A Fire in the North

by David Bilsborough

  But when the opportunity did arise, well, it was not to be passed up and could be so gratifying to one such as he. To dwell in the flesh case of one caught between worlds, to inhabit this halfway house somehow reconciled life and death in such a satisfying way.

  Yes, possession; it was a holistic experience indeed, yet also one so wholly steeped in revenge, the sweetest turning of the tables imaginable.

  For centuries Mauglad’s soul had wandered the dark crevices of Sluagh Valley, forever howling out towards the north, Kill me! Kill me! Slay my body and let me be at peace! For he knew from suffering this unceasing perdition in limbo that the body that had once been his – his real body – had not been laid to rest. Soulless now, a vacant shell, just another tool for the use of the Rawgr, it walked in dark places where its owner could not go. Such heinous blasphemy! And until his original body was destroyed, the soul of Mauglad Yrkeshta would simply go on and on, forever condemned to wander in grinding bitterness and self-torment.

  To Mauglad when he had been alive death had always been the most dreadful terror. It was something he had taken the greatest pleasure in inflicting on others but had taken great care in avoiding himself at all costs. There were some who claimed that every different type of creature on Lindormyn had developed in its own way purely as a result of this obsessive, unceasing struggle to avoid death. In fact, for most, life itself was little more than a continuous escape from death, the struggle to survive no matter what.

  How naive this all seemed now to Mauglad, who would do anything to end his endless existence.

  Then all of a sudden Methuselech had happened along, straying unconscious on horseback into the shunned depths of the Sluagh. Deep into his dying mind Mauglad had probed, laying bare its contents. Oh yes, what a veritable diamond mine of information he had been! Then Mauglad’s new shell, a battered and unreasonably alive reanimation of Methuselech’s former self, had pulled itself out of its prison of stone, stood jerkily upright upon damaged feet and smiled thinly.

  ‘Well, well, well,’ it had said. ‘So Drauglir has fallen! I never would have believed it possible. It certainly never would have happened if I’d still been around. Well, we’ll just have to see what we can do to put things right, won’t we, my friend Methuselech, eh?’

  So too did the Tyvenborger now begin to suffer as Xilvafloese had done. A numbness began to seep outward from his brain along every nerve, like an early frost penetrating the soil, driving the warmth before it, deadening the senses, until all that remained of the body’s former mind was a small piece of consciousness locked up as if in an old and battered trunk shut away in some dusty cobweb-hung attic of the brain.

  The Mauglad-thing reached awkwardly around its back and with clumsy new fingers wrenched the arrow out and cast it away into the darkness.

  Such strength! it thought, marvelling at this fine new body after so long in Methuselech’s rotting carcass.

  ‘Right,’ it rasped to itself. ‘Let’s get this over with once and for all.’

  ‘Only the soul-dead would betray their friends,’ Nibulus shouted above the screams of the maimed and dying, unable to believe what had just happened. The loss of several of their new allies within just a few seconds was bad enough, especially as they had not even been given a chance to retaliate. But the absconding of the mage-priest had shaken him badly. His grief at losing Xilvafloese for the second time was still keenly felt but, now the Asyphe had gone for good, out of those remaining Nibulus had counted only Finwald as a genuine friend.

  But there was little sympathy for him among his company. The blunderbuss had killed one Vetter and three Cervulice and left two others writhing in pain; four other Vetters had been badly wounded by crossbow bolts; the throwing axe had lodged itself deep into the sternum of a very dead Cervulus; Flekki’s three poisoned chakrams had each found a target, namely Wodeman and two further Cervulice; and the Polg’s haladie had sliced the head clean off another Vetter before returning to its grinning wielder.

  ‘Oh, come off it, boy, you should be used to betrayal by now!’ Appa growled at Nibulus. Splashed liberally with blood and with Englarielle’s help struggling to restrain those he was attempting to heal, his lower jaw had resumed its customary dog-like thrust. He was in no mood for the Peladane’s fit of righteousness. ‘Isn’t that right, Bolldhe?’ Appa added.

