The Hickory Staff e-1

by Rob Scott

  Ignoring the potential threat behind her, Brynne hurried back to the quarterdeck: get to the guard before he fires at Mark. She did not muffle her steps, nor disguise her approach. Her lips were pressed together in a grim half-smile, her eyes fixed straight ahead. Her hair was tucked beneath the collar of her tunic. She held a knife loosely in each hand and rolled her fingers along the hilts, as if searching for the perfect grip. She watched as the sailor reached the stern rail, saw the look of surprise as he saw the skiff tied to the stern line, and inhaled sharply as he drew an arrow from his quiver, nocked it and took aim.

  Brynne, unconcerned for her own wellbeing, cried out to the Malakasian bowman, but he didn’t appear to hear. He was focused on his target. He drew the bowstring taut and sighted along the shaft.

  Mark saw the Malakasian appear above the stern rail: he’d been spotted. For an instant his thoughts flashed to Brynne. Was she hurt? Had this man killed her? He felt anger burgeon inside himself and suddenly he wanted very badly to deal with this man, this enemy, one-on-one. He drew an arrow from the quiver, nocked it, took aim and fired.

  A startled look of surprise passed across the Malakasian’s face as Mark’s arrow flew wide over his shoulder and into the night. Mark drew again. This time he closed one eye, placed the arrowhead in the centre of the man’s chest and fired. The arrow leaped from Garec’s bow, sped towards the sentry and embedded itself in the wood of the stern rail.

  ‘Come on!’ Mark shouted up in English, ‘take your best shot. Go ahead and kill me, you chickenshit asshole!’

  Too angry to feel afraid, he drew another shaft as the sailor nocked his own arrow and prepared to fire. Mark turned his attention skywards for his final attempt.

  The sentry peered down at him along the thin black arrow as Mark, crying out, loosed his third shot and watched his arrow sail up and out of sight. It missed the man by a good fifteen feet.

  ‘Here it comes,’ Mark whispered, and braced himself. He started shuddering as he imagined the burning sensation of the thin obsidian arrowhead ripping through his muscles and maybe piercing a bone. For a fraction of a second he thought of Garec lying immobile and glassy-eyed on the ground in front of the fisherman’s shanty.

  The Malakasian drew a breath, held it and fired.

  Mark didn’t see the arrow rocketing towards, him nor did he see Brynne as she reached the man an instant later. A dull wooden thud resounded as the Malakasian arrow sank deep into the bench not six inches away.

  ‘He missed,’ Mark cried in disbelief. ‘You missed, you blind bastard!’ He started laughing maniacally in relief until a splash of cold water snapped him out of it. ‘What the hell?’ He stared into the dark water. His first thought was that the man had leaped over the side to engage him in close combat. Brynne had his axe; now he searched fruitlessly for a weapon until his hand fell on the arrow embedded in the seat beside him. He tugged it free and brandished it menacingly above his head.

  The corpse bobbed to the surface; the dead man’s face bore a look of surprise. Almost placidly the body rolled over and sank beneath the waves.

  Mark looked up at the stern rail. Brynne looked down at him, brandishing her bloodstained hunting knife.

  ‘I love you,’ he called out in English.

  ‘Speak Common, vile foreigner,’ she teased and disappeared.

  The old sorcerer met her halfway back to the starboard stairs. ‘Watch your back,’ she whispered, ‘half the crew is coming out of a forward hatch.’ She moved past him, knives at the ready, preparing to leap into the fray.

  ‘I know,’ he said, grabbing her arm. ‘I met them as I came out of the main cabin.’

  ‘Where are they now?’

  ‘They are… resting.’ He seemed to be enjoying himself immensely. ‘I’m afraid they’ll all have terrible headaches in the morning. At least they’ll be alive, though.’

  ‘You’ll give us revolutionaries a bad name,’ she teased as she climbed back to the deck.

  ‘Nonsense, my dear. I did not come here to kill sailors.’

  ‘That loud rumble?’

  ‘The old royal residence is probably going to need a few new windows.’ He looked towards the flickering lights that marked the docks and the city beyond. ‘Nerak knows we’re here.’

