Fafnir lost focus for a moment, drifting on a sudden wave of fear. “Taken,” he said at last.
Hengest put a steadying hand on the Chain Maker. “By the warlock?”
“By his son.”
Deglan frowned with confusion. “Slouch Hat is a bloody husk. He has...no...sons.”
A frozen stone dropped into Deglan's gut. Slouch Hat wore the iron crown. The crown of Jerrod the Second. That twisted tyrant had many children, but only one who could invoke the look of drowning dismay that Fafnir now wore.
“The Gaunt Prince,” Deglan hissed, feeling his mind unraveling at the prospect. “How is that possible?” But his frayed thoughts quickly wove themselves into an image of an owl. “Gasten.”
Fafnir nodded weakly.
Dropping the tome, Deglan flung himself at the stricken runecaster, grabbing fistfuls of his cloak and shaking him.
“You encouraged him! Convinced that poor boy he was a sorcerer! You pushed him towards it!”
Through his rage, Deglan could feel Hengest trying to pull him off. Ulfrun made no move to interfere.
“You did this!” Deglan cried.
“I felt only his power,” Fafnir protested. “I knew not its source.”
“You did not want to know!” Deglan growled, shoving the dwarf further against the cave wall. “You saw only a tool for your precious quest. A confused young man, easily swayed and you have damned him!”
The wizard did not struggle under Deglan's abuse, merely looked him in the face, morose and defeated. “I swear, I did not know.”
Shaking his head with scorn, Deglan released the dwarf and stepped back. His mouth was sour. When he spoke again, his own voice sounded tired and tedious.
“Crane is the Gaunt Prince's puppet. And Flyn,” he flung the name down at Fafnir, “is not the proper champion.”
The Chain Maker's face clenched with inner turmoil. “I know.”
“Now?” Deglan pressed. “Or always?”
Fafnir struggled to swallow. “Does it matter?”
“No.” It was Ulfrun who answered.
“No,” Deglan echoed, scowling. “None of it matters. None of it will matter. You have done nothing, Chain Maker, but fashion the deaths of all foolish enough to follow you. You have erred at every turn of this quest.”
Fafnir regarded him with a spark of defiance. “Save one.”
“And what is that?” Deglan spat.
“I allowed you to come.”
The dwarf's gall kindled fresh rage in Deglan. He would dare make a mockery now? But before Deglan launched into another tirade, he saw the stone-faced earnestness in the wizard's face.
“You are right, Master Loamtoes,” Fafnir said, struggling to rise. Hengest bent to help him. “You were right on Skagen, when we spoke in the Wreck. You had the loyalty of Crane and Sir Flyn. The loyalty of fellowship. That is a gift I would never earn. After all, one does not earn the loyalty of a wielded implement, one simply takes it in hand and forces it to purpose. As you say, they were tools to be used. Nay, they were weapons. And I loosed them upon the Corpse Eater, for she needs to die. Ulfrun and I will continue on that path, but you, Master Loamtoes, you must do what fate demands of you. Save your friends.”
Deglan snorted. “They are lost, dwarf! I lived beneath the Earth for enough centuries to know that these caves are expansive. I could wander for days!”
The lids of Fafnir's eyes slowly drooped and the dwarf lifted his chin, concentrating. “The sword Coalspur quickly approaches the vale. That is where the Breaker and I must go.” The Chain Maker's eyes opened and he looked to Hengest. “What of Sir Flyn?”
The beardless dwarf came out of his own momentary reflection and answered readily. “Above us, and deeper in the mountain.”
Fafnir nodded once. “Then they are parted. Go. Take Master Loamtoes to Flyn.”
Without pause, Hengest tightened his grip on his ram-headed staff and began walking deeper into the cave. Deglan caught his arm, stopping him.
“How do you know where Flyn is?”
“I aided in the forging of his mail,” Hengest replied. “Come.”
Together, the four traveled through the frigid cavern, but soon came to a junction of tunnels. Fafnir nodded assuredly at one spur, the most level. “This is our road.”
“And this ours,” Hengest said, pointing to a larger, upward sloping branch.
“Luck to you,” Ulfrun said, nodding at Hengest, at Deglan.
“Come with us,” Deglan urged the giantess.
