The Brand of the Warlock

by Robert Kroese

  I walked to the nearest village and, not wishing to waste any time, purchased a horse. With a job and a house waiting for me, saving money was no longer my paramount concern; I only wanted to reach my beloved Beata as quickly as possible. A week later, having ridden that poor horse almost to exhaustion, I reached her father’s farm. Her father did not at first recognize me; he was, I think, somewhat astounded to realize that this young captain who bounded up to his doorstep on a horse was the same boy who had once watched his sheep for an erme a week. He informed me with some embarrassment that they had not seen Beata for a few weeks; she had left to seek employment in Nagyvaros. I got the impression there had been something of a falling out, but I did not press the matter. He let me know that he would be quite grateful if I were to retrieve her; the way he said it put me in mind of those stories where a princess is secreted away by an ogre and must be rescued by a brave and selfless knight. Although I worried for Beata, I was sufficiently conceited to think fate had arranged these circumstances so that I could appear heroic to her parents and thereby secure their blessing. I supposed that I would find Beata working as a scullery maid in some tavern of middling repute, rescue her from this life of drudgery, and then have a good laugh at the expense of her parents, who had imagined her to be in genuine danger. What a fool I was!

  I agreed to spend the night at her parents’ house, because although I was anxious to find Beata, my horse wouldn’t go another mile without rest. I set off for Nagyvaros late the next morning, with her parents waving to me and bidding me to bring their daughter back to them.

  It was early evening when I reached the inn where her father had told me she was to be found, called the Lazy Crow. It was only an accident he had discovered her location; a neighbor of his had stopped at this inn while in the city on some business and had seen a girl he had thought looked like Beata. That was only three days prior to my arrival; her father had not dared come for fear of provoking his daughter further.

  The Lazy Crow was located in that part of Nagyvaros called the Hidden Quarter—a name that requires some explanation. Nagyvaros is a strange city, in that it is built on top of the ruins of a much older city. The vast structures of the ancient city seem to have been constructed with a semi-liquid aggregate material that congealed to be as solid as granite. It is thought the aggregate was made by combining lime from beneath the city with gravel from the surrounding plains, but efforts to recreate the recipe have failed; the ancient builders either added some mystery ingredient to the mix or refined the lime in a way that is now forgotten. No matter the proportions of lime and gravel that are tried, buildings formed from a mixture of the local lime and gravel crumble within a few weeks. Nikola I, the first Governor of Nagyvaros, was so convinced he had hit upon the secret ingredient that he built an immense palace near the center of the city, which collapsed on him three weeks after he moved in.

  For the most part, though, the Szaszok settlers who founded Nagyvaros were content to make use of the existing structures, often modifying them by carving at the walls with picks and chisels or embellishing them with partitions of brick and stone, columns, arches and frescoes. When only the deeper and more inaccessible chambers remained vacant, later arrivals built new structures next to, or on top of, the old. Occasionally the combination of excavation and added weight caused cave-ins that swallowed entire neighborhoods, but generally the ancient structures proved remarkably durable. When a collapse did occur, gravel was poured into the sinkholes until it stopped flowing and construction started up again. If a chasm was too deep or would not be filled, it was spanned with elaborate arched bridges which were suspended by chains or massive rope braids from the immense spires that rose over the city. The spires, also made from the mysterious aggregate, were solid structures roughly five times as tall as they were wide at the base, smooth except for a grooved spiral pattern, gradually tapering to a point. They were scattered about the city, with the taller ones clustered near the center. Most were between thirty and sixty feet high; the tallest, call Apa Tornya, was one hundred eighty feet tall. A few of the medium-sized spires had been hollowed out at the base to form temples or markets, but most had been left intact—not out of any sense of respect for the ancient builders, but rather because the aggregate forming the spires was particularly tough to cut through.

