The Failed Fellowship

by Michael R. Underwood

  Maybe this is what it's like to be a Real Genrenaut, she thought.

  Her mind back on her work and the task at hand, she focused again on the world in front of her. Mold and mustiness filled the stuffy air, but they walked the two miles under the city without incident.

  "As I suspected," Declan said. "The Night-Lord doesn't know about the secret ways. Though of royal blood, he is not of Fallran."

  Ioseph stroked his beard. "Regardless, we must expect heavy resistance as soon as we come upon anyone not of the household staff."

  Nolan added, "I know the quick routes through the castle; between me and Declan, we should be able to lead you right."

  Xan'De nodded. "Upon the edge of a knife, the dancing leaf relies on the wind to avoid becoming its own neighbor."

  "And what's that supposed to mean, sorry?" Roman asked.

  "He means that we're in a difficult situation, and we need all circumstances to go our way so we don't die."

  The Matok smiled.

  Declan raised a finger to his lips as they approached the far end of the tunnel. They sneaked the last hundred feet, Leah keeping the Hammer of K’gon resting on her shoulder. After two weeks of practice, she felt more than comfortable with the artifact, in no small part thanks to feeling like it weighed about half of what it should while still hitting as hard.

  She'd been voted down on trying the Hammer on ruins or trees, but everything else she'd tried shattered in the face of the Hammer.

  Let's just hope the Deathstone isn't an exception.

  They came to an old wooden door, clasps rusty but functional. Declan opened the door and disappeared into the cellar, then returned a minute later, waving them in.

  Once inside, they split into two squads: Leah with the companions, Declan with the rest of the Genrenauts. Which meant that Leah was the stand-in for Theyn Lighthall.

  She was basically the Chosen One. It was all coming full circle. The stand-up bit about the Chosen One had gotten her the job, and now it was her turn to be the Special instead of the orphan from Iowa. She'd just had to wait about fifteen years for her chance. Now she was storming the castle to defeat a Dark Lord and save the kingdom.

  Eat your heart out, Orphan Joe from Iowa.

  The cellar gave way to a hallway, then a stairwell, then another hallway.

  Where are the skeletons? she wondered. The party continued, Declan leading the companions, Genrenauts behind. Leah stood between Xan'De and Ioseph, Nolan at the back.

  They stepped into a wide hall. Declan pointed. "From here, we can bear right, and then it's straight up the tower."

  "I sense great sorcery afoot," Ioseph said. "It's permeated the very walls. Fates only know what abominations the Night-Lord has wrought in our absence."

  "Take the left way," Nolan added. "It's less visible from the balcony."

  Declan followed Nolan's suggestion, creeping along the left-hand side of the wide hall, adorned with tapestries of the former Kings of Fallran, their epic deeds. Every twenty feet sported a lit brazier, yellow-orange flame a welcome change from the purple tainting the sky both day and night.

  Halfway down the hall, the lights went out, replaced by a sickly purple glow at the center of the room. And as light filled the great hall, everything changed.

  And at the center of the room, standing beside the source of the light, stood a cloaked man, tall but slim. His arms were raised, hands crackling with magical power.

  The Night-Lord laughed, his cackle echoing throughout the hall. And as it resonated, skeletal troops poured out from every exit, cutting the heroes off entirely.

  "Welcome back, old friends. I see you've brought new offerings."

  Three figures stepped out from behind the glowing stone, the Deathstone.

  One was a leather-clad Latina, decked out in assassin gear with knives galore. Her face was covered by a veil, short black hair drawn up like an anime heroine, right down to the blue streak of hair at her temple.

  Beside her was a slim man, fair-skinned with black hair. His whole look exuded Dark Prince, embodying the antihero or lovable villain mold. He picked his nails with a gold-hilted knife, face locked into a haughty sneer.

