by Sean Rodden
Waif looked away.
From somewhere nearby, Ev lin Dar was certain she heard the Halflord’s mar render huff. The Black Shield allowed herself a small smile.
The Halflord’s gaze moved almost leisurely to the command tent’s entrance.
“Weapons ready,” he instructed. “Ev. Gren. With me. Waif. Urchin. Follow.”
The two Black Shields dismounted, tested the draw of their swords in their scabbards, and strode with their Prince toward the tent.
Waif and Urchin lingered, holding hands, one defiant, the other hesitant.
“Come. Now.”
Urchin winced at the soul-shredding shrillness of his sister’s silent shriek.
Gren del Mor’s report had been exceedingly accurate.
The place reeked. Horribly. Too many unwashed bodies in too small a space with too little in the way of ventilation. Of the several dozen chieftains, captains, petty kings and warlords gathered in the command tent, few had ever seen a bath, let alone taken one. Filth, fetid perspiration, piss. Rotting teeth and rancid breath. Effluvious echoes of vomit and shit.
Ev lin Dar wrinkled her nose and tried in vain to snort the stench from her nostrils. Failing that, she set her soft lips in a firm straight line, inhaled as shallowly and as infrequently as mortally possible, and glowered irritably at the happy place in her mind.
At the Halflord’s other shoulder, Gren del Mor was manifestly appalled. His nose was rucked, his mouth twisted, his eyes squinting as though the stink was a visible outrage. His customary dolour darkened to disgust, revulsion, as he surveyed those gathered there with the murderous loathing of one contemplating a massacre.
Of the three Bloodspawn standing just within the entrance, only the Halflord appeared unaffected.
And his two tiny wards were entirely at their ease.
The twins stood before Kor ben Dor, little fingers yet entwined, smiling blithely, like two cocksure scallywags, sure of their secrets, with no care in the world. They seemed so small, so insignificant beneath the grey giants of the Bloodspawn, yet their casual smirks and the luminous light in their round blue eyes hinted at something deeper, darker. A thing dripping with dread and cunning. Verily, with no care in the world.
Nor for it.
Before them were assembled the select, the elite, the chosen leaders of Suru-luk’s vast army of vengeance and conquest.
A few dozen Unmannish chiefs and elders, even a king or two, squat and dark, low of brow, wrapped in skins and shod in crude iron. The Horachian Urkrok king and his retinue, huge and hulking, constantly grunting like pigs rutting in a sty. His counterpart from the Blackbones, a massively obese bitch, her green-grey tongue repeatedly licking the slime from her pierced nostrils; her fawning entourage. The fur-clad princes and war chiefs of wintry Var, quite tall for humans, broad of shoulder, thick of limb, bloodthirsty of heart and battle-axe. The Norian warlord, small, slim, his skin dark and wizened, his narrow eyes pale slits in a face both shrewd and cruel; his cortege of champing captains.
And the gigantic self-styled King of the Giants, the undisputed ruler of the wastes under Earthfall. Hair the colour and texture of hanging moss, skin the tone and toughness of slate. He and his gathered Graniants dwarfed even the biggest of the Bloodspawn. And he did not look happy.
“Settle,” spoke the Prince of the Bloodspawn.
Save the interminable snuffling of the Urkroks, the place fell quiet – though Ev lin Dar was convinced she could hear the reek there, an incessant slinking, slithery, slimy sound that seeped through the ears into the soul. And all Gren del Mor heard was the imaginary slippery, slapping sound of his sword slashing, slashing, slashing.
“Good morning, friends,” Kor ben Dor said softly.
Both Ev lin Dar and Gren del Mor checked small choking sounds before they escaped their throats.
“I am grateful for your audience.”
Kor ben Dor spoke a simple dialect of Eastish, a generic language largely derived from Unmannish which all there would – should, rather – comprehend.
The King of the Giants loomed above him.
“Why are we here, Halflord?” demanded the Graniant, apparently oblivious to the line of drool hanging from his chin. “I am king, and kings do not come when called.”
“Yet you are here, Arn’badt,” replied Kor ben Dor quietly.
Arn’badt balled his gigantic fists.
