by P D Ceanneir
As the group crested the winding stairs and crossed the white powdered snow that covered the courtyard, they could see many more of those sad chunks of frozen warriors from the past. Some obviously caught out in the open as they sprinted for the safety of the palace entrance and frozen together in groups as they ran. While others stood alone at the entrance of the palace as they turned to meet their foe to stand and fight.
The entrance in question was a remarkable sight. It was approximately fifty foot wide at the base and a huge arch of thick ice columns a hundred foot high curved inwards towards a sharp point at the top. Beautiful blue light cascaded through the frame of the entrance, while everyone exclaimed at its enormity, Havoc was the first to notice that there was no door.
‘An open invitation if ever I saw one,’ said Ness Ri with a smile.
The group walked gingerly across the courtyard, wary of attack from the Ice Drake. They climbed the high steps to the entrance and hesitated before entering the huge structure.
‘Are you sure this Nicbetha is not a giant?’ said Furran to Carbaum as he had to look straight upwards as he passed under the enormous arch of the entrance.
‘This grandeur is only made to intimidate us and make us feel small,’ said the captain and Havoc thought he had the rights of it.
An eerie light bathed the hall. Duller and sicklier in shade from the vibrant blue from outside, it seemed to seep from the walls itself. More frozen blocks of the dead were here, scattered all over the corridor floor. The dark shapes of the corpses inside rippled with the light as the group passed.
Stalactites of ice hung from the high ceiling many feet above them, cave openings in the walls halfway up could hide a watching dragon and each man circled their friends as they walked the hall, eyes flicking to every shadowy nook and cranny.
As they progressed, they found it grew warmer and their breath did not cloud the air. Soon the hall’s opening widened and a junction of seven separate, smaller corridors marked the end of the entrance hall and a course change.
‘Which one do we take?’ Velnour asked. Havoc stepped out from the group and stared down the openings, one at a time. They were just high enough for Little Kith to go through.
‘We split up,’ he said, then walked into the centre corridor without another word.
‘That wasn’t the answer I was hoping for,’ said Velnour, ‘but it will just have to do.’ Havoc’s footsteps receded down the echoing walls as the others divided themselves up into groups. Little Kith did not wait for anyone and followed behind Havoc, along with Captain Carbaum and his two warriors. The rest of the Paladins took a handful of the Falesti infantry and ventured into the other tunnels. Just as Powyss and Foxe were about to leave with Garnet and three infantrymen, they turned to Lord Ness who was staring into the furthest away opening.
‘Are you coming with us Master Ri?’ asked Foxe.
‘No, I will go this way on my own. There is someone I need to meet, do not follow,’ with long paces he disappeared into the corridor. Foxe was a little stunned.
‘What the...?’ he said.
‘Don’t worry, it’s a Ri thing,’ said Powyss, clapping Foxe on the shoulder. Then he stopped and frowned, looking around him.
‘Where did Mannheim go?’ he said.
Loud shouts from his guards and panicking footsteps outside the hall entrance roused the old Sernac from his sleep. He only just managed to get his robe on when the captain of his guards knocked on the door to his private quarters.
‘Yes, man, what is it at this hour?’ he bellowed.
‘My lord, there are armed men at the harbour heading this way,’ said the guard.
Polmyn thought at first it was his son and the prince returning, and then the anxious strain in the guardsman’s voice told him it was not good news.
He dismissed the guard and hurriedly dressed in his linen trousers and tabard with the Sernac crest of the Ternquin Tree emblazoned on the front. He then stomped out of his rooms and gathered his guards to walk down to the harbour. At a hundred feet from the Boughhauss, he met with a large number of armoured soldiers covered in red and yellow waistcoats. A beautiful girl in a purple robe stood motionless in front of them with her hands tucked into her sleeves. Pacing up and down in front of her was a tall, shorthaired man with a blonde coloured beard and greying temples. He wore the white cloak of a Ri.
Polmyn, slightly taken aback at this interruption, wondered where they had come from. Surely, they were not from the Cybeleion. His instincts told him to be cautious. The Sernac’s own men were now rushing towards the scene, though they were still outnumbered by these foreigners.
‘Welcome strangers,’ he said, ‘this is unexpected...’
