensing that, after Raythen’s revelation, Astarra was in no mood to leave her other companion’s secrets undisturbed.
“I think we could work that one out ourselves,” Raythen said, unable to resist a flash of sarcasm.
“They grant you particular powers?” Astarra asked. “Premonitions?”
“I’ve already told you,” Shiver said. “Memories, mostly. I have to unlock them, one by one. I seek them all over Terrinoth.”
“How did you lose the memories? Why do they matter so much?”
Shiver didn’t answer. A sudden numbness gripped him, and his thoughts fled away for a moment. He heard the rattle of his manacles, and realized he’d started to shake. He tried to reach out to the Empyrean, but he found himself unable to grasp even the small trickle of Empyrean magic that was available to him. It was as though an invasive force had turned the energies of the great ether into quicksilver – it ran though his fingers, refusing to form, refusing to become something he could grasp and turn tangible.
He felt suddenly sick. The numbness was growing worse. He slumped back down against the cell wall, a moan of pain and fear slipping past his lips.
“Something’s coming,” he managed, forcing himself to fix his eyes and focus on Astarra and Raythen. “Something terrible.”
•••
Raythen was about to try and haul Shiver up onto the bench when he heard the sound of boots ringing through the undercroft outside.
“What’s he saying?” Astarra was asking urgently. Shiver was mumbling something, his eyes rolling back. To Raythen it looked as though he had gone into shock. At first, he’d thought it was a response to Astarra’s questioning, perhaps even an act, but he could feel the same thing creeping over him now, growing stronger as the approaching footsteps rang louder.
It was a strange blankness, as though some cosmic entity had suddenly called into question whether or not any of them actually existed. It made him feel at once hollow and insignificant, and brought on sensations of panic he hadn’t had to endure since he’d been a youngling. One glance at Astarra told him she had started feeling it too – the grip on her staff was white-knuckled and shaking.
He knew what this was. Bad news.
The sound of the boots halted abruptly outside the cell door. It swung open without a sound, revealing Bradha the Shield at the head of a band of Dunwarr.
Raythen stepped back from the entrance as the captain came in, followed by one of her armored Warriors’ Guild brethren carrying a small velvet pouch carefully before him. Next came two more Dunwarr, twins clad in formal leather jerkins stamped with a gold leaf design depicting the mountain and the jewel at its core – Thelgrim. They were both bald, but their beards were snowy white and braided into twin forks, one with a silver clasp and one with gold. Their expressions bordered on disdain as they took post on either side of the doorway, behind Bradha and the other warrior.
The last Dunwarr to enter was the tallest. He was wearing simple boots and breeches and the heavy leather smock of a member of the Blacksmiths’ Guild. The humble pretense was cast into doubt by the circlet of shining, brilliant gold that sat upon his brow, and the ringlets in his white beard. It had been laboriously braided and beaded with hundreds of intricately cast little golden tokens, so that in the firelight it seemed as though the imposing dwarf wore a breastplate of glorious silver and gold. His eyes, like Raythen’s, were flinty and gray.
“Hello, Father,” Raythen said.
“That is not how an outsider addresses the king of Thelgrim,” Bradha snap
ped, but the tall dwarf raised his hand. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Raythen.
“Captain Bradha has served as the commander of the gates of Thelgrim for the better part of a century,” King Ragnarson said, his voice like mountain rock cracking and grinding its way down a shale slope. “Along with captains Svensdottir, Svensson, and my two advisors, Korri and Zorri, there is no dwarf anywhere on Mennara who I would trust more. Yet even then, when she told me that my son had returned, I did not believe her. Even now, looking at you, I struggle.”
“Well, I have put on a few pounds,” Raythen said. “Lost a few assets. None that matter though, I promise.”
It took every ounce of will and experience to keep his voice calm and level. His heart was racing, and he could feel his hands quivering, despite his best efforts to appear relaxed. He’d been anticipating this moment since he’d seen Bradha and her brutes tramping down the Hearth Road towards him. He’d played out his father’s likely words and his own reactions dozens of times as they were marched through Thelgrim, and all over again as they sat waiting, his thoughts festering. But somehow, all his preparation hadn’t been enough. All his wiles, his wit, all his experience dealing with the hardships Terrinoth had flung at him over the past twenty years, were at risk of flying away, leaving him as a shaking youngling once more, a beardless child quailing before the wrath of his father, the king.
