Dead Man's Steel

by Luke Scull

  You stood before the Bandit King. You knelt before the Butcher King. And you sent the Broken King to his death.

  He might’ve stood before Asander the Bandit King and he might’ve knelt before Krazka the Butcher King, at least after a fashion. But there was no way in hell he would ever send his own son to his death. ‘No man’s broken till he can’t get back up,’ he said, more sharply than he intended.

  Magnar looked away and Kayne hesitated a moment, dreading what was coming, knowing it had to be done. ‘Son,’ he began. ‘I got something to tell you. It’s... it’s about your ma.’

  Magnar’s grey eyes, his mother’s eyes, met Kayne’s blue orbs, and just like that understanding passed between father and son. ‘When?’ came his strangled reply.

  ‘A few weeks back.’ Kayne swallowed the lump in his own throat. ‘She loved us both. As much as any woman can love a husband and son.’

  Magnar nodded. His eyes were squeezed closed, and Kayne turned away so as not to see his son’s tears. He cleared his throat, took a step towards the entrance to the tent, and then stopped. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘For thinking what I did about you. That you could do what I thought you did.’

  ‘It’s okay, Pa.’

  Kayne nodded, suddenly overwhelmed by gratitude that Mhaira had raised a more forgiving man than he himself had ever been. ‘Rest now, son. We’re already halfway to the Trine. I promise, you ain’t seen anything like the city of Dorminia.’

  And I’m guessing they ain’t seen anything like us.

  Kayne exited the tent. A brisk wind ruffled his hair and beard and sent the smoke from the many campfires drifting south, towards their eventual objective, still hundreds of miles away. The ruins of Mal-Torrad were behind them now. The spirits had been kind and there was no sign of the gholam as the great train of Highlanders passed through the ruins. Still, the River of Swords was just ahead and fording the waterway was a daunting task at the best of times. With the incessant rain of early spring currently swelling the river to near bursting, now was decidedly not the best of times.

  ‘Your boy all right?’ came a rasp behind him and Kayne turned to see Jerek striding over, twin axes on his back and fire-scarred face locked into his perpetual frown. The grimmest and quite possibly the angriest man alive had been in a foul mood since nearing the bank of the great river. He’d been in a foul mood since the day he was born, that was a fact, but whatever a man might say about the Wolf’s temperament, he’d been a better friend than Kayne deserved.

  ‘I just told him the news. About his ma.’

  The Wolf nodded. Jerek wasn’t much for words. He let his actions do the talking, and he did them louder than any man Kayne had ever known.

  ‘Wanted to thank you again. For everything you’ve done. For forgiving me.’

  Jerek turned away and spat. ‘Been saving your sorry old arse for years now. Kill you, and what would I do with myself?’

  ‘Dunno,’ Kayne replied. ‘Maybe find a wife. Time comes when a man has to settle down.’

  Jerek spat again. ‘Women,’ he rasped. He reached up and ran a hand over his bald head, then over his beard, shot through with grey. ‘Ain’t got time for that shit.’

  ‘Kayne!’

  The old warrior spun as a familiar voice called out his name. Despite all the tragedy of recent weeks, Kayne couldn’t help but smile. Those emerald eyes and that shock of red hair were unmistakable.

  Brick wore a green travelling cloak thrown over his leather shirt and breeches, and his bow was slung over one shoulder. Beside him was his girl, Corinn, blue-eyed and blonde-haired. Kayne had last seen the two youngsters just north of the Greenwild – the immense forest that marked the southern border of the High Fangs. Brick and Corinn had departed in order to lead Milo, Tiny Tom and the rest of the orphans to the safety of Southaven in the Green Reaching.

  Brick threw his arms around Kayne, who returned the hug. ‘It’s been a while, lad,’ he said, giving him a fierce pat on the back.

  ‘Did you find her?’ Brick asked, his youthful voice full of excitement. ‘Did you find Mhaira?’

  Kayne swallowed the despair that welled up and forced a grin. ‘Aye, I found her. But let’s talk about that some other time. How are the foundlings?’

  ‘Safe,’ Brick replied. ‘The chieftain of the Green Reaching, Brandwyn, is a good man. He’s making sure they’re cared for.’

  Kayne nodded. Brandwyn the Younger was a different sort of leader to Carn Bloodfist. A leader for times of peace rather than war.