  Bolldhe, kneeling by his side, did not look up from his task of holding the lantern steady over the priest’s patients. ‘Only the dead are beyond betraying their friends,’ he agreed readily. ‘People under threat are capable of doing anything to survive.’

  Nibulus looked around bitterly. There were six dead and six injured, plus three including Wodeman, rigid with paralysis from the poison on the chakrams. For the time being no one was going anywhere, revenge or not.

  ‘What d’you think those people want?’ Gapp asked, visibly shaken by the carnage. ‘Are they going to keep out of our way now, d’you reckon, or are they going to pick us off one by one?’

  ‘They’re here for loot, pure and simple,’ stated Nibulus, ‘but I don’t want to chance a repeat performance of this bloody mess. They’ll pay for this with their lives, I swear – one way or another. But there’s not much we can do till Wodeman snaps out of it. I’m not going on without him – we’ve lost enough of our number in the last hour or so as it is.’

  Paulus stepped forward, black with fury. ‘The priest was my charge,’ he said to Nibulus. ‘I want him back.’

  ‘Well, tough!’ Nibulus retorted bluntly. ‘Unless you can see in the dark.’

  ‘Finwald can’t,’ the Nahovian countered. ‘Leastways, not as well as I. And I move faster.’

  The Peladane considered this point for a moment. ‘We certainly can’t allow him to run around loose in this place,’ he admitted. ‘Pel-Adan only knows what he might get up to. But go quietly, Paulus, all right? There’s no telling what that one’s capable of if he’s cornered.’

  ‘He’s not evil, if that’s what you’re saying,’ Appa called over to them between spraying gouts of arterial blood. ‘Even when he bolted, I could sense no evil in him. Deceit yes, but no evil.’

  ‘Thanks for that reassurance, Appa,’ Nibulus grunted, ‘but all that tells me is to watch my back with you as well. Paulus, if you can fetch that bastard back before he brings all hell down on us, then go. Now.’

  Finwald fled up the spiral stairs in the wake of the thieves. There was light here, of a fashion, for the fire from the channel found its way along narrow ducts to kindle a muted redness in the marble walls. The stairway shaft whispered with distorted echoes, among which he was sure he could pick out faintly the slapping of many feet on stone somewhere above. His jaw, shapely and refined though it was, was set as tight as a bear trap, and his movements, swift and light, were those of a hunter. Finwald was as resolute as ever.

  He leapt nimbly up the glass-smooth winders of the staircase, with only the lightest whisper of robe against stone. Fleet, surefooted and determined, under it all the mage-priest’s mind was close to exploding.

  Everything was coming undone, and the full extent of this undoing had not yet sunk in. But Finwald was a man of singular purpose, driven by great need, and as always he simply would not allow himself to fail. He would focus his prodigious mind upon first locating the thieves, and once he had persuaded them not to kill him outright, he would use every last ounce of eloquence, bribery, trickery and even intimidation to somehow get them to go along with his plans.

  What exactly those plans would be, however, he was still not sure. And how he was going to bring his eloquence to bear when he did not even speak their language remained at the moment a complete mystery. He would have to deal with those problems if and when—

  He stopped dead and flattened himself against the wall. He had heard something below him. Damn, there it was again! Someone or something was climbing the stairs after him.

  Onward and upward he leapt, now choosing speed over stealth. This shouldn’t be happening, he thought as h
e climbed. I’m not a bad man. Why is this happening to me?

  Oh, how the world turned! It could not have been even three weeks ago now when he had stood upon the blue-hazed meads of Eotunlandt and looked on in horror and incredulity as Bolldhe offered his allegiance to the cut-throats of the Thieves’ Mountain; standing over Appa with the poleaxe poised above the old man’s outstretched neck. How Finwald had fumed! How his insides had boiled with righteous indignation at this lowest of treacheries!

  Yet here he was now, doing much the same. Not on an impulse born of self-preservation, as in Bolldhe’s case, for Finwald’s life was probably not even threatened by his former companions. He had defected knowingly and deliberately, refusing to look his conscience in the eye. Oh, how the world turned, indeed . . .

  The rustling of a coat, the slight squeak of leather and the patter of rapidly approaching feet spun Finwald round again. He fearfully approached the parapet, trying to still the panting that shook his frame, and leant over to peer down into the stairwell.