“Why?” Ragnarson demanded. His tone wasn’t angry, not yet, but it was as cold and as hard as the Dunwarr peaks in midwinter. “Why have you come back?”
“Why else?” Raythen asked, determined not to break so easily. “Silver.”
“There is none here for you. You have never been part of my inheritance.”
“Believe it or not, it’s not your silver I’m seeking.”
“Then just who did Captain Bradha catch you in the process of robbing?” Ragnarson demanded, nodding past Raythen at Astarra and Shiver. “These two?”
“They are my companions,” Raythen said, forcing himself not to bite so soon. He glanced back, and saw that Astarra had gone pale, though she was still on her feet. Shiver was shaking uncontrollably though, curled up in the corner of the cell.
“If you want to talk, take away that Null Stone,” Raythen said to Ragnarson, nodding towards the warrior carrying the velvet pouch. “Otherwise, I’ll say nothing more.”
“A Null Stone,” Astarra said abruptly, apparently finding focus. “There’s a Null Stone in here?”
Raythen watched Ragnarson frown slightly, clearly trying to gauge just who and what Astarra was. He gestured curtly to the warrior with the bag, who in turn shook a small runeshard marked with a square symbol onto his palm.
“I will have none of your sorcery here,” Ragnarson said.
Raythen wondered how much being in the stone’s presence was affecting the king and his fellow, silent interrogators. If it was, his father made no sign of discomfort. He was just as Raythen remembered him.
“That null void has completely severed the elf sorcerer’s connection to the Turning,” he said, trying to change tack. “It’s no better than torture. Remove it.”
“You should have considered that before helping an Ynfernael worshiper infiltrate the mountain,” said one of the white-bearded Dunwarr to Ragnarson’s right with the golden clasp – Korri – his voice edged with spite.
To Raythen’s surprise, Astarra responded before him.
“He isn’t an Ynfernael worshiper,” she snapped. She was pale, but she stood tall as she stepped towards the gathering of Dunwarr before the door. Captain Bradha unsubtly let her hand drop to the hilt of her short sword.
“Remove that stone,” Astarra went on, her eyes full of threat.
“You do not address the King in the Deeps like that, outsider,” growled the advisor with the silver-clasped beard, Zorri.
“He’s not my king,” Astarra retorted.
“If you want the stone removed you will surrender your staff, for a start,” Korri said.
“You can take it from my bloody corpse, Dunwarr,” Astarra exclaimed.
“We’ve done nothing,” Raythen said loudly to his father, moving to stand between Astarra and the royal delegation. “You have no reason to imprison us, and no right either.”
Ragnarson glared for a moment at Raythen, then, suddenly, struck him with the back of his hand. Raythen took the blow, its unexpectedness stinging more than the strike itself.
“I thought you’d stop taking me for a fool when I ordered you to leave this city,” Ragnarson said. “I only regret I didn’t formally banish you before the Guild Council.”
“As I recall, I was the one who chose to leave,” Raythen said bitterly, facing down his father.
“An arrangement that served both of us,” Ragnarson said. “And now you return, slinking in the shadows of the Hearth Road, consorting with demon-worshiping deep elves, and worse, stealing from the tombs of our hallowed ancestors.”
Raythen caught himself in the midst of his reply.
“I’ve stolen nothing,” he exclaimed, outraged. “Nor have my companions!”
“Lies,” barked Korri, stepping towards Raythen before Ragnarson’s sharply raised hand stopped him.
“Where is the Hydra Shard?” the king demanded, his voice now low with threat. “You will tell us, or you will fester here beneath the horror of a Null Stone until it is recovered.”
“The Hydra?” Raythen repeated incredulously, wondering what in the name of the Ancestors was really going on. Just what had the three of them walked into? “Father, I have no idea! I didn’t even know it was gone!”
