The Black Road

by Mel Odom

  “Would you like to eat?”

  “Aye.”

  The sage gestured to one of the serving wenches. The young woman went to get the order immediately.

  “Sahyir told me you were a sailor,” the sage said.

  “Aye.”

  “Tell me where you saw the demon,” the sage suggested.

  Darrick held himself in check. “I never said that I saw such a thing, now, did I?”

  A frown deepened the wrinkles over the sage’s eyes. “Are you always this churlish?”

  “Sir,” Darrick stated evenly, “I don’t even know your name.”

  “Taramis,” the sage replied. “Taramis Volken.”

  “And what is it that you do, Taramis Volken?” Darrick asked.

  “I gather wisdom,” the man replied. “Especially that pertaining to demons.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t like them, and usually the things that I learn can be used against them.”

  The serving wench returned with a platter of goat’s meat and shrimp and fish, backed by fresh bread and portions of melon that had shipped up that day. She offered mulled wine.

  The temptation was there only for a moment for Darrick. For the last year he had tried to bury his life and his pain in wine and spirits. It hadn’t worked, and only old Sahyir had seen fit to save him from himself. But as the old man had told him, saving himself was a day-to-day job, and only one man could do that.

  “Tea,” Darrick said. “Please.”

  The wench nodded and returned with a tall tankard of unsweetened tea.

  “So,” Taramis said, “about your demon—”

  “Not my demon,” Darrick said.

  A fleeting smile touched the sage’s lips. “As you will. Where did you see the demon?”

  Darrick ignored the question. He dipped his finger into the gravy on his plate and drew out the ellipses with the single line threading through them. He even drew the symbol so that the line went under and over the appropriate ellipses.

  The sage studied the gravy symbol. “Do you know what this is?”

  “No.”

  “Or whom it belongs to?”

  Darrick shook his head.

  “Where did you see this?” the sage asked.

  “No,” Darrick replied. “You’ll get nothing from me until I’m convinced I’m getting something from you.”

  The sage reached into the worn lizard-hide traveler’s pack in the chair beside him. Thoughtfully, he took out a pipe and a bag. After shoving the bowl full of tobacco, he set his pipe ablaze with the lantern. He smoked in silence, a hazy wreath forming around his head. He never blinked as he stared at Darrick.

  Fresh-shaved that morning, Darrick hadn’t seen a more fiercely demanding gaze since the mirror then. Even the Westmarch ships’ officers paled by comparison. But he ate, savoring the hot food. By the working standards he was accustomed to in Seeker’s Point, the meal was an extravagance. The cargo handling he’d done for the day might have to feed him for two weeks in order to keep him from hunting meager game in the forest with winter soon to be breathing down their necks.

  Taramis reached back into his traveler’s pack and took out another book. Flipping through the tome, he stopped at a page, laid the book on the table, spun it around, and pushed it across the table toward Darrick. The sage moved the lantern so it shone on the pages more directly.

  “The demon that you saw,” Taramis said. “Did it look anything like this?”

  Darrick glanced at the page. The illustration was done by hand and in great detail.

  The picture was the demon he’d seen at Tauruk’s Port, the one who had summoned the undead creatures responsible for Mat Hu-Ring’s death.

  Not entirely responsible, Darrick told himself, feeling his appetite ebb. He owned the majority of that responsibility. He kept eating mechanically, knowing it would be days or weeks before he had the chance to eat so well again.

  “What do you know about the symbol?” Darrick asked, not answering the sage’s question.

  “You’re a hard sell, aren’t you, boy?” Taramis asked.

  Darrick broke a piece of bread and slathered honey butter onto it. He started eating while Taramis tried to wait him out.

  Finally giving up, Taramis replied, “That symbol is the one that was longest associated with a demon called Kabraxis. He is supposed to be the guardian of the Twisted Path of Dreams and Shadows.”

  “The Way of Dreams?” Darrick asked, remembering the stories Sahyir had been telling about Bramwell that morning.

  “Interesting, isn’t it?” the sage asked.