  His panting was arrested by a choking whimper, and his laboured heart seemed to stop pounding. The surest and most chilling vision of night-spawned vengeance spiralled up the stairs towards him. Greatcoat billowing out in languid ripples to caress the scarlet gypsum of the wall, feathered cowl masking his visage in the manner of an assassin, and bastard blade held out in front like a divining rod that tracked a liquid altogether thicker than water, Paulus was coming for him.

  When Finwald’s heart started to beat again, all thoughts and machinations, all feelings of compunction, self-pity and failure evaporated in the furnace of his terror. He turned and ran as fast as ever he could. Up and up the steps he wound, with the Nahovian closing fast behind him. ‘C’m’ere, you wanker!’ Paulus growled without any hint of breathlessness. Still upward the priest stumbled, running for his life, for he had no doubt in his mind that the mercenary, now let off his leash, fully intended to kill him.

  His lungs had nothing but fire in them and his legs were about to buckle when the stairs finally came out onto a landing. Leaning heavily against the massive balustrade, Finwald swiftly scanned his new surroundings. Either way a long passage reached back into darkness, lined on both sides by rows of heavy brass doors.

  One of which was slightly ajar.

  ‘I’ve got you now,’ Paulus simmered, just yards behind him.

  Finwald slipped through the welcoming doorway just an instant before his pursuer gained the landing. Noiselessly he swung the heavy door to behind him till it almost closed, leaving just a crack through which he could peer.

  Here came Paulus now, a great black bird of prey against the dull-ember glow emanating from the shaft. Had he seen where Finwald had gone? His faceless cowl swung this way and that as he crouched watchfully on the landing.

  Oh Cuna! He’s coming this way!

  As Paulus approached the doorway, Finwald stumbled away from it into the darkness of the room. It was almost pitch black with only a sliver of illumination from the crack in the door. He had no idea what to do.

  The heavy boot of Paulus crashed against the door. Reverberating, it slowly swung open, and the tall predator slipped inside. He did not come straight for Finwald, for he had not spotted him yet. Instead he disappeared off to one side and was swallowed up by the darkness.

  Reprieve! If he could keep silent, he might make it back to the door before Paulus noticed him. Stock-still for the moment, he waited for the mercenary’s footsteps to recede. There they went, pad-pad-padding away into a corner of the room. Finwald breathed in deep, offered up a prayer to Cuna and readied himself – he had to get this right. There could be no false move if he were to get out of this alive.

  Just as he was about to break for the door a horrible scuffling sound broke out. Finwald’s mind screamed in panic, and paralysis took him.

  The scuffling was terrifying. There were no words or shouting, just strangled grunts and the desperate gasps of those locked in a struggle to the death. As he stood there immobilized, images of his persecutor being torn limb from limb by nightmare creatures ran through Finwald’s brain. Then a scream of agony sliced through the stillness of the chamber, followed by the deafening clang of iron upon stone as Paulus’s sword clattered to the floor at Finwald’s feet.

  He stared at it lying there in the glow from the corridor. The blade was slick with blood, but even in the near-darkness it did not look a normal red.

  That was enough for Finwald. He sprang for the open doorway. Just as he was about to fly through, something huge stepped in front of it, blocking out the light. Finwald smacked straight into this leviathan with a force that sent him staggering back to collapse on the floor. It was like colliding with an armoured war bison.

  Lights from torches, lanterns and other cleverer devices sprang out of the surrounding darkness, and in a hazy muddle Finwald looked about.

  ‘Of course,’ he breathed in relief. ‘It had to be.’

  He had caught up with the Tyvenborgers.

  But Finwald had little to feel relieved about. By running from his own group he had cast himself hopelessly adrift. For there could be no reconciliation now, not now, not ever. He had run from his own people – who had been both escort and friend to him – only to throw himself at the mercy of the most savage and deadly bunch of cut-throats he had ever clapped eyes on in his life. As he looked upon their impassive faces and their assortment of ingenious flesh-rending tools (all now casually pointing at him) the old expression, ‘Out of the frying pan . . .’ sprang to mind.

