by Andy Remic
“I was thinking more about the danger to the bandits,” said Trista, offering a cold smile, colder than the grave.
“Bandits are not the problem,” said Kiki slowly. “There are three roads through, but none are troubled by outlaws or brigands. Nothing lives down there. Nothing at all.”
They sat, staring, for a long time.
“It’s totally silent,” said Trista, eventually.
“Yes.”
“Why do no birds sing? Why no sighing of trees?”
“The birds and the wind choose to ignore this place. I don’t know why.”
“I don’t bloody like it,” muttered Narnok, moving his horse forward. The beast seemed a little skittish and stomped its hooves. “It’s a bad place. A place of ghosts.”
“You’ve been here before?” asked Trista.
Narnok nodded, milky eye seemingly fixed on the dreamy, silent world below. “We made it halfway through before two of our party… well, one man cut his own wrists, and a woman called Annabel – she disappeared. It took us three hours to find her. She’d hanged herself from a twisted old oak.” Narnok drifted into silence.
“So, it is a haunted place, then?” said Zastarte. “I have heard rumours, of course, but one casts such things aside as waffle and dribble from those who’ve partaken of too much port and brandy.” His smile was weak.
“Maybe. But still we must go through.” Kiki bared her teeth in a skull grin. “We’ll lose days if we have to head back north to circle the forest and the Rokroth Marshes. We have very little choice if we want to arrive at Desekra before the bastard mud-orcs invade.”
“You still harbouring that dream, sweetie?” said Trista.
“As long as you consider the dream a nightmare, then yes.”
“I’ve heard of this place,” said Dek suddenly. “The Sea of Trees. It’s spoken that when you sleep, the tree roots come to life and strangle you before retreating, leaving your death a mystery. And hundreds come here every year to take their own lives.”
“Why would they do that?” asked Trista, dreamily. One hand had lifted, fingers entwining with her golden curls. Her eyes glittered like misty diamonds. “They must have been very unhappy with their lives to even contemplate such an act.”
Dek shrugged. “I don’t know. But why kill yourself, when there’re plenty of other bastards willing to put a knife in your belly?”
“Still. It has a certain… romanticism to it, don’t you think?”
“What?” snorted Dek. “Being found six months later, your body rotted away to bones and skin and dust, old shit still in your pants, your eyes eaten by the fucking birds? No. I’ll die on a battlefield, thank you.”
Suddenly, Dalgoran toppled from his saddle and hit the ground hard. The Iron Wolves kicked from their mounts and crouched around him. Narnok tossed aside his axe and stooping, lifted the general in his arms. “He’s frozen. Let’s find a hollow in the lee of this hill, build a fire, get some hot food into him.”
They moved swiftly, working together. Dek galloped off to the edges of the forest with a spare mount, collecting wood which he piled onto the saddle before tying it tight with rope. Arriving back, he found the others had dug in two poles and made a lean-to with the tarpaulin. Dalgoran was lying on blankets and coughing harshly as Dek arrived, stripping the wood from the spare mount and tossing it to Narnok, who was building a fire in a ring of stones.
Kiki knelt beside Dalgoran, who was trembling, before he went into another coughing fit. When Kiki glanced around, her face was sombre.
“What is it?”
Kiki showed Dek a white cloth which was soiled with blood. She tipped water from her canteen onto the cloth, dabbing it at Dalgoran’s mouth. His face was pale and drawn, and when his eyes opened they seemed very, very old.
“You understand, don’t you?” he said, softly.
“Of course I do,” murmured Kiki. “Lie back, get some rest.”
“There is only one way to avoid criticism, Kiki; do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing. I cannot stand back and let evil flood the world in the guise of the mud-orcs; in the name of Orlana. I cannot be that man.” He gripped her arm. “You do understand?”
“Yes. Shh. Lie back now. Get some rest.”
Away from the old general, the Iron Wolves gathered in a small circle. Narnok looked off down the hill, towards Sayansora alv Drakka. Everything was still and completely silent. The forest seemed to give off an ancient, brooding atmosphere.
“Tomorrow,” said Kiki, placing her hand on Narnok’s arm.
“If he lives,” said Narnok.
“If he lives,” agreed Kiki.