‘Where is the Cybeleion?’ said the tall Ri cutting off Polmyn in mid-sentence. The Sernac bristled at the man’s arrogance.
‘Who asks?’ he said, folding his arms.
‘I am Fowyn Ri, Lord of Jultyn Uiom, and Herald to the King of the Vallkytes. I come on a mission to reclaim the Gredligg Orrinn for my people,’ said Lord Fowyn with a frown. He continued to pace back and forth, agitated and tense. Serena knew this mood and it was not a happy one.
‘So Lord Herald what does the King of the Vallkytes want with me?’
‘It is not you he wishes to speak with, only the Archward Mannheim and his servants have the king’s trust. And he will speak to me.’
Struck dumb, Polmyn’s mouth fell open.
‘Mannheim? But what...?’ out of the corner of the Sernac’s eye he could see blue-coated Wards encircle his personnel guards. They were also armed.
‘Delay not, sir!’ shouted the Ri, ‘who are you to talk back to me?’
Polmyn regained some composure and stepped forward with a dark frown on his face.
‘I am the Sernac Polmyn, son of Lath and I rule here,’ he said through gritted teeth.
The Ri stopped pacing and burst into a high pitched laugh that to everyone there sounded like it was bordering on madness.
‘Sernac!’ he yelled, ‘you are no Sernac.’ With that, he paced forward, unsheathing his long sword from its staff scabbard and took the Sernac Polmyn’s head from its shoulders.
The walls of the corridor shimmered with the ethereal steel blue glow as Furran, Velnour and six of the infantry wandered through it. After a time, the tunnel curved to the left and they found a set of spiralling steps was the only way onward. At the top, they crossed a wide balcony overlooking a second courtyard where they could see more of the tall stumps of ice with corpses encased inside.
On the other side of the courtyard, they noticed Powyss, Foxe, and Garnet entering from a high lintelled doorway. On the opposite side, Hexor and Gunach wandered in from their route followed by Linth and Whyteman. Furran noticed on his side of the courtyard was a wide flowing staircase and banister leading up to the balcony he stood on.
‘See you at the top,’ shouted Furran pointing towards the stairs. As the others converged to the only way up, a strange sound surrounded them.
‘What was that?’ said Garnet, halting the others with a sign. They stopped and listened to a whistling wind that sighed as it settled into their minds. A tickling sensation spread from their ears to their nape and all shuddered involuntarily, all except Powyss who was frowning at them all.
‘What’s wrong, what do you hear?’ he asked Garnet.
‘There is something in my head,’ he said, pale and wide eyed, ‘I can hear a voice.’
The only voice in Havoc’s head was the Blacksword’s, who had become re-animated of late.
I have been here, I know this place, he said with fascination. Havoc was about to question him when he and his party entered a long banqueting hall with tall fluted-carved ice pillars stretching down each side of a narrow table covered in frost. Six frozen bodies sat at the closer end. Their well-preserved features remained stiff in rapt curiosity at something on the table, which to Havoc’s eyes seemed unexciting, except for the place settings of empty plates and a large candelabra at each
end, nothing was out of the ordinary.
The rest of the group moved into the room quickly and they all grinned as they looked at the table.
‘Whoa, that smells good,’ said one of Carbaum’s men, a thin man with a wisp of a beard, ‘we have been expected, it seems.’ He sat down on a cold high backed wooden chair, ignoring the dead body beside him. He started to grab at the air next to his plate, eyes wide with ravenous hunger.
Carbaum and Little Kith stood next to him looking up and down the table; Kith picked something up, invisible to Havoc, and started to eat at the air next to his hand.
‘Now, now there is plenty for everyone,’ said Carbaum, who also reached for something on the table. ‘Just look at the juices running out of this pork leg,’ he said.
‘Tastes good,’ said Little Kith with a stuffed mouth of nothing.
‘Um, gentlemen, what are you doing?’ asked Havoc with a dark frown.
‘Eat, my lord,’ said Carbaum, ‘you must be hungry. There is enough here to feed an entire army. Swan, goose, duck, there is even a roast deer over at the far end.’
Havoc shook his head and folded his arms. ‘I see nothing, the table is empty.’
One of Carbaum’s soldiers scoffed at the prince, but saw the seriousness on his face. The others turned to look at him, then at the table. Havoc walked to Little Kith and held out his hand.
