Lady of Poison p-1

by Bruce R Cordell

  Fallon, breathing shallowly, smiled then said, “I know.”

  He breathed his last, a smile frozen on his unmoving lips.

  Marrec gently closed the elfs staring eyes. “May Lurue grant you redemption.”

  Damanda and Bonehammer fell from a height of over ten feet. Damanda corrected, landing on her feet with perfect grace, though Bonehammer stumbled and fell heavily onto a pile of crumbled brick.

  She had panicked. She had used her emergency escape scroll, as unreliable as it was, when things turned sour. Luck was with them. Despite the scroll having been scribed by Lex years earlier, and Damanda’s only passing facility with the arts of wizardry, both she and Bonehammer made the uncertain transit and in’ full possession of their limbs.

  Shafts of afternoon light bored into the chamber from two high punctures in the ceiling. Luckily, neither of them had appeared beneath those rough apertures. Damanda had picked the bastion of retreat the very moment Lex had penned the scroll, of course. A fortified but empty building in the middle of the Dun Tharos ruins still above ground, it had seemed unlikely to fall into disrepair after having stood for so many centuries. It was near the Close but not in it, in case it was from the Rotting Man she had to use her escape. Despite the odds, in the intervening time the structure had moldered and fallen into further disrepair. That would teach her for choosing an above-ground retreat. Of course, she couldn’t repeat her mistake even if she wished. Lex had been destroyed by that prince of betrayal, Fallon.

  Damanda roundly cursed the elf, envying the Rotting Man his way with words and ancient languages but making do with her own obscene vernacular. At least Lex had slashed the little bastard as she fell. Damanda knew lethal blows. She doubted she’d see Fallon again.

  “What now, Damanda?” inquired Bonehammer, already back on his feet. With the light of day so close, the wounds given by that odd dark man with the strange war club were not mending as quickly as they should.

  Damanda considered her minion’s question. She said, “The Talontyr once told me that the cleric and his band would bring the Child to him of their own accord. If that is true, we merely need to arrange an ambush of such magnitude that nothing can survive it; well, we want the girl to survive, of course.”

  “Perhaps we should refrain from setting an ambush, if they’re going to come to the Rotting Man anyway.”

  “I’d rather the Talontyr receive the girl from the hands of his trusted lieutenant.”

  Bonehammer nodded; he was nothing if not a yes man to Damanda’s will.

  While the sun remained above, they were trapped there in her emergency redoubt. On the one hand the building stood within sight of the Close itself. Once darkness fell, she’d raise an army. In a few hours, she’d gather hundreds of blighted volodnis, twigblights, and other rot spawned creatures. She knew all the passages, all the ways that the Close could be accessed, both above and below ground. If the cleric pressed ahead with his fool’s errand, they’d be caught and flayed, there was no doubt in her mind.

  First, a bit of rest. Activity during the day, even spared direct light, was taxing. Yes, a bit of a lie-down was called for, she decided. Soon, in just a few hours, the sun would dip below the horizon. Then her full powers would return. Her quarry was as good as in her grasp.

  CHAPTER 28

  Ash bent, touching the limp form of Fallon on the forehead. Where she touched, a glow lingered before suffusing the body. It seemed then to Marrec that Fallon’s motionless form sighed.

  Ash said, “Redemption he has.”

  Marrec turned quickly to the crouching girl. “Ash. Can you hear me?”

  The girl rose, the look of compassion fading from her face, animation fleeing her body. In a moment, she looked as she always didunresponsive and uncaring.

  Marrec was grateful for the small miracle that moved Fallon to save Elowen from the vampire’s bite. He murmured thanks to Lurue. He just wished the betraying hunter had decided to return to the light before he’d kidnapped the girl. Had it been so, perhaps all might now be different.

  “Now what?” wondered Elowen.

  “We continue to head toward the center of Dun Tharos and confront the Rotting Man. With Ash in our keeping, we may have some protection,” replied Marrec.

  “Going overland will take daysyet I do not wish to return to Under-Tharos.”

  “True,” said Marrec. He turned to the Oslander, “What do you think, Gunny?”

  “Either route has its difficulties. Above ground we’ll likely run afoul of the Rotting Man’s forcessuch was the original reason we decided to approach from belowbut the subsurface route seems far more indirect and dangerous than we hoped. The path is not clear.”