  ‘I can’t believe we’re heading south again so soon,’ Brick continued. ‘I thought we’d found a home in Southaven, but I guess it’s like you said. “Find someone that makes you feel like you belong and you’ll never want for a place to call home again.”’ He looked at Corinn, who was hanging back, smiling shyly. Suddenly Brick noticed something – or someone – and his grin returned twofold. ‘Jerek!’ he exclaimed.

  The Wolf was lurking a little apart from the group. He drew back as Brick sprinted towards him, fixed the boy with a scowl. ‘Keep your hands to yourself,’ he grumbled. ‘It’s pissing me off, all this fucking hugging. Are we men, or pussies?’

  Brick smiled even wider at that, as though he had expected no less. ‘I thought you were dead,’ he said, voice thick with disbelief. ‘When the gholam followed you into that tunnel I thought it was the last time I would ever see you.’

  ‘Well, here I am.’

  The flame-haired youngster looked from Kayne to Jerek and back again. ‘You were going to kill each other,’ he said nervously. ‘Are you friends again?’

  Jerek scowled. ‘We’re all right,’ he rasped. ‘Now stop with the questions. You’re doing my head in.’

  Brick’s grin almost split his face in half.

  *

  The River of Swords was a surging deluge. Kayne stared doubtfully across the river and turned to regard the vast army of Highlanders making its way towards the north bank. There were thousands – men, women and children, the young and the old and everyone in between. The great snaking line of humanity stretched back for miles – all the way to the bottom of the Purple Hills, where Asander the Bandit King’s men had ambushed Kayne, Jerek, Brick and his uncle in the not-too-distant past.

  Kayne wondered what Asander would make of an army of Highlanders pouring out of the mountains and crossing his domain. If he had any sense, Asander would mind his own business. The great migration of the people of the High Fangs to the Lowlands would change the shape of the north forever. If the Bandit King or his Seer tried to interfere with the exodus, they would be swept away by sheer numbers.

  Not to mention drawing the attention of the demon horde, the Legion, that’s rampaging through the Fangs.

  Kayne could only hope his countrymen from the remotest Reachings had somehow made it out of the mountains. Orgrim and Mace had bought the Heartlands some time, at least. Maybe the Brethren had, too.

  Kayne stared again at the river just ahead of him. Would water slow a demon? He reckoned not, or the Icemelt would’ve done a much better job of keeping them from the East Reaching. He wondered what had become of Watcher’s Keep. Ten years he’d served at the citadel as a Warden. Now it most likely lay in ruins. The world kept on changing, that was a fact – but it seemed to him the last year had seen enough change to last a man a lifetime.

  ‘We will need to ferry the provisions across,’ said Brandwyn the Younger. The chieftain of the Green Reaching came to stand beside Kayne. ‘We cannot afford to lose any more food.’

  We cannot afford to lose any more food. That was what Brandwyn the Elder had told Kayne when the Sword of the North turned up at his door in Beregund bringing warning of the Shaman’s ire. ‘How are we for rations?’ Kayne asked.

  Brandwyn stroked his rust-coloured beard and sighed. ‘Already we’ve less than half of what we brought through the Greenwild. Our foraging in Mal-Torrad turned up nothing. The place is as dead as ash.’

  ‘The Badlands ain’t much better,’ Kayne
said. ‘It’s near barren down to the Trine. Seems to me it’s a dying world we’re living in.’

  Brandwyn nodded. ‘What the world needs,’ he said slowly, ‘is fewer men good at killing and more men good at growing. At nurturing.’

  The barb behind his words wasn’t lost on Kayne, who winced. ‘Aye. Fewer men like me and your father.’

  The chieftain shrugged. ‘The people of the Green Reaching decided to follow a different path after the Shaman burned Beregund and had my father killed. Perhaps where they lead, others will follow.’

  ‘Can’t say I got any objections to that,’ Kayne replied. ‘Let’s hope you and Carn can lead us to a place where the farmers can grow and the merchants can trade. Till then, I reckon it’s the job of killers like me to make sure we survive that long.’

  *

  Night had fallen by the time the bulk of the Highlanders had forded the River of Swords. Even with the wooden ferry Brandwyn and his men had overseen the construction of, a handful of unfortunate souls had been lost to the vicious currents. Most were the very young or the very old, swept away into deeper waters where they were dragged under and drowned. They had also lost a tenth of their rations during the crossing, and fully a quarter of their grain supplies had been spoiled. All things considered, though, it could have been a lot worse.