General Dalgoran was made of harder stuff than that. With the dawn he opened his eyes and gazed at Kiki sat beside him, propped up, her own eyes closed. Immediately her eyes flared open and Dalgoran smiled at her.
“I thought I’d died and awoke to see an angel,” he said.
She blushed. “You mock me.”
“Not at all. I have never seen you more radiant. More beautiful.”
“I… watched over you. I was frightened for you. You seemed so strong. I didn’t see that one coming.”
“You saw the blood?” said Dalgoran.
Kiki nodded. “We share a common enemy. The one that hides inside our bones and chooses our time for us.”
“I think he will kill me first,” smiled Dalgoran, and reached out, taking Kiki’s hand. “I will not live to see Desekra. You know this, and I know this. So let us no longer beat around the bush, Kiki. And anyway, in my dreams, I was visited by… an old friend.”
He smiled, picturing General Jagged. The smile faded when he recalled Jagged’s words in his dream; for their worst fears had been confirmed. King Yoon was not just insane, but in some way in league with Orlana, the Changer. Jagged was sure of it. He was totally unconcerned about an army of mud-orcs marching to his front door. To what bigger end, what deviated game such a collaboration would play out, they did not know. But Jagged had been murdered by Yoon – Dalgoran had seen the event clearly, as if it had been in bright sunlight and he stood but a few feet away. King Yoon’s arm lifting with the shortsword, then slamming the blade down to cut a huge wound in Jagged’s throat. The second blow severed Jagged’s head, and Dalgoran shuddered at the powerful vision that had so troubled him in the night…
Jagged’s final words echoed in Dalgoran’s mind, spoken like oil-smoke from a mouth no longer connected to the body of his oldest, dearest friend…
“Seek out Orlana, and use the Wolves, Dalgoran… use their magick… then turn it on Yoon. He is a cancer at the heart of this country and he needs to be excised. Use the Wolves, Dalgoran… then lift their curse. They have earned that much.”
“General?”
Dalgoran blinked and rubbed his stubbled chin. “What I wouldn’t give for a hot bath, a shave and a fine beef dinner.”
“You mentioned an old friend?”
“I was visited by Lord Jagged. In my dreams. He was murdered by King Yoon and the king plans no good for Vagandrak; he will stand by with thirty thousand men and watch Desekra Fortress sundered. We need to get to Desekra.”
“Yes, I know this,” said Kiki gently.
“If you… use the Wolves, use their power to kill Orlana, to send back the mud-orcs, then we have agreed. We can lift the curse.”
Kiki stared at him.
Eventually, she said, “You can do this?” Her mouth was bitter like ash.
“Yes. Jagged was the last one through which the magick of Morkagoth was bound. With him dead, now I am able to release you.”
“And what if you die?” said Kiki.
“Then I will give you instructions on how to achieve it. But first, promise me you will fight Orlana. She is not of this world; she is from the Furnace, and at the very least she must be sent back.”
“Tell me how to lift the curse?” said Kiki, iron eyes glinting.
“Promise.”
“I promise.”
“Deep below Desekra F
ortress, beneath Zula, the keep, far far below there is a chamber. A hidden chamber. Inside it there is a chest. Everything you need to lift the curse is inside that chest.” With shaking hands, Dalgoran lifted a key attached to a chain around his throat. “Help me unlock the clasp.” Kiki did so. “This key unlocks both the chamber and the chest. You will understand, when you see it.”
Kiki stared down at the ancient bronze key in her hand. It was still warm from contact with Dalgoran’s fevered flesh.
He slumped back, seemingly exhausted. “I’m sorry, Kiki. Sorry it took so long. You were all heroes and yet you were punished by that very thing which saved you; you saved Vagandrak! You did not deserve to be chained for decades. But now you can all be free. It will be so, I swear.”
Dalgoran coughed again, and this time there was bright blood.
“One more thing,” he said.
Kiki looked down with tears in her eyes. “I never realised you were so weak,” she said. “You fought the mud-orcs!”
He waved his hand. “Ha. When you have as much experience as I, you learn to conserve your strength. And it was only these last days I have felt my strength ebbing away. I am seventy years old, Kiki.” He smiled weakly. “I think, at last, I have truly had enough. But I would ask you one last favour.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t tell the others. About the key. About lifting the curse. If I am gone, I… do not trust them all. I fear one would take the key and seek to cure only themselves. You must rely on yourself, Kiki.”