  “It is not,” agreed Marrec, sighing.

  Gunggari continued, “If the blightlord had retreated physically rather than magically, I might have tracked her back to the center.” The Oslander shrugged.

  Ususi held up one hand. “Hold on… that gives me an idea.”

  The imaskari grasped the Keystone that she still wore around her neck. She brought it to her eye, then began scanning the chamber as if gazing through a looking glass.

  Marrec furrowed his brows. “Surely the Mucklestones do not reach so far?”

  Ususi said, “They do not, but listen. The Keystone is a tool designed for use with the Mucklestones, true, yet it is also sensitive to all magic associated with portals and transport. Perhaps the magic used by Damanda to escape left a seam in space, as such spells often do, though they always fade quickly. I might be able to locate the seam using the Keystone… and there it is!” the wizard crowed.

  “What good is that to us?” wondered Marrec.

  ‹S› ‹S›-

  When they appeared, Marrec and the others did not fall ten feet like Damanda and Bonehammer. Despite utilizing a raw, poorly executed, and fading seam in reality, Ususi had the Keystone. With its power, she grasped the unraveling threads of Damanda’s escape, wove a new portal, and transported the group into an echoing warehouse with nary a bump.

  Marrec blinkedslanting shafts of daylight betokened approaching twilight, but it was still brighter than where they had just stood. The cleric slowly turned, scanning the area for Damanda and her hulking henchman. As he looked, he kept one of Ash’s hands firmly in his left hand. In his right hand was Justlance.

  Loose brick rubble covered the floor, piled in untidy heaps in some places. Dust covered all. Gaps in one wall revealed a ruined cityscape, tumble-down and covered in forest growth. Ususi had thought that the endpoint of Damanda’s escape lay near the center of Rawlinswood. The mage was correct. They must be somewhere within Dun Tharos, in one of thousands individual ruins that made up what remained of the ancient Nar city.

  Where was Damanda?

  If she was in truth cursed with vampirism, she wouldn’t enjoy standing there, indirectly illuminated by fading daylight. Perhaps farther back, where the ceiling allowed through less light?

  Marrec pointed to the rear of the building, lost in shadow, where a slender stone door stood closed. Gunggari caught his gesture and nodded. Marrec released Ash’s hand. He looked down at the girl and said, “Stay here.” Ash studied the middle distance. With his free hand he unstrapped his shield from his back.

  The cleric and the Oslander approached the door. Elowen was not far behind, her blade still shimmering with its exposure to the sun it loved. Ususi hung back.

  Without losing time to doubt, Marrec heaved open the stone door. It fell backward, unsecured to the lintel, generating a terrific rolling boom as it struck the ground. Beyond was a tiny chamber without exits, no more than fifteen feet on a side. The light from Justlance’s tip revealed two forms lying upon the ground, side by side, arms crossed across chests, eyes closed.

  One reclining figure was Damanda, the other Bonehammer.

  Before he could get his sinews to respond or cough out a warning, the eyes of both the sleepers shuttered open.

  Damanda jerked upright like the arm of a catapult, without
the intervening need to lever herself up as a living creature might. Her arms shot forward as her form moved to vertical, catching Marrec in the chest. That supernatural shove bowled him back through the narrow entry and out into the brick-strewn warehouse. A brick cut him above the eye and another across his forearm.

  Marrec gained his feet, cursing his slowness. He heard Gunggari yell, then a clash of arms. Elowen called out the Nentyarch’s name, as she so often did when fighting. Ususi stood to the side of the doorway, not committing to entering, but chanting and waving in the midst of casting a spell.

  The cleric charged back into the room. Bonehammer, lurking by the door, caught him on the side with his great weaponMarrec barely caught the blow on his shield, though his arm nearly went numb with the effort. He was forced to step back a pace. Had the vampires fought that hard a few hours ago, Marrec doubted he and his friends would have survived. Something was different. As his shield glinted in a stray beam of sunlight, Marrec realized what it could bethe vampires were trappedthe only place to run was either outside the building into direct sunlight or there into the main warehouse where a stray beam like the one that’d just fallen across his shield would have more serious consequences on vampiric flesh.

  He yelled, “Gunny, herd them out this wayinto the sunlight.”