Ulfrun shook her head with little vigor. “I must go where the augury commands. I must chase my Doom.” “Toad shit! Flyn and Crane need you.”
“No, you ugly bear cub,” Ulfrun replied with a small smile. “The gamecock needs you. As for Inkstained, he needs that word-prison.” She lifted her chin towards the tome in Deglan's arms. “We share affection, it is true, but memories of lust and bed-play will not aid him now. Aye, they may do harm, if the songs of this Gaunt Prince are true.”
“She is right,” Hengest said from over Deglan's shoulder.
“Go,” Ulfrun said with encouragement. “Help. Heal. I have a battle-hunger and the mother of Wind awaits.”
The giantess turned and followed Fafnir down their chosen tunnel. Deglan watched her for a moment, then went with Hengest into deeper darkness.
Flyn snapped awake with the feeling that he still fell. A cold, stone surface was pressed into his face, his chest, his belly, pulsing pain wherever it touched him. As consciousness returned, a leaden ache settled into Flyn's skull and he tasted blood, could smell it through a thick foulness in the air. Spitting and blowing, he expelled the coppery fluid from his beak and nostrils, only to have more flood warmly back into the cavities. The pain barking through his right shoulder was nearly audible, the agonizing sensation accompanying the ringing in his addled head. He could feel something gripped in his hand, a cold weight at the end of the pain, and had a vague recollection of plunging the elven spur into the side of the shaft before the world vanished.
Opening his eyes, the world returned, red and roiling. Grotesque blotches, limned in orange and crimson, swam before him, emerging from perfect blackness. Flyn heard grunts and low bestial groans rumbling from a chorus of surrounding throats. Crying out against the pain, he scrambled quickly to his feet, holding the spur out at the end of an arm quaking with injury. Flyn spun in place, finding the shambling red blobs encircling him, closing in. He began to discern the suggestion of bandy legs and long, corded arms extending from broad, cruel shoulders.
Flyn recalled seeing such a shape before. A male troll. Save for his mate, that one had been alone and revealed under the light of a winter moon. Now, near ten of the creatures ringed him, seen only by the heat of their reeking flesh.
Instinctively, Flyn reached for the axe at his belt, but found the ring empty, the weapon falling free at some unknown time during his aerial grapple with the Corpse Eater. Unmated trolls were said to be crazed, deadly and monstrous, overcome with savagery at the loss of their females.
Flyn chuckled in the darkness. So like his own kind, these trolls, except coburn became unreasoning at the presence of their females, a lust for flesh descending into lust for blood, an inbred barbarity which some believed Flyn lacked. Gallus had called him a cockless coward, a castrate in a metal shirt. Inkstain had cast similar aspersions up in the nest, likening Flyn's valor to weakness. Viciousness, he claimed, was the essence of all coburn. Certainly, the Dread Cockerel was vicious. A more merciless knight there has never been, according to Corc. And now Sir Wyncott fought somewhere above, with Coalspur in hand and the weight of prophecy upon his head, while Flyn skulked in the darkness, weaponless and surrounded by snuffling beasts.
He still wore his metal shirt. The armor would provide little protection against the pressing trolls, however. They had not yet charged, but Flyn could hear them becoming more incensed at his presence, their stentorian expulsions of breath growing with aggression.
Flyn felt his
own blood boiling. To be torn asunder by these low fiends was not a worthy end for a knight. A dung-filled crevasse was no fit grave. This was a place of darkness and discarded bones, the den of pitiful, pitiless animals. That was what should die in such a place, an animal. He could give them that, allow himself to become lost in the blood red haze. It was not absent in him, for all the insults. Twice had he unleashed the savage side and fought at its urging. Once, at Castle Gaunt when compelled by sorcery and again against his father. Both times, he should have died.
Flyn felt his breath quickening with mounting fury. Not again. It was not his way, not his strength, but that was no weakness. Only an animal would die in this pit, so he would not become one and thus, he would live and emerge, a knight with a purpose. No longer to slay the Corpse Eater, that task had been willingly passed, but to free Ingelbert Crane from whatever malevolence caused his evil comportment. These beasts would not stand between Sir Bantam Flyn and the salvation of a member of his order.
Reaching down, he unbuckled his other spur. He now held both in his hands, points down, his fists rolling slightly in front of him as he pivoted.
