The Way of Pain

by Gregory Mattix

  “Aye. As you noted, it’s the hardest and most sought-after ore in the multiverse,” Creel replied. “A blade properly forged of the metal will never shatter, and it can hold the most powerful of enchantments. Due to its properties and rarity, since it’s only found in the Abyss, the value is astronomical.”

  “No wonder they were seeking it. Do you think this artificer’s ring is Abyssal iron? It’s exceptionally light, and I’ve never seen such a metal before.”

  Creel studied it a moment when Taren handed it to him, weighing it curiously. “Could very well be. I’ve not seen its like before either.”

  Taren accepted the ring back and shelved the notebook, continuing his search.

  They finished their search of the bookshelves but came up empty-handed, exchanging unhappy glances.

  “Too bad we haven’t found any more of those constructs,” Mira said. “It might have been able to give us information about aiding Ferret.”

  “Aye, but the one we destroyed seemed to be the last of them,” Creel muttered.

  Dispirited, Mira sensed her companions’ reluctance to give up on Ferret, but she knew they felt the same desire as she to leave the eerie hall behind and return to the surface world. As Creel had pointed out earlier, their food provisions would be adequate for another two or three days with rationing, but their water was running low. Beyond the practical considerations of acquiring more water, the feelings of sorrow and decay the hall engendered were filling her with unease, and she yearned to breathe fresh air and see the sun again.

  “Well,” Creel said heavily, “let’s find this portal and see if we can’t get out of this cursed place.” The decision seemed to pain him, knowing they were unable to aid Ferret and unlikely to find help outside the Hall of the Artificers.

  ***

  Taren reluctantly resealed the door to the overseer’s office, already hoping he might have the opportunity to return someday and further study the treasure trove of books within. Although he’d seen no mention of the transmutation process used on Ferret, unfortunately, he hoped to glean more about the purpose of the artificers’ work. The answers they sought were likely in one of the many moldering tomes that disintegrated upon touch.

  After going through the remaining laboratories in a cursory search for anything of aid, Taren discovered a spigot in a wall over a large basin. He turned the spigot’s gritty lever with some difficulty but was disappointed when only flakes of rust came out of the pipe.

  Another door requiring Taren’s ring to unlock barred their path at the end of the hallway outside the overseer’s office. Once he applied his ring, a heavy vaultlike door banged open with a resounding boom, and the orange crystals within bloomed with light.

  The portal room was a large domed chamber where every sound seemed amplified, echoing queerly inside the massive circular room. To the right of the entrance was the tunnel leading to the ore repository, the tracks in the floor ending at the massive sealed door.

  The portal itself was an intricate spherical construction standing at the far side of the chamber. Interlocking rune-inscribed rings of black metal were joined on twin axes at top and bottom. To the left of the portal, a stone obelisk rose from the floor with an orb of black stone perched atop it.

  Taren approached the waist-high obelisk, sensing it was a control mechanism for the portal. On the orb’s top was an unusual pyramid-shaped indentation. Runes were carved upon the obelisk’s surface, but other than the indentation, the orb itself was smooth and featureless, like a sphere carved from onyx.

  “Never seen a portal like this before,” Creel muttered. “But I’d be willing to wager that’s your Abyssal iron right there.” He pointed at the portal’s matte-black rings, inscribed with sigils along their faces. “I’ll fetch Ferret and our gear while you figure out how to fire this contraption up.”

  Mira went with Creel to assist him.

  Taren scratched the stubble on his jaw as he studied the stone orb. “Let’s hope the ring can activate this thing.”

  Gradnik’s ring was warm in his hand. When he held it toward the orb, it disassembled and refolded until it formed a pyramid with a knob on the bottom. He inserted the ring into the pyramid-shaped depression. The room hummed with power around him, and a moment later, the portal’s interlocking rings slowly began to spin and rotate independently of each other, picking up speed until the rings were a blur.

  This ring is wondrous indeed. Gradnik, I wish you could have seen this, my friend. Each of the artificers must have had such a ring, or at least those of sufficient rank to come and go as they pleased.

