The Lady's Man

by Greg Curtis

  “The others?”

  He had to ask even though he knew the answer.

  “I don't know.” The wizard sounded almost as broken as Yorik felt. “I did what I could. I sent the birds to catch them. The Lady helped.”

  But what he could do was little enough. Yorik remembered only too well the way they had taken off as if fired out of one of those accursed dwarven cannon. He remembered the way they had flown so fast and so high, vanishing almost in the blink of an eye. And he remembered being completely helpless as the wizard had simply tossed them to their deaths with scarcely a thought.

  As for the Lady, while she had immense power it was only given to her faithful. It wasn't selfishness or a lack of caring. It was simply that even she had limits and the Order's needs had to come first. What she could do was one thing; what she would do was another entirely. When the pain of his damage ribs and broken shoulder ripped through him, like being stabbed with a rusty sword and made him nearly cry out, he was secretly grateful for it. He should suffer for his failure.

  “Let me help you.”

  Ancient but surprisingly strong arms grabbed Yorik around the shoulders and started lifting him to his feet, causing him to almost cry out once more as he felt more injuries bursting into life. But he choked the scream back, and somehow even managed to stay upright when the wizard let him go. Paladins did not give in to pain, and they did not fall down until long after they were dead, if then. Such weaknesses were not acceptable.

  So he stood there on the grassy river bank before the wizard, and finally knew where he was. On the shores of the Dragon Falls River, not that far from the falls themselves. He could hear their thunder and feel it in the ground. The spray of the water and its magical vitality had been helping him to heal as he slept. The ancient temple was a third of a league away, almost straight up. It was going to be tough to get back there. And when he did he would be in no shape to fight.

  Aside from his injuries his armour was broken and lying in pieces all around him. He remembered letting it fall from him as he'd collapsed, looking for a place to sleep. He had found his great sword, but his shoulder was in such bad shape that he doubted he could even draw it. And then when he had tried to fight, he had been unable to anyway. The Lady had not been there with him. Without her he was nothing.

  “By the Mother you're a mess!”

  It was an understatement if anything. His armour was broken and lying in pieces and his body was just as broken as it. Broken ribs making it painful to breathe, broken shoulder and very nearly a broken back. Breathing was still painful though at least the taste of blood was no longer in his mouth. But blood had poured from at least a dozen wounds. Wounds that were still open. In fact it was a miracle that he breathed at all. Nothing but a little magic and a lot of luck had kept him alive. Only strength of will and the care of the Lady would keep him going for much longer. But he would do whatever was required of him, starting with killing an evil wizard. Nothing else mattered. But something did strike him.

  “Me? What about you? And why are you covered in bird droppings?”

  It seemed an odd thing to Yorik, and as his brain finally woke up more fully and he saw his robes covered in thick white guano. He could smell him too, an unpleasant odour.

  “The Lady decided that it was important that I awaken promptly this morning. So the birds squawked and pecked at me and when that wasn't enough, left reminders of their visit.” Myral looked disgustedly at the mess they had made of his robes.

  Even in his pain that brought a smile to Yorik's face, though he tried to hide it. This was not the time for amusement. They were alive and there was work to be done. One task in particular. And there was one thing he needed to know.

  “How does that creature still live?” He had to know. He had to know so that he could kill him. Properly this time.

  “Mayfall you called him. The same wizard you killed before?”

  “Yes.”

  Except that he clearly hadn't killed him the first time. Not completely. No more it seemed, had the demon when it had driven its talons deep into his eyes. It was impossible. He should have been long dead. Several times over. Instead he was alive and uninjured, and a hundred times more powerful than before.

  “I figured. He didn't seem to like you.”

  “But how can he be alive?” It was still the question that Yorik most badly wanted an answer to, and the one he suspected that no one could give him. Not even a five hundred year old wizard.

  “You're assuming that he is?”

  The ancient wizard smiled at him as if he was a small confused child, and by his standards maybe he was. But even through the pain of his broken body Yorik didn't allow that to annoy him. Nor even the pain as the wizard started pulling off what remained of his clothes. Not even when he started dragging whole laundry lines of bandaging out of a leather carry bag and began wrapping them around his middle. Not when he suddenly realised Myral might actually know something of Mayfall.

  “He's not?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. Alive, dead. The words get confused around some people.”

  If Yorik had had the strength he would have reached out and grabbed the ancient wizard by the shoulders and shaken him until the answers fell out. Luckily enough perhaps, he didn't, and so instead he had just stood there, letting himself be wrapped up in white linen like a bride, and waited until Myral took pity on him.

  “It's hard to say what state that wizard was in. But the “what” is easier. It's a thane.”

  “A village justice?” That made no sense at all to Yorik.

