by William King
As Kormak entered it turned to greet him in a voice as chilly as a steel blade left overnight in snow. “I thought luring these tender little morsels into my palace with mists and mirror-magic might prove bait for stronger nutriment and so it has…”
“You should not be here," Kormak said. “You should be dead. At least the body you wear should be."
“I shall consume your essence and when I am done I shall seek out the thief who robbed me.”
“Thief? What was stolen?”
“That is no business of yours. I will soon recover what is mine.”
“I don’t think so.” The wight cocked its head to one side as if amused. Kormak wondered if it could really see him or whether it was looking at his soul. Some of these creatures could do that.
"You're not afraid,” the wight said. “That will change.”
It moved closer, seeming not so much to walk as to drift on the air. Kormak put his hand on the hilt of his sword.
The wight laughed. It was a horrible sound and there was no mirth in it. "Such a brave mortal. Such a foolish mortal. You will regret your folly when your soul is devoured and your corpse is my slave forever."
Kormak drew his blade. The steel caught the torch's light. The runes on the blade caught fire. The wight stepped back, casting an arm across its eyes, and letting a long hiss escape from its lips.
“I see you know what I carry," Kormak said.
“It will avail you not."
The wight drew a gleaming sword, its blade pale and cold as the face of the moon. Kormak could see that it too was wound round with deadly spells. The runes on the weapon seemed to absorb the eerie blue light and draw strength from it.
The undead thing lunged at him almost too fast for the eye to see. Kormak raised his blade. Sparks flickered where dwarf-forged steel bit liche-blade. Ozone stench assaulted Kormak’s nostrils. The force of the creature’s stroke was astonishing. Kormak’s fingers felt numb from just holding on to his own weapon. The wight’s hateful laughter echoed through the tomb as it rained down blow after blow on the tall swordsman.
He forced himself to concentrate as he had been taught long ago at the Chapter House on Mount Aethelas. His breathing became more regular, his movements more fluid as he parried the wight’s cold deadly assault. He thrust forward with the torch, aiming it in front of the thing’s face, careful not to touch it lest the chill of the creature dowse the flame. The wight shrieked and the movement of its sword became erratic.
As Kormak had suspected, it did not see like a normal man. Perhaps it perceived his body heat and now it was dazzled by the torch’s blaze. He lashed out with his blade aiming for the creature’s sword arm. There was a sizzling sound and a stink of burning flesh as it bit home. The runes on the blade glowed like molten lava as he pulled it forth. The wight’s sword arm fell to the ground, convulsing like a headless snake. As it did so Kormak’s blade took the thing’s head from its shoulders.
The body thrashed, still animated by whatever dark force was in it. Kormak rammed his blade home a third time and left it there. The crackling sound increased as the runic steel shattered the bond between dark spirit and corpse. Black smoke rose from the body as the wight’s essence left the vessel that held it, seeking another. This was the moment Kormak had waited for, when the thing would be most vulnerable and most dangerous. He was the obvious host for its unbound spirit. Misty tentacles enveloped him and disintegrated as they encountered the protective shield of the Elder Signs he wore. The thing started to swirl away, as if somehow it could still find refuge.
Kormak swept his blade through the shadowy fog. The sword’s fires tore it apart, turning black mist to white and sending puffs of the resulting smoke towards the ceiling. An unholy stench filled the air as the wight’s existence ended forever. Kormak’s torch was the only source of light now and he was glad of it.
He strode towards the small bodies on the slabs, fearing that he had come too late. He could see that one child was already dead, or worse. His skin was grey and flaky. His hair was pale and white, his cheeks were sunken and sere as a wind-dried leaf in Autumn. He looked like a newly disinterred mummy, not the nine year old boy he had been. The eyes were wide with horror, the open mouth caught in a scream hinted at the terrible agony the boy had endured.
Kormak touched the small corpse with his blade and it caught fire for a moment before collapsing into a pool of ash. He commended the boy’s soul to the Holy Sun, though he feared the lad was beyond the reach of any sacrament, then he turned his attention to the remaining children.
They were cold and their breathing was all but imperceptible but at least they appeared to be still alive. His blade would free them, one way or another.
CHAPTER TWO
KORMAK TOUCHED EACH of the small forms with the edge of his sword, trusting its power to disrupt the spell that enthralled them. Slowly the children began to move, looking up at him with fear and horror in their eyes.
“It’s all right,” said Kormak. “You are safe now.”
“Where are we?” said a girl, younger looking than the rest. She sat upright, stretched, rubbed her eyes. “I had such terrible dreams.”
“You are awake now,” said Kormak.
“Am I?” she asked. It was clear that she did not entirely believe him. She looked at her surroundings, and a terror crept into her eyes that might be there for the rest of her days. Kormak understood that; he had felt such fear himself sometimes, awakening in the strange dawns of his horror-haunted life.
“You are.”
“Are you a friend of the cold king?” she asked.
“Who?” He kept his voice gentle.