‘Give me what you are eating,’ he said. The giant did so, if a little reluctantly. ‘What is it?’
‘It’s a chicken leg boss, the best I’ve ever tasted, reminds me of grandma Betts cooking.’
‘No its not, it’s an apple,’ said Havoc touching the big man’s hand as he spoke. Little Kith flinched from the touch and pulled his hand back breaking the prince’s Thought Link.
‘How did you do that? It’s changed into an apple!’
‘It’s not real, none of the food is,’ said the prince. ‘The Nicbetha is playing with your mind.’ Carbaum and Kith stepped back from the table, a little shocked. The other two stayed and wispy beard laughed.
‘No my lord, it’s real, see this bowl of fruit.’ Then he reached for the empty bowl and screamed as the thin emaciated hand of the dead man next to him wrapped his bony fingers around his wrist.
‘It’s a woman’s voice. She sounds so nice,’ said Garnet, ‘she is welcoming us to her palace.’ Powyss saw the others nodding in agreement.
‘I hear nothing,’ said Powyss, ‘this must be some trick.’
Garnet’s eyes took on a glazed look as the commander spoke; he frowned.
‘You are calling me a liar!’ he shouted, ‘she does not like liars.’ He drew his sword and stepped forward to attack Powyss, but Foxe and one of the Falesti soldiers gripped his arms. ‘Let go, fools! She has promised me everlasting life with her, but only if I kill the commander!’ Powyss walked up to the ranting thane and slapped him hard, Garnet stopped talking and stared at him, and then he looked around, confused.
‘I’m sorry I... I... don’t know what come over me,’ he stammered.
‘The Nicbetha is toying with your minds!’ shouted Powyss so the others on the balcony could hear him. ‘Block her out, build a wall around your thoughts.’ Just then, a cracking, splintering noise echoed around the courtyard, each of the blocks of frozen dead was splitting from the ground up. Inside the one closest to Foxe, he could see the corpse shift suddenly as the ice fell from its ancient armour. The thin pale eyelids opened and the imploded eyes fixed on him.
‘Commander, tell me I’m not imagining this?’ he said.
‘No, Foxe, I see it too,’ said Powyss as he extracted Bor-Teaven from its sheath.
‘Ah, Arcun!’ cried Foxe.
Chapter Eleven
The Army of the Dead
T
he descendants of the Elementals at Ternquin of Assassi put up a good fight against the Vallkyte soldiers, but the enemy numbers appeared to be augmented by the treacherous Wards and this caused widespread slaughter among the people loyal to the Sernac.
While the soldiers carried out their orders, Fowyn and Serena watched from afar. Two older priests skirted the fighting groups and approached them. They both placed their staffs on the ground and knelt.
‘Great lord of the Brethac Order,’ said one with a frosting of grey hair, ‘the augers saw your coming. My loyal Archward ordered us to assist you in dealing with the sinful.’
Serena and Fowyn glanced at each other. ‘Your assistance is much appreciated. Tell me, where is the prince?’
The older Ward priest looked up, ‘he has gone to the Ice Palace to find the Talisman of Mortkraxnoss.
Bemused at the answer, Serena said, ‘Talisman?’
‘An amulet,’ explained Fowyn Ri, ‘that brings the Guardians to the Isle of the Dead into alignment.’
‘I don’t understand,’ Serena shook her head. Fowyn ignored her and spoke to the Wards. He had to speak up due to the ruckus of the battle before them.
‘Who is your contact within the Brethac Ziggurat?’ he snapped.
The priest looked puzzled and a little intimidated at the sound of the Ri’s voice.
‘I know not, my lord. We receive our orders from Manheim.’
Fowyn grunted and then stooped beside him to pick up Polmyn’s head in both hands and closed his eyes. The Ri got all the information he required from the mind of the decapitated head of the Sernac. The Thought Link he performed extracted more information than he needed.
‘The De Proteous seeks the Talisman in the Ice Palace that much is true. It seems Lord Sernac was correct; we need this talisman to align these Guardians at the gate,’ said the Ri as he stared into the old Sernac’s lifeless and half hooded eyes.
‘Guardians?’ asked Serena.
‘The parts of some kind of bridge formation,’ answered Fowyn.
‘Then we can ambush them at this gate,’ offered Serena as a possible plan.