  Small consolation when you’re burying a young child. Trying not to stare into empty eyes but feeling so guilty you have to. Arranging tiny limbs, cool and clammy.

  Kayne turned away from the last of the mounds and wiped his forehead with the back of one hand. He had volunteered for the grim duty, along with the relatives of the deceased. Jerek had wandered over and grabbed a shovel as well, got to digging without a single word uttered. The Wolf was sitting alone now, staring into the dancing flames of his campfire. Brick spotted him from where he was sitting with Corinn among Brandwyn’s entourage. The youngster hesitated, and then climbed to his feet and came to sit opposite Jerek. The men exchanged a small nod and sat in total silence.

  Kayne ambled over to a quiet spot beside an old willow. He knelt down and placed his greatsword on the sodden earth, then reached into the small leather pouch on his belt and removed the lock of Mhaira’s hair he kept there. He brought it up to his face, squeezed his eyes shut.

  He didn’t know how much time passed while he was kneeling and remembering his wife. He heard movement above him and opened his eyes to stare up at the hulking figure of Carn Bloodfist, the hilt of Oathkeeper jutting ominously above one shoulder.

  ‘We cross into bandit territory on the morrow,’ rumbled the chieftain of the West Reaching, staring in the direction of the Bandit King’s vast town of tents, south and east. ‘Can we expect trouble?’

  Kayne climbed back to his feet, his knees cracking painfully. ‘Not if Asander has any sense.’

  Carn’s dark eyes narrowed at something off in the night. ‘Do you see that?’

  Kayne followed Carn’s gaze, squinting up at the sky. A few stars peeked out from behind gathering thunderheads. Many miles east, up in the clouds, a dark speck circled.

  ‘The hell is that?’ Kayne muttered. He felt a deep sense of foreboding. ‘This Herald demon I heard so much about?’ he wondered.

  Carn shook his head, causing his braided hair and beard to sway. The Herald is huge, but whatever that is, it is bigger still.

  Brick came to stand beside them. The youngster raised a freckled hand and stared out with eyes unsullied by the vagaries of age. ‘It looks like... a flying lizard,’ he said in awe.

  ‘A flying lizard?’ Kayne echoed, filled with a deep unease.

  An orange flash lit the sky below the creature. ‘Was that flame?’ Brick said, puzzled.

  Once again, one of the Seer’s prophecies caught fire in Kayne’s weary old brain; a prophecy about the red-haired youngster beside him.

  You will bring fire and blood back to the north, Shara had told Brick.

  Blood there was always plenty of – even in times of peace. But something told Kayne that the strange egg their friend Grunt had been carrying – the egg that the Seer had seized when she had taken them prisoner in the Bandit King’s camp – and the appearance of a giant, flying reptilian monster in the night sky were somehow related.

  The apparition wheeled once and then disappeared, flying east, dwindling until it disappeared from sight.

  ‘An ominous sign,’ Carn rumbled. ‘Whatever that thing is, let us hope it stays away from us. There appears be no end to the threats plaguing this land.’

  ‘Changing times,’ Kayne muttered.

  ‘This is a night of omens,’ Carn announced. ‘Heavy with portent. A night for fates to be decided.’ He reached up and unsheathed Oathkeeper. The runes etched into the steel glowed purple in the light of the campfires. The chieftain of the West Reaching fixed Kayne with an intense stare, dark eyes glittering in his huge skull. ‘A night for oaths to be fulfilled.’

  Kayne suddenly became aware of the silence that had settled over the camp. Hundreds of faces were watching the two legendary warriors, Finn among them, anticipation bright in his eyes.

  ‘Ready your blade, Sword of the North,’ Carn Bloodfist demanded. ‘For the thousands of my kin who died at Red Valley, I challenge you now.’

  Kayne saw Jerek begin to rise, and shook his head. The Wolf caught his expression and sat back down with a scowl. He wouldn’t interfere.

  Brick opened his mouth, a hundred questions on his lips, but Kayne placed a hand on his shoulder and guided him gently away. ‘This is between us,’ he whispered to the boy. ‘Don’t get in the way, lad.’

