Mickey Zucker Reichert - By Chaos Cursed

by By Chaos Cursed (v1. 0)

  Silme closed her eyes, allowing Astryd’s words to seep into her soul, dragging the burden of grief with it. Though not directly spoken, Astryd’s words brought home the realization that the task her companions were going to undertake this day was nearly or completely impossible and almost certainly fatal. To die with them was folly. Yet she could not shake the fact that, even though far weaker than Bolverkr, she could add power to her friends’ attack. The understanding that she had inadvertently stabilized Bolverkr. in her dream, losing her friends the days or weeks they might otherwise have had to prepare, saturated the realization with guilt. “At least let me come along. I’ll only use magic if the situation becomes desperate.”

  “No!” Larson sat up and pounded a fist onto the shelf hard enough to send the last few books tumbling to the floor. “The situation is desperate already. The last time you helped me fight a Dragonrank Master, you forced me to kill you. I won’t do it again. I swear it, Silme. I’ll let Bolverkr destroy me and everyone else in the world before I’ll take your life again.”

  Silme remembered as vividly as if it had happened the previous day. Before Larson had fought Loki, he had had to face her half-brother, Bramin. In order to neutralize Bramin’s magic, Silme had linked her life aura to his, and Larson’s sword had killed them both. To restore Silme’s life, Larson and Gaelinar had been forced to barter with the goddess Hel, an insane task that had made them enemies among the gods and had ultimately resulted in Bolverkr’s tragedy and crazed hunt for vengeance. “But even without magic, I could distract ...” she began.

  Larson interrupted with a crisp wave of dismissal. “The only person you’re going to distract is me. You and the baby would be just one more thing to occupy my mind when all I should be thinking about is killing Bolverkr. I don’t want you there, and you’re not going to be there. Case closed.”

  Anger boiled up inside Silme, but she bit it back. In her mind, the case was far from closed, but the time for arguing had ended. She saw no need to aggravate Larson just before what might well prove the final battle for them all.

  Larson sprang to his feet. “Let’s get this over with.” He strode toward the door.

  Taziar intercepted Larson, hooking his sleeve with a finger. “Not so fast, buddy.” His harsh, German accent mangled the American slang. “Don’t be in such a hurry to die. We can’t fight Bolverkr unless we can make it to Bolverkr.”

  Larson studied Taziar blankly.

  “The baron’s guards think I escaped. They probably won’t be quite so alert and numerous as before, but they do know you came to Cullinsberg with me. The baron’s offered a generous enough bounty to make the guards willing to slaughter one another. They’re not going to let you walk through the front gates without a thorough questioning.” Taziar placed the emphasis on the last few words, obviously intending the expression as a euphemism for torture.

  Asril the Procurer laughed. Rising, he stretched like a cat, then leapt lightly between Larson and the door. “You concentrate on Bolverkr and leave the baron’s imbeciles to me. With the help of a few dozen thieves, con men, and street gangs, I’m sure I can divert Cullinsberg’s red and black long enough for you to get over the south wall. Deal?”

  Silme’s gaze went naturally to Taziar. She saw the familiar sparkle in his blue eyes that accompanied the opportunity to work against impossible odds. Yet the dullness of his other features belied the excitement. Beneath it all, Taziar knew he no longer belonged in the city of his birth, the place he had called home for all but the last half year. And it pained him.

  A deep silence ensued.

  A moment later, Silme found herself enwrapped in Larson’s arms. His fine white hair felt like silk against her cheeks, smelling pleasantly of soap. His elven frame appeared delicate, but there was nothing fragile about the arms that crushed her to him.

  Tears filled Silme’s eyes, and she knew with grim certainty that the only man she had ever loved enough to marry would almost certainly be lost to her forever.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 3

  Chaos War

  A still small voice spake unto me,

  “Thou art so full of misery,

  Were it not better not to be?”

