“It’s in the air. Can’t you feel it?”
Haskeer gave a prolonged, noisy sniff. “I can’t.”
“Take my word for it, Sergeant; our destination’s imminent. Though we shouldn’t get too excited. It may be closer only in distance.”
After that, the star and the mountains it crowned rapidly grew larger.
Eventually the problem of where their destination would lie was solved: the canal came to an end. It terminated in a modest dock, which had the benefit of a winch that proved sturdy enough to unload the barge. But that was the end of their luck as far as the weapon was concerned. Without beasts to help with the burden, it had to be moved bodily. The band was hardly keen on the idea, but they had experience of hauling siege engines over long distances. Once roped up, they found it took about half the band to pull it, which meant they could labour in shifts.
Now as big as a harvest moon, and rivalling the sun, the star was suspended above whatever lay behind the mountains. Fortunately there was a wide pass cutting through them. They made for it.
Halfway along, the pebbly stone floor of the vale began to be covered in patches of fine sand. By the time they got to the end of the pass there was nothing but sand underfoot, and it was quite thick. They had to work even harder to negotiate it. The temperature was also noticeably hotter.
Ahead of them was a low ridge of granite. Leaving the weapon at its base, they climbed the gentle incline to see what was beyond. Lying on their bellies, they looked out at the beginning of a vast desert. More arresting was what stood on it in the near distance. It was a pyramid, the largest any of them had seen, and it seemed to be made of milky glass. At its apex was what looked like a massive, multifaceted gem. Sunlight glinted on it.
“What in hell is that?” Coilla said.
“Something legendary,” Dynahla explained. “If I’m right, it’s the Prism of Sina-Cholm.”
“Which is?”
“An artefact created by the wizards who built this world.”
“What does it do?” Stryke asked.
“It kills.”
“How?”
“Can you get one of the archers to send an arrow its way?”
“Sure. It’s in range. But I don’t think an arrow’s going to hurt it.”
“That’s not the point.”
Stryke shrugged and ordered one of the grunts to string-up.
“It might be an idea if we all kept our heads down,” Dynahla suggested.
The archer loosed his bolt and it soared towards the pyramid. It had almost reached it when an intense white beam shot from the gem at the apex, striking the arrow and obliterating it.
“It targets anything that approaches,” Dynahla said.
“Is there somebody in there operating that thing?” Pepperdyne wanted to know.
“No, it functions entirely by itself. It works by drawing energy from what passes for the sun here, concentrating it and using it to defend itself.”
“Do we have to tackle it?” Stryke said.
“You know the nature of this place by now. It’s there because it’s the next thing we have to overcome. Maybe the last thing. Fortunately, we have a chance because of that.” He nodded at the weapon parked below them.
“Won’t the pyramid just destroy what we fire at it?”
“What if we were to fire more than one thing at the same time?” Coilla suggested.
“That’s not a bad idea. Think it might work, Dynahla?”
“Your faith in my knowledge about this place is touching, Stryke. Frankly, I don’t know. But it’s worth a try, isn’t it?”
They needed a spot where they could get the weapon to see its target, and where there was some kind of shelter for the band. Scouts found such a place not far from the incline they climbed. It was a ground-level slab of stone big enough to accommodate the weapon, and with a perfect view of the pyramid. There were enough sizeable boulders strewn around it to give the Wolverines cover. They set about hauling the weapon to it.
“All right,” Stryke said when they were installed, “let’s get the thing loaded and lined-up.”
While that was going on he picked six archers.
There was a lot of fussing with the weapon’s alignment, and when he was finally satisfied, Stryke stood ready at the lever. The archers nocked their arrows and drew back the strings.
“Now!” he yelled, pulling hard on the lever.
The weapon coughed its missile as six arrows were loosed.
The arrows travelled faster than the ball, which described an arcing path. A flash came from the gem and one of the arrows vaporised. There was another dazzling streak and a second arrow disappeared. Then it was the ball’s turn. A beam sought it out, shattering it to fragments. The remaining arrows got through and clattered feebly against the pyramid’s face.
“Fuck it!” Haskeer cursed.
“We proved it can’t handle several things at once,” Stryke said.
“But it got the important one, didn’t it?”
“We’ll do it again, with more archers this time.”
Ten archers lined-up as the weapon was reloaded and its angle slightly adjusted.
Again the launch was simultaneous. The beam from the gem got two, three and then four arrows, and they were picked off before they had travelled as far as the first volley. But the ball got through. It struck the pyramid low down, near its base, and did some damage, although nothing terminal. A cheer went up from the band.
The weapon was primed once more and its angle altered on the basis of the previous shot. Arrows were readied.
“Now!” Stryke bellowed. He pulled the lever and rushed forward to see the result.
The beam singled out no less than five arrows this time, and intercepted them much nearer their firing point than before. Tumbling through the air on a high trajectory, the ball travelled unscathed.
There was a blinding flash and a roar. Stryke found himself on the ground, along with the others, not knowing what had just happened. As they looked up, they saw the ball hit the pyramid at the point where the gem was fixed to its peak. The sound of the impact was tremendous. Swaying for a second, the gem tumbled, and as it fell the pyramid itself rippled with numerous cracks and began to fall apart. Great shards of the glassy material plunged to the ground to shatter into thousands of pieces. In a brace of heartbeats the entire structure gave way, the remains shrouded in a cloud of dust from the debris.