Nine. Nine trolls.
Flyn smiled. “Perchance this is worthy of a knight, after all.”
He stilled, ceasing to turn in place, and focused on one of the beasts. It lumbered toward him, flanked by its fellows. Another two strides and Flyn would be within reach of those terrible, thick-fingered hands. He spun, turning completely around to charge the troll that was behind him a moment before. The surrounding brutes bellowed with aggravation at his sudden movement. Ignoring the others, Flyn flung himself at his chosen opponent.
The troll responded with a clumsy, surprised swipe of its arm. Flyn jumped, avoiding the blow and, landing briefly atop the beast’s low-scything forearm, he vaulted over the troll. Twisting as he began to fall, Flyn stabbed downward with the spurs in his hands, plunging them deep into the creases where neck met shoulder. Hot blood spurted and Flyn planted his feet into the stricken troll’s back, pushing away as he yanked his weapons free. Howling, the wounded troll stumbled forward, his legs buckling beneath him. He spilled onto the cave floor, his tumbling bulk interrupting the charge of three of his brethren. Two more came at Flyn from the sides.
From a crouch, he flung his legs back over his head and rolled, avoiding the cauldron-sized fist from the faster of the two, causing the blow to strike the slower troll instead. The meaty thump of hard knuckles on thick skull resounded in the cave as the hapless creature fell senseless.
“Bad luck, large one,” Flyn gloated.
He darted to the left, flanking the troll who had just inadvertently brained his companion. As he sped by, Flyn hammered one of his spurs dagger-like up into the beast’s exposed armpit. The elven steel punctured the tough skin with ease, releasing a torrent of blood as Flyn withdrew the point on the run.
The six uninjured trolls were now converging on him, but Flyn cut a wide path around, skirting the cave wall. He drug the spur in his left hand along the rock as he went, hoping to detect a tunnel opening into the cavern, some means of escape, but the sound of scraping steel was uninterrupted. Not wanting to lose his momentum and the advantage of speed, Flyn shot back towards the center of the cave, charging directly at the trolls. The six had gathered into a group, their dull minds prodding them to congregate against danger.
Wasting no time, Flyn charged into the circle of monsters, dropping to slide beneath the bowed legs of one troll, ripping the unfortunate brute's swinging genitals with a vicious swipe. Skidding clear of the squealing wretch, Flyn gained his feet and came up directly in front of another foe. It grabbed for him, but he dodged within its reach and punched his spurs into its soft midsection in a rapid series of brutal blows.
“Shall we dance?” Flyn laughed.
He left the blades embedded in the troll's flesh upon the last strikes and used them to heave the beast around just as his fellows attempted to lend aid. The impaled troll hollered as he was beaten savagely from behind, the fists of his brethren pummeling him in an attempt to reach Flyn. His living shield began to topple, and Flyn spun away, taking the dripping spurs with him. In their fury, the trolls were unaware that their quarry had escaped and continued to bludgeon their fallen comrade.
Flyn made a quick count. Four of the brutes were mercilessly beating the now limp troll into the floor, while the one Flyn had gelded was writhing weakly upon the ground. Two more lay unmoving a short distance away. Flyn hesitated.
“I thought there were nine of you?”
A primal roar erupted at Flyn’s back and, before he could act, great crushing arms seized him. The breath was forced from his lungs in an agonizing rush as his ribs began to bend inward. His right arm was pinned at his side, while his left flailed from above his assailant's enclosing arms. Flyn stabbed backward, trying to strike the troll’s face with his free spur. The beast began to shake him violently, upsetting his attacks. In his shuddering vision, Flyn saw the other trolls had discovered his predicament and abandoned their rage-murdered kin. In another moment, they would be upon him and help their brother tear him to pieces.
Releasing his grip on the steel spur, Flyn reached backward and grabbed a fistful of his attacker’s filthy hair. Pulling with all his might, he forced the brute’s head downward, moving his own head aside so that the troll’s chin now dug into his shoulder. With savage instinct, the troll opened his growling mouth and bit down. Flyn grunted against the painful pressure, but his mail saved his flesh a gnashing. He continued to pull down on the troll’s head as he bent in the middle, straining against the hold, lifting his feet until they were struck out directly before him. The four uninjured trolls reached for his talons, eager to rend his limbs.