“And you trust me?”
Dalgoran chuckled. “You’re my captain, Kiki. Always were, always will be. I’d trust you with… my life.”
Kiki took Dalgoran’s hand, wrist to wrist, in the warrior’s grip. “We’ll see this thing through together, you and I. You might be the general, but you don’t have permission to step down just yet, old man. Vagandrak needs you. The Iron Wolves need you. And I need you. You are strong. I know you can see this thing through to the end. We will kill Orlana together and send Yoon packing with his tail between his legs. Are you with me, General?” There were tears on her cheeks. Dalgoran nodded. “Then get your shit together, soldier, and let’s move out.”
Tiny wisps of snow fell as they reached the edge of Sayansora alv Drakka. Kiki led the way, followed by General Dalgoran, Narnok, Trista, Zastarte and Dek bringing up the rear as requested. After the loss of his brother he wanted – needed – a little solitude. Well, thought Kiki as her horse padded the dead pine needles blanketing the wide trail into the Drakka, this is certainly the place for that.
Within a hundred metres the entire world descended into a softness, a silence, a terrible calm. The trees were quite densely packed, very old, towering above the group for hundreds of metres in places. Light filtered through from high above, but it had a surreal, unearthly glow, like something from an eldritch dream.
The Iron Wolves rode in silence, like intruders in an alien place. Through each ran different emotions.
Kiki slowly felt herself descending into a morose mood. Suza entered her mind, dark and brooding but saying nothing, like some evil ferret crouched on her chest as she slept, stealing her breath, sucking out her life and humanity and waiting for the opportunity to chew out her windpipe. The silence surrounded Kiki, invaded her like a mist, and she tumbled yet further into herself. She thought about the tumour close to her heart, feeding from her, a parasite the surgeons could not remove. She missed the tender, giving, nurturing love of the honey-leaf, its delicate and slightly bitter taste under her tongue, its pungent aroma in the drug pipe; after all, was it not the honey-leaf which had taken away her pain all those years as the tumour grew? Was it not the honey-leaf which masked her constant bitterness at the curse under which the Iron Wolves had been placed, in the name of honour and duty and doing the right fucking thing for their country? And Dalgoran had taken it away from her. On the one hand she cursed him for that, because he simply wanted her to fulfil his own ends. But then, he was her father; her adoptive father; the man who had showed her so much love and comfort after her own parents had… no. Don’t go there. But you must go there, for now Dalgoran is dying, it could be weeks, or days, or even hours… your father is dying, Kiki, your father is dying…
Narnok pictured his face in the mirror and bitterness ran down his throat like acid. It burned him and scorched him inside out, because look what they did to him, just look what they’d fucking done: putting out his eye, he still remembered the fire, the sound of it popping, that bastard Xander leaning over him, stinking of sweat and lavender perfume in the hope it would mask his putrid stench, the grinning, leering face and the shiny bright tools of his trade… and all because of Dek, all because of Katuna the bitch, may she rot in the Furnace… but why hate, why hate at all? Hate accomplishes nothing in the end. Except maybe hate for oneself. Look at your face, your twisted carved up scarred face used as a totem to scare little children. Evil Narnok. Bad Narnok. Look at his face, he must possess true evil in his heart to end up with a face so cruel, a face so evil!