  She couldn’t repress the look of fear that passed over her face, but she braced herself and banished the feeling of terror. ‘All right then. Bring him on.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ he said as he checked the knot holding the stern line in place, ‘but your part is done.’ He gestured her over the side.

  ‘No, I’m staying.’

  ‘My dear child, you have no weapons to fight him. He is dead already. And I need not to be worried about you.’ He looked back at the dock and, a little impatiently, ordered her, ‘Quickly now, over you go.’

  Brynne knew when she was beaten. She sheathed her knives, wrapped her arms tightly about the old man’s neck and whispered, ‘Please be safe. I don’t want to have to go through the rites again.’

  He hugged her, and said comfortingly, ‘I have spent half my life preparing for this. I’ll be fine. But please, Brynne, you must go now.’

  Brynne nodded, and slipped over the rail.

  Steven ignited a small fireball to bring some light to the dark prince’s private chambers, but as its soft glow banished the shadows, it also banished the opulence: the lush decor, the rich tapestries, the brocaded silks and velvets were all an illusion. When the hickory staff had breached Nerak’s magical defences, it had also shattered that spell. The thunderous eruption from across the harbour confirmed that Nerak was coming – how long did he have? A minute? Two? Twenty? Steven tried not to think about it and instead set his mind to finding the far portal.

  Contrary to what he had seen through the porthole, Nerak’s cabin was sparsely decorated: no comforts, no bed, no books, no fireplace. There were no clothes in the closet, no tapestries on the walls and no carpets covering the floorboards. The wooden walls, floors and ceilings of the large square room were dark, almost black with age, and dust covered the floor: Steven was leaving boot prints in the grey blanket like tracks in city snow, as he made his way towards the centre of the room. Nerak – and the evil minion that possessed him – did not appear to sleep. He did not eat, read, or entertain guests. It looked like no one had entered this cabin in years, and Steven guessed the dark prince was more a spirit than a man, more the idea of evil than an actual person.

  Against the far wall a rectangular wooden table had been pushed back into the shadows. There were two things on it: a leatherbound book and a black metal box with curious raised markings. Nervous that the Larion monster would arrive before he’d found the far portal, Steven moved hastily, kicking up a cloud of dust in the process. He brightened his fireball with a glance and reached out to open the book – then thought better of it.

  ‘How did he do that?’ he asked aloud, feeling unsuccessfully for any evidence of magic imbued in the table, or within the items upon it. Nothing. He closed his eyes and concentrated, hoping something would happen.

  ‘Why would I pick them up?’ he asked, his hands stuffed protectively in his jacket. ‘I’ll be eviscerated or some damned thing.’ Too much time had passed: he felt an overwhelming need to hurry. ‘Just do it,’ he told himself, ‘pick them up.’ He reached for the box, then pushed his hands back into his pockets.

  ‘Right,’ he said forcefully. ‘The room was rigged, so there is no need to rig these two.’ Slowly he took out one hand and reached forward for the book. ‘Right?’ he asked hesitantly of the empty chamber.

  As soon as his fingers touched the book he could feel magic surge through him – like the feeling when he and Mark first opened William Higgins’s cylinder back home at 147 Tenth Street. But this time Steven savoured the sensation. He laid his palm against the book’s cover and allowed it to rest there for a few stolen moments, basking in the now-familiar sensation of an untapped, unbridled magical force.

  Unfamiliar colours and irregu
lar shapes moved across his field of vision, followed by images and ideas, both evil and benevolent. Some were ancient, others not even imagined: promises of futures filled with growth and with ruin, with pestilence and with prosperity. Steven could feel these possibilities move through his body, slipping through his veins, diffusing through his muscles: a patternless cascade that drowned out his thoughts and filled his mind with the atonal polyphony of imperfection and scattered logic.

  Steven lost track of time, revelling in the myriad hues of unknown colours, unfamiliar aromas, untasted flavours and memories both real and imagined. This was a power greater than anything he had ever known and he felt himself draining, spiralling away, losing himself inside the mysterious tome.

