by Sean Rodden
Having heard Ghost, having listened and brooded, deliberated and planned, Tulnarron now stood alone some distance from where the warriors of the Host of Arrenhoth recovered from their wild ride and prepared for one even wilder. He stood upon a small hummock, mighty arms folded across his chest, his countenance hewn and hard, cold eyes looking north into the night. As he gazed out upon the vast grey morass of Coldmire, Tulnarron did not consider that his terrible pride might be an appalling fault, a dreadful flaw in his character, his own personal hamartia. He did not contemplate the horrible hubris of his planned attack upon the enemy encampment. That his small company of fewer than three hundred Deathward warriors should strike, and strike successfully, at the heart of a force more than four-hundredfold their number did not seem illogical in his estimation. Not even for a moment.
Tulnarron’s eyes glistered like glace. Somewhere out there in the wet wastes of Coldmire another Fian strove to do that which so many others would have deemed impossible, another Deathward soul endeavoured to achieve a thing considered unachievable. A valiant attempt, others would say, valiant and vain. But Eldurion yet lived, Tulnarron knew, for the gold of the Colossus still shone, declaring that Grimroth remained in or near the hand of a living scion of the House of Defurien. And where there was life, there was hope. And with hope, possibility. Possibility, potential, promise.
Promise.
Despite his heavy cloak and hood, a chill slithered over Tulnarron’s skin, beginning at the nuque of his neck, then quivering and shivering down his spine. He stiffened. His face tingled as though pierced by a thousand tiny pins.
He was no longer alone.
He sensed a manifestation somewhere to his left. A presence. A power.
“I thought you might come,” murmured the Master of the House of Eccuron without turning.
There was no reply.
“My wife sent you, I assume. An intolerable combination, that, wife and Seer. She cannot help herself. The woman is always meddling.”
There came a deep coughing sound, and a large dark figure formed in the fog and moved silently to Tulnarron’s side. Bright silvery eyes swept over the vapid vista of Coldmire.
“Have you come alone, old friend,” the Master asked, “or have you brought with you some of your kin?”
As though in answer, the mists eddied before a bitter earthbound breeze, swirled back and away, revealing rank upon rigid rank of shadowy grey forms standing silent and still in the night. Hundreds upon hundreds of fierce fulgurant eyes gleamed, glowed. Argent and angry.
“Ah. I see. You have brought all your kin.”
The regal head inclined slightly.
“I suppose you would have me relinquish command of this little enterprise. You being a Lord, after all, and myself a mere Master.”
A throaty growl and the shake of a great black mane.
“Very well, Lord of Galledine. Your modesty far surpasses my own.”
Tulnarron looked upon the massive beast at his shoulder, reached over, ran a surprisingly tender hand over the dark, thick coat.
“We have a long hard run ahead of us, old friend. Think you can keep up?”
The wolf-king of the warokka peeled back broad black lips, baring wicked white teeth in a feral, eager grin.
Promise.
Tulnarron smiled thinly, ruffled the mighty Alpha’s midnight mane. Then he and Teraras turned away from the misted misery of Coldmire and headed back toward the waiting Host of Arrenhoth.
And in the churning fog of their wake, silent and sleek and stealthy, the spectral shapes of a thousand war wolves.
Kor ben Dor did not scream.
Every aspect of his being – the taut skin encasing his hard flesh, the molten marrow of his bones, the persistent impulses firing in his brain, the wildly raging inferno of his soul – urged, insisted, demanded that he scream until his throat shredded.
Yet the Halflord did not scream.
But he had never known such pain. Such utter agony. Excruciating, blinding, universal. Ripping through his flesh, every nerve rended, his brain torn, his soul slivered. A maleficent misery so very far beyond physical hurt. His eyes bulged, white and wide, his back arched, his body thrashed, legs kicking violently, his fists bunched into hammers of flesh and bone and pounded the ground. Blood seeped angrily from his ears, his nostrils, weeping red anguish from his eyes. His heart slamming, ramming, battering his ribcage, fast, furious, on the verge of breaking, bursting.
And still he did not scream.
“You must stop, Umbar’hal!” demanded Ev lin Dar, tears streaming from her wide white eyes, her fists balled at her thighs. “You will kill him!”
