by RW Krpoun
“So basically your world will return to what it was before the Council started meddling.”
“Just so, with a few innovations that came from you outlanders.”
“Its like legal practice,” Sam mused. “You get a piece of evidence thrown out, everything based upon that evidence goes as well. The Council will have to find an entirely new method to open a road to Earth-they will have to re-invent the wheel.”
“So tell us about what it will take to isolate this device,” Shad said.
“The place where the roads join the device is akin to the Great Field: very disadvantageous for natives of this realm, but not to outlanders, and to a lesser extent the Twelve. My Lady will need you to protect her while she severs the connection there.”
“Speaking of protection, what does the Council have watching the device?” Shad asked.
“An army of undead. Wights, to be precise.”
“Wonderful.”
“I have a charm that will make you more effective against them,” Fu Hao observed.
“If you haven’t noticed, we aren’t exactly an army.”
“I will summon a force to accompany us; they cannot enter the final place, but the wights can, which is why you are needed.”
“How long will you need to break the device?”
The warlord shrugged.
“Better and better. We’re going to recover our gear and talk.”
“I’ll open with the observation that we are all going to die,” Shad said disgustedly. “You guys take it from there.”
“If she breaks the roads we go home,” Derek observed.
“If we believe her,” Fred shrugged.
“We’ve suspected that we were getting shined along for quite a while,” Jeff pointed out. “So far, Astkar has dealt the fairest towards us of anyone.”
“The key to a good con is establishing trust,” Sam pointed out.
“She was legitimately imprisoned, and I don’t think she’s lying about who she is,” Derek said thoughtfully. “I don’t think she could lie about it-as a ‘mancer I can feel the power coming off her.”
“That doesn’t mean she has a good plan,” Fred objected.
“No, but the fact is the Council dragged us here and has been almost no help to us since we’ve arrived,” Jeff said.
Sam pulled his pack from the cache. “She’s talking about taking on the twelve best mages this world has, with an army of wights to boot. That’s crazy.”
“Suicide, really,” Fred agreed, lifting out his pack.
“Shad, you’re quiet,” Derek observed.
“That’s because I’m going to help her,” the Jinxman finished tying his torches to his pack and slung it onto his back with a grunt. “You guys do what you want.”
“You trust her?” Fred was surprised.
“No. But she’s the first person we’ve met here who is doing something for zero personal gain.” The Jinxman faced the other Talons. “She got banished here, she accepts it, and she is still putting her life on the line for a world that has long since forgotten her. Anybody that stupid deserves my help.” The Jinxman grinned at his friends. “You guys can head back. I’ll tell you how it played out.”
“I’m staying, too,” Derek announced. “I didn’t go to Iraq to let these terrorists trash the US.”
“What makes you think she can pull this off?” Sam asked. “At most she’s got us and her pen-pal boy-toy.”
“She was the one the Emperor sent where things were the worst, right? And the baddies who ganged up on her here preferred boxing her in than going for a kill; I’m guessing that if it can be done, she can do it.”
“And if you’re wrong?” the Bard persisted.
“Feces occurs, dude. Just box me up and ship me home.”
Fred and Jeff looked at each other for a long moment and then Fred started snickering. “We can’t let the goat-banger upstage us.”
Derek sighed and shook his head.
“I’m sorry guys, I just don’t see it,” Sam hung his head. “I’m going home.”
“No harm, no foul,” Shad slapped the Bard on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it-I’m sure it’s just a result of your parents never loving you and the strain of going through life with a small penis.”
Sam gave Shad the finger.
“Jeff, get his stones mounted on his belly harness, Derek, let him copy out the locations and incantations. We need to keep a copy in case we need a plan B.”
“Plan B is to use twice as much explosives,” Fred objected.
“Plan C, then.”
The trip down the slopes was much faster than going upslope, although it wasn’t easy. The four Talons bickered and harassed each other as was their custom, Sam brooded, Astkar kept his own council, and Fu Hao smelled nearly every type of plant they passed. By the second hour she was able to stop wearing the cloth across her eyes so long as she kept her hat tipped low across her face. Each evening after dark she left the group to dance on high ground under the stars.
“So how did time pass for her in the prison?” Sam asked Astkar while the former Chinese general was trotting off to examine an interesting rock outcropping.
“Much like being in a dreaming state, into which followers were able to link views of the outside world,” the mage explained. “That is as much a part of the prison as the physical structure. Obviously, a person as resourceful as my Lady would have been able to extract herself if she had been fully aware.”
“Sleeping Beauty,” Jeff observed. “Only instead of a kiss she needed a hand job from Derek.”
“I wish,” the Shadowmancer rolled his eyes. “When that door vanished I figured I was toast.”
“She really seems to be happy to see the real world,” Shad observed, watching Fu Hao chase a rabbit.
“Indeed,” Astkar’s sour face twitched into something that approached a smile. “Of course, the imminence of death makes each moment sweeter.”
“Death? I thought she said she could do this?” Fred objected.
