by Dante King
“Can’t you just tell me now, father?”
“Only when you return and officially sit on the throne for the first time. I’m sorry, son, but that’s how the tradition works, and that’s how it’s worked since Uger’s days. I’m not about to break over a thousand years of tradition. Just keep in mind the fact that it’ll be waiting for you when you return.”
And that had been the last time he and I had ever spoken. After that, my treacherous uncle Rodrick had murdered him. Since then, I hadn’t thought much about what he’d said, but now, after catching a glimpse of Uger’s final moments and hearing what Tendo had said, it all made a lot more sense.
“You remembered something important, Vance?” Isu asked.
“Damn straight I did. Shit, my father knew all about this, and he was going to tell me when I came back from Luminescent Spires. But then Rodrick murdered him before he could pass the secret on to me.”
“And now that knowledge is lost forever. How convenient for your uncle Rodrick, a servant of the Blood God.”
I punched my fist into my palm. I hadn’t thought that I could possibly hate Rodrick any more than I currently did, but now I had a special kind of loathing reserved for that piece of goblin shit.
“Wait!” I said as a sudden realization hit me. “Tendo said that the secret would be passed down his family line as well, so if that family line still exists, then the secret knowledge of the whereabouts of these gauntlets might still exist too.”
“Indeed,” Isu said, still smiling strangely.
“What do you know about all of this?” I demanded.
“Ah, well, I would have known every little detail.” She batted her eyelashes at me in a half-flirtatious, half-mocking manner. “But that was when I was a goddess. When you took that from me, you also took many of the memories of my time as goddess. Now, as a simple necromancer, those memories of mine have simply faded into oblivion. How inconvenient for you, Vance.”
I didn’t know if she was lying about this whole loss-of-memories thing or if she genuinely had lost them when I’d stolen her divinity from her, but either way, it was clear that she wasn’t going to tell me anything. I’d have to find all this stuff out on my own. Perhaps this Wise Woman in the Wastes could somehow give me answers to these questions… and to questions that I hadn’t even begun to properly formulate yet.
“Well, uh, thank you for showing me that,” I said grudgingly to Isu. “Now please put my ancestor’s coffin cover back and get your shit ready to leave in the morning. I’ll talk to you later; I still have a lot to organize before I go.”
I turned and left the crypt without waiting for a response from Isu. She had given me some very valuable information, but she’d also pissed me off. She had a talent for doing both of those things at once.
Chapter Five
I headed over to my personal armory to check on my weapons. Grave Oath, of course, stayed on hip at all times, but I also had my other items that I didn’t need to carry with me permanently. Gleaming menacingly on its mount on the wall was my kusarigama. It was imbued with Death magic, enabling me to draw from and channel the strength of my undead warriors through the chain section. Now that I’d resurrected Xayon, it had also had its Wind powers restored. This allowed me to shoot small tornadoes from the weapon and aim them with deadly precision.
Then there was the little wrist crossbow imbued with the Tree God’s magic. It was a small weapon that packed a big punch; with this little crossbow, I could turn dead materials into wood, and living opponents into trees.
I took the weapons out of the armory and headed over to the dungeons of the castle, which was where my undead troops were stationed. When I kicked my uncle’s ass and took back my rightful spot as ruler of Brakith, the dungeons were practically overflowing with prisoners.
Most of them, however, hadn’t been actual criminals—just people who had been loyal to me and hadn’t believed my uncle’s lies, or people who had made disparaging remarks about my uncle in public (or who had said such things in private but had been reported by spiteful neighbors or my uncle’s lackeys). So, of course, I’d set all these people free immediately, which had cleared a lot of room in the dungeons. Many townsfolk were, understandably, a little unsettled by the presence of my skeletons and zombies. I’d thought it would be wisest and most diplomatic to keep my undead in a place where the public wouldn’t have to constantly see (or smell) them.
The dungeons were a perfect “barracks” for my skeletons, zombies, and skeletal horses. They didn’t need food, water, or fresh air, so that worked out.