  And at their center was the Tall Woman. Leah was right. It was the same woman who had been in her first mission, run poor Theo Long over, and interrupted his reconciliation. The same woman who had taken shots at King and her just weeks before, who had killed the inadvertent killer Ricardo Hernandez. She was back again, traveling across dimensions to interfere with the story worlds. For what reason? Was she following them, or were the ripples her fault and they were following her? What was her relationship to the Night-Lord? What did she want? Who were these people with her? Minions? Or were they a whole team of dimensional travelers?

  Questions bounced around so fast that her mind became an overworked racquetball court. She pointed an accusatory finger and said, "I was right!"

  King gave her a short nod that said, Yes, but be quiet right now. His nods said a lot. Perks of being the boss.

  "What are you doing here?" Nolan asked, his eyes locked on the Tall Woman.

  She raised a finger and tsk-tsked him. "You're in the presence of royalty. Be silent."

  The group shifted into fighting positions as the skeletons closed in.

  Leah grabbed the Hammer in both hands, plotting a path through the melee to get a clean shot at the Deathstone. Nolan took a step over to stand by her side. She nodded at the older swordsman as he drew his blade. Nolan raised his blade as the skeletons charged.

  In the heat of battle, time slowed. The old warrior turned.

  First, she wondered why he was turning to her. He raised his pommel and Leah realized too late what was happening. She couldn't raise her weapon in time. The last thing she saw was Nolan's pommel coming down on her head. She felt a sense of completion, of book-ending. She'd claimed the Hammer, proven her theory right. All to die right before the finale?

  Was this really the end?

  The last thing she remembered was thinking What the eff?

  END PART ONE

  Part Two

  The Heroes of Fallran

  Chapter One

  Tower Defense Game

  Leah awoke to the sound of howling winds. Her head throbbed, and her vision was foggy like someone had wrapped her up as a cheesecloth mummy. The world was lit in purple, and as her eyes tried to focus, her ears gave her far clearer input.

  "Good, you're awake. How do you feel?" It was Shirin, her voice strained but steady.

  Leah sat up and focused on the dark blur that she thought was Shirin. Colors sorted themselves out from one another, especially after Leah remembered that everything would be in a purple filter thanks to the Night-Lord's world-dominating, skeleton-animating toy.

  Mallery sat beside Shirin. They were both safe. What about the others? What had happened?

  "Where are we? Dungeon?"

  Mallery nodded. "Tower cells. And the rooms are enchanted, no magic allowed. We've tried everything. Cantrips, blessings, rituals, prayers. Nada."

  "That's a good trick. Always hate when the bad guy locks up the heroes but doesn't remember who he's dealing with. It's just lazy. Seems like this one has read the Evil Overlord Manual."

  Mallery grinned at the reference. At least she was safe. Safe-ish. No more in danger than any of them. If something had happened to her while Leah was out…

  Not useful, she told herself.

  Shirin waved toward the door, which had a tiny grated glass window. "King and the boys are locked up across the hall, but the skeletons took all of our equipment, including the comms. And the rooms are soundproofed."

  Leah pushed herself up onto the hanging cots of the room. The walls were gray stone, tinged by the same purple light to look almost metallic, like their world had been inexplicably crossed over with cyberpunk.

  That'd be cool. Thaumopunk needs to be more of a thing, she thought aimlessly.

  "So, what's our move? With no magic, it's down to like faking il
lness or taking out the guards when we're en route somewhere."

  Shirin walked over to the window, looking out into the purple dawn. "Narrative logic would suggest that the Night-Lord will want to gloat at us at least once before he kills us. That'll be our opportunity, unless something else comes up."

  "So, why do you think the Tall Woman is here?" Leah asked, picking up on the gnarliest of the loose threads in the story. "Were those people with her other dimensional travelers? What are we going to do about her?"

  "I got knocked out before I could get that much of a read on them," Mallery said.

  "Our first priority is to patch the breach. If we can bring the Tall Woman and the others in, then that's a bonus. But for now, we need to focus on escaping."

  Leah gestured to the room. "Right now it looks like all we have is time. And judging by when she showed up, I'd bet dollars to donuts that she's playing some role in the story, which makes her part of the breach."