“For once in your life, stop lying,” Zorri snapped.
“You expect me to believe that, with the mountain gates shut and the whole city sealed off?” Ragnarson said.
“We didn’t know why the gates were closed,” Astarra spoke up, glaring past Raythen at the king. “No one outside Thelgrim does. There are thousands of refugees beyond your gates right now, starving to death!”
“A necessary evil, until the device is retrieved,” Korri said. “If the recent influx hadn’t brought so many beggars and thieves to our city, perhaps it would still be where it belongs, in the tomb of the great Deeplord Holburg.”
“If the Hydra has been stolen, none of us had any hand in it,” Raythen repeated. Anger had overtaken fear, the rare fury of being wrongly accused. “You have no proof, nothing but your own blind hatred.”
“Your presence here is proof enough,” Ragnarson said. “You reappear, a known thief, after twenty years, in the wake of the most treacherous, disgraceful act of robbery to have ever befallen Thelgrim. You have taken me for a fool far too many times before, my son, but you will not do so again.”
“This is absolutely ridiculous,” Raythen said.
“Tell us where the Hydra is,” Zorri demanded.
“I don’t have the Hydra,” Raythen shouted. His father’s appearance, the effect of a Null Stone and the unexpectedness of the accusation was all too much for his reserve. He was angry, and he wasn’t thinking straight enough to either craft a lie or come up with a better way of talking himself out of the situation.
“They should be disarmed, my king,” Korri hissed.
“Whoever comes for my staff first, dies,” Astarra said loudly. “Null Stone or not, you have been warned.”
“There is no need for any of this,” Raythen said, thoughts racing now as he tried to regain control and chart a way out. “If someone really has stolen the Hydra then we can help you. We can track them, find them.”
“I see you still enjoy playing games, my son,” Ragnarson said. “I suspected as much. The Null Stone will remain here, just outside the cell door. Perhaps, given time, it will help convince you to give up your childishness and tell me where you have hidden the Hydra.”
He looked past Raythen at Astarra, continuing to speak.
“You may keep your stick and your trinkets. The Null will render them worthless anyway. I am leaving Captain Bradha on the door. Try to escape and she will kill you. I will return when you are ready to admit to your crimes.”
“Well, this is a first,” Raythen said bitterly as Ragnarson prepared to leave, his frustration getting the better of him. “Arrested for a crime I haven’t even managed to commit yet.”
The king said nothing. The twins followed him out, eyes lingering on Raythen, followed by Bradha and the guard. There was a heavy thump as the door closed behind them, followed by the rattle of keys and, finally, the resounding thud of the lock.
Chapter Eight
Astarra closed her eyes. She felt sick and weak, but she stayed on her feet, trying to fight back against the horrible pall that had fallen over them all.
After the Dunwarr left, Raythen had sat down heavily on the bench. He was still there, his head in his hands. Astarra couldn’t find the words to comfort him, so instead she mastered her thoughts, looked at him, and asked him a question.
“What is the Hydra Shard?”
Raythen didn’t answer. He didn’t even look up.
She tried once more to reach out to the Turning, to the invisible magical power that infused all of Mennara, but she found herself grasping at nothing. It was as if a hard barrier had been conjured up between her and the runeshards that allowed her to access the Turning. It was unyielding, and there was no way to find purchase on it, no way to crack it or break it down.
She had heard stories of Null Stones, had even sought one herself, in far off Sudanya. The trail had proven long-dead, a fact she was now thankful of. Stories had spoken of the void shards inscribed with the Null marking created in the Turning, how their unique design drained magical properties rather than enhanced them. She had assumed the other tales associated with such stones – of horror and madness – were just that, the stories of the ignorant, of those who didn’t understand runemagic or the miracles they could bring about.
She would never doubt them again. The stone didn’t feel so much like a void. It was a direct barrier, walls set all around her, claustrophobic and suffocating. And if it felt that way to her, a runewitch who relied on the shards in place of a direct conduit, how much worse must it feel for Shiver?
The Gates of Thelgrim Page 9