But Umbar’hal only shook his head earnestly, emphatically, as he clung desperately to the Halflord’s head cradled in his lap. The witchdoctor sat cross-legged on the earthen floor of Kor ben Dor’s tent, the Prince’s tortured form twisting before him, black hair splayed across the shaman’s thin thighs. The dragon’s heart hanging from Umbar’hal’s neck, withered as it was, glowed a brilliant red and pulsed rhythmically, vigorously beating, beating, beating. The Graniant’s gigantic gnarled hands struggled to hold the Halflord’s head motionless as the body writhed, the shaman’s fingers replicating the tattooed talons, cracked nails tearing into the Prince’s temple and cheeks, drawing blood.
“Stop! Cease this madness!” commanded Ev lin Dar as her sword whispered from its sheath. She took a step forward, her eyes wild for fear and weeping. “Stop or die!”
But a strong hand fell upon her shoulder, staying her advance.
“I like it no more than do you, Ev,” hissed Gren del Mor at her ear. “But I gave my word. As did you. We promised our Prince we would see this through, come what may. We must endure. We must honour that word.”
Ev lin Dar haughtily shrugged her friend’s hand from her shoulder, seethed, sheathed her sword, but did no more. Only watched. And listened.
A soft chant, almost a cooing, issued from Umbar’hal’s scratched and raspy throat, seeking not only to soothe, but to push Kor ben Dor past the pain. Past and back. Back into a yore where there existed no pain, no hurt of any kind, in any sense, in any measure. Back to the time before the pain.
Kor ben Dor thrashed in agony.
Ev lin Dar bit down on her lip, weeping freely.
The lullaby was constant, unceasing. Consistent, persistent, insistent. Never faltering, never failing. Sung every night for a fortnight in the halflight of the Prince’s tent, that hoarse and ancient voice murmuring over the stricken prostrate form of Kor ben Dor, comforting and encouraging. At once a calming nightsong and a coaxing reassurance, urging the Halflord against the towering black wall of phantasmal pain in his mind.
Phantasmal, yes.
For the pain was not real.
The agony that the Halflord remembered was not genuine, had never been, but had been only a terrible illusion, and remained so. The pain had been purposely placed in his mind, an artifice insidiously inserted, potent and pervasive. Put there as a barrier to other memories, a barricade to the forbidden knowledge of self.
To the truth that was Kor ben Dor.
The Halflord’s fists came crashing down one last time with such furious force that Ev lin Dar felt the earth tremble beneath her boots. Somewhere, deep within the palmed prison of Kor ben Dor’s skull, in a place profoundly submerged and subliminal, walls came crashing down. And then Kor ben Dor’s thrashing suddenly subsided to a spasmodic shaking punctuated by short pronounced sporadic convulsions that soon dwindled into a sustained shuddering. And finally, a silent shivering.
“This…this is different,” whispered Ev lin Dar.
“Very,” agreed Gren del Mor at her shoulder. Then, to Umbar’hal, “What is happening, shaman?”
The ancient Graniant looked up, obviously perplexed. His wasted countenance was pallid and drained from the strain he had endured. He shook his head, the yellowed skull fetishes clattering hollowly in his greasy green hair. His shoulders slumped, his hands sliding wearil
y away from the Halflord’s head. Upon Umbar’hal’s sunken chest, the desiccated dragon’s heart fell still once more.
“The Prince shivers,” Ev lin Dar observed, “yet he perspires. Is he fev –”
But the Black Shield never completed her question.
Because the world exploded.
Night is.
Night conceals, night hides.
Night is a slumbering god, and the world is its dread dream of horrors. Night is a monstrous maw stretched in a silent scream. Night is the cloak of the lurker, the spotted coat of the hunter. Night is the padded feet of the predator, the reed-woven blind behind which killers crouch, the cover beneath which stalkers creep up quietly on their prey. Night secretes and secrets sin in its alleys and alcoves, screens the sinner from scrying eyes. Night obscures, obfuscates, disguising deeds dastardly and perverse. Night is the black hand of murder.