  Ususi unleashed a spray of magical bolts that traced wildly arcing trajectories through the air. Many of the bolts found their mark in Damanda’s flesh. The vampire was undeterred in her fight with Gunggari and Elowen, but she spared a smoldering glance for the wizard in the doorway. Ususi screamed, threw her hands before her eyes, and fell back.

  Marrec hoped that glance wouldn’t prove to be trouble later. He knew about the domineering gaze of vampires.

  Elowen growled, “I’ll keep this one pinnedhelp Marrec with that other, one.” Gunggari danced back, his warclub landing a parting shot to Damanda’s head, which was absorbed with a grunt of pain.

  Dymondheart seemed to grab Damanda’s attention more than the dizheri. She didn’t merely absorb Elowen’s swift swingsshe deflected, ducked, and spun to avoid taking a cut.

  Gunggari was upon Bonehammer, smashing with an unrestrained fury that momentarily startled the vampire. Marrec saw his chance, ducked under his foe’s guard, and came up on the other side.

  “Now!” yelled Marrec, hoping to coordinate his activity with Gunggari’s.

  He and the Oslander dashed themselves directly into Bonehammer. Marrec threw his arms about his foe, who promptly turned his head and sank his fangs directly into Marrec’s neck.

  A fire blossomed there, and a weakness. The weakness felt something like his loss of contact with Lurue, but more immediate and far, far more lethal.

  Though his strength seemed to be flowing from him, with Gunggari’s help he forced the vampire back, step by step, into the larger, ruined chamber.

  The angle of the sunlight was becoming extreme. A few minutes more, maybe less, and the sun would be down, but such questions no longer mattered for Bonehammer.

  Marrec and Gunggari forced the struggling, biting vampire directly into a reddening shaft of pure sunlight.

  “Damanda!” screamed Bonehammer, as he released his bite on Marrec’s neck. -

  He began to thrash, so violently and fast that neither man could maintain his hold, but it was no longer necessary to hold him. Bonehammer was speared in place by the shaft of sunlight.

  Their foe’s whipping limbs moved so quickly that Marrec could barely discern them. Smoke coiled off the vampire’s skin, and a reddish radiance peeked from Bonehammer’s open mouth, his nostrils, from behind his eyes, and even from his fingernails. The next instant all burned through. The fire that had been ignited inside reached the surface. A flash of all-consuming heat and red light left nothing behind but ash and disintegrating fragments of skull and spine. Even that smoked away a second later.

  Marrec sagged. He worried that the vampire’s bite would reveal itself as a debilitating, life-draining wound, but he didn’t fall. There was still Damanda.

  “Let’s bring the other one out,” he whispered to Gunggari, though the Oslander was already half way back to the fight where Elowen kept the blightlord at bay.

  Marrec spared a glance for Ash. The girl remained standing where they had appeared, looking completely out of place in the darkening ruin. The last shafts of light penetrating the building dimmed still further and were finally extinguished. The sun had set.

  Marrec stumbled back to the door, bypassing Ususi along the way. She stood shaking her head back and forth, as if trying to throw off a hallucination. Trouble. He could tell. Damanda…

  Back in the sealed antechamber, Elowen had the blightlord backed into a corner. The vampire feared that blade; its sap was suffused with pure sunlight, and Marrec perceived it was also made of wood. He couldn’t imagine a better weapon to use against a vampire.

  “Cleave her, Elowenshe can’t heal Dymondheart’s blows. You can slay her outright.”

  Between gritted teeth, parrying Damanda’s blows, Elowen said, “What do you think I’m trying to do?”

  Gunggari was already in the mix, applying his dizheri with abandon. Marrec heaved himself forward, still feeling weakness flooding every limb. He brought up

  Justlance. Perhaps he could pin the elusive blightlord in place…

  Damanda screamed as she received a cut from Dymondheart across the stomach. The flesh crackled and smoked as if the light of the sun itself had touched her.

  “We’ve got her,” said Gunggari.

  Damanda shrieked and spun, put her head down, and ran directly into the wall behind her. The ancient masonry, already unstable, gave way before the vampire’s supernatural strength. Hardly checking her speed, Damanda burst through a hole of her own making, bricks, mortar, and larger stone blocks falling around her. Damanda had made her own exit.