  “Sahyir told me he’d gone to church in Bramwell,” Darrick said. “There’s a new church there called the Church of the Prophet of the Light. They also mention the Way of Dreams there.”

  Taramis nodded. “They worship a prophet there named Dien-Ap-Sten.”

  “Not Kabraxis?”

  “It would be pretty stupid for a demon to be going around telling people to call him by his rightful name, now, wouldn’t it?” Taramis grinned. “I mean, the whole bit of anonymity would be right out the window if that was the case. Most people wouldn’t worship a demon by choice, although there are some.”

  Darrick waved a hand over his platter. “I appreciate this fine meal you went and bought me, I really do. But I have to tell you, if this story hasn’t picked up some by the time I finish, I’m out of here.”

  “Patience isn’t one of your virtues, is it?”

  “No.” Darrick felt no shame in admitting such.

  “Kabraxis is an old and powerful demon,” Taramis said. “He’s been around, in one form or another, since the beginning of recorded history. He’s been known by dozens, possibly hundreds, of names.”

  Darrick pointed to the gravy-rendered symbol on the tabletop. “And this is his symbol?”

  Taramis puffed on his pipe. The coals in the pipe bowl glowed orange. “I believe this is the demon’s primary symbol. Did you see this in Bramwell?”

  “I’ve not been to Bramwell in years,” Darrick answered. It had been too close to Westmarch.

  “Then where did you see the demon?” The sage’s interest was intense.

  “I never said I did,” Darrick reminded.

  “Your friend told me—”

  “He told you that I knew about this symbol.”

  “That’s all you’ve ever told him?”

  Darrick sipped his tea and ignored the question. He pointedly returned his attention to his meal. The plate steadily emptied.

  “Do you know the meaning of the symbol?” Taramis asked.

  “No.”

  “It’s supposed to represent the layers of man. The facets of a man that a demon may prey on.”

  “I don’t understand,” Darrick said.

  The sage seemed surprised. “You’ve had no priest’s training?”

  “No.”

  “And yet you know of Kabraxis’s most potent symbol without training?”

  Darrick said nothing as he used his knife to spear a potato chunk.

  Taramis sighed. “All right, then. You intrigue me, and that’s the only reason I’m going to continue, because I will not tolerate being treated in such a cavalier manner.” He tapped the ellipses. “These are the layers of man as divined by Kabraxis, Banisher of the Light.”

  “Why is he called Banisher of the Light?” Darrick asked. He glanced around them, making sure none of the sailors or longshoremen was taking much interest in their conversation. In some communities, the discussion of demons was enough to get a man strung up or, at the least, tested by a dunking chair or a red-hot poker.

  “Because Kabraxis’s main objective in the world of man is to eclipse and replace Zakarum. Kabraxis worked during the Sin War to keep Zakarum from being brought forth by the Archangel Yaerius through his disciple Akarat.”

  “What of the Archangel Inarius?” Darrick asked, remembering the old stories he’d been told of the Sin War. “It was Inarius who first built a Cathedral of L
ight in this world.”

  “Inarius grew overconfident and destroyed Mephisto’s temple, and Inarius was enslaved and returned with the Seraph to Hell to be tortured for all time. Kabraxis aided in Inarius’s downfall by winning them over to the demon’s side.”

  “I don’t remember that,” Darrick said.

  “The war was primarily between Mephisto and Inarius,” Taramis said. “Only a sage or someone who has had priest training would know of Kabraxis’s part in the Sin War. The Banisher of Light is a conniving demon. Kabraxis works in the shadows, stretching their boundaries till they cover the Light. Most men who have worshipped him over all those years have never known his true name.”

  “But you believe he is in Bramwell?” Darrick asked.

  “At the Church of the Prophet of the Light.” The sage nodded. “Yes. And there he is known as Dien-Ap-Sten.”

  Darrick tapped the symbol. “What of this?”

  “Again,” Taramis said, “those ellipses represent the layers of man as Kabraxis perceives them. It is through those layers that he is able to reach into a man’s soul, twist it, bend it, and finally possess it. He is not by nature a confrontational demon as are Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal.”