  Perhaps I was a trifle rash?

  He looked from the bleeding unconscious form of Paulus sprawled on the floor to the squat thief-sergeant who returned his stare with undisguised disdain. It was only then that it occurred to Finwald that the Tyvenborgers would not even realize he was running from his former companions. For all they knew, he and Paulus were simply the first to catch up with them. And how on earth was he going to explain all this when he could not speak a word of their language?

  How, indeed. For now he could do nothing. Rough fingers enmeshed themselves in his long hair from behind, and he was dragged away, along with the insensible Nahovian, out of the room, down the passage, along several other passages, up many flights of stairs and through lightless places that did not seem to be a part of this or any other world. The further up they went, the less real it all seemed, until Finwald began to form the impression that he had already been slain somewhere along the way and that this was where he was condemned to wander for the rest of eternity.

  Though he did not know it, the thieves were bringing him to the mid-levels of Ymla-Myrrdhain and their latest hideout. During all the time they had spent in the inner keep so far the Tyvenborgers had only succeeded in finding one secret room, and even that had contained little in the way of treasure. Nevertheless, because it had seemed reasonably safe, it now served as their base.

  Eorcenwold and his band of picaroons were clearly not the sensitive sort, Finwald realized as soon as he was thrust into their chosen room. For of all the chambers he had looked upon in Vaagenfjord Maw, this surely had to be the most warped. Though the thieves appeared completely unaffected, to him it seemed a visual and olfactory transgression. It felt in fact as if he had stepped into a disturbing dream: a vision of the aberrant, a nightmare in purple and green, a chamber for demons to dream in.

  What was this unearthly place?

  Drapes of glistening sickly mauve hung like wet skin from the walls, all the while undulating strangely as if something lurked behind them. Between these could be seen alternately great mirrors that reached from floor to ceiling and pictures of vicious delights similar to those in the great hall downstairs. These images, however, were of such revolting atrocity that a mere half-glance at them caused Finwald to avert his eyes out of fear of losing his sanity.

  Huge candles of black wax stood around, ensconced in pricket candlesticks. In place of rugs, strewn about the floor were the pelts of flayed humans, Haugers and giants, some with the
heads still intact, snarling in pickled pain.

  The chamber was dominated by a giant four-poster bed. The twisted spinal columns of huge creatures served as the posts, supporting a cornice that looked to be the upper shell of an enormous virulent-green turtle. From this hung a crumpled black leather valance and matching hangings. Covers of burgundy and ermine-white were spread over the mattress, and two crossed bardisches hung above the headboard. To the right was a fabulously ornate bedside cabinet with a pewter bowl on it and, beneath, a pair of slippers with finely stitched apertures to accommodate claws.

  Under the bed could just be seen the head of some defeated champion. Its jaw had been dislocated and the mouth grotesquely widened, the contents of the skull scooped out, and the whole ghastly item placed on a brass hoop with three legs so it could serve as a chamber pot.

  Finwald felt a certain sense of familiarity as he beheld all this. Had he been told something about this place before? By that old eremite in the green jacket, all those years ago . . .?

  Nothing in this ghastly room appeared to have decayed or mouldered or indeed been affected by the passing of time in any discernible way. It was as if it had been spared the ravages of the ages, and instead had about it an air of patient expectancy. Yet there was also a queerness that pervaded all. There had been too much raw flesh, burning and incense in here for it to ever wholly dissipate.

  ‘Set him down over there,’ Eorcenwold instructed, indicating Paulus. ‘And bring the other one to me.’

  Finwald was surrounded by several of the brigands and forced to kneel on his hands. Eorcenwold approached him and stared at him intensely with his big round eyes. He began: ‘Right, you lanky streak of piss, I think it’s time you started explaining yourself.’

  The mage-priest, of course, did not understand a word but there was something surprisingly comforting in the stocky little thug’s tone. It was so down to earth, so human, so normal, that it did a great deal to bring Finwald back to the real world of men from the weirdness of this chamber. And anyway, despite the company he kept, Eorcenwold did not look like the kind of man to murder someone casually.