  —Alfred, Lord Tennyson The Two Voices

  The pine and hickory forest beyond the walls of Cullinsberg seemed to close in on Al Larson. He trailed Taziar in silence, trying to focus his thoughts on Bolverkr. But other concerns crowded in, unable to be banished. The tight, damp foliage dragged up memories of suffocating Vietnamese jungles, the reek of blood, gasoline, and excrement, death screams, the echoing shrieks of macaws, and the distant chop of helicopter blades. Through it all, he could not shake a feeling of enemies prowling silently behind him. Every few steps, he stopped abruptly, straining his hearing for the rustle of movement at his back. Occasionally, the rattle of brush or a twig snap answered his efforts, increasing his discomfort though he knew the noise had to come from Taziar, Astryd, or his own hyperactive imagination.

  “Here. Stop.” Taziar whispered suddenly. Though soft, his voice shattered a long and oppressive quiet.

  Larson pushed past Astryd to Taziar’s side.

  Taziar halted Larson with an extended hand. “Remember what I told you about seeing magic?”

  Larson nodded, staring ahead indirectly as the others had shown him. Now he could see the braid of Bolverkr’s ward, as tangled and forbidding as a perimeter of concertina wire. “I see it.” His voice sounded strained, even to his own ears. Only then did he realize he was gripping Gaelinar’s sword’s hilt so tightly that his hand had blanched and the brocade had left impressions in his palm. Bothered by his paranoia, he freed his hand and shook it to restore the circulation.

  “There’s another circle of magic just inside the first.” Taziar rested a palm against the trunk of a sturdy oak with several jutting branches. “Careful now. Follow me.” He shinnied to a high limb with an ease and quickness Larson could never hope to copy.

  “Yeah, right,” Larson mumbled. Turning, he motioned Astryd over to the base. Cupping his hands, he created a step for her. “Put your foot here. I’ll give you a boost.”

  Astryd looked doubtfully from Larson’s fingers to the wards while Taziar watched with nervous expectation. Dutifully, Astryd passed her dragonstaff to Taziar, then placed her booted foot on Larson’s hands.

  Short even compared with Taziar’s five foot nothing, Astryd seemed nearly weightless to Larson. He hoisted her without difficulty, waiting until she caught a solid grip on a higher branch before lowering his hands. Though agile, Astryd looked as awkward as a growing adolescent compared with Taziar’s practiced grace. Sighing, Larson seized the trunk and followed her, the rough bark scratching his hands.

  Taziar waited only until Larson had reached the branch on which he and Astryd perched before tossing the garnet dragonstaff safely over the wards. He leapt in a gentle arc to the ground, then signaled for Astryd to jump.

  Astryd hesitated while Larson waited, clinging to the branch with one hand, the other braced against the trunk. She lowered herself over the limb, dangling by her hands to lessen the distance to the ground, then let go. She plummeted dangerously close to the wards. Larson held his breath, scrambling to a position that might allow him to make a desperate dive for her. Before he could leap, Taziar stepped between Astryd and the barrier, catching a slender arm and hauling her to safety.

  Larson clambered to the branch, heaving a sigh of relief. He waved Astryd and Taziar out of his way, not liking the distance of the jump. In junior high school, a lesser fall had broken Larson’s arm. Edging to the end of the branch, he sprang to the ground, hit, and rolled to his feet, unharmed.

  “That’s the hardest part,” Taziar said. “The rest is just dodging around wards. Take your time, don’t get sloppy, and you should do fine.”

  Larson clapped dirt from his palms. He took little solace from Taziar’s words. Accustomed to judging obstacles by his own ability to surmount them, Taziar’s idea of “sloppy
” rarely gibed with Larson’s. A high school soccer player, weight lifter, and college boxer, Larson had always considered himself fit, but Taziar’s nimbleness made the American feel clumsy. Worse, thrown onto an unfamiliar body, Larson had been forced to relearn coordination, a competence rapidly acquired and sorely tested by Gaelinar’s sword lessons as well as Bramin’s and Loki’s attacks.