  He began to sway on his feet until, his hand still resting on the book’s smooth cover, he heard someone calling to him faintly. ‘Hurry, Steven. You must hurry.’ It was his own voice.

  He jerked his hand back in a protective reflex and swore vehemently. He shook his head to clear the remnants of the seething thoughts and muttered, ‘Goddamnit. What is that thing?’ He blinked his eyes and leaned forward for a closer look at the book’s spine, frowning when he saw it was blank. ‘Well, what the hell did you expect?’ he asked out loud, ‘an ISBN number?’

  He reached for the box, careful not to touch the book again. The box was cold, and he could detect no magic or mysterious energy emanating from within. He ran his hand curiously over the smooth metal container. There did not appear to be a latch and he could find no hinge or crack along which it might open.

  The top and sides were adorned with raised silver ornamentations that looked like a child’s drawing of a perfectly formed Christmas tree, smooth on each side and rising to a point in an exact isosceles triangle. On the upper corners of each side were two cones, separated by four more along the centre edge. On the lower corners of each side were single ornaments separated by two more along the centre edge. Steven pushed and pulled against the tiny silver sculptures, trying to find a catch: they could be moved back and forth slightly, or depressed until they flattened flush against the metal. But still the box remained determinedly shut.

  He turned it over: the bottom surface was flat and featureless. ‘Okay,’ he said, fingering one of the single cones, ‘so this is the top. Now to open it.’

  He considered the box: ‘Two, four, two and one, two, one repeated on five sides… no, four sides and a top.’ He pushed each one, felt them depress until flat, then bounce back against his fingertips. He tried them in combinations: side-to-side and up-and-down, then the single cones, double cones and quadruple cones in order. Nothing happened.

  ‘Four sides and a top,’ he said, pushing and sliding cones as he spoke. ‘Top first-’ push and slide, ‘-sides first-’ push and slide, ‘-top, sides and top again-’ push and slide, ‘-sides, top and sides again-’ push and slide.

  Push-and-slide combinations were followed by slide-and-push, but nothing changed: each time the silver ornaments simply returned to their original positions.

  ‘Two, four, two and one, two, one… four sides and a top-’ Steven said the numbers slowly again, trying them out in different patterns and arrangements Until a second thunderous rumble roared through the cabin, nearly knocking him off his feet. This one felt much closer.

  ‘Oh, screw it,’ Steven cried and slammed the staff down on the box, a massive blow that shook the Prince Marek as much as her master’s fury had. Box, book and table were unaffected.

  ‘Well, shit,’ Steven spat. He’d run out of ideas.

  Suddenly the old fisherman was by his side. ‘That was you, was it?’

  ‘Yep.’

  He nodded approvingly. ‘Well, you’ve certainly learned how to produce a fine blast.’ He dragged a boot heel through the dust, drawing an arc. ‘Might I ask why?’

  ‘This box.’ Steven shook it. ‘I think the far portal may be inside this box, but I can’t get it open.’

  ‘Did you push these buttons?’ He played with a few of the raised carvings. ‘That’s probably how it works. Maybe one of them opens it.’

  ‘I tried forty-six different ways, using every combination I can imagine.’ He shook his head dejectedly. ‘There are too many possibilities and I’ve run out of ideas.’

  ‘Maybe it’s in another cabin – this is a huge ship.’ The old man looked about the sparse chamber. ‘We don’t have much time before Nerak gets here; I want you long gone before that happens.’

  ‘I know it’s in here: I can feel it.’ He didn’t take his eyes off the curious box. ‘Look: Mark pointed this shape out to me the night we opened the portal in our house. It was there, stitched into the fabric. We thought it looked like a tree.’

  Gilmour squinted and rubbed his eyes. ‘I’m afraid this fisherman didn’t have very good eyesight; I may have to work on that a bit when we get out of here. But you’re right.’

  Steven tried not to think about how little time they had. ‘Maybe we should just take it and run, get back to the boat and try to escape.’

  ‘No, either we figure it out here, or we use our combined forces to delay Nerak long enough to get it open and then escape. There’s no point running away at this juncture: no matter how quickly we paddle away in that little boat he’ll find us, and we’ll have no chance.’