An almost imperceptible gesture of the Halflord’s hand, and the two Black Shields subtly stepped another stride away from their Prince.
“The only king who rules here,” continued the Halflord, unperturbed, “is the one who sits the Blood Throne beneath U’gloch Nur. And I am certain that he does not make a habit of slavering upon himself.”
Arn’badt glowered, both in ire and incomprehension, suspicious that he had been insulted – suspicious but unsure.
“I remain a king,” the Graniant rumbled, “and you are but half a lord. And half a lord is not a lord at all. I will not follow you.”
“You need not do so, Arn’badt. I have neither the intention nor the desire to lead. That is indeed precisely why we are here.”
The King of the Giants shook his huge head, sending the string of drool behind him to lash one his lieutenants like a wet white whip.
“Trickery! The Halflord seeks to fool us!”
“The Blood King won’t leave his seat, Bloodspawn,” interjected Ongulthuk, the Unmannish King of Waldard. “Who will lead us in the field, if you will not?”
Kor ben Dor lowered his gaze meaningfully to the two human children.
Waif and Urchin beamed.
“Babies?” gaped Sten Hjerte, the proud Wulfic prince. “You would have us follow babies? This is sheer madness. The girl is obviously simple – simple or touched, and touched hard. Do you not see what she carries? The Wulfings of Var will not follow mad babies. The sum of these children is even less than half a lord!”
Stop giggling, sister. They will see it on your face, on your face, your face.
Oh, but it is funny, brother. So very funny.
Arn’badt laughed. A loud, raucous, ugly sound.
“Do you even know why you are called ‘Halflord’? Tell me, if you can, what is this pseudomorphic creature we call ‘Bloodspawn’? Do you know what blood flows in your veins? Some good Graniantish blood, that much is clear. But what of the other portion? How was this half-breed bred? Hmmm?”
Ev lin Dar’s hand hovered over the haft of her sword. Gren del Mor’s gauntleted fist curled about the grip of his weapon.
“I urge you not to lose your head, Graniant,” Kor ben Dor said softly.
“You do not urge me, half-breed. Do you hear me? I am a king! You are – what are you, exactly? Hmmm? More a half-bastard than a half-lord, surely. Do you even know who your father is?”
Gren del Mor tensed. Ev lin Dar readied herself.
But Kor ben Dor simply stared.
The Graniant guffawed. “Your pretty white eyes don’t impress me, half-bastard.”
“There is more than one way to make an impression, King of Giants.” Kor ben Dor’s voice was soft, gentle, enchantingly tender. “Tell me, if you can, why do they call you ‘Arn’badt the Headless’?”
“They don’t –”
The Graniant’s eyes narrowed, then widened in sudden startled understanding. His hand flashed for the crude flat sword-like weapon at his hip.
And then his head disintegrated.
Blood, skin, hair, teeth, skull shards, grey matter exploded backward, spattering and splattering over the gathered leaders of the Blood King’s army. Shouts and alarmed cries erupted, a cacophony of disgust and revulsion swelling to fear and horror. Arn’badt’s decapitated body remained upright for several heartbeats, spouting brownish blood, a grotesque geyser gushing gore, before finally crumpling to the earthen floor.
Gren del Mor made a herculean but futile effort to suppress a grin.
Ev lin Dar grimaced. She looked disdainfully upon the corpse of the King of the G
iants. Half-bastard? Really? She sighed into the stink.
The Halflord stood, his tattooed face impassive, his massive mace in hand, fragments of flesh and bone pasted to the flanges of its crown. Arn’badt had been the first to reach for a weapon. All there had witnessed that. But none among that mortal company save the Black Shields had seen Kor ben Dor heft his mace from its harness, swing through the space his guards had so casually provided him, and completely obliterate the Graniant’s head. The deed had been done with a deftness, force and velocity that untrained eyes simply could not follow.
Did you see that, sister? Did you see, see, see?
Impressive, indeed, brother. Evidently the price for losing one’s head around the Halflord is…well…losing one’s head. How perfectly appropriate.
Something you should remember, sister.
Oh, shut up.