  Through the breach in the wall, all could see the ruined street of Dun Tharos. Elowen and Gunggari raced each other to see who would be first after the vampire; Elowen won. Marrec brought up the rear, noticeably slower than his two friends.

  The forest-infested ruin of Dun Tharos was silent in the gathering night. There was no sign of the blightlord.

  Marrec screamed in frustration. Then, thinking Damanda might be playing them for idiots, he rushed back into the smaller antechamber, then on into the warehouse. Ash remained, as did Ususi, who had apparently recovered from her shock.

  She asked Marrec, “What happened?”

  The cleric continued forward until he stood again at Ash’s side. Then he said, “The blightlord escaped, again, but we destroyed her last servant.” He pointed with his spear where the final fragments of Bonehammer lay.

  “Are you ok? I saw her try to lock gazes with you.”

  “I’m fine,” answered the wizard. “Just took me a few moments to clear my head.”

  Elowen and Gunggari returned.

  Elowen said, “We are near to the center of Dun Tharos. I can nearly see the great trees that surround the Nentyarch’s old seat. Great trees, filled with life and energy, each one so tall and grand that you wondered how such a thing could exist…” The elf seemed overcome for a moment with memory.

  Gunggari said, “If we are so hear, we should press forward, before the escaping blightlord can warn her master, and he can mount an answering defense.”

  “The time has come, eh?” Marrec questioned his friend, strangely reluctant now that it had come to it.

  His weakness persisted. His thoughts were muddied, and even Justlance seemed heavy in his hand. He didn’t want to come up against what would likely be his greatest test in such a condition, but there was no choice. He would endeavor to ignore his state. It was the final push.

  The cleric took Ash’s hand again, intending to ask her if she was ready, though he knew she wouldn’t respond.

  Ash surprised him by squeezing back, as if truly feeling the pressure of his grip. She looked at him, truly met his eye for just one amazing moment. In those eyes, Mar
rec found rest and the promise of renewed strength. He gasped, but already Ash’s grip had slackened to its usual flaccid strength.

  Once more, Ash had shown forth her secret, inner power. The strength promised in her eyes grew and blossomed in the cleric’s flesh. Marrec felt hale and whole of body and mind. Moreover, for a fleeting moment, it felt as if his nascent connection with Lurue herself might return. The momentary bonding weakened immediately then winked out, but it left a lingering feeling of hope, and his renewed vigor didn’t hurt.

  “Yes, the time has come to face the Rotting Man, even here in his place of power,” Marrec told Gunggari, but loudly enough to address everyone. “With Ash at our side, I believe we have a chance.”

  “One moment, though,” cautioned Gunggari. He looked over to Ususi. “What of her? She met the vampire’s gaze. She could be under the blightlord’s influence.”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” barked Ususi.

  “It’s not idiotic to enumerate our weaknesses prior to battle.”

  Ususi responded, “No simple glance by a blightlord can suborn my mind; I am stronger willed than that. She merely caught me off guardhad I been any less strong, yes, she might have had me. What you perceived as weakness was in fact my fighting off her insidious instructions. I’m happy to note that I was successful.”

  Gunggari studied the mage, no expression crossing his face. Marrec knew the Oslander well enough to interpret the look. Gunggari didn’t trust Ususi’s words.

  Marrec shrugged. Before Lurue’s absence, he had access to spells that might have cleansed any taint potentially remaining from the vampire’s gaze. He said aloud, “She seems fine.”

  That earned him a quick smile from Ususi. Of course, he mentally vowed to keep an eye on the mage, too.

  “It is time to beard th’e Rotting Man in his lair,” said Marrec. “Everyone ready?”

  CHAPTER 29

  Great plazas and wrecked temples devoted to demonic powers lay half-buried in the boggy forest that covered all. Stone, cracked and broken into numberless pebbles, littered the expanse, hinting at tumbled statuary, building facades, and other structures. Only ruinous heaps remained of what was once a grand avenue, overgrown with forest plants. There was an arch that still stood, but it looked upon an empty cinder, flooded with foul water. Stagnant pools floated a detritus of wreckage and age-old destruction, but despite the growth, the crumbled grandeur, and encroaching marsh, the outlines of a once-great city were clear, visible despite the lowering twilight.