  Without further warning, Taziar headed off, soundlessly weaving through the brush. Astryd followed. Larson darted glances in all directions, locating the splayed pattern of magical glints, memorizing positions and trying to trace Astryd’s footsteps. Yearly deer hunts in the New Hampshire forests had accustomed Larson to pine forests and moving quietly over twigs and brush, and months in Vietnamese jungle had made him oversensitive to the sounds of rustling foliage. Again, he thought he heard a distant noise behind them. His palms went slick, and sweat dampened the leather-wrapped hilt of Gaelinar’s katana. Larson cursed himself. Keep your mind on the wards. There’s nothing behind you. And even if there is, it can’t possibly be as dangerous as what’s ahead.

  The uppermost branches of oak caught the dawn light, silhouetting the autumn leaves red and gold against pink. Taziar frowned, and Larson understood his discomfort. Accustomed to working in near darkness, night gave the little Climber an advantage. Daylight would turn the odds even further in Bolverkr’s favor.

  At length, Taziar stopped, motioning to Larson and Astryd to stand in place. Without turning to see if they had complied, Taziar went on alone. Within seconds, he had disappeared between the trees.

  Wind shivered through the branches, sending the pines into a bowing dance. Larson lowered his head. In a safe position between the wards, he went deathly still. Something brushed his hand, and he glanced up at Astryd. She held a stance of defiance, yet fear glazed her eyes. Larson took her hand, squeezing encouragingly. He had faced death enough times to know that the trick to succeeding at a suicide mission was to concentrate wholly on the goal and forget the consequences. To think about a future without himself, Taziar, and Astryd, to know fear instead of certainty, even for a moment, might jeopardize the success of their attempt. So Larson pushed failure out of his mind.

  But Astryd had lived her first fifteen years as a shipbuilder’s daughter and the last six protected and isolated from the world on the grounds of the Dragonrank school. She had not yet learned to accept her own death. Larson pitied her, sympathizing with her struggle against innocence, yet he knew he could do nothing except understand.

  Taziar returned, dodging through the wards once again. “Bolverkr’s still pacing the curtain wall. Any suggestions?”

  Larson stated the obvious strategy. “We need to hit him fast and hard, preferably from more than one side. Our only chance is to catch him by surprise and strike before he can retaliate.”

  Taziar nodded in agreement. “I can get us onto the ramparts.” He patted his side to indicate a coil of rope he carried beneath his cloak.

  Larson frowned, wondering why Taziar had not produced the rope when they’d been maneuvering over Bolverkr’s magical perimeter. Apparently, he didn’t see the need. Or he didn’t think we could spare the time. Larson found it difficult to fault a tactic that had worked. We made it over. That’s all that matters.

  Apparently recognizing Astryd’s discomfort, Taziar took her other hand. “The wards get thicker the closer we get to the keep. Pay attention. Don’t get too eager or distracted. Insane or not, Bolverkr’s not stupid. The only safe path to the wall is on the side where he’s pacing.”

  Larson dropped Astryd’s hand, leaving her solace to Taziar. They all knew Bolverkr’s retribution was aimed specifically against the men who had loosed Chaos against him; if Larson and Taziar were killed, Bolverkr had no further need of Astryd. They had already discussed the contingency; if their attack failed, the Dragonrank sorceress was to use any means at her disposal to return to Silme, accepting the men’s deaths without consideration of revenge.

  Alert to the urgency of time and the necessity for quiet, Taziar gave Astryd a fond but quick embrace unaccompanied by verbal explanations or platitudes. Pulling away, he knelt, seized a fallen twig amid the underbrush, and cleared a patch of dirt. Using the tip of the branch as a stylus, he drew a series of curved and tangled lines on the ground. “This is the pattern through the wards from the edge of the forest to the curtain wall. We may have to run through it. Can you do that?” He glanced up at his companions.

  Larson frowned, uncertain. He had experience with obstacle courses, but none so hair-trigger deadly as a Dragonrank sorcerer’s magic.

  Apparently, Taziar intended his last question to remain rhetorical, because he did not wait for an answer before pushing silently through the brush.

  Astryd and Larson trailed Taziar. Branches parted before them, leaves brushing quietly against linen and leather. Larson kept his head tilted, his concentration fully on the glittering traces of sorcery, though he could see them only indirectly. Taziar’s words haunted him. The idea of racing, almost blindly, through a mine field brought memories of a corporal named Steve, severed at the waist by a V.C. trap, still breathing as his life’s blood colored the jungle clay a deeper red. A chill rushed through Larson, and it took an effort of will to keep from seizing Astryd and heading home.