Night guides the pieces on the gameboard, masking their movements, conveying them behind the lines, arraying them in ambush. Night is the wolf on the ridge silhouetted upon the pale white face of the sinking moon. Night is the hand of vengeance, the raised dagger in the dark. Night is the band of raiders crawling on their bellies over frosted grass, blackened knives clenched between their teeth, death in their cold grey eyes. Night whispers with arrows aflight, softly thudding as steel barbs pierce a hundred hearts. Night is the black blood seeping from so many slitted throats. Night is a thousand grey ghosts slinking among the sleeping. Night is a spark in the dark.
Night hides, night conceals.
Night is.
A blinding flash. The world went white. Nothing but light.
Light.
Silent light.
Only an instant. Barely enough time to blink. But to those for whom death is imminent an instant is as a thousand years.
Ev lin Dar squeezed her eyes shut, threw up a shielding arm.
Then the sound. That sound. So impossibly loud. The sound of detonation, massive, monstrous, like the abrupt eruption of an enormous volcano, the roar of angry gods waging their war of ages, breaking the earth.
Gren del Mor covered his ears, his own scream lost in the thunder of the sonic blast.
And lastly, concussion. Exploding, radiating outward, an incredible release of energy. Absolute. The shock wave toppling, flattening all in its path. For miles. Razing the Plains.
Fire. Billowing smoke. Ash.
Death.
Ev lin Dar did not believe she had gone blind, though all she could see was a formless darkness. She did not consider that she might have been deafened, despite hearing naught but a constant hollow humming, as though struck tines of metal had been held to both ears, vibrating vigourously, endlessly. Her tongue was pasted with dust, her nostrils stuffed with dirt, depriving her of all taste, of all smell. She felt no pain, no discomfort, only the soft weight of a descending darkness persistently pressing her body into the earth. On some level, deeply subconscious, she realized that she was not breathing.
Ev lin Dar was certain she was dead.
Powerful hands hauled the heavy canvas of the toppled tent from her fallen form. Hands hooked under her armpits, urging her to a sitting position. Darkness took her for a time, and her soul slid away down a steep black slope greased with oblivion. Then she was snatched back. Something – someone – pounded her back between the blades of her shoulders, then the cleft between her breasts. Voices, the words muffled and indecipherable yet unequivocally urgent, thrummed upon her traumatized eardrums. She blinked against the chaos of colourless shadows swirling before her eyes. A hand struck her face. Hard.
And Ev lin Dar returned.
“What…?”
“Up, woman,” came Gren del Mor’s insistent growl. “We have been attacked.”
Something wet and warm oozed from her brow, trickling down her cheek. The terrible tickle of blood on skin.
“You took a blow to the head, Ev. A bad one. But you’re tougher than you look. Up, now.”
Her feet beneath her, the Black Shield teetered upward, vying against the last vestiges of vertigo. Her nostrils twitched. The air smelled of sulphur, tasted of chemicals, caustic and sour. Acrid ash floated on the black breath of night. The stench was strangely vivifying. Ev lin Dar’s vision floundered into focus as her mind won the battle for balance.
Before her, Gren del Mor had raised his hand once more.
Ev lin Dar’s own hand automatically found the haft of her sword.
“Hit me again, lizard-face, and I will relieve you of the offending hand.”
Gren del Mor grinned like a gargoyle, his thin saurian face begrimed with dust and dirt, blood and ash.
“Ah, there she is. The ever demure and grateful Ev lin Dar. Welcome back.”
Ev lin Dar glared at Gren del Mor, then past him.
The eastern section of the camp was leveled. Tents had been toppled, carts were overturned. Everywhere, chaos and destruction. Nothing moved there save a large tattered Black Jack banner which had been torn from its pole and was undulating rhythmically over the devastated camp like a winged serpent of death.
Ev lin Dar’s eyes shone white.
“Casualties?”
“Half a hundred tents, some steamy dreams, a few egos,” replied Gren del Mor. “Nothing that cannot be repaired or revisited. We Bloodspawn are a resilient folk.”
Beyond the ruin of the camp, the edge of the world was on fire. The night to the northeast was glowing orange and red and yellow, shot through with fluorescent blues and greens, as though the northern aurora had descended to earth and set the prairie ablaze.
“The train?”
“Obliterated. Or so I assume. I hope you are partial to the distinctive flavours of grubs and grass, Ev lin Dar.”