  Creel and Mira returned a few minutes later. They had found two iron bars of uneven sizes somewhere and fashioned a crude litter with a blanket stretched between the bars, upon which they carried Ferret. After setting the litter down, the two watched the portal’s movements with interest.

  Mottled veins had appeared on the orb’s surface, glowing a cool cerulean blue. Taren placed his hands upon the stone, and a circle formed around the key. Four phrases formed in glowing letters at each cardinal direction: Ammon Nor Prime at the top, Shirak Research Station and Kaejax Outpost to either side, and Voshoth to the bottom. None of the names meant anything to him except the first, other than the mentions in Lenantos’s letter. Instinctively, he turned the stone sphere, and it rotated smoothly. He turned it clockwise until the name Voshoth was at the top of the circle. The portal hummed with energy, the rings spinning and then locking in place with a resounding ka-shing. He realized that the way the rings aligned with each other dictated the portal’s destination. But instead of a void or glowing aura forming within the portal, it remained closed. Red runes flashed on the sphere beneath his hands, cycling several times until the word “forbidden” appeared. With a shrug, Taren turned the control again. The portal’s rings resumed their gyrations, reorienting themselves differently each time for Kaejax Outpost and Shirak Research Station. Blue fire limned the inner edge of the innermost metal ring, and the cold of the void burst into being with each of the two unfamiliar settings. When he changed it to Ammon Nor Prime, the portal glowed with a soft turquoise light, the same as the portal by which they had entered the facility.

  “Fascinating. The others must lead off plane, but I’ve never heard of any of those three destinations.” Creel frowned at the control sphere.

  “And Voshoth, wherever that might be, cannot be accessed without the control rod Lenantos guarded,” Taren said. “If any of the artificers remain, I presume it will be in their possession at the Kaejax Outpost.” They had left Lenantos’s document on the desk in his office before resealing the door. The Order of Artificers seemed to be extinct, but Taren felt a duty to at least preserve their history as much as he could.

  “Let’s be away from this wretched place,” Creel said.

  He and Mira lifted Ferret again.

  Taren removed the key from the orb, and the portal remained open. The key returned to its ring shape, and he stuck it absently into his pocket.

  Then he followed his companions through the portal.

  Chapter 7

  Bone-weary, Elyas plodded after his fellow soldiers in the column, head bowed against the bitter cold and swirling snow that stung his face. His hands were numb, and he bunched them into fists, wishing he had gloves to keep them warm. The ill-fitting dead man’s helm he wore slipped low again, digging into his brow, and he straightened it for the hundredth time during the march.

  He wished he could say the cold was the source of the men’s bowed heads and slumped shoulders, but such was not the case. The weariness and resignation gripping them was due to their impending defeat. Nobody voiced the words, yet all knew just the same. They were outnumbered and outmatched, wounded and bloodied—a lame deer that a stalking pack of wolves was content to bring down at their leisure.

  The past few days had been demoralizing, with the Ketanians’ numbers slowly winnowed down further. As if to stoke the king’s ire, the Nebarans attacked with swift but limited ambush tacti
cs, often in the dead of night: volleys of quarrels sent into their ranks from hidden archers, a fleet charge of cavalry, magical fireballs and lightning bolts unleashed into their midst, enemies teleporting into the center of camp and seeking to assassinate the royals and commanders. Try as they might, the Ketanian army could never force a straight-on battle with their foes.

  The Nebarans clearly had the numbers and morale advantage. Elyas suspected the demoness, the so-called warlord leading the Nebarans, was merely toying with them. Whether she sought to lure King Clement into making an impulsive blunder or simply prolonging the inevitable, he knew not. Yet they were steadily forced northward, abandoning their camp on the fields of Varrackot, driven from the road and into the open plains of the kingdom’s heartland south of Carran. The enemy army seemed to be split into three units now, steering them ever northward while preventing them from either retreating northeast toward Llantry or northwest past the Downs of Atur.