  Darrick shook his head. “You can’t go about just dropping the names of all those demons like that. They aren’t real. They can’t be all real.”

  “The Prime Evils are real.”

  A chill threaded through Darrick, but even after everything he’d seen—even after everything he’d lost after seeing the demon in Tauruk’s Port—he struggled to believe that the worlds of the demons, the Burning Hells, were real and not just stories.

  “Have you seen the Church of the Prophet of the Light?”

  “No.”

  “It is huge,” Taramis said. “In less than a year, the Church of the Prophet of the Light has become one of the most prominent structures in Bramwell.”

  “Bramwell isn’t a big city,” Darrick said. “Mainly fishermen and farmers live there. Westmarch barely keeps a garrison of guards there, and it’s mostly a show of support because no invading army would attack Westmarch through Bramwell. The roads are too harsh and uncertain.”

  “Kabraxis takes generations to build his power,” Taramis said. “That’s why even the unholy trinity of brothers learned to fear him. Where they waged war and fought with human armies with their own demonic ones, Kabraxis won believers to him.”

  “Through the layers of man.”

  “Yes.” The sage tapped the outermost ellipse. “First is the fear mankind has of demons. People who fear Kabraxis will acknowledge his leadership, but they will break away at the first chance.” He tapped the next ellipse. “Next comes greed. Through the Church of the Prophet of the Light, Kabraxis and the high priest known as Master Sayes, also called the Wayfinder have granted gifts to their worshippers. Good fortune in business, money, an unexpected inheritance. Then he moves closer to the heart.” He tapped the next ellipse. “Covetousness. Do you secretly want your neighbor’s wife? His land? Worship Kabraxis, and it will be yours in time.”

  “Only if the man you want those things from doesn’t worship Kabraxis as well.”

  “Not true.” Taramis paused to relight his pipe. “Kabraxis weighs and judges those who serve him. If one man—more powerful in the community than another—will better serve Kabraxis’s purposes, the Banisher of the Light rewards the more powerful man.”

  “What of the worshipper who loses whatever the other man wants?”

  The sage waved the question away. “Simple enough. Kabraxis tells everyone that the man who lost his lands or his wife or his family wasn’t strong in his faith. That he played Kabraxis—or, in this case, Dien-Ap-Sten—falsely and deserved what he got.”

  Sour bile rumbled in Darrick’s stomach. Every word the sage spoke had the ring of truth in it.

  Taramis moved to the next ellipse. “From that point, Kabraxis seeks out those people with greater fears. Sickness in your family? Come to the church to be healed. Your father is becoming senile? Come to the church, and have clarity returned to him.”

  “Kabraxis can do these things?”

  “Yes,” Taramis said. “And more. Demons have many powers. In their own way, they offer salvation to those who serve them. You’ve heard of the gifts Diablo, Baal, and Mephisto have given their own champions in the past. Enchanted armor, mystical weapons, great power to raise armies of dead. The Prime Evils rule through fear and destruction, always aiming for subjugation.”

  “Kabraxis has no interest in that?”

  “Of course he does,” Taramis said. “He’s a demon, after all. Even archangels want those who worship them to fear them just a little bit. Otherwise, why would they choose such fearsome forms and act the way they do?”

  Darrick considered the question and supposed it was true. Still, all this talk of demons was foreign to him, something he didn’t even want to invest in. Yet he felt he had no choice.

  “Archangels for the Light threaten man with being tortured by demons for the rest of his eternal life, and they promise dire vengeance for any who worship and aid the demons.” Taramis shook his head. “Archangels are warriors, just as demons are.”

  “But they have a more generous view of how man is supposed to fit into this world with them.”

  “That,” the sage said, “depends on your belief, doesn’t it?”

  Darrick sat quietly.

  “There are some who believe this world should be cleansed of demons and angels, that there should be no Light or Darkness, and men should find their own way in life.”

  “What do you believe?” Darrick asked.

