The Shadow of Malabron

by Thomas Wharton

  “Do you say that?” Finn asked.

  “I say little about things I haven’t seen for myself,” Harke said. “A large party of us went there one night to drive this thing out or kill it. We discovered that over the years the League had transformed the keep, turned it into a treacherous maze. The thing that dwells there had no trouble staying one step ahead of us. Since then no one goes near the wretched place. We hear the creature almost every night. The sounds it makes can chill the very blood in your veins.”

  He wrapped his cloak more tightly round himself and said nothing more. No one else spoke. In the silence Will noticed that the sleet had stopped. Finally Harke stirred, and after a few words with his fellow watchers he led the way from the guardhouse, across a deserted square, and up the winding curve of a narrow street. The city was uncannily silent. Most of the windows in the houses they passed were shuttered and lightless.

  Harke went along at a swift pace, and then halted abruptly at an alcove in a wall. Will could just barely make out the shape of a door in the shadows. Harke took a large iron key from his belt, unlocked the door, and opened it. He gestured for the others to enter before him. They did, and found themselves in a walled court. On their left stood a long, low-roofed building that Will guessed was the smithy itself. A wavering reddish light came from its wide doorway, and Will could hear the sound of a hammer ringing from within. On the right was a small, rickety-looking house of stone and timber, three or perhaps four storeys high.

  “We have guests, Freya,” the blacksmith called to someone in the smithy. Will saw a figure silhouetted by the glow of the forge, a figure that turned and came at a jog out into the courtyard. It was a young woman with plaited white-blonde hair and a streak of soot across her brow. Her face was ruddy and glistened with sweat. In her hands was an iron hammer.

  The young woman was far more pleasant to look at than the blacksmith, Will thought, but still there was no doubt she was Harke’s daughter.

  “You’re back early, Father,” she said, glancing warily at the strangers. “Will you come and look at the work?”

  “Damp the fire, Freya,” Harke said. “That’ll be all for tonight. Is your mother within?”

  “Yes, she’s with Thorri.”

  The girl studied the toymaker’s face for a long moment and then broke into a smile. To Will’s astonishment she ran up to the old man and hugged him.

  “Father Nicholas,” she cried, burying her face in his shoulder. “It is you.”

  “Freya,” Pendrake said with a laugh. “You’ve grown, my child.”

  “Father said you would come back some day,” Freya said, stepping back with a wide smile.

  “You were hoping I’d bring toys, like last time?”

  Now it was the young woman’s turn to laugh.

  “No, just yourself,” she said. “I’ll see you inside when I’m finished here.”

  She gave the rest of Pendrake’s party another quick, curious look, then returned to the smithy. Harke led his guests to the house. As they climbed the steps, the door opened and a woman appeared, the warm light from within at her back. Her hair was less threaded with silver than Harke’s, but Will could see where Freya’s good looks had come from. The woman surveyed Will and his friends with a keen eye, and then, like her husband and daughter, her face beamed with happy surprise when she recognized the toymaker. She hurried forward to embrace him.

  “We thought you had forgotten us, Nicholas,” she said in a trembling voice.

  “Never, Ulla,” Pendrake said. “I have been kept busy.”

  He turned to Rowen. The toymaker introduced her to Harke’s wife.

  “A lovely girl,” Ulla said, and embraced Rowen, who stammered a polite reply.

  “And this is Will Lightfoot, and his friend Shade,” Pendrake went on. “And Finn Madoc of the Errantry.”

  Now that she had welcomed the toymaker, Ulla seemed not to notice or care what a strange company the five of them made. Without hesitation she invited them into the house, and led them to the kitchen. A boy of three or four was playing on the floor with several wooden toys that had once been brightly painted but had lost most of their colour. He looked up at the strangers with startled, haunted eyes. The same look, Will thought with a pang of sadness, that he had seen in Jess’s eyes after their mother died. Then the boy saw Ulla and as if nothing had happened he returned to his play.

  “Good to see those toys still getting use,” Pendrake said with a smile.

  “Children still play,” Harke said with a nod. “Despite the dark. We can be thankful for that.”

  The room had a stout brick oven and a domed ceiling, and was bright with a multitude of metal pots and pans that Will guessed had likely been made by Harke and his daughter. It was a cosy, welcoming room, but a sword hung within easy reach by the door.

  Ulla ushered them into the kitchen and invited them to sit on benches round the table. She served them broth and hard bread, with a few thin slices of cheese. She glanced at Shade, who was sitting at Will’s feet.

  “I’m afraid I don’t even have a soup bone, for…” she began apologetically.

  “I do not need to eat,” Shade said, and both Ulla and Freya stared at him in amazement. After that, Ulla seemed unwilling to ask too many questions, but made up for the awkwardness by talking about the way things were in Skald now.

  “When the werefire first broke out, Ragnar and I wanted to leave,” she said. “For Freya and Thorri. We even began packing, but in the end we stayed. We thought of all those who gave their lives for this city over the years. They never despaired, and neither will we.”

  “We didn’t know about this in Fable,” Finn said. “When riders of the Errantry came to Skald, they were…”

  He hesitated.

  “Made unwelcome,” Harke said. “The mages didn’t want any knights of the Guild interfering with their plans. And fools like me decided it wasn’t any of our business, and did nothing.”