Trista, bright and beautiful Trista, but she’d never been bright and beautiful enough. Not for him. Not for that bastard. Oh he’d brought her flowers and chocolates and she’d been wooed by his pretty words, his silver tongue, when really it was the tongue of a serpent and she’d courted him, let him into her bed and life and love and heart, and they had married and it would have been perfect, for she was with child. How could it have gotten more perfect than that? But then the pains came, and the baby died inside, and how could she be a normal person after something like that? It made you want to… kill yourself. But not him. Oh no. He looked at her now with hate and disgust, as if she’d done something wrong, as if the death of their child was something she’d actually wanted! His days out, at work in the city, grew longer and longer and she knew he was seeing other women but did not care, for a while. But then, slowly, her energy came back and she followed him. He had three other women, one in every quarter of the city, and he would circulate through them, cycle through them as if they were fucking different sweetmeats to be sampled at his patronising leisure. He’d take them flowers and chocolates, just like he’d brought for her; and no doubt as he slipped his maggot into their sweet honey quims he’d whisper silver words into their ears as they groaned and slimed under his slick oily caress. The bastard. Well, she’d shown him all right, skewering him with a long blade as he fucked one of his mistresses, then crouching down in front of him and meeting his eyes and grinning as she watched him die, watched the life-light bleed from him like fluid from a punctured liver. And then – the others. The other women! Oh how they’d all died. Horribly died, begging and bleeding in front of her, offering her anything they could think of as she skinned them and cut off bits and put out their eyes. Oh they hadn’t understood, but fuck them, why should they? Finally, she’d preyed on the newly married. She couldn’t have the love of her life; so why should anybody else? They would only cheat on one another and watch their bright brilliant love turn to horse shit. So, she immortalised them after their greatest night of joy, because it never gets that good again, does it, and – horror, now she was here and yes, she’d said she would never do it again but – but – she felt herself drowning, in self-disgust, not for committing the murders but for going back on her promise to herself, for telling Kiki she would never do it again and her eyes glinted dark and evil under the surreal glow of that forest canopy, and she despised herself for being weak, hated herself so much she wanted to fucking puke...
Zastarte rode through the forest light. He lifted his head and allowed rays to fall upon his perfect skin. It felt warm after the cold wind of the savage hillsides, felt bright and orange and he felt… at one with the world. Faultless. Synchronised. Like a perfectly timed clock, tick tock tick tock ticking. He closed his eyes and orange bathed his eyelids, and the orange was warm, and glowing, and flickering, and it was the flames, the flames leaping up around him or more precisely, licking at the clothes and flesh of the men a
nd women chained in his cellar. I love to see you burn. I love to look into your eyes reflecting the demon of beautiful understanding firelight; to see the demons dance, see them burn, smell the flesh as it cooks, hear the screams as it roasts, all like pig-meat, perfect perfect roasted pig-meat. Why do you cook them? Why do you burn them? Do they deserve the fire? Do they deserve to burn? Do they deserve to roast like a beef joint in the roasting oven, fat sizzling and running yellow and hot? Well of course they do. Who doesn’t deserve to burn? Who hasn’t had an impure thought or word or deed? The whole population of Vagandrak is corrupt, my dear. People step on people step on people. Nobody looks out for others any more. Nobody looks after their neighbours. Family are just selfish fucks interested in money and power and position and their own petty advancements; families used to be about close-knit communities, but not any longer; now a family is nothing but a family in name. There’s no honour there, not like there used to be. I look at Dek and listen to him whining about his mother, and his brother, and it makes me laugh and writhe inside like I’m filled with rancid maggots; because he does not understand, nobody fucking understands, not like me, not like Prince Zastarte. And so, to make you people understand I take you, I move you from your comfort zones and I cut you, yes, and I hurt you, yes, and I introduce the concept of pain, yes, and I bring to you – after many hours and days and perhaps weeks of constant physical abuse – I bring to you a clarity, an understanding, a fucking purity of soul which has been driven out by the social conditions in which you live like pigs snuffling at a rancid trough. And yes, I may burn you; I may burn you until you die. But that’s all about the purity. That’s all about purification. Because there can be no greater crime than being impure. And you, Zastarte. Are you pure? Or do the toxins run through your veins and mind and soul? Are you part of the impure breed you so seek to burn? And he laughs. He laughs, because there is nothing else he can do. Because there is nothing he can possibly say. Because he is all part of the same corrupt and broken social system; all part of the same fucked up world with its twisted politics and deviant structure. Do you deserve to burn like all the rest, Zastarte? Of course I do. Of course I deserve to burn. And if there is ever any choice in the matter, if I ever get to choose my own passing, then that’s the way it’s going to be. I’m going to burn in the hot flames. Smoulder on the coals. Cook like soft braised beef. Because in fire, there is light, and heat, and cleansing. A cleansing of body and spirit and mind and soul. It’s purification, my sweet fucking bastard. Purification of the highest possible order.