The band cheered. It took them a moment to hear Coilla shouting at them and to realise something was wrong. Stryke turned and saw what it was. The weapon was on its side, the tube broken into several pieces, the woodwork blackened with charring. Its ammunition, the iron spheres, were scattered all around. Some were split in two.
Coilla was on her knees next to something half under the toppled weapon. Stryke and the others dashed to it.
“The pyramid fired at us just before the ball hit,” she explained. “Vobe was standing next to the weapon.”
Stryke looked. Their comrade was crushed, bloodied and unmistakably dead.
They would have liked to give Vobe the send-off he deserved, but they knew that wasn’t always possible in the field. So Stryke and Coilla said a few words about one of their longest-serving brothers-in-arms, and Dallog commended his spirit to the Tetrad with Haskeer looking on disdainfully. Then they buried the body as deep as they could in the desert sand.
“Strange to think we’ve buried him in a place that doesn’t actually exist,” Coilla said as they moved away.
“Nothing that happens these days surprises me,” Stryke replied. “But I wish we could have seen him off on a pyre on Ceragan, where he belongs, with feasting and drinking in his honour. He deserved at least that much.”
“We’ll raise a tankard to him when we get out of this.”
“Think we will get out?”
“Of course we will. And you don’t want to let the others hear you talking like that.”
“No, you’re right. But what with Thirzarr, and now Vobe-”
>
“I know. But the best way we serve them is to complete this mission, the way we set out to do.”
“That feels like a long time ago, and it seemed so much simpler then.”
“Tell me about it.”
Dynahla approached them. “I don’t want to intrude on your grief,” he said, “but we should be thinking about moving on.”
“Yes,” Stryke agreed soberly. “But which way?”
“To what Sina-Cholm was guarding. Now the prism’s gone we should be able to get through.”
Heavy-hearted, the band set off over the sand towards the ruins of the pyramid. They realised how big the thing had been when they had to negotiate a vast quantity of debris, much of it viciously keen shards of the glass-like material it had been constructed from. But they struggled onto its base, and after rooting through the chaos uncovered an aperture in the floor with a flight of stone steps that descended into darkness. They filed down, weapons in hand.
At the bottom of the stairwell they found that their way was lit, just as other areas had been on their travels in this world, from an unknown source. They were in a wide, tall tunnel, seemingly constructed without blocks, bricks or any evidence of joins. There was only one way to go and they took it.
“This I do know something about,” Dynahla told them. “I was in this labyrinth when I first came to Serapheim’s pocket universe. Take heart. We’re very near our destination now.”
They trudged along the tunnel for what seemed like an eternity, their surroundings never changing and the light staying at the same uniform level. More than one of them noticed the sulphurous whiff in the air that indicated a magical charge. And it was getting stronger.
There was a brighter radiance somewhere far ahead, and it shone more and more strongly as they approached it. When they arrived at its source they found that the tunnel ended at a waterfall of multicoloured light.
“We’re here,” Dynahla announced. “All we have to do is step through this curtain of energy and into Serapheim’s world.”
“Is it safe?” Spurral asked.
“Perfectly. Stryke, I think you should have the honour of going through first.”
“I reckon this… entrance or whatever it is should be big enough for us all to go through together.”
“Good idea,” the shape-changer said. “Shall we?”
The band lined up in front of the dazzling cascade, not quite believing it could be an entrance of any kind. Standeven, as usual, hovered a few steps to the rear of the others, looking fearful.
On Stryke’s word they moved forward and stepped into the luminous whirlpool.
The sensation was not unlike world-hopping with the instrumentalities. It felt as though they were falling from a great height through a madness of churning colours and exploding stars.
They opened their eyes on something like paradise.
The sun beat down on a verdant scene of grassy pastures, soft rolling hills, trees in full leaf and silvered lakes. So blue it almost made their eyes hurt, the sky was host to a few fluffy white clouds. The air was fresh and a gentle breeze blew, fragrant from a thousand wholesome, growing things. There was no sign of the vibrant curtain they had walked through.
“This is quite something,” Pepperdyne said admiringly.
Spurral nodded. “It’s… beautiful.”
“It’s based on Maras-Dantia before it fell into corruption,” a voice boomed from behind.
They spun round. Serapheim stood before them, a broad smile on his face. “Congratulations on getting here,” he said, “and welcome to my world.”
29
Tentarr Arngrim, or Serapheim as the world of sorcery knew him, looked very much as the band remembered from their first meeting on Maras-Dantia, albeit he showed the signs of ageing. But he had at least the appearance of vigour, despite what Dynahla had said about his failing health. His back was still straight, his build lean. He had shoulder-length auburn hair and a tidily trimmed beard. There were lively blue eyes above a slightly hawkish nose, and his mouth was well shaped. He was dressed in a blue silken robe and shiny black leather boots. The shape-changer was at his side.