‘We could do,’ nodded the Ri, ‘but the Cybeleion is close by. We must destroy it before Havoc returns.’ He rubbed his furry chin for a while in thought. ‘We will bring the Quest Ship to us.’
He threw away the decapitated head as if it was a worthless piece of rubbish and walked through the fighting ensemble occasionally waving his hands to summon strong gusts of the third element to blast the Sernac’s guards out of his way. He then summoned a huge ball of flame, which was so bright everyone had to avert his or her eyes from the glare.
He then sent it spinning into a high arc towards the Ternquin Tree.
The scream from wispy-beard ended when the grinning corpse, that held him by the wrist, thrust a long dagger into his heart. The other Ternquin soldier did not have time to draw his sword when two of the other corpses attacked him, weighing him down with savage cuts from their weapons. Havoc, Little Kith and Carbaum drew their swords and walked backwards from the table, back towards the entrance. The light blue glow within the walls pulsed stronger and faster as the reanimated dead turned and advanced on the trio. Carbaum turned to look at the doorway and saw dark shadows of humanoid shapes shuffling down the corridor.
‘The exit is blocked,’ he said to Havoc and gave a gasp as the two dead Ternquin soldiers suddenly stood up, joining the shambling dead at the table.
‘There is an opening on the other side of the room. Let’s rush them!’ said Havoc and sprang into the attack.
Powyss gave a shudder as he watched dozens of zombies smash out of their frozen tombs. All had the same thin and yellowy freeze-dried flesh along with the drawn back blackened lips of the mummified. They shuffled towards them at an ungainly gait as their unused limbs snapped and creaked at the joints. Each of them looked at the group of the living through shrunken eyes; the grin of their rotted teeth was not the least bit funny.
Their armour, though old, looked too big for their emaciated bodies and some of the greaves and shoulder guards slipped off them as they walked, but they did have swords, maces, or sabres that they wielded in their thin-clawed hands.
The dead rushed to
wards Powyss and Hexor. Both men moved back, parrying every lunge. Powyss was fast and sliced his opponent open at the chest to reveal shrunken organs behind the ribcage, yellow pus oozed around the wound, it smelt like rotting flesh bursting with maggots. The thing did not fall, but continued fighting oblivious to the mortal wound. As the others defended themselves, they each found that death had already struck these old warriors and would not intervene again.
‘How in the name of the gods do you kill them?’ asked Hexor as a shield hit him and he went skidding across the frosty floor.
Whyteman lopped his opponent’s sword arm off, and then embedded his own sword in the corpses gut, releasing a putrid stench that made him gag. The corpse pulled at the sword and hissed at the archer, black lips twitching as it did so. Gunach appeared at his side and cut off the thing’s head with his axe. The body fell to the floor like dry leaves.
‘Decapitate them, it’s the only way,’ said the dwarf.
The Army of the Dead were swarming into the courtyard from the lintel entrance as the group reached the stairs, still trying to fend off the shuffling things. Three of the Falesti Infantry fell as the press of frozen dead overwhelmed them. When the main group reached the top, they aided Furran and his party.
‘I bloody hate zombies,’ groaned Furran, as he hacked at a tall corpse in rusty chainmail. ‘The Necromancer’s Katávri were bad enough, but these things…’
‘At least they are a little slower, my friend,’ shouted Gunach from behind him. Both men had experience with the undead due to their recent scrape with the Necromancer, Cornelius Pagan.
Velnour hacked away at two of the zombies trying to help four Falesti as the dead cut them off from the main group, but it was no use, they swarmed around the soldiers and cut them down. Powyss ordered him to disengage and follow them to the open room at the top of the stairs. They bunched together as they entered a huge roofless room of frozen spikes and angled ice blocks that covered the floor and the high walls. The dead crowded into the opening to the room and Powyss saw an opportunity, he pointed Bor-Teaven at the pack and used the sword’s Fire Orrinn to send a long hot stream of bright red flame into the centre of the group. The flames hit the front rank of dry corpses and leapt from body to desiccated body as they stumbled towards them. The silent sound of burning zombies was disconcerting, but they continued onwards waving their weapons until their arm muscles burnt off or their legs gave way. More flame-wreathed corpses stepped over the fallen and quickly moved to attack.