The Prince of the Bloodspawn lowered the head of his mace to the ground, leaned a thick iron-braced forearm on the butt of the long haft, heavy hand dangling loosely. His pearly white eyes regarded the remaining Graniants calmly. He seemed content to wait upon them, upon their reactions. Upon whatever would come.
Gradually, the roars of revulsion and whines of fear fell away. Even the snuffling of the Urkroks was mercifully muffled.
A stooped giant, longer in years than he was of leg, stepped forward. Bent as he was, the Graniantish elder yet towered over Kor ben Dor, and the muscles of his arms and bowed legs remained corded and tight. Cranial fetishes dangled in his thinning greased green hair, marking him as a shaman of his clan; the withered dragon’s heart hanging upon a cord of sinew from his crooked neck named him shaman of shamans. Witchdoctor. Evoker, invoker, provoker of powers primal and eldritch, powers long lost to younger races.
The giant wiped something wet from his cheek. Stared down upon the headless corpse of his dead king. Nudged it tentatively with the toe of one battered boot.
“Seems dead enough.”
The gigantic shaman raised his aged eyes. His ivory gaze met Kor ben Dor’s own, white on white.
“He was never our king, you know. Not really. No part of any crown ever rested upon his head.” The Graniant gestured to the flanged business end of the Halflord’s weapon. “It is quite fitting that a crown now wears part of his head.”
The Graniants behind the elder laughed, some nervously, some not.
“You have released us, Halflord. You have ended the terror of the tyrant. You will have our allegiance.”
But Kor ben Dor shook his head.
“I will not.”
The elder giant’s milky gaze dipped down to the two human children.
Waif and Urchin grinned up at him.
“Ah. Them.”
“Yes.”
“This is the Blood King’s will?”
“It is.”
The Graniant squinted myopically, creamy eyes slitted more for a function of thought than for one of sight.
“They are not what they seem. They are more. And less.”
“Blutsaugers,” said the Halflord in the shaman’s tongue.
The Graniant shook his head, the skull fetishes rattling hollowly.
“They have been called ‘Leech’ in many languages by many peoples over many millennia. But they are more seele-esser than blutsauger. Eaters of the spirit. Devourers of souls.” His squint widened slightly, whitely. “Though the souls that once dwelt within these little ones seem to have eluded them.”
“Some innocence cannot be taken.”
The elder peered at the Prince of the Bloodspawn, his head cocked awkwardly on his twisted neck, oily hair hanging limply, skull fetishes clattering, shriveled drakeheart swinging like a pendulum. Something shrewd shone in his ancient eyes.
“Have they names, Halflord?”
“Waif. And Urchin.”
“Ah. Names you gave them. Fitting. And what of the names of the human children before they were…invaded?”
“Unknown.”
“Ah. Pity, that. Names have power.”
“Yes.”
“My name is Umbar’hal.”
“I am Kor ben Dor.”
There was a sorrow to the shaman’s smile.
“I am saddened you will not lead us, Kor ben Dor.”
The Halflord lowered his eyes to the headless corpse lying in a lake of dark blood at his feet. The carcass of the King of the Giants had already begun to augment the stench in the tent with its own specific stink.
“You would not want to follow where I must go, Umbar’hal.”
The Prince of the Bloodspawn then hefted his gigantic mace and turned away, away from the reek, away from the captains and kings, from Waif and Urchin, away, away, pushed through the tent’s hide flaps, out into the gaudy morning beyond. After a dozen strides he stopped, his broad back to the command tent. Ev lin Dar appeared at his right shoulder, Gren del Mor to his left, the former smiling, the latter scowling. The Halflord deftly returned his unwieldy weapon to its harness, unfurled the great black wings nestled in his hair.
“When the Leeches are done, their command over the armies will be absolute,” announced Kor ben Dor, his voice become harder and flatter than was usual. “The bodies they have taken require nourishment, so they will pause to feed. But they are impatient creatures, primal in their passions, and other hungers drive them. Ancient hungers gone unassuaged across the ages. They will not wish to linger.”
The Black Shields waited. Not long.
“Prepare the ’Spawn. The host will march this day.”
Ev lin Dar and Gren del Mor nodded and quickly moved away.
The Halflord turned his tattooed face toward the risen sun, closed his eyes, inhaled deeply.