Sarge, the first skeleton I’d ever raised, still wielded the golden greatsword of the pompous paladin I’d killed. He kept it with him as he stood guard at the entrance to the dungeons, along with Captain Jandor, leader of my contingent of zombie Resplendent Crusaders. Not that they needed to stand guard, really, but both of them, I think, had a need to do something rather than mope around all day… as much as zombies or skeletons could really “need” or “want” anything.
Sarge was looking good, but Jandor and his crusaders… well, they were, uh, not looking so great, and they were smelling even less so. My skeletons’ bones would become brittler and weaker with the passing of time, I had learned; my Death magic was enough to keep them “alive,” if you wanted to call it that, but it wasn’t strong enough, at least not yet, to stop them from decaying. So, with the skeletons, this simply presented itself as weakening bones, but in the case of the zombies, it was full-on decay. Their flesh was slipping off their bones and dripping in globs of putrid black goo. The stench was absolutely unreal, and a wall of it hit me when I stepped into the dungeons. I was used to the stink of death now, but this was strong enough to make even me want to vomit.
I knew that I just needed to advance my magic levels to slow down and perhaps even permanently halt this decay; it wasn’t evident in my lesser creatures, Talon and Fang, who were not rotting at all. I figured that keeping human corpses reanimated in a stable state took a higher level of magic than I currently possessed. All the more reason to take more souls.
Speaking of taking souls, I’d noticed that for the last couple of weeks, Grave Oath had been buzzing a lot. Someone had been taking souls on my behalf. I’d figured it had been Rami-Xayon, in some way, but considering the number of souls that appeared to have been taken, she would have had to have gone on some sort of serious rampage to have accomplished it on her own.
Now that Cranton and Grast were coming here with an army in tow, I was pretty sure I knew where all of these souls were coming from. It had all happened at just the right time too; I needed a little boost in my powers before setting off on a new quest into perilous territory.
With my weapons fitted snugly into my battle outfit, I made my way down to the town gates to await the arrival of Cranton, Grast, and an army of new followers.
“Lord Vance, Lord Vance, I um, I, please, Lord Vance, if you could just lend me your esteemed ears for but a moment, my lord…”
I walked past Edwin in the stocks without even bothering to acknowledge his pathetic pleading. His face was covered with rotten eggs and a couple of smashed rotten tomatoes. To top things off, some kids had shoved wads of sheep dung into his ears. Someone else, it seemed, had dumped an entire plate of Yengish noodles over his head. He needed a few more hours of the rot-and-shame treatment… just a few more hours of it. Then, hopefully, he would have learned to never, ever fuck with me again.
By now, a crowd had started to gather. The army was only one or two hundred yards from the city gates.
“Make way!” one of the guards on the battlements shouted. “Make way for the Army of the Temple of Necrosis!”
A path was cleared, with guards shoving people back and using their spears as makeshift barriers. I waited in the gates, my arms crossed over my chest, staring out with a grim expression at the approaching force.
When I saw Cranton and Grast, however, it was hard to maintain a severe expression; both of them beamed out ear-
to-ear grins when they saw me. I fought it, trying to look serious for my new followers, but the closer they got, the harder it was. Eventually, my face broke into a smile too.
Cranton, to his credit, took the sort of initiative he never would have as the greenfoil-head he’d been a few months ago. He charged out ahead of the army on his horse and turned around to address them.
“Devotees of Necrosis!” he yelled in his thin, reedy voice—not the most authoritative or intimidating, but hey, it would do- “I present to you, your god! All hail Lord Vance Chauzec, God of Death!”
A tremendous cheer erupted from the black-clad mass of followers. I felt the potency of their energy pulsing like a powerful drug through my veins. This was the reason I’d been feeling like a million gold coins.
I cleared my throat, drew Grave Oath from its sheath—noticing, as soon as I touched the dagger, that it crackled with potent energy—and held my trusty soul-slurper high above my head.
“Welcome, loyal devotees, to Brakith!” I bellowed. Hell, even my voice seemed to have become stronger; it rang out like a peal of thunder.