  Thus, they retreated, leaving a trail of unburied dead and broken swords and wagons and equipment, their passage churning the ground and fallow fields to mud.

  The prior morning, following the assassination attempt in the night, an angry King Clement had ordered a march due south. They’d sought to engage the enemy head-on, but instead, the center of the warlord’s forces melted away, retreating south, only to leave them open to being flanked on either side. The daring scouts’ eleventh-hour reports staved off utter disaster before the trap could snap shut.

  Elyas doubted the king was acting rationally after having lost his youngest son during the final, desperate battle the rearguard had fought. The survivors of the ambush had escaped and made their way back to the army’s camp without further woe, yet the news of Prince Dorian’s death was a dire blow to the king. His grief seemed to be consuming him, and Elyas had heard mutterings around the camp over the past days that he was mad with grief.

  The men were cold, hungry, and demoralized, their numbers shrinking with each ambush. Their heavily rationed supplies were thinning to the point where fatigue and illness were taking a toll. To make matters worse, the fall weather had suddenly turned cold and blustery, with snowflakes falling from the leaden sky.

  They were bleeding to death from a hundred minor cuts rather than any great, decisive blow.

  She will fall upon us at any time now, and that will be the end of us.

  Elyas thought back on his last sighting of the enemy warlord. The previous afternoon, she had plummeted down from the cloudy sky like a diving falcon, snatching General Debrec from the saddle of his horse, an infernal whip ensnaring him around the waist. A few archers got off shots, but they failed to harm the demoness. Instead, she hoisted the general high above their heads as they could only watch in horror. While Debrec struggled in vain, the warlord literally tore him apart in midair, the savage whip cutting entirely through the hapless general. Bloody remains rained down on the officers and enlisted soldiers, the gory display infuriating the leadership even as it terrified the men and further eroded their dwindling morale.

  The sole high point of the past week had been the army’s joining with the routed Ammon Nor forces, who had also fled north, a maneuver likely allowed by the Nebaran warlord. The arrival of Colonel Krige’s additional four hundred troops briefly raised cheers from the weary forces although they quickly realized the garrison soldiers were even worse off than their own dire situation, half starved and heavily laden with wounded. The combined Ketanian army numbered around six thousand troops, less than a third of the Nebarans’ numbers, with many men unfit for battle.

  “Keep your chin up, lad,” called Glin, rousing Elyas from his grim musings.

  Glin had fallen back to slog alongside Elyas midway down the column, the sergeant seeking to give their fragile morale what boost he could. They moved ever northward across muddy fields, preparing to face the Nebarans in one final battle upon ground of their own choosing on fields south of Carran.

  Elyas nodded a greeting to the sergeant. After a moment, he asked the question nagging his and the other men’s thoughts. “You think we stand a chance against twenty thousand, especially with those demons among their ranks?”

  Glin looked at him and sighed. “I’d like to be able to tell you we’ll prevail, but after the shite we’ve both witnessed?” He shrugged. “Best pray that Sol or Anhur or whoever you favor will grant you a clean death once all is said and done.”

  At least he’s honest about our chances. “Aye, as I thought. We don’t stand much chance.”

  “There’s always hope,” Glin replied, clasping his shoulder. “If we fail, who’s gonna stop ’em?”

  Elyas didn’t have an answer to that. Once the king’s army fell, the imperial forces would be free to burn and pillage their way through the heartland and sack Llantry and Carran, the largest and most influential cities in the kingdom. Perhaps, with danger threatening their doorsteps, the Free Kingdoms of elves and dwarves could be persuaded to join up with whatever remnants of the Ketanian army might survive after they were crushed on the battlefield. Vallonde to the west had been infamously neutral throughout the centuries of conflict between Ketania and Nebara, so they couldn’t be relied on for aid.

  “Have you seen Jahn?” Glin asked. His eyes scanned the fields behind them.

  “Nay, not since he volunteered to lead the rearguard this morning. I’m sure he’ll be fine if he’s half the warrior you are,” he added, seeing Glin’s worry.