“The cold king. We got lost when the mists came on the hills. He found us and brought us to shelter and we slept. He talked to me in my dreams, saying he would make me a princess forever.”
“He lied to you. He is gone now.”
“Did you kill him?”
“I could not kill him. He was already dead.”
“Then what did you do to him?”
“I sent what was in him back to the Shadow.”
The other children were crying now. It was a good sign in its way. For them, he had been in time. At least he hoped he had. Sometimes the survivors of such rituals were altered and became worse than the things that had taken them, wolves among men. That was not his problem now. His problem was to get these children back to their families, and get them all home before something worse befell them all. And he would have to explain to the parents of one of them that their child would not be returning. The sense of his failure cut deep, one more to be added to a long list.
“Follow me,” he told them and led them out of the deep darkness and into the still and waiting night.
The others were still there, standing in the circle of salt, glaring into the gloom. Someone had got a small fire going. Kormak could smell it as he emerged from the damp cold air of the barrow. The children looked relieved as they saw their parents, and began to race forward. He ordered them to stop and be careful not to disturb the salt lines. As if learning a new game they delicately picked their way over it and found themselves in the arms of their folk. One woman stood apart and looked at him, then the barrow mouth, then back at Kormak. He shook his head. Her head fell and she started to weep silently. The man beside her stood shaking his head and trying to embrace her.
Sir Brandon asked, “Where is little Olaf?” His voice was choked.
Kormak shot him a warning look. The knight ignored it and repeated the question.
“Dead,” said Kormak. He did not want to speak the boy’s real fate aloud. It was bad enough that these people had lost a child without knowing that his soul had gone to feed a monster.
Brandon looked at Kormak. “Was it bad?”
The Guardian shrugged. “For them, yes.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“What would you have me say?”
“Did you meet the tomb wight?”
“Yes.”
<
br /> “Is it dead?”
“It was always dead. It just looked otherwise.”
“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
“I put an end to the thing if that’s what you want to know.”
“Simple as that?”
Kormak nodded and wondered at the gloom that had settled on him. He felt worse now than when he faced the monster. He told himself that he had done his best, that he had got most of the children out, that there was nothing he could have done for Olaf. The boy must have been dead from the moment he had entered the final chamber of the barrow. He looked at the boy’s weeping parents and thought of his disintegrating corpse and it did not help. Failure tasted bitter in his mouth. If only he had gotten here sooner, acted faster…
The others were looking at him now, with wonder, with gratitude and resentment. There were always some who did. His actions made them measure their own courage against his, and feel smaller. He wanted to tell them that it was not a question of courage; it was a question of temperament and training and having the right weapons, and that sometimes it was not courage that made him do what he did, but a different species of fear, the fear that he could not do what once he had done in his youth. These thoughts were pointless. Even if the others understood them, they would still resent him.
“What now?” Brandon asked.
“We go back.”
“Through the darkness and mist?”
“Aye. I have my blade. It will burn anything that comes upon us this night.”
“Lead on then!”
They began the trek home.
“Reminds me of the night march to the Grey Tower,” said Brandon as they led the procession through the hills. He was nervous and talking for the sake of it. All around them were rocks and moss-covered standing stones lit by the eerie moon. Behind them men held flickering torches that barely kept the darkness at bay. “The Orc War was a terrible time.”
“It was,” said Kormak remembering. The orcs had erupted from the endless steppelands of the east and surged across the Sunlander kingdoms, leaving a trail of carnage and destruction. It had taken three years of bitter fighting to throw them back. It seemed that the man-flesh eaters had not learned their lesson. Rumour had it that some new khan had arisen and they massed beyond the borders of Belaria once more. It seemed they wanted new stock for their human herds.
“I could take it more then,” said Brandon. “My bones were not so old. The lack of sleep did not slow me, and I burned with the lust for glory. Now I burn with the lust for bed, and not just because my Gena is there.” Brandon patted his paunch. It had grown, just as his jowls had. His face and limbs were thicker, and although he still looked strong, he did not have the lithe power of his youth. “The years have been kinder to you, Kormak. You don’t look a day older than you did then, except maybe for the grey in your hair.”
Kormak smiled. “I carry their mark in a different place, that’s all.”
"Let me keep my illusions," said Brandon. "I’d like to think the passing of the years was kind to someone."
Kormak kept a wary eye on the surroundings, half expecting something to emerge from the darkness.
"Things have been getting worse, since that hairy star appeared in the sky, since the bloody civil war started,” said Sir Brandon. “First the old king himself goes and has a stroke and now his heirs fight over who will succeed before he is even buried. There are monsters everywhere. Maniacs are unleashing the things in the tombs. The orcs stir on the borders again. It looks like the Holy Sun has decided to test the Kingdom of Taurea once again."
"The way you are talking, it sounds like he's decided to test the world," said Kormak.
"You'd be in a better position to know than I am," said Sir Brandon. "I am just a poor back-country knight-- although even I can see that things are worse than they were when we were young."
"Worse than when the orcs were overrunning our lands?"
"I am starting to think so."
"I pray you're wrong."