  Leah sat up on the cot with Mallery, resting her head on the taller woman's shoulder. She was talking a good talk, but this was the worst situation she'd been in yet. No weapons, no comms, nowhere near enough information about the new characters added to the story.

  Mallery wrapped Leah in her arms. No matter what, they'd face it together.

  "I'm glad you're okay.”

  "Me too. And it's nice to be able to talk normally again without breaking concealment protocols."

  "The danger of ensemble stories," Shirin said. "King, Roman, and I once spent nearly six weeks traveling with a Chosen One Princess on a mission most of a decade back. It was a standard deliver-the-McGuffin-to-the-Axis-Mundi kind of quest, but her protectors had all died before they could reach the palace.

  “Roman had just joined the team a month before the mission, and trying to pass his Post-Apocalypse cant off as generically foreign was a trip and a half.”

  They passed the hours trading more stories of Fantasy World. Gritty war stories of holding a castle against legions of orcs and goblins, heroic tales of lost heirs, and comedic tales of puns gone berserk and magical academies that bore a hilarious resemblance to mid-twentieth-century American universities, complete with academic infighting and bitter rivalries over comparatively small stakes. Some of the stories Leah had heard during their three-day hold before the mission, but these tellings were different. What else would you expect from professional storytellers?

  And sure enough, after their morning meal (moldy bread with un-moldy and therefore un-tasty cheese), an armed force of skeletons came into the room to bind them with manacles, hand and feet.

  Another force met them on the stairs with King and the Genrenauts. Leah risked looking over her shoulder and saw the Tall Woman's fantasy companions in the back.

  But no Nolan.

  Leah prayed to nothing and everything. Let me get my hands on my sword and I will wreak righteous vengeance upon you. This I swear.

  Also, they needed to get out, soon, because that thought was entirely too Fantasy-World-y.

  But first, the lair of the Night-Lord.

  ———

  King wracked his brain, looking for escape scenarios, as the skeletal forces led them into the solarium, where the Night-Lord awaited them, the Tall Woman and her crew in tow. Including Nolan. The four interlopers stood off to the side, Nolan's friendly expression gone, replaced by a haughty smile.

  We got played. Hard. Had the Tall Woman pegged that they were on to her in Mystery World? Then she what, set this all up as a trap?

  Was Nolan another rogue dimensional traveler, or a local plant? Another variable. Maybe the Tall Woman was the only dimension-hopper; maybe she had a whole team of her own, from Earth Prime or recruited across story worlds. Too many variables, King thought. He needed more information for his report to be sure.

  I can deal with that after facing the council, he decided.

  He needed to get face time with them to start to pick out some truth to lay a better foundation for all of his speculation, or it'd just be flights of fancy, even with his experience. And moreover, they needed photographic or video evidence. Something solid to take to the council.

  There were any number of ways that the Tall Woman could have made the crossing. There'd been rumors of others that could travel between worlds—that maybe one of the Science Fiction regions could have developed the same technology as the High Council. But from the way the Tall Woman's squad held themselves, he'd bet good money they were a unit. She'd recruited them or they'd all been in this from the beginning.

  The Night-Lord stood, throwing open his cloak in that trademarked supervillain fashion. The cowl was still drawn forward, making him guess the Night-Lord was either totally babyfaced and therefore really unassuming, or scarred by the forces he controlled.

  "I trust you have all been enjoying your accommodations? I wanted to make sure you had a view of my sky," he said, one cloaked arm gesturing to the oversized windows out on the barely red dawn, the artifact's necromantic pall nearly complete.

  Ioseph Bluethorn struggled against his captors, skeletons hands-on even though the wizard's hands were bound in rune-laden manacles. "We have no desire to be your audience, Armand of Serani." The Night-Lord's stance stiffened at the mention of his real name. "The Light will find a way, even if we fall. The dwarves will rise, the Matok will assemble the clans, and your reign will be but a footnote."