Crying out with desperate exertion, Flyn jerked his legs up and felt the arms around his midriff slacken. Hauling on the troll’s head for leverage, Flyn flipped up and landed astride the brute’s shoulders, immediately slamming the natural spurs on his heels into the unwilling mount’s chest.
Finding his fortunes suddenly reversed, the offended troll bellowed with pain and frustration, flailing his long arms in an attempt to smite Flyn from his perch. His right hand still lodged in the monster’s locks, Flyn jerked the troll’s head, causing his arms to wildly slap at the other brutes. They recoiled, but their stricken brother lumbered forward, as if he could flee the pain clinging to his body. Digging his spurs in, Flyn held fast, riding the crazed troll as he barreled into his cave-mates, thrashing them with agony-fueled blows.
As soon as his roaring steed burst free of the press, Flyn drove the remaining elf spur into the troll’s throat before jumping free. Gargling his own blood, the brute careened into the cavern wall and fell in a heap upon the ground where he noisily expired.
Flyn stood, facing the remaining trolls, and let forth a war cry that rattled off the stone.
“Come, oafs!” he challenged, his voice mixing with the echoes of his screech. “Come, animals!”
He took an aggressive step forward and the trolls shuffled backwards. Flyn could feel his feathers standing away from his flesh, every quill puffed out contentiously, the skin beneath itching for further combat.
Five of the trolls were down. Three of the fallen were unmoving, the other two crippled and moaning where they lay. The remaining four were unharmed, yet they flinched away from Flyn, cowed and timid.
“Run and live, beasts,” Flyn said, striding forward.
The trolls hurried away from him, their size making a mockery of swift, fearful movement.
Just then, light burst into the cavern. It came from Flyn’s left, radiant and livid. The roiling red shapes of the trolls were dispelled, replaced with the reeling forms of the creatures revealed in full brightness. Throwing up grey-skinned arms to hide their eyes, the beasts dipped their shaggy heads, lowing in pain and fright. Blinking against the nimbus, Flyn watched the trolls flee, even the injured, loping heavily into the safety of the dark tunnels dotting the cavern walls.
The source of the effulgence dimmed, hard shafts of light receding until only a warm glow bathed the cave. Hengest stood in the mouth of a tunnel, the light emanating from his raised fist. Behind the dwarf, stood Deglan Loamtoes.
“You chased away my playmates,” Flyn jested, his laughter coming out strained and raw.
Deglan crossed the cavern, something large hugged against his chest. As he drew closer, Flyn recognized Ingelbert’s ledger.
“Hello, Staunch. Decided to give up medicine for chronicling?” Flyn watched the gnome bite back and swallow a reprimand. “I know. I am a preening, foolhardy, reckless popinjay.”
“You are,” Deglan agreed. “But, Earth and Stone, it is good to see you!”
“And you, you mouldy old mushroom.”
Hengest walked over, his runestone still illuminating the cavern and the bodies of the trolls.
“They played rather rough,” Flyn said.
The hairless runecaster squinted at the fallen creatures. “We should go. There may be more.”
“Agreed,” Flyn exclaimed, quickly finding his lost spur and buckling the pair on to his feet. “Neither of you appear to have a sword I could beg.”
“Fresh out,” Deglan said, and then his tone became grave. “Flyn, Crane has been consumed by the influence of that damned owl.”
Flyn put a hand on Deglan's shoulder. “I know.”
Quickly scanning the cavern, he set off towards one of the tunnels.
“Dammit, you impatient wastrel!” Deglan complained, hurrying to catch up. “It's the Gaunt Prince!”
Flyn breathed a hum and quickened his pace, entering the tunnel.
“Hob's teeth, you unschooled strut, do you know who that is?”
“Some long-dead son of a Goblin King,” Flyn said, intent on the tunnel floor and keeping alert for branching passages. “The heir to the iron crown. You forget, Staunch, I was sent to kill one of those before, by you, a certain saucy piskie, and a bunch of other strange sorts. And that Goblin King turned out to be nothing but an unlucky farm boy. Well, Ingelbert Crane is just an overly clever chronicler. We are going to remind him of that.”
The Errantry of Bantam Flyn Page 61