Sporadic sounds of battle floated down from the north. The intermittent and distant din of steel on steel, shouts and screams, the enraged roars of men and monsters fighting, dying. And oddly, the horrible howling of wolves in the night.
Fire and blackness flitted over the white of Ev lin Dar’s eyes.
“We are attacked.”
“Yes, I did say that.”
“What of Prince Kor?”
Gren del Mor flashed a little lacertilian grin, grunted.
“Besotted as you are, I thought that would have been your first question.”
Ev lin Dar glared at him, the fire in her eyes swelling heatedly.
Gren del Mor shrugged, gestured behind her with his pointed chin.
“Ask him yourself.”
Ev lin Dar turned.
Immediately before her, Kor ben Dor sat astride his teratoid steed. Beside the Prince loomed the hunched and weary form of Umbar’hal; at the Halflord’s back, beneath the billowing Black Jack, were assembled the entirety of the Bloodspawn, fully armoured in shining black steel and mounted on mar rendera, ready for war.
Beneath Kor ben Dor, his render growled anxiously, its eyes raging with red fire, a pinkish froth dripping from its maw as it champed at its bit. Its wickedly clawed forefeet gripped and gouged the ground, eager, earnest. Broad black nostrils flared fervently for the scent of blood in the night.
The Prince himself was completely calm, utterly composed. His back was straight, his shoulders square, his tattooed face the very picture of peace. He was clad in full battledress, his black armour reflecting fire and refracting darkness in equal measure. His hair had unfurled into wings so terrible and black as to inspire envy in an angel of death. The muscles of his naked biceps and thighs gleamed with sweat and firelight.
“I am gladdened that you are unhurt, Ev lin Dar.”
The Black Shield inclined her head. She opened her mouth to speak, but the Halflord preempted her.
“We have been anxious for your recovery.”
“How long was I –”
“Overlong, Shield.”
Ev lin Dar blinked. There was no tone of admonishment to the Prince’s voice, only a soft and simple relation of fact. And underlying it, perhaps, maybe, just maybe, another thing.
Her heart fluttered, something flitted in her belly.
He waited for me?
Aside from streaks of dried blood on his chiseled cheeks and chin, Kor ben Dor seemed entirely unaffected by his own ordeal and the subsequent devastating explosion.
“Remain here, Umbar’hal,” commanded the Halflord. “I need not remind you to say nothing.”
The fatigue upon the Graniant’s face was utter, absolute.
“Of course, Halflord,” wheezed the shaman.
Kor ben Dor then met Ev lin Dar’s damp gaze. A brief but certain silence shared.
“We ride now.”
The Black Shield nodded mutely. Her throat felt suddenly sore.
He waited for me.
Two renders rumbled out of the night, manes and fetlocks flowing like flames. With reptilian alacrity, Gren del Mor swung upon his steed. Entirely recovered, save the tightness in her throat, Ev lin Dar leapt lithely aback her monstrous mount, taking the reins in an iron grip, nudging the monster northward toward the diminishing din of battle.
But the beast did not move.
“No, Ev lin Dar,” said the Halflord softly. “Not north. West.”
West?
The question must have been etched upon the Black Shield’s blood-streaked, tigress-tattooed mien, for Kor ben Dor answered.
“Yes. West. Fast and hard. Then north. I am sure you can reason why.”
Ev lin Dar nodded dumbly once more. West, north, east, south. What matter? She did not care where, did not care why.
He waited for me.
With no further word, the Halflord spun his render about, the monster rearing as its mighty master hefted his massive mace high.
And the black tide of the Bloodspawn roared once and thundered away.
The Host of Arrenhoth rode like a great grey wind.
West. Fast and hard.
Bent low over their majestic mounts, cloaks and pennons flying, Tulnarron and company raced headlong and heedless along the Soft Road. Caution sacrificed for speed. The hooves of the mirarra devoured league after league, even as the hours consumed the last morsels of night. The sun slid slowly above the rim of the world, red spears of light hurling at the backs of the riders as they chased their shadows westward. Far behind them, a surly scarlet dawn shone its shadowlight upon the ruin that had been wrought, the death that had been dealt.