  Steven’s heart raced. This really was it. He struggled to open his mind as he examined the box from every angle. While he paced, the old sorcerer tried using his own magic, but it too had no effect. He scratched at the stubble on his chin and announced, ‘I don’t think it’s magic.’

  ‘What?’ Steven had not been paying attention. ‘Say that again.’

  ‘The door, this room, that book there on the table, even the table itself: I can feel the magic in the fundamental fabric of each. Although there’s a spell protecting this box from being destroyed or blown apart by our power, I don’t believe it’s a spell keeping it locked – I would be able to detect it. It’s just a confounding, tricky box.’

  Suddenly Steven’s thoughts shifted. This wasn’t a problem he had to address with his limited understanding of the staff or its magic. This was far simpler, like a problem he might have tackled in school, or while working out a loan at the bank, or even- Steven paused. ‘Jeffrey Simmons.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Jeffrey Simmons,’ Steven grinned. ‘He’s a doctoral student in mathematics at the University of Denver in Colorado.’ His face had changed. This was what he was good at: the abstractions that made sense in layers of cognitive twists and turns; it frustrated and confused most students, but not him. Steven worked the problem.

  ‘How can Jeffrey Simmons help us? I remind you, our time is alarmingly short.’

  ‘Two, four, two, one, two, one on four sides and a top,’ Steven muttered to himself, and began pacing more quickly.

  ‘Steven?’

  ‘Two, four, two, one, two, one on four sides and a top. Think it through: what makes sense?’

  ‘To me or to Nerak?’

  ‘Neither. What makes sense mathematically?’ Steven smiled and continued, ‘You said yourself there was magic protecting the box, but no magic keeping it locked. So it has to be a mathematical riddle. Watch-’ He began moving the silver ornaments. ‘If two from the right and two from the left slide to match the four in the middle-’ He slid the ornaments simultaneously and for the first time both double cones remained in place. Steven repeated the process on each side. ‘And one cone from the left and one cone from the right slide to match two cones in the middle- ’ He slid the single cones towards their matching twins on the top.

  ‘Now we should be able to open the box.’ He released the cones. Both slid back into place.

  ‘Bloody demonpiss,’ the old man grumbled. ‘I thought you had it.’

  ‘Don’t get discouraged. That was only the first side.’ Steven repeated the process with one of the remaining four sides, but the cones slid back to their original position. ‘Shit.’

  ‘This isn’t working,’ the fisherma
n entreated. ‘Steven, we’re almost out of time. We have to think of something else.’

  ‘No,’ Steven said brusquely, ‘there are three more sides. Maths makes sense.’

  ‘It never did for me.’

  ‘It does. Trust me. This will work.’ He tried sliding the single cones to match the double cones on each of the final three sides, but each time the raised silver knobs slid silently back home. Steven’s resolve began to flag, but he gritted his teeth and muttered, ‘No, this has to be the answer.’ He ran through the entire process a second time – but still again the uncooperative cones failed to align with Steven’s geometric logic.

  His mind raced. This was not right. Curse this miserable land. Nothing made sense here, not even maths. And yet mathematics went unperturbed by the soft philosophies and gummy epistemologies that trapped so many thinkers by the ankles: it was almost truculent in its determination to make sense. That’s why he adored it, because with enough time and intellectual determination, it all added up.

  But not in Eldarn. Not in this inane land of horse-lion creatures, subterranean demons, dictators evil beyond the ken of mortal man, Cthulhoid cavern-dwellers with a penchant for bone-collecting, murderous spirit wraiths and long-dead sorcerers giving orders on barren mountaintops. What kind of place was this? Damn, damn and curse this hellish land.

  Why was he here – and who or what had gifted him the hickory staff? More importantly yet, why couldn’t he stomach the thought of just going home and leaving Eldarn to the natives? Let Gilmour and Kantu – or even Lessek – sort out the problems.

  Sweat poured off him as Steven struggled to understand. What am I doing here? Nerak is coming to kill me and I don’t know what I’m doing here. What do I care if Sandcliff Palace crumbles, if the spell table is opened again, if Lessek’s Key is ever found?