  The sergeant smiled at that. “Little brother certainly has more luck than I, though I can best him more often than not in a fair bout.”

  Elyas grinned in turn. “Little” wasn’t the word he would use to describe either Glin or his twin brother, Jahn. Glin was only able to use the term by virtue of being a few hours the elder. Both men were equally big and brawny, nearly of a size with Elyas himself, and skilled fighters. Elyas liked the brothers and couldn’t have hoped for a sturdier shieldman than either one.

  “Well, if you see him afore I do, tell him I’m meaning to win my coin back this eve.” Glin had lost a heated dicing match with his brother the prior evening.

  Elyas nodded, and the sergeant moved back along the column, hailing familiar faces and sparing a moment to inquire as to a man’s health or exchange a ribald jest or colorful curse for the Nebarans as he went.

  Would that the entire army was led by such men.

  Lord Lanthas and the recently deceased General Debrec seemed the most competent leaders thus far, but in recent days, the king had taken a more active role in managing the army, and to ill effect. Elyas had begun noticing more empty bedrolls and holes in the ranks come the dawn. At first, the deserters were spoken of with scorn and derision, but as the days went by and their stomachs became emptier and the situation more desperate, such talk had ceased. He knew the thought of desertion was beginning to appeal to many.

  Anhur, grant us a favorable battlefield and a worthy death—and soon, before these hundred cuts finally take their toll. He couldn’t help but wonder if the remnants of the army would succumb first to starvation, desertion, or the swords of the pursuing Nebarans.

  When word of a favorable battlefield arrived early that evening from the forward scouts, later confirmed by Lord Lanthas, who rode ahead to see for himself, Elyas was relieved. Finally, they would make a final stand—no more fleeing and getting picked apart ever so slowly. The army marched into the night until they arrived at the field the scouts spoke of. It was good ground—rising steadily to the north but fairly flat and lined by a steep ridge to one side, a narrow river on the other. The Nebarans wouldn’t be able to attack them effectively in any numbers except for head-on, which would be an uphill charge.

  As Elyas bedded down that night, he was actually anticipating the morning even though the odds were certainly not in their favor, and his own death was a likelihood.

  So be it—one final battle. This will spare me the damned blisters and cold hands and empty stomach. They’ll pay a very heavy price for any victory they achieve
on the morrow. I’ll do my best to make you proud, Da.

  ***

  The Nebaran warlord must have grown tired of harrying them, for the next morning, they marched directly across the field to engage the Ketanians head-on, as the commanders had hoped.

  Elyas stood in formation beneath a clear blue sky, the sun shining down, glinting on burnished mail and keen blades throughout the ranks. The early taste of winter had disappeared as quickly as it had arrived, a minor blessing, but one that seemed to improve the men’s moods nonetheless.

  The red falcon on a blue-and-white field rippled in the breeze, held aloft by the king’s standard bearer. King Clement was resplendent in his gleaming plate mail. His remaining son Prince Jerard, Lord Lanthas, and various nobles and knights in their polished armor and clean surcoats gathered around the king just behind Elyas’s position, where they held last-minute council on horseback. The army had few remaining horses, so they no longer had an effective cavalry. All the mounts other than the nobles’ and officers’ had been used for rearguard duty, a rotation of volunteers picked each day. The handful of spare mounts remaining were currently being kept in reserve, likely to bear any wounded nobles and officers, should they be taken out of the fight.

  Elyas shifted his stance in nervous anticipation. At last, the day had arrived that would decide the fate of the kingdom. If they failed, Ketania was likely lost. Yet if they somehow succeeded, with Anhur’s favor, they might strike a mortal blow and take away the Nebarans’ desire to fight, hundreds of miles from home on foreign territory. He knew the odds were extremely long, yet after days of marching burdened by fear and shame, he was ready to give his all, and he sensed the majority of the men felt the same. More deserters had slipped away during the past night, but not in numbers as great as Elyas had feared.