Again the crowd cheered, and once more I felt a heady rush of energy coursing through me.
“I thank you for your devotion!” I roared. “And I am no selfish deity. Each and every one of you will be rewarded for the sacrifices you have made in my name.”
Again a roar of approval boomed out from the crowd.
“For the moment, though, enter my city, make yourselves at home, and rest after your long journey. I will address you all tonight!”
There was one last cheer from the black army, and I stepped aside to allow them to enter the city. Each of them bowed to me as he or she walked past and entered Brakith. They all wore black hooded cloaks with my sigil, the simple, yellowish-green skull emblazoned on the back.
I saw people of all nationalities, shapes, and sizes; Cranton had gotten busy and had taken his proselytizing pretty damn seriously. It was really hard to believe that the Cranton I was looking at was the same goofy green-fiend I’d met in a scummy tavern in Erst. He was still as ugly as a troll’s behind, of course—nothing, unfortunately, could fix that face, not even divine purpose—but he had a glow about him that was impossible to deny. Making him a priest of the Church of Necrosis—which involved ripping out his heart and dunking it in acid, and turning it black—had, weirdly enough, saved his life.
Cranton and Grast waited until all of the devotees had entered Brakith before coming to speak to me. Cranton trotted over on his horse, while Grast rumbled over on his massive bone-wagon, his ruddy cheeks glowing with drunkenness.
“Lord Chauzec!” Grast bellowed with as broad a grin as I’d ever seen on his face. “It’s bloody fantastic to see you, it is! And praise to, um, you, you’re looking bloody good, my lord, bloody good indeed! Would you care for some Yorish brandy to wet the ol’ whistle, my lord?”
I chuckled and declined politely. I needed to have my wits about me for all the preparations for the quest.
“The wagon looks awesome, Grast,” I said. “It just screams ‘death,’ with this whole bone theme you’ve got going. Where’d you get this done?”
“One of our new devotees, Lord Chauzec,” Grast answered, swigging on his wineskin. “He’s a master carpenter, he is. Used to do a lot o’ work for the Church of Light, he did, in their cathedrals and such.”
“Someone who worked for the Church of Light is pretty much the last sort of person I’d have expected to see doing work for me.” I raised an eyebrow.
“Oh, he got fed up with that lot, Lord Chauzec,” Grast said with a chuckle. “Always paying him less than they said, always nitpicking about his work, trying to rip him off, like. Cranton met him in a tavern, he did. The bloke was drowning his sorrows and cursing the Church of Light to any and all who would listen. Well, old Cranton, he says to this bloke, ‘If you’ve had enough of those pompous penny pinchers, I’ve got a new god for you to follow, I have!’ And then he went on about how bloody great a god you are and how you don’t rip nobody off or pinch pennies, about how you’ve been fighting the Blood God while the Church let one of their own bishops get away with worshiping that bastard under their noses! This bloke was mighty impressed, he was, Lord Chauzec. He took one look at my wagon—in its old state, you see—and said, ‘That’s no wagon for the God of Death. I’ll make it look like a real Death Wagon, I will.’ That’s what he said. And look! He bloody well did make it look like a proper wagon for the God of Death, didn’t he!”
I turned to Cranton. “Sounds like you’ve been doing a pretty damn good job of bringing in converts to the Church of Necrosis, eh?”
He smiled shyly, a gesture that, unfortunately, only made his face more unattractive than it already was.
“I’ve been doing my best, Vance,” he answered. “But, like, I can’t take all the credit. There are a lot of people out there who are fed up with the Church of Light. The Church is forcing them to pay increased tithes and shit, and they get nothing for it. The priests are aloof and arrogant, prayers go unanswered, requests for help from the Church go ignored… People are looking for an alternative, man. Especially the, uh, the misfits of society, the ones that the Church doesn’t want.
“They like the fact that you don’t have any puritanical rules, that you actually fight for justice against true evil instead of just preaching one thing and then, like, going and doing the exact opposite behind closed doors.