  Kayne raised his greatsword, feeling every day of his fifty-odd years, aware of hundreds of eyes boring into him, willing him to fail. Willing him to answer for his sins.

  ‘This is for my father,’ Carn growled, readying his own celebrated weapon. ‘Prepare to die, Sword of the North.’

  Oathkeeper came screaming down.

  Child of Murder

  ✥

  ‘WHERE IS SHE?’ demanded Davarus Cole, staggering through the throne room of the White Lady’s palace as the Consult and the Magelord’s handmaidens watched on. He was utterly spent; dragging Sasha onto a horse and keeping her upright for the entire ride back from the Fade ruins had been tougher than anything he’d ever done. He wanted to collapse right then and there, but sheer anger drove him on.

  ‘Turn back, brother,’ said one of the Unborn, moving to block his path. The broken throne loomed on the dais ahead. It was empty.

  ‘I’m not your brother,’ Cole spat. ‘She betrayed me. Fergus and his lackeys tried to kill Sasha. All we’ve ever done is dance to that bitch’s tune and this is how she repays us. Well, I’m not taking it any more. Get out of my way.’

  ‘We will not.’ Another handmaiden moved to join her sister, and then another. He was outnumbered three to one.

  Fuck this, Cole thought, impotent fury lending him courage. He lowered his shoulder and charged, expecting to be pounced upon and dismembered – or at least restrained – but as the White Lady’s servants began to converge on him, they shuddered and then stopped, held in place by some mysterious force.

  Cole didn’t pause to question his good fortune. He hurried past the broken throne and through the doorway at the rear of the chamber, then followed ivy-hung marble corridors to where he knew the Magelord’s private chambers were located. He would attempt to kill her when he found her. He knew he probably wouldn’t succeed. But there came a point when enough was enough.

  He gripped Magebane tightly, his hand pale and thin, his body wasting away from having given so much of its own vitality to save Sasha’s life.

  He reached a set of ornate silver doors upon which the White Lady’s likeness was etched, and his anger intensified. If there was one personality trait Davarus Cole could not abide, it was narcissism.

  There were noises coming from beyond the door; it sounded like the White Lady was screaming at someone, most probably Thanates. The two mages hated each other with a
passion. Cole certainly couldn’t blame the Dalashran wizard-king for his animosity. The woman he had once known as Alassa – the woman Thanates had once loved before the Godswar – was pure evil. Thanates on the other hand struck Cole as hard but fair. A man chiselled from a lifetime of intense hardship into a grim angel of retribution.

  Cole gritted his teeth and braced himself. I know exactly the feeling.

  He drove a booted foot into the doors and sent them crashing open with an almighty clang. He took five strides into the White Lady’s chambers before he stopped, dumbstruck by the sight before him.

  The Magelord was sitting astride Thanates on a great four-poster bed. She was stark naked, her back to Cole, her platinum hair dancing behind her as she moved up and down in a furious rhythm.

  ‘The fuck is this?’ Cole rasped.

  Thanates peered around the White Lady’s undulating figure. Eyeless sockets of black fire somehow contrived to look guilty. ‘Child of murder,’ he said, somewhat sheepishly.

  The White Lady leaped off Thanates, revealing the Dalashran wizard-king to be equally naked. She spun to face Cole, her silver gown rising off the floor to drape itself around her body. Her purple eyes narrowed in fury. ‘You dare?’ she whispered.

  ‘I dare what?’ Cole yelled, meeting her anger twofold. He pointed a trembling finger at Thanates. ‘I followed you from the Blight,’ he said accusingly. ‘You promised to make the White Lady pay for each and every wrong she’s done you. And now I find this... this bullshit.’

  A member of the Consult, an older fellow, suddenly burst into the chamber behind Cole. ‘Mistress!’ he began, sweat pouring from his brow. ‘I came here to warn you. The child of murder—’ He stopped when he saw Cole, realizing his warning had come too late. Then he saw Thanates naked on the bed and his eyes almost bulged out of his head.

  ‘Get out!’ the Magelord screamed. The man was thrust backwards out of the chamber by the force of her magic. There came a thud as he struck the wall in the corridor beyond.

  ‘Is that how you treat all your faithful servants?’ Cole demanded. ‘You use them, and then dispose of them when the mood takes you? What did Sasha ever do to you?’