  After six hundred years of this, it was impossible to say what the city had looked like when the first settlers arrived. The Szaszok people were at that time largely illiterate, but even the oral histories of that time are curiously lacking in descriptions of the ancient city. Their word for the race that had built the city was Feregian, which is similar to the current Szaszok word for “worm.” Whether this term was meant to disparage a race of humans they considered inferior or a literal description of some non-human species is impossible to say. Other than the city itself, no sign of the Feregians’ existence remains. The Feregians seem to have built no other cities—at least, not in Orszag. To the extent that the original structures can be identified, they appear to lend credence to the hypothesis that the Feregians were something less than human: the buildings are intricate and precisely constructed, but they lack aesthetic adornment, and their arrangement is more reminiscent of an nest of insects than a human city.

  Other than the spires, Nagyvaros looks from a distance like a typical city. One quickly realizes, however, that Nagyvaros has a geography all its own: traveling from the Eastern Gate to the market on Bridge Street, for example—a distance of perhaps three hundred yards—requires first traveling north to the spire called Anya Tornya, ascending a spiral ramp wending around that spire until one gets to a rope bridge crossing a deep chasm some thirty feet across, proceeding west and downward on a steep concourse that passes below several city ministries and the Governor’s Palace, south through the Municipal Gardens (a part of the city where the ground is considered too unstable for permanent structures), up a ramp, west along Wall Street (so named because it is built on top of a section of wall some thirty feet wide and three hundred feet long), down another ramp, through a tunnel, and finally north to the stone bridge from which the market gets its name.

  One might well wonder, given the inconveniences (and indeed danger) of living in such a place, why anyone chooses to live there at all. There is no simple answer to that question. The original Szaszok settlers were no doubt looking for an amenable site along the Zold, which allows easy trade with the Eszaki to the north and the Lealtoki and Troya to the south. Finding structures that could be occupied with minimal effort, they camped there, probably intending to build their own city at some point. But the settlers grew used to the inconveniences and inured to the dangers, and soon more settlers arrived. Efforts to move the population to a more suitable location came to naught, and inertia took over. Nagyvaros was born.

  It should be noted that there are two additional advantages that compensate somewhat for the city’s less attractive qualities. First, those ancient builders, the Feregians, had seen fit to construct a complex system of water conduits throughout the city, using the same aggregate material they had used for their buildings. Pipes, canals and aqueducts connect apertures throughout the city to the Zold. Originally, there were two separate systems—a sewer system and a fresh water delivery system, indicating that the Feregians possessed pumps that could be used to bring fresh water from the river and sewage from the tunnels. The secret of these pumps has been lost, so while residents aboveground have an excellent sewage system, they have no easy access to fresh water, and those below ground have fresh water but have to port their waste to the surface in barrels.

  The second advantage is obvious to anyone approaching the city: the spires provide an excellent means for observation of the city’s surroundings and defense in case of attack. Ladders and platforms for observers have been affixed to most of the larger spires, and it is the men on these platforms who have thus far dissuaded the Barbaroki from attempting a direct attack on the city. Indeed, were it not for these imposing structures, it i
s doubtful Nagyvaros would have survived as a city at all, for while it is cradled by the Zold on its western side, it lacks any other defenses against an attack from the east. The spires have allowed it to survive to become a powerful city-state, projecting its power throughout much of Eastern Orszag.

  The part of the city known as the Hidden Quarter is an artefact of the city’s strange history. The name is a misnomer, as Nagyvaros is composed of four quarters not including the “Hidden Quarter,” which is less than half the size of the smallest of the other four. Further, the Hidden Quarter might better be called the Sunken Quarter, as its streets are, on average, about thirty feet below the main level of the city. Parts of the Hidden Quarter are indeed concealed by vast bridges, walkways and platforms suspended from the spires, but much of it is visible from above. It got its name from the difficulty visitors have in finding access to it; one can only get to the Hidden Quarter by one of four ingresses: two narrow stone staircases, a wooden ladder, and a tunnel that spirals underground from near the city’s North Gate. The last of these is by far the slowest means of access, but it is also the only means by which the Hidden Quarter is accessible to horses or carts. Fortunately, I had visited the place once in my youth, so I knew the way. Not wanting to bother with the Carter’s Tunnel, I left my horse at a livery stable near the Bridge Street Market and took the Eastern Staircase down.