  “Maybe these days, but thousands of years ago the thanes were minor lords. Rulers of a number of smaller lands bound within the realm of a larger kingdom. Powerful within their own lands, but still subservient to the King. They hated that.”

  Of course they did. The same was true still. Whenever anyone was in a position of power, they always wanted more. More power, more wealth, more land, in fact more of everything. It was their nature. It was one of the reasons why every paladin was commanded to give up all their titles when they entered the Order. A paladin could have only one name, one kingdom, one fealty, and that was to his mistress.

  “So some of them struck a bargain.”

  That Yorik guessed, was a bad thing. Bargains for power were always bad. But how bad it was depended on who or what they'd made their deal with. He suspected it was very bad.

  “They wanted power, so they gave themselves, mind, body and soul to the Nameless in return.”

  The Nameless! The word itself was enough to send a shiver down Yorik's spine. And he knew no more what it was than did anyone else.

  To most it was a legend. A word spoken in the dark of night to frighten small children and keep them in bed. To those with magic it was a source of dark power. Something primal and ancient, formless and without even substance, but still something that could be drawn upon. The beast of the void. To the priests it was that which had been there before the world had begun, and that which hungered to bring the world back to that first darkness. It was hunger and destruction, and the enemy of life. But to everyone, it was evil. No one knew what it was truly, but they knew one thing above all else; you didn't make deals with it.

  “Unfortunately for them, the Nameless accepted their sacrifice. Thereafter what walked in their stead was something other.”

  Yorik could understand that. What he couldn't understand was how that related to a dead wizard walking and blessed with magic beyond what he should have, but with all the pride and malice remaining. He would have asked but there was no point, especially when Myral tightened one of the bandages around his middle and he could only stand there holding his breath, and try to keep from screaming and drawing predators to them. Then the wizard tightened a few more.

  “Over the centuries and millennia the thanes vanished from our world, died out maybe, lost their power or just went away. No one knows for sure what happened to them. But they vanished and everyone thought they were gone. That wa
s after all three, four or even five thousand years ago.”

  “So you think Mayfall made a deal with the Nameless?”

  “No.” The wizard looked away, his face a mask of unreadable emotions, none of them good however. “The path to the Nameless was warded; locked away and hidden long ago. And it was done by many casters far older and more powerful than me. Sylph casters. No mere wizard would be able to break through. And no one who knew the way and where it led would take it.”

  And yet Yorik would have guessed from his expression that Mayfall had the same dark thoughts in his most secret places.

  “But there have always been rumours over the years that the thanes still walked the world, quiet, unseen, greatly weakened. Cut off from their master, whoever or whatever the Nameless truly is.”

  “There were also stories that if they found a suitable host, someone evil of intent, weak of will and desperate, they could subsume them. They could do this by merging their essences with the mortal wizard somehow, slowly devouring their souls from within like a gut worm, but granting them immense power while they did so. A marriage of sorts, unequal and not of long duration, but immensely dangerous. The two become one – the thane taking the wizard's form and memories while the wizard takes the thane's power. And there were also tales that spoke of the return of their ancient powers when they did so. And that's what tells me what Mayfall truly is.”

  “A dark wizard?”

  “A thane. One of the thane's terrible powers was the ability to sever ties. Leaving all of the priests powerless.”

  And more importantly, powerless against him as Yorik realised. That feeling of being completely helpless against Mayfall was one that would live with him for a long time to come, and probably haunt his nightmares. The feeling of being alone though, of being without the Lady, that was even worse.

  “It was their greatest power, their most dangerous weapon.”

  It would be Yorik realised. The priests were the most powerful of spellcasters, their magic divine and as such far beyond mortal. The paladins like himself were also among the strongest of warriors, their strength aided by their patrons. But if Mayfall could break their connection they would be defenceless. And there was no telling how much more he could do.

  “So Mayfall is now a thane?”

  “No.” Myral shook his head slowly. Then he appeared to reconsider. “Maybe. Mayfall I think is dying as he is consumed by one. But some of his memories, his evil soul lives on in that which now walks in his body. His will directs it. Enough to recognise you, and to dislike you first and above all. For the moment.”

  “Then too his magic is strange. None of the other thanes were necromancers. They were all elemental casters of terrible power. None of them raised the dead or used them as servants. None of them hunted down particular people like you or worried about enemies like the dragons. None of them cared. They just destroyed. This one seems different, and that may help us to fight him. You may help us to fight him.”

  Yorik wondered why Myral had added the last, but when the wizard started pulling on more of the bandages, tightening them so that he could barely move, he abruptly lost interest. The pain was too raw. He just drew his breath in and concentrated on his control as he'd been taught.

  “Then how do I kill him?”

  In the end that was the only question that mattered. Mayfall or whatever walked in his shoes, had to die. Again.