“Closing the road is within our means. Surviving after the roads collapse and you depart is another matter entirely. The Twelve will be undone, but their undead horde will remain, and she will only have my assistance.”
“What about this army she said she was calling?”
“She works upon that each evening. The…well, I suppose you could describe it as dancing.”
“No, I mean why will they not help after the roads are cut?”
“They are of your world, shades of those who have fallen. The opening of the roads allows their calling.”
“Undead?” Shad asked suspiciously.
“No. Just warriors who are willing to suffer battle and risk the pains of death one more time in defense of what they once held dear. When the roads close they will return to their rightful place.”
“Leaving you and Fu Hao facing an army of wights,” Derek said slowly.
“Yes.”
“Both of you are expecting to die.”
“Just so.”
“Why? I mean, why you? Fu Hao is fighting for the land of her birth, but why are you fighting?” Shad asked.
“This is my land, my world,” Astkar turned his darks eyes to the horizon. “It is far from perfect, but it is what it is. The Twelve have much larger plans than just revenge-the dark attacker is merely the first step in their endeavors. If the Council succeeds their grand ambitions will grind the lives of tens of thousands of ordinary men and women into the dirt and reshape our world into something that is much worse than the tribulations common today. I am not inclined to stand by and allow that to happen.”
The Talons lapsed into a thoughtful silence as they worked their way down-slope. Tired of chasing rabbits and birds, Fu Hao rejoined them, flushed and smiling. “What a grim band of warriors,” she chided the group. “I have seen funeral processions that were more jolly.”
“We were just pondering the coming battle, my Lady,” Astkar gestured vaguely, perhaps towards the future.
“What will happen, will happen,” the warlord slapped her sword hilts. “No one ever won by sighing and weeping.”
“Hookers and beer!” Jeff grinned.
She missed the reference but caught the spirit and grinned. “The Tu-Fang resisted the formation of a greater state for generations, but I broke them in the field. The Yi, the Quang, and the Ba fell each in their own turn, undone by over confidence and a failure to understand their warriors. To win, first you must conquer your fears.”
“Did you really win sixty campaigns?” Shad asked.
“I fought for years,” she shrugged. “What is a number? We built an empire, the Shang dynasty. We made China. We fought with stone and bronze and brought order to what was wilderness. We took tribes and taught them to belong to a greater whole.”
“That must have been amazing,” Derek said, eyes glowing.
“Somewhat,” Fu Hao said thoughtfully. “There was much disease and slavery, and there were few whom you could trust. Looking back, it was a bad time, but we took what there was and made it better. Civilization is always preferable to barbarism. It was bitter and hard, but we left something better than we were born to, and that is as much as anyone can ask for.”
“There was magic back then?” Jeff asked.
She shrugged. “There were…powers. It was not like here. It was not until late that we realized that what we were building would destroy the very powers that helped us.” She smiled reflectively. “That was what the barbarians fought for: a world where that sort of power was everything. We used it to build a nation of ordinary men and women.”
“It must have been a shock when you were banished,” Sam said nervously.
“It was,” she barked a laugh. “But it was a worse shock for those of my enemies who had been sent here before me. They discovered that Fu Hao was much stronger in this place than I had been in China. And in China I had bested them.”
“How did they trap you, if you don’t mind my asking?” Jeff asked.
Fu Hao threw her hat straight up, spinning on edge, and caught it. She winked at the Night-grifter. “They didn’t. They died, instead. They could not defeat me in China and they fared no better here. No, I was ambushed by cowards from this place.”
“Ah,” Jeff nodded. “We had heard…a garbled version.”
“Tales grow,” she nodded. “I fought at what you call the Great Field. The war was to decide what was to be done about our banishing-there was still much power back then. While I was terrible in China, there were those from elsewhere who were much more powerful. Some wanted to unleash horrors on the world that had banished us, and would have, but the rest of us took up arms and prevented it. We broke them, broke the great powers, although it cost us dear and scarred the world. I was near death when I was taken from the field by a handful of loyal followers, what remained of my Ebon Guard. They placed me where you found me, to recover from my wounds. Later some remnants of the foe, lesser minions who likewise escaped the battle, sealed me in. The rest you know.”
“You succeeded on the Great Field-you saved…our world from revenge.” Jeff was impressed.
She smiled. “I was one commander of many, but yes, we won. We paid a terrible price for that victory, but we won. When the battle was over few who had walked the homelands remained, and none who had the great powers still lived. Those who did survive went on to build homes, families, ordinary lives. Better things than Empires, perhaps. I didn’t really understand that in China, nor even before the Great Field, but since in my dreaming and watching I have learned that much. Still, such lives can only be built after warriors have built a structure that will protect them.”
“You never asked about China,” Sam ventured.
Fu Hao sighed. “My land, my China, is dust. Time passes strangely here-at the Great Field I fought alongside, and against, men and women who had lived centuries before my time, and centuries after. There are beasts and things like men whom I cannot believe ever walked under the same sun as I had in China, but here they are. It is not my place to question such things-I am Fu Hao, and I will do what it is I must do.”