  Asking around, I ascertained the location of the Lazy Crow and made my way there. A many-gabled three-story building a hundred paces from the foot of Carter’s Tunnel, near the center of the Hidden Quarter, the Lazy Crow was, if anything, a more respectable establishment than I expected, and it occurred to me that perhaps Beata didn’t want rescuing. It might be that she was quite happy in her life as a scullery maid. But I remembered the promises she and I had made to each other, and I knew that whatever had happened between her and her parents, she would want me to come to her. Even if she had fallen in love with another, Beata was the sort of woman who would want to tell me to my face. I didn’t know what I would do if she rejected me; perhaps I would try to rejoin my former squad or live as a lonely bachelor on General Janos’s estate. I could not imagine wanting to marry another woman. But whatever her feelings for me, she would expect me to come to her and settle matters between us. And so I came.

  I was informed by the proprietor that he expected her to show up shortly before sunset, so I had a beer and some bread and waited for her to appear. The tavern grew gradually busier and more boisterous. Against the back wall was a small stage, and just before seven o’clock, a wiry little man with a long mustache climbed onto it, holding a guitar. He took a seat, tuned the guitar, and began to play a simple tune. No one paid much attention; it was, to be honest, a rather dull tune. After a few repetitions of the refrain, I saw that a woman had come onto the stage. I did not see her climb up; evidently she had entered through some back way. She was tall and thin, with honey-blond hair and pale skin, and she wore a simple forest green gown. Her face had lost its youthful softness and her hair had grown longer, but there could be no doubt: it was my Beata. I held my breath as she began to sing.

  I had heard Beata sing before, but like a child who has grown up in a seaside town and thinks nothing of the roar of the ocean, I had forgotten how wonderful her voice was. She sang a song of a soldier in a far-away land who dreamed of returning one day to his true love, and I couldn’t help wondering if she knew I had come. There was no sign of recognition in her eyes, though, and except for the stage, which was flooded with lantern light, the tavern was so dark that I doubt she could have made out my face. Did she sing this song every night, thinking of me? Or was she thinking of someone else? Perhaps, I thought, it was just a song, and it held no particular meaning for her. It did no good to speculate; I would know if she were still true to me soon enough. After singing three more songs, she gave a deep bow. By now the tavern was full, and she received a loud ovation. She walked to the steps that would take her to the floor of the tavern.

  So enraptured was I by Beata’s performance that I failed to note the entrance of an acolyte of Turelem and three armed men in her employ. At least one occupant of the tavern was not so rapt as I: as the four pursuers fanned out across the tavern and made their way methodically toward the stage, a man in the audience wearing a dark cloak with the hood pulled low over his head got to his feet and made for the very steps that Beata was now descending.

  Unable to get out of the man’s way, and perhaps seeing something in the man’s face that frightened her, Beata retreated back onto the stage. The hooded man followed. The acolyte and her cohorts had noted the hooded man’s attempt to flee and converged toward him. The crowd watched the scene unfold with hushed murmurs.

  Having expected Beata to come through the front door, I had situated myself at a table near the kitchen, all the way across the tavern. Realizing I had no chance to get to Beata before the hooded man, and knowing that there was a back door to the place through which the hooded man might attempt to escape, I ducked out the front door. The street was deserted, and I ran around the corner of the tavern to the back alley, where I knew the door must be.

  The door flew open just as I rounded the corner into the alley, and Beata emerged, followed by the hooded man, who gripped her tightly by the arm. In his other hand was a dagger, which he held near the small of her back. She shot me a pleading look. I don’t think she recognized me; she thought me to be some army officer who happened to have witnessed her abduction. In any case, her gaze was averted when the hooded man threw his right arm around her neck, pressing the edge of the dagger against the skin just below her jaw. I was only about seven paces away and moving toward them, but now I hesitated for fear that if I startled him, his hand would jerk, severing her jugular vein. So far, he had not seen me.