  “I believe in the Light,” Taramis replied. “That’s why I hunt demons and expose them for what they are. I’ve killed eight lesser demons in the last twenty years. Not all of them are the likes of the Prime Evils.”

  Darrick knew that, but he’d only seen the one demon, and it had been a truly horrifying creature. “What are you going to do to Kabraxis?”

  “Kill him if I can,” the sage stated. “If not, I mean to see him exposed for what he is, his priest slain, and his church razed to the ground.”

  The man’s words drew Darrick in, and he took comfort in them. Taramis made doing such an incredible thing sound possible.

  “You’ve lost someone to the demon,” Taramis whispered.

  Darrick drew back.

  “Don’t bother to deny it,” the sage said. “I see the truth in your eyes. You wear your pain like a chevron for anyone who has been through the same thing.” He paused, his eyes sliding from Darrick’s for a moment. “I lost my family to a demon. Twenty-three years ago. I was a priest. Such a thing wasn’t supposed to happen to me. But a demon’s hand took my wife and my three children from me.”

  The lantern light flickered on the table.

  “I was young then and full of my studies as a Vizjerei mage. I taught in one of the outlying schools in my homelands. A stranger came to our door. We lived in back of the school, just my family and I. This man told us that he had no place to sleep and had eaten nothing for two days. Fool that I was and full of my new position, I let him in. During the night, he killed my family. Only I lived, though most thought I would not.” He pulled back the sleeves of his shirt, revealing the long, wicked scars across his flesh. “I have more scars over the rest of my body.” He tilted his head back, revealing the thick scar that curved around half of his neck and across his throat. “The priests who saved me had to piece me back together. All of the healers told me later that I should have died. The Light knows I wanted to.”

  “But you lived,” Darrick whispered, drawn into the horror of the story.

  “Yes.” Taramis knocked ash from his pipe and put it away. “For a time, I resented my life. Then I came to realize that it was a more focused one. The demon that had killed my family would go on to kill other families. I resolved to get well, mentally and physically. And I did. It took me three years to heal and nine years to track down the demon that took my
family from me. I had killed two other demons by that time and revealed four others.”

  “And now you hunt Kabraxis?”

  “Yes. When the Church of the Prophet of the Light first came into being, I became suspicious. So I began researching it and found enough similarities between the healing and the changes wrought within the worshippers to lead me in the direction of Kabraxis.”

  “Then why come here?” Darrick asked.

  “Because,” the sage said, “Kabraxis was once here. For a time, the barbarian tribes worshipped him when they warred against the people of the southern lands. During that time he was known as Iceclaw the Merciless. He succeeded in uniting some of the more powerful barbarian tribes, creating a great horde that landed between the Twin Seas, the Great Ocean, and the Frozen Sea.”

  Darrick considered the implications. The stories about the barbarian horde went so far back that they were considered only tales to frighten children with. The barbarians had been depicted as cannibalistic warriors who filed their teeth and filled their bellies from the bodies of women and children. “Until Hauklin came with his great sword, Stormfury, and slew Iceclaw during a battle that took six days.”

  Taramis grinned. “You’ve heard the stories.”

  “Aye,” Darrick replied. “But that doesn’t answer why you’re here.”

  “Because Stormfury is still here,” the sage answered. “I came for the sword because it is the only thing that can slay Kabraxis.”

  “It didn’t slay him the first time,” Darrick pointed out.

  “The texts I read said that Kabraxis fled before the devastating might of Stormfury. Only in the stories of men was the demon reported dead. But I believe the sword has the power to kill Kabraxis. If you can track him back into the Burning Hells with it.”

  “If you knew all of this, why did you bother to talk to me?”

  The sage’s eyes searched Darrick. “Because I am one man, Darrick Lang, and I’m not as young as I used to be.”

  “You know my name?”

  “Of course.” Taramis waved at the books before him. “I am a learned man. I heard the stories of the discovery of the demon at Tauruk’s Port more than a year ago while I was down in Westmarch. And I heard of the young navy officer who lost his best friend while carrying out a mission given him by the king’s nephew.”