The group turned south when they reached the South Way, except for Sam, who was heading north; the place where he was to invoke his belt and break his wards was not far from the point where the Black Talons had encountered the trappers.
“Its been real,” Derek shook the Bard’s hand. “We wouldn’t be heading home if it wasn’t for you.”
“Drink a Doctor Pepper for us,” Jeff sketched a salute.
“Good luck,” Fred offered his hand.
“I hope Goblins don’t kill you before you get clear,” Shad observed. “Don’t be taken alive, whatever happens; you look too much like a girl to risk capture.”
Flipping off the Jinxman before waving to the others, Sam trudged off with many a backward look.
“You had to mention Goblins, didn’t you?” Derek chided Shad. “The poor guy will be looking over his shoulder the entire trip.”
“He had better,” the Jinxman waved a hand towards the surrounding terrain. “You don’t think there are eyes on us? We didn’t have much trouble traveling because there’s no profit in jumping a group of bravos. But one small guy by himself? He’s easy meat for a half-dozen Goblins. He’s safer scared; thinking you’re home free makes you careless. He’s got over a hundred miles between him and the exit point, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the Council didn’t tip the local baddies to keep an eye on those places. A little fear on his part will increase his chances.”
“Still, taken as a whole his chances are better than ours,” Jeff pointed out.
“No joke there.”
Chapter Seventeen
Late in the afternoon of the fifth day after their parting with Sam, Astkar warned the Black Talons that the site was nearby. “Less than four miles, in fact.”
“Great,” Shad eyed the range of dry hills they were passing through. “We were almost out of food anyway.”
“I’m glad we thought to get wide-brimmed hats before leaving the City-State,” Jeff mopped away sweat, leaving streaks of grime on his high forehead. “Whatever little break we got from the heat from the passage of days has been lost by continually heading south.”
“I figure we must be getting close to the second week of September,” Derek observed. “If I have the local calendar right.”
“How long does that make us here, real-time?” Fred asked.
“Between four to five hours,” Shad shrugged. “One hundred fifteen days all told, spread between five different lunar cycles. It all depends on how the hour-to-lunar-cycle rate is calculated. Not that an hour’s difference matters.”
“It might.”
“How?”
“It could.”
“Again, how?”
“Oh, shit, you left a brisket on, didn’t you?” Derek groaned.
“Maybe.”
“Fred, your kitchen has so much grease splattered and dripped around that cockroaches are offended. They have to wear air tanks and flippers to get around.”
“If he burns to death in his sleep back home, does he die here?” Jeff wondered.
“He dies here for good, so yeah, I bet the road works both ways in that regard,” Shad shook his head disgustedly.
“Screw all of you,” Fred shrugged good-naturedly. He cleaned his apartment once a year, just before his annual Christmas party, and nothing would budge him from his chosen standard of living. In Fred’s world, a garbage can and a floor were one and the same. Strangely, and despite his slovenly habits, the warehouseman was the most accomplished cook amongst the four.
“We should make camp here,” Astkar, who ignored the Talons’ bickering with lordly disinterest, gestured towards a clump of what Derek would have called Spanish Oaks. “There is an old but serviceable well. We can rest and approach the night’s business refreshed.”
“Why are we doing this at night?” Derek asked. “Isn’t daylight hard on wights?”
“I have a
number of charms which are useful in night fighting, and not only are wights unaffected by daylight, they are actually harder to see in daytime,” Fu Hao advised.
“Huh. Looks like I heard wrong.”
“No, I’m sure you heard correctly; that is a rumor started by those who employ wights as guards. Necromancers are a cunning lot.”
“Great,” the Shadowmancer sighed. “Is there anything else we should know about wights?”
“You have faced revenants, have you not? The two are similar; wights have more physical substance, less resilience to damage, employ artificial weapons, and are weaker,” Astkar advised.
The trees did shelter an old well, and with little effort the small band settled in. Fu Hao promptly wandered off to explore, and as was his custom Astkar buried himself in a book.
“Are we really doing this?” Derek asked. “Betting our lives on a long-shot Mount Doom operation?”
“Can’t be worse than mortars and RPGs,” Jeff shrugged. “These wights aren’t as tough as revenants.”
“More of them, though.” Fred observed.
“So? They never met an Airborne Ranger before,” Jeff grinned.
“I never trusted the Council from the start,” Shad mused, running an oily cloth along his sword’s blade. “And the bastards yanked me from my life to this dump without so much as a hello. I’m pretty sure I’ve walked more since I’ve been here than I have in my entire life. I know I’ve gone longer without a shower than at any point in my life.”
“What’s your point?” Jeff asked.
“Its time for some payback. Its time to really jam up those bastards, and I’m pretty confident that even if Fu Hao is lying to us, she plans harm to the Twelve.”
“Do you think she’s lying?”
“No,” Derek answered before the Jinxman. “Its in the way she represents herself: she is extremely proud of who she is and what she has done. Stooping to dupe us is beneath her dignity. I think we’ve been fed the third grade version of what is going on, and a lot of the local politics has been skipped, but I believe we’ve gotten the gist.”