  The Night-Lord walked right up to Ioseph, coming up next to the long-limbed wizard.

  The Night-Lord held up his hand.

  "No, it is you who will be the footnote. In the section marked The Doom of Fallran.

  "Ioseph Bluethorn, last court wizard of Fallran, who spectacularly failed both in protecting the crown and avenging it. He died at the hands of Our Glorious Leader on the eve of his ultimate victory."

  The Night-Lord's hand glowed, and in a blur, it surged forward into the wizard's chest. The overlord pulled and ripped out a fist-sized sapphire. Ioseph’s clothes dropped to the floor, empty.

  "Holy Obi-Wan Kenobi!" Leah said.

  Circumstances were bad enough that dressing the newbie down over breaking the masquerade protocols was pointless. She was a bard who looked as foreign as he did; she'd be expected to speak of things unknown to Fallran or Serani.

  Rather than chastising Leah, he watched the Tall Woman and her crew.

  Sure enough, their body language and expressions told him they did get the reference. Which meant they'd been to Earth Prime, or other Earths that shared the narrative — Near Future SF, Romance, or Action, perhaps one or two others from outside his territory.

  King decided to press his luck for more intel.

  "So, who are your friends? I've seen their leader before, and I can guarantee that she's out for her own agenda, and she's as likely to stab you in the back the way that he did to us and Theyn."

  "A convenience, a way of expediting the process. They're mercenaries, well paid. They're just wise enough to know how to pick the right employer."

  "The people most likely to be betrayed are the ones who are certain that they won't be."

  "Well said, traveler, but irrelevant. My victory is at hand. Tonight, a lunar eclipse will give me all the time I need to cast an eternal darkness across the land, the solar power of the gods of light held at bay by the Moon Goddess and her shadowy children.

  "And you will all be here to witness. But not yet, not now. There are too many preparations. And without your precious wizard, no chance to escape."

  The Night-Lord gave a dismissive wave. "Take them away. I must finish my work."

  King locked eyes on the Tall Woman for as long as possible, until a skeleton grabbed his head and turned him toward the stairs.

  Options narrowed before his eyes, and King could not see a way forward. He was running short on options for a happy reversal.

  But he had to trust in the story. They all had weak points, edges, opportunities built into the ebb and flow of every tale type.

  It required patience, insight,
and the bravery to put everything on the line when the opportunity presented itself.

  No matter the cost.

  Chapter Two

  Cribbing from Edmond Dantès

  Leah was done being patient. Which meant that her best approach for figuring out an escape plan was to pace.

  Angrily. She'd pace so hard, her Robin Hood-y booties would wear down and then the skeletons would have to come in to give her new shoes and she could crack their skulls together in true heroic fashion and bust everyone out of the tower.

  It was her best plan so far, but it'd take a while. The skeletons hadn't reacted when Shirin faked illness, nor apparently when Xan'De bloodied his hands against the door.

  Mallery meditated up a storm, still trying to reach out for some kind of divine intercession. But Felur wasn't listening, or couldn't hear. Which was alarming in and of itself. What could trump a god's omniscience?

  Not to mention that Leah was still getting used to the idea of being in a world with demonstrably real gods. She venerated her ancestors like she'd been raised, but in a “respect your elders” kind of way more than a “their spirits will literally guide your hand” way.

  So, if the gods were really real, shouldn't they be able to do something? Or was it that the cell and the manacles just stopped the god from being able to intervene? Because then it would mean the magic was trumping divine power, which was a whole different barrel of scary. Like antimatter scary.

  Were gods so puny here that evil overlords could just head them off at the pass with some cold iron and a rune pattern? She'd seen Mallery's magic do some pretty awesome things, but it seemed like divine source or no, it was still magic, and one kind of magic could cancel out the other. She searched her memory for what the Genrenauts' texts said on the matter. Before this mission, it'd all been theory to her, and only now that she'd been here and done magic herself did she have visceral context for all of the theorizing.