Both men fell silent. They both knew he was not wrong.
"I hear the Oracle at Shattermoon is predicting the end of the world," said Brandon after the silence had grown too long. "I hear she says that the Shadow will soon return to claim all the lands of men."
Kormak suppressed a shudder. "Someone is always predicting that. For as long as I've lived, someone's been predicting that."
"Aye," said Brandon. "But this has been the first time I've ever thought they might be right. There was a baby born not three months ago over at High Farm. She had no eyes. Not even a trace of them. Just skin where the eyes should have been."
"What happened to the poor mite?"
"The parents wanted to follow the old way, to expose her on High Hill. They thought she was touched by the Shadow. I took the child from them and sent her to the Temple orphanage at Skara. The priestesses took the babe in."
"Such things have always happened," said Kormak. "Particularly in areas where the Old Magic is strong. And you are near to the Cursed Lands here. The bones of Kharon lie just north.”
"Aye- that's true. But that's the sixth malformed child born within a year. I've never known things this bad, not even when the orcs ravaged the land."
"That many? I did not know it was so."
"You’ve most likely been too busy fighting monsters and hunting wizards to pay attention. I have to. I am the lord of these people."
Kormak felt ashamed. It was a sort of thing he was supposed to notice because he had been trained to notice. He should have spotted such omens. But Brandon was right about one thing- he had been busy. He had been doing the work of three Guardians.
"You've gone very quiet, Kormak," said Sir Brandon.
"I was just thinking."
"I thought there was a nasty smell of burning wood."
Kormak laughed. It seemed like an eternity since he'd last done so and he was glad of it. The people that followed them were not. They looked at Kormak as if he were mad. They were too nervous for humour and they saw precious little to laugh at in this bleak land.
“I'm glad you've not lost your sense of humour, Brandon," said Kormak.
"A few more nights like this and I might well do," said the knight. Suddenly they emerged from the mist. Kormak could see lights of the village glow beneath them and a river glittering in the moonlight. Above the waters, on a high promontory, stood the small strong keep that was Sir Brandon’s home. They had made better time than Kormak had hoped. The people behind him gave glad cries and offered up prayers for their deliverance. Several of them began to run downhill towards the village and the folk who kept vigil there.
“We made it,” Sir Brandon said. It was only then that Kormak realised how truly afraid his old friend had been.
Kormak surveyed the small chamber gratefully. A fire blazed in the grate. A platter of bread and cheese and a mug of ale lay on a small table beside the bed. A gold-painted solar circle and two wooden blocks carved with protective Elder Signs hung over the doors. A curtain of fur blocked the draught from the tiny window. Sir Brandon was not wealthy enough to afford glass.
Kormak stretched out on the bed, making sure that his sword was within easy reach. There had been times when such caution had saved his life, and even here in the house of a friend he was not going to relax it. You never knew when the past might catch up with you. Kormak had seen many strange deaths in his time.
He pulled off his boots and leggings. The stone flags felt cool under his feet. He made his way to the window and pulled back the fur. He was not sure why he did so, but instinct was at work, and he had learned long ago to trust it.
From the Tower he had a view away from the river looking towards the Barrow Hills. Green lights flickered. Witch lights that moved like the souls of the damned across the misty hills. Another evil omen, he thought. A sign that dark times were ahead. In the sky, the green comet glowed, still distant but noticeable, the eye of an evil god looking down upon the sleeping world.
&n
bsp; Soon he was going to have to go back out and investigate. Perhaps there was some connection between those lights and the open barrow and the man he was here to hunt. As if they sensed his eyes upon them and wanted to hide from mortal notice, the lights vanished one by one. Kormak waited for a long time but the glow did not return. He closed the curtain and threw himself on the bed, covering himself in piled furs. Images of the dead child and the open barrow haunted his mind.
Sleep was a long time coming.
CHAPTER THREE
THE GREAT HALL was not much of a great hall. It was a large open room that took up a good deal of the lower floor of Brandon’s keep. A large fire blazed in the far corner and a couple of small boys rolled on the straw-covered floor wrestling with each other and the dogs. A larger boy sat in a wooden chair by the fire yawning ostentatiously as he saw the stranger. Opposite him sat a pretty blonde haired girl reading a scroll. She looked much as her mother had at about that age. At a large table Brandon and his wife sat. Kormak was aware that all of them were watching him.
Brandon gestured to the table. There was bread and cheese and ham and a jug of buttermilk there. Kormak walked over. The youngest of the boys had got up and watched him wide eyed, chewing on a thumb. Kormak winked at him and the boy ran to clutch at his mother’s skirts caught between delight and fear.
The Lady Gena was still beautiful although she was plumper than the bright young beauty Kormak remembered from King Brand’s court all those years ago. There had been those who had thought she had made a mistake marrying a bumptious knight from the far north of Taurea. Her father was a rich merchant from the great city-state of Vermstadt, she was a beauty and there had been many of higher birth and reduced fortune at the king’s court who would have married her for her father’s money. She had married Brandon for love.