“They respect the fact that you’re a powerful warrior who fears nobody, and who speaks his mind without sugarcoating things, unlike the effete, limp-wristed Church of Light priests who hide in their ivory towers and shit.
“But most of all, Vance, things are changing out there in the rest of Prand. There’s a real sense of… of fear among the common people. I think that they can, on some level, sense the power of the Blood God growing. And if that doesn’t half scare them.
“The Church of Light, man, most of those assholes in positions of power in the church, they’ve got their heads up their asses! The common people like, don’t feel like they’re going to get any protection or help from the Church if shit really starts getting bad. I mean sure, the Lord of Light is powerful, but it seems like he’s also… distant. Uncaring. At least to many people.
“I’ve had no problems getting people to flock to your banner, man. Especially, as I said, people from the fringes of society. Assassins, mercenaries, rogues, rangers… We’ve got all sorts in our growing band.”
“And I promised to reward each and every one of them,” I muttered. “I’m going to have to figure out just what kind of reward I can give them.”
“Well,” Cranton said, “for many of ‘em, just serving you is enough of a reward in itself. Their lives lack meaning or direction and shit like that, and the Church of Necrosis gives it to them. Many of them actually know about the rising threat of the Blood God—hell, I’ve managed to find people whose daughters, sisters, or lovers were abducted and slaughtered in evil rituals by people like Bishop Nabu and your uncle Rodrick and other followers of the Blood God. They’re fucking angry, Vance, and they’re lusting for vengeance, man. The only reward they’re after is seeing you utterly obliterate the Blood God and every single one of his followers.
“The Church of Light doesn’t give a shit about them, but you do. They’re never going to get revenge for their dead daughters or sisters or whatever from the Church, but they sure as hell will get it from you. And that’s the only thing they care about—seeing you kick the Blood God’s ass, and the asses of every one of his shithead followers.”
“Well, that certainly is something I can give them.”
“They know that.”
“You’ve done excellent work, both of you. Come on in, and welcome to Brakith! We’ll have a grand feast tonight. All of my followers are invited. But tomorrow, at first light, I’ll be leaving this place for a while. As you well know, the Blood God and his followers don’t rest, so neither can I. At dawn tomorrow, I’ll be heading off fo
r the Wastes.”
“Ah, well, I’m glad we reached you before you left then,” Cranton said. “We don’t intend to stay, of course; I have no intention of stopping my quest either, man. Hell Vance, you’ve given me purpose and direction! I’ve never been this motivated in my life! Shit, I just want to grow the Church of Necrosis, man, make it huge, fucking massive, man!”
I clapped an appreciative hand onto his back.
“Excellent work, Cranton, excellent work. You too, Grast. All right, all right, enough of that bullshit now. Get your asses into my city, rest up from your travels for a while, and then tonight, we’ll have a damn good feast in my Great Hall, and we’ll have a good few tankards of Brakith’s finest ale and some laughs about our previous quests. Come on in, and, I say this from the bottom of my heart as ruler of this fine city: welcome to Brakith!”
I hadn’t intended to set off on my quest to the Wastes with a hangover, and a motherfucker of a headache throbbing with dull persistence behind my eyeballs, but hey, sometimes drinking until an hour before dawn when you’re supposed to leave with the rising sun just happens. Especially with someone like Grast around, along with a couple hundred people who literally worship you and want to drink toasts to you all night.
As it turned out, being a god had its perks when it came to alcohol; I was able to drink far more than I could in my pre-divinity days, and even then, I had always been able to drink even the most iron-stomached northern barbarians under the table. Now, I could do that many times over and would be able to out-drink a whole horde of the tough bastards. In my pre-god days, the amount of grog I’d slugged back the previous night would probably have put me into a permanent coma.
My hangover was relatively mild, all things considered. But it was there, and it was annoying. So, I didn’t quite feel like making small talk with any of the human members of my party—Rollar, Elyse, Isu, and Grok—when we set off from Brakith at first light.