“Greetings, Wolverines,” he said. “It’s good to see you again, and a pleasure to welcome some new faces.” He looked to the Ceragan recruits, Spurral, and Pepperdyne and Standeven. Then he took on a more solemn tone. “Allow me to commiserate with you on those who fell on the way here. I know the loss of your comrades must be a grievous burden.”
“I think you’ve got some explaining to do,” Stryke told him.
“Yes, I have. You deserve no less. But come, let’s do it in more comfort than standing here.”
He led them to a white marble villa. It was elegantly fashioned and tastefully furnished, and it was hard to credit it all as a product of magic. In a room the size of a banqueting hall he invited the Wolverines to rest themselves and take refreshments. Several young male and female humans, similarly dressed in blue robes, appeared with trays of water, juice and ale, and platters of bread, cheese, fruits and freshly roasted meat and fowl. It was hard to believe that the food and drink, like the villa and the world in which it stood, literally didn’t exist.
Serapheim let them pick at the food and take some of the drink before moving on to weightier matters, despite the obvious impatience of Stryke and several others.
At last he said, “I can understand your frustration and your puzzlement at the turn events have taken.”
“Can you?” Stryke replied frostily. “We signed on for this mission to get our revenge on Jennesta. But it all got a lot more complicated than that, didn’t it?”
“Not really.” He raised a hand to gently forestall Stryke’s objection. “You signed on with two objectives in mind. One was helping to liberate the orcs of Acurial, and you achieved it. You should be proud of that. It again gives the lie to the slander that orcs are selfish, purely destructive creatures. As to the second prong of your mission, settling with my daughter, that was and remains the prime purpose of the assignment.”
“There’s still hope that we can do that?”
“Every hope. It’s why you’re here. And let me add, Stryke, that I’m fully aware of the situation your mate, Thirzarr, is in. Her wellbeing is as important as defeating Jennesta, and I give you my word that every effort will be made to reunite you.”
“Maybe she wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place if I hadn’t agreed to this crazy scheme.”
“If anything I’ve done has been responsible for putting Thirzarr in danger then I apologise. That was never my intention. But you have to understand that she would have been in danger anyway, sooner or later. From Jennesta. We are all in peril because of my daughter. You know of her scheme to create an army of obedient zombie orcs?”
“Course I do,” Stryke replied angrily, “Thirzarr’s one of them.”
“No, she’s not. She’s being held in a state between normality and mindless servitude. It suited Jennesta to have it that way, so she could more easily manipulate you. Or so she thought. Her demise would see an end to the hold she has over Thirzarr, and all the others who have fallen under her influence.”
“We kill her-”
“And they live, yes.” He looked around at the others in the room, all of whom were intent on what was being said. “Some of you, particularly those new to this warband, might find it difficult to understand how I can talk so calmly about the death of my own flesh and blood. But Jennesta is no longer my daughter. It’s as if I had never fathered her. I renounced her long ago, and my heart is heavier about that than you can imagine. The fact is that I helped bring evil into being when she was born. My only wish is to put that right.”
“You tried once before,” Stryke reminded him.
“Yes, and somehow, by some fluke, she survived the vortex. This time my thought is to serve her a fate from which there is no escape.” He fell into a kind of reverie for a moment, undisguised sorrow in his eyes. Then he roused himself. “But about her plan for a sla
ve army. Do you know who inspired that idea in her?”
“No. Should I?”
“In a way, you already do. I’m afraid we’ve been a little deceptive with you, Dynahla and I, and for that, too, I offer my apologies.”
“What do you mean?” Coilla asked, finding her voice.
Serapheim turned to Dynahla and said, “Shall we show them?”
The shape-changer smiled and nodded. He stood, and immediately began to transform.
The band watched in awe as the process twisted and contorted Dynahla’s body. At the end of it they were looking at a handsome, some would say beautiful, woman. Only her crimson hair was retained, tumbling to her milky white shoulders. It was hard to estimate her age, but she appeared to be in the prime of life for a human.
“Allow me to introduce Vermegram,” Serapheim said. “My mate, my partner, my bride. And Jennesta’s mother. She is as old as me, which is to say very old… I hope you’ll forgive my indiscretion, my dear… and as high an adept in the ways of sorcery as I am.”
“Why?” Stryke said. “Why the deception?”
“To protect her, and your band. If Jennesta knew that you were consorting with her mother, whom she despises, she wouldn’t just have toyed with you, or with Thirzarr. The likelihood is that you’d all be dead by now.”
“I’m sorry,” Vermegram said. “We weren’t trying to trick you. It just seemed the safest way to offer you some protection and guide you through this world.” The band found it hard to get used to the soft, almost melodic voice of someone they had thought of up to now as a male. “As to my inspiring our daughter’s obsession with raising her slave army, I think at least some of you know a little about that from Serapheim. Basically it was because I tried to do something similar myself, a long time ago, when Maras-Dantia was still as fair as this artificial world. Unlike Jennesta my intentions were benign. I wanted to do good. But as the old saying goes, the road to Hades is paved with the tarnished gold of noble intentions. I was damned for that and I’ve been trying to rectify the error ever since.” She glanced affectionately at Serapheim. “We both have.”
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