  “You can't kill him. No one can. You especially. Your magic is of the divine. Your strength too. Against him you are helpless. Druidic magic like mine is a little more effective, but not enough. Only the magic of the wizards, true wizards, can defeat him, and even they can't kill him, only fight him.”

  “True wizards?”

  “Those whose magic is of the elements. Fire, light, lightning, thunder, earth, water and air. Once, millennia ago, they were the most common of wizards. Now the rarest. But some still live. You know them as the sylph.”

  “The Land of The Sky?”

  Yorik knew of the sylph of course. He knew the stories. And he knew of their realm far to the south west. But he knew of no one who had ever been there. No one who had actually spoken to a sylph. Centuries before they had left the known world, retreating to their mountainous realm, and staying there. Since then nothing had been heard of them. They did not leave their realm and those who visited did not return.

  “The next leg of our journey.”

  “Let's hope it is better than this one.”

  And then even as the words left his mouth left his mouth an intelligent question finally arrived in his head.

  “Why? He is not the Dark One.”

  Going to see the sylph about the dark wizard or thane didn't seem that important when the Dark One was busy raising armies of the undead and destroying the world. No matter how terrible Mayfall might have become, he was still only one man. The harm he could cause was limited. Wasn't it? Slowly, and somewhat awkwardly Yorik managed to get his questions out.

  “Because the thane is very dangerous. The destruction he can bring about is far worse than simply what a wizard could do, no matter how powerful. And he will bring death and destruction to the world on a scale not seen in eight hundred years. And a thousand before that.”

  “Eight hundred years? You said the thanes vanished many thousands of years ago?”

  “I said most of them.”

  Myral tied a knot in the bandage around his shoulder just then that straightened it out a little, and Yorik nearly fainted from the pain. He didn't cry out, but that was only because his throat had locked up.

  “But some survived. Some walked the world to cause trouble. And the last one I know of walked the world eight hundred years ago. He caused terrible destruction. A dozen cities were destroyed, people died in their hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, perhaps even more. There was widespread panic and fear, and for a time all hope was lost. Until he went away.”

  “Until he ...” Yorik didn't like the sound of that. That he hadn't been defeated but had simply gone away. And there was another problem as he slowly realised.

  “Eight hundred years ago is not that long. There are records of those times. And I don't recall anything in my lessons about such a terrible calamity.”

  “Of course not. You assume that because Mayfall is human the last one was too. But he wasn't. He was sylph. The cities destroyed were theirs. The Land of The Sky as we know it today was devastated. Once it was said to be beautiful beyond compare. Now it is a rocky wasteland. Some humans and elves and those of other races were killed, some of their towns destroyed, but in the end the thane aimed his spite upon his own people and the rest were spared.”

  But this time the thane was human Yorik realised. He didn't need the wizard to tell him that. Mayfall would aim his spite at the human realm, probably at the realm of New Vineland. It was that that Mayfall knew, and it was there that he no doubt had a score to settle with many.

  “You said they went away. How long before Mayfall goes away?”

  Myral shrugged helplessly. He didn't know. “Even five hundred years ago when I last walked as a man, the damage was then three hundred years old, and it was in sylph lands which most of us did not dare enter. The sylph are not a welcoming people.”

  “But now we have to go there and ask for their help?”

  Yorik didn't expect an answer. In the end it wasn't really that sort of question. More a statement of unwelcome facts. Of course they had to go there and hope that the sylph were in a welcoming mood for once. And if they weren't they'd have to persuade them to be. Yorik did not want to think about what that might entail. So he let his thoughts turn to the practical. The military matters which he did understand.

  “So, do we now have two enemies to fight? The Dark One raising the dead and shattering the world, and this servant of the Nameless doing the same? Can this really be?”

  Which of course it couldn't be. It made no sense. It was like being blown away by a hurricane at the very same time that the ground was
opening up beneath your feet as the earth shook and the mountains spewed orange fire. Some things were simply too unlucky to be true. Surely.

  “Maybe not young one. Others have mentioned that you had doubts about the Dark One being responsible for the undead. And to my mind your doubts about the Dark One were well placed. Maybe someone just wanted us to believe it was the Dark One returned. Maybe this has all been the thane.”

  “Then it cannot be the Nameless. According to all that is known, the Nameless has no will. It eats, it hungers, it hates and destroys, that is all. And even if Mayfall has become its partly dead or dying servant, surely he can want little more? Except of course for killing me.”

  Yorik knew that he was right even if he hadn't studied the ancient holy tales as much as he should have. He much preferred getting out and doing to sitting down with the endless tomes of knowledge and studying. But still everyone knew that much about the Nameless. He or it was not so much a creature no matter how horrible, as an eternal hunger. The remains of the primordial chaos that had been before the world according to the sages. But Mayfall on the other hand – if it was him in there – he would want to kill him. He would very much want to kill him.