  The trees thinned, granting Larson distant glimpses of wall through ragged, dawn-gray holes in the brush. Taziar stopped, allowing his companions to draw up to his side as closely as the tightly bunched wards allowed. He pointed ahead.

  Larson shifted until he found a gap wide enough to accord him an unobstructed view of what had once been a farming village called Wilsberg. Shattered stone littered land that rose gradually to a central hill, the carnage interspersed with an occasional jutting foundation of a cottage or fountain. Magics of varying hues reflected the twilight in wild patterns, their otherworldliness enhanced by the need to view them from the corners of his vision. It seemed only natural to Larson to glean details by direct focusing, and the disappearance of the wards whenever he tried to study them drove him into fits of silent but vicious swearing.

  On the summit of the hill, Bolverkr’s ten foot curtain wall rose squarely around a crumbled ruin of a keep. A man marched along the closest rampart. Though tall and slender, Bolverkr walked with a stomping gait, his fists clenched, his white hair streaming behind him in a snarled mane. He seemed to take no notice of the three hidden spies in his forest, to Larson’s intense relief. He traced Bolverkr’s straight path across the top of the wall to its farthest corner. There, the sorcerer paused. His hands snapped to chest level, and light blossomed into a ball between his fingers.

  “Now,” Taziar whispered. He sprinted toward the wall, dodging through the narrow ribbon of safe pathway surrounded by Bolverkr’s wards.

  Astryd chased Taziar.

  Riveted on the sorcerer, Larson all but missed the signal. He raced after Astryd, taking the first several steps by mimicking the location of her footfalls before he remembered the method to seeing wards. The procedure required him to lose sight of the enemy above him, a lapse that sent his survival instinct jangling and wound his nerves to knots.

  Larson heard an explosive crash, followed by a woody crack that reverberated from the forest canopy. He stumbled, dropping flat to the ground from habit, his head jerking toward the noise. His left arm scraped a ward, and the magic burned a slash from wrist to elbow. Pain drove a scream from his lungs. He choked it back into a gasp, aware that drawing Bolverkr’s attention would be sure suicide, gaining strength from the memory of a young private with his chest flayed by a grenade who had managed to bite back the moans of agony that would have revealed his companions. I’m not hurt that badly.

  Taziar stood with his back pressed tightly to the base of the curtain wall, directly beneath Bolverkr’s line of vision. Even through dawn’s copper-pink and gray, Larson could see the concerned expression on the Climber’s face. Astryd had nearly reached Taziar. Bolverkr still stood at the farthest end of his walkway, his
back toward Larson. On the ground before him, an oak lay beside its smoking, splintered stump. Leaves whipped and tumbled in a multicolored wash. Bolverkr started to turn.

  Larson scrambled to his feet, aware he had to cover the three yards to Taziar and Astryd before Bolverkr completed his about-face. Shit! Larson sprang for safety.

  Astryd gasped.

  Larson jerked his head toward her, and a ward appeared in vivid relief, directly before him at waist level. He jolted backward in midair, all but grazing it as he landed.

  Taziar cringed, gaze whipping to Bolverkr.

  No time to get fancy. Larson hurled himself over the ward. Landing on his shoulder, he rolled to Taziar’s feet, then scuttled in a wild crawl to the base of the curtain wall. He rose and pressed against the wall. The granite felt cold and solid through the sweat-dampened fabric of his tunic. His heart hammered, and his skin itched with a sense of imminent peril. He could almost feel the tear of Bolverkr’s magic through his flesh. His injured arm dangled, throbbing without mercy, and he drew some solace from the realization that the injury from Bolverkr’s sorcery could have proved far more critical. It could have killed me. I was lucky. It was weak or old, or perhaps I only grazed it.

  Beside Larson, Astryd stood still as a statue, her back crushed to the wall. Overhead, Bolverkr’s footfalls grew louder as he approached.