  With Beata now paralyzed by the pressure of the knife, the hooded man released her arm and pushed the door closed behind him. I saw now that his left hand was coated with blood; he had been wounded. He pressed his bloody hand against the door, closed his eyes for a moment, and muttered what might have been a prayer or a curse. Sensing an opening, I drew my rapier and ran toward him.

  The incantation, although it took only a second, seemed to drain him. He faltered and the dagger fell from his hand. Beata broke free and ran. Half out of her mind with fear, she seemed to have forgotten I was there. She ran directly at me, nearly impaling herself on my rapier. I let the sword fall from my hand and caught her. As we collided, our eyes met, and I saw a glimmer of recognition.

  There was no time for a tender reunion. Beata’s approach had blocked my view of the hooded man, and I did not know whether Beata was his quarry or simply a convenient hostage. I gripped her by the arm, where a bruise was already forming where the hooded man grabbed her, and hurled her aside. She gasped and tumbled to the dirt.

  The hooded man had recovered somewhat, but he stood unsteadily, uncertain if he should flee or pick up the fallen dagger. The hood hung low over his eyes, so I still had not seen his face. Behind him, the door shuddered as someone slammed into it from the other side. Twice more the door shuddered with a tremendous blow, but it wouldn’t budge. I saw something like the shadow of a great spider writhing over the surface of the door, but there was nothing to cast such a shadow, and it seemed unnaturally distinct in the dim twilight.

  I knew of the existence of sorcerers (and had suspected the hooded man’s crime the moment I saw the acolyte), but I had never encountered one; Barbarok shamans with their potions and charms of dubious efficacy hardly qualify. Weakened though this man was, he was dangerous. My best chance was to act quickly, denying him the opportunity to speak another incantation. Not bothering to retrieve my rapier, I lunged at him.

  I cannot reliably describe what happened next. Events seemed to wash over me in waves, according to some logic of which I was unaware. I fell upon the man, and his hood fell back, exposing his face. Somewhere behind me, Beata screamed. The man’s face was a labyrinth of black lines, darker than any tattoo.
The lines did not move and yet seemed to writhe and crawl across his face, in the nature of those complex Prendish weavings that seem to come alive if you stare at them long enough. I was dimly aware that beneath the labyrinth lay an ordinary human face, but the labyrinth was so mesmerizing that I could not have given even the most rudimentary description of the man’s features.

  Distracted by the man’s appearance, I allowed my grip on his arm to slacken, and he managed to get his hand on a knife that must have been strapped to his upper arm. I gripped his wrist, causing him to drop it, but not before he cut a deep gash on my forearm. Blood flowed down my wrist into my palm, making my hand slippery. The sorcerer twisted his wrist and clutched my forearm, our blood mingling together. His grip was weak; I could see from the stain on his clothes under the cloak that he had lost a great deal of blood. Before I could reassert control, however, I was seized by a numbness throughout my body that seemed to proceed from my arm as if the man’s fingers had injected me with some sort of venom. The numbness was replaced by a sensation of bitter cold, the likes of which I had never before experienced, even during the nights I had spent shivering in a tent on the Barbarok steppe. It was what I imagine the coldness of death must be like, and in fact I thought for a moment I had died.

  I seemed to awaken on a vast gray plain, dimly lit by what I somehow knew was an eternal twilight. The jagged peaks of dark, foreboding mountains were visible to my right; directly ahead was an immense castle of black stone ringed by a wide moat. Just on the outside of the moat was a round stone tower, beyond which I assumed was a bridge that allowed access to the castle. The castle, I knew, was several hundred paces off, but despite the distance I seemed to hear ghastly shrieks and howls coming from inside it. Rather than repulsing me, however, these piteous sounds seemed to beckon to me, as if promising me some great reward. I was about to take a step forward when I heard thunder from behind me. Turning, I found myself back in the alley behind the tavern; the thunder was merely the pounding on the door by the agents of the acolyte.