For a long sweet moment, the world seemed so exquisitely quiet, utterly serene, a place of perfect peace, of true transcendent tranquility.
And then the screaming started.
10
THE STONE OF SCULLAIN
“And at Scullain, the cornerstone of the Earth,
were gathered the Guardians of the Lands,
there to decide the doom of the World.”
Rafayel, Book of Laments, Chapter VII, Verse 12
“So ends the tale of my gravest trial,” concluded Rundul.
A hush hovered about the Stone of Scullain.
The Darad lowered his head.
“I don’t have the gift of eloquence, but I’ve shared with you my knowledge to the best of my ability and recollection. I leave nothing in want of telling.”
I have laid bare my shame.
A deep and profound silence.
The Stone of Scullain glimmered like a moon fallen to earth. All eyes – black, silver, gold and grey – were upon Rundul as he lowered himself to his seat. A student of neither Athain nor Fiannian custom, the Darad considered the stern silence of his audience to be censure, condemnation. His back throbbed as though the mark of the beast was a living thing, a salamander writhing in wreaths of fire beneath his skin. Though the Daradur were impervious to physical pain, they felt some agonies more surely and more sorely than did others.
Unworthy.
But Lord Alvarion stood and bowed his head toward Rundul.
The Darad blinked mutely. Does he mock me?
Then Alvarion turned to address the gathering. All harkened.
“Hear me, faithful friends and true,” declared the Lord of the Fiannar, the ruined cheek tissue beneath his right eye flushing faintly. “We are in the company of one whom history will hold heroic long after the Earth claims our bodies and the Light embraces our souls. Verily, it is only through this Stone Lord’s strength and courage that we have had warning of the doom crouching upon our threshold, that we retain any hope of turning that doom aside.”
Looking again to Rundul, Alvarion placed a hand over his glittering rillagh in acknowledgement, gratitude, salutation.
The Darad only blinked back blankly.
“The Fiannar are forever indebted to you, brave Rundul of Axar, Warder of the Wandering Guard,” pro
claimed the Lord of the Deathward. “Where there is a Fiannian heart that beats, mind that remembers, or tongue that tells, the Legend of Rundul’s Run will endure.”
What the…?
And as one, they rose, the great ones of the Fiannar. The Lady Cerriste, the Seer Sarrane, Master Tulnarron and Marshal Eldurion. Hands upon their hearts and love leaping like flames in their shining eyes.
Spoke the Lady Cerriste, “We will always remember, noble Rundul. Truly, we can never forget.”
The Darad straightened slightly, found himself nodding.
Beside him, his own brethren said nothing.
Lord Alvarion lowered his hand to his side. The steel of his grey gaze hardened.
“The question remains, however, as to what to do with the warning which Warder Rundul has provided.”
All but Alvarion resumed their seats.
As he spoke, the Lord of the Deathward seemed a man made more of metal than of mere flesh:
“The Blood King of the Wraithren has returned. But he has been exposed, and his secret scheme has been revealed. His intent is clear. Long has he desired the destruction of the Deathward and dominion over the lands of Men. He means to bring war to Lindannan, seeking to break the Fiannar and take the Pass of Eryn Ruil. Should my people fail to repel him, and should Druintir fall, the Blood King’s conquest of the High Land and the Free Nations of Men can then proceed little hindered.
“But he failed to fathom and factor in to his estimations the valour of our friends – for not only has Rundul of Axar brought us word of the Blood King’s clandestine machinations, but the Darad has caused him to act rashly. For whether in despair for his foiled plan or in the arrogance of his nature, he expended vast amounts of power in sending forth his red wind and raising his great black fortress from the bowels of the Bloodshards. He will need to recover.
“And so he waits there now, brooding behind his black gates, unsure of our strength, and gathering his own. Our scouts report that further forces, numbering in the many thousands and fully equipped, march openly now from Mroch Durva, from Waldard and from the Hebbingore, from the harsh countries beneath Earthfall. From the south have come companies of Norian mercenaries, and with them a new threat – Southfleetian munitions. The army of the Blood King grows. As does his confidence.” Alvarion’s steely eyes glinted darkly. “However long he may need to recover, he will not wait long.”