  “Ragnar and I have lain awake many a night, listening to the foul things that haunt our streets,” Ulla said to Pendrake. “We wondered if our old friend Nicholas would ever return…”

  She broke off and her eyes filled with tears.

  “Harke has told me about the dweller in the keep,” Pendrake said. “It sounds as if that is the source of the werefire, and most of the trouble.”

  “You’re right, I’m sure,” Harke said. “But what can we do about it?”

  Pendrake stroked his beard thoughtfully but said nothing. Freya came in to sit with them and share the meal. She was introduced to everyone and soon began asking questions about their journey and why they had come, but when she saw that no one was willing to tell very much, she turned to speaking of other things.

  “I help father make the armour for the Watch,” she said when Pendrake asked. “And sometimes I go on watch, too.”

  “They let you fight?” Rowen asked eagerly.

  “She’s one of our fiercest,” Harke said proudly.

  When the companions had finished eating, the blacksmith showed them upstairs to a narrow loft where they could spend the night. There were no beds, but several thick blankets and bolsters were ranged along the walls. A small round window in a deep alcove looked out onto the street.

  “We often have guests these days,” Harke said. “Folk driven from their houses and farms by the cursed hellthings that prowl ever closer to our gates. The mordog and others can smell the city’s dying.”

  “What is the werefire?” Will asked after he had taken a long look out of the window. The blacksmith’s good eye fixed upon him. He knows I’m the reason we’re here, Will thought.

  To his surprise, Rowen answered his question.

  “It’s the Weaving,” she said with a startled look, as if she had just realized it herself. “It’s what becomes stories.”

  Pendrake nodded, studying her carefully.

  “Innumith. The fathomless fire. Mages can draw it out of the Weaving like raw ore, not yet refined into tales. If
this is done with care, good can be accomplished, but there are dangers. If done recklessly, the raw storystuff runs wild. It cannot harm you as a real flame would, but it can dazzle the eyes and mislead the mind. The fire desires to become stories but there is nothing to shape it, so it creates illusions that flicker and change like flames. And worse, blood-hobs and deathdancers and other shadowfolk are attracted to the fire and feed on it. Until it dies down, these creatures are sure to stay.”

  “How long does it take for the fire to die?” Harke asked the toymaker. “Months? Years?”

  “That depends on many things, especially the fire’s source.”

  “There are only vague rumours of what happened,” Harke said. “We know that the Four often left the city. They were looking, it was said, for some lost artefact, a thing of spellcraft that would give them even more power. Not long before the werefire broke out, they returned from such a journey, but one of them, the mage Strigon, was not with them, and the other three were very troubled. Then one night the werefire was suddenly everywhere, and soon afterwards folk began to speak of the dweller in the keep. We went to demand answers of the League, but by then they had fled the city.”

  Harke was about to leave them for the night when there was a shriek from the street below, followed by the sound of raised voices and running feet. Will and Rowen hurried to the window and looked out: they were in time to see a group of cloaked figures with torches running up the street.

  “Another band of the Watch,” Harke said, joining Will and Rowen at the window. “After something that just slithered out of its lair.”

  Will was about to turn away from the window, but he lingered, looking across the rooftops at the distant battlements of the keep, lit by the eerie green glow of the werefire. The flames were stronger there than anywhere else he looked.

  For an instant the small window was filled by a face, white as a ghost’s, with huge bloodshot eyes. Even as Will shouted and leapt back, the face was gone.

  “Roofcrawler,” Harke said. “A kind of large bat. Or something in a bat’s shape, with a man’s face. They look in windows a lot, but they never try to get in. The only trouble they make is stealing dogs and cats for food. You should keep your … friend indoors with you tonight.”

  He nodded towards Shade, who bristled.

  “For their sake,” the wolf growled.

  “Grandfather,” Rowen said, and her voice was so weak they all turned in alarm. She had sat down on one of the makeshift beds. Her face was pale and gleaming with sweat, as it had been in the storyshard. Pendrake hurried to her side.

  “I’m just a little dizzy,” she said. “Tired.”

  “It’s the werefire,” Pendrake said. “It affects some more than others. This happened to me the first time I was exposed to the fire. You need rest.”

  “And I’ll try to see you get it,” Harke said, and once again he gave Will a quick, uneasy glance. “I will post sentries from the Watch at my gate.”

  He bade them good night and went out. Will turned to Rowen and was alarmed to see terror in her eyes.

  “What is it?” he asked, sitting beside her.

  “I see shapes,” Rowen said. “People. Things. At the corners of my eyes. I can’t stop them. They’re there and then they vanish.”

  “They can’t harm you, Rowen,” Pendrake said. “They are only illusions, created by the werefire.”

  “But why? Why am I seeing them, and no one else?”

  “Just let them come and go, Rowen,” Pendrake said, running his hand gently over her brow. “Don’t try to stop them. They’re like dreams. Shadows of stories that haven’t come to be.”

  “Is this what you see, as a loremaster?” Rowen asked, her eyes wide. “Is that what’s happening to me?”

  Pendrake studied her with concern.

  “When I was very young, younger than you,” he said, “I stumbled upon an outbreak of werefire. I was foolhardy. I thought I could step unscathed into the Weaving, learn the secrets of the fathomless fire. It almost destroyed me, but it taught me who I am. To be a loremaster is more than a choice, or a duty. It is in my blood. And so it is in yours.”

  Rowen stared at him, her face white.

  “You knew this would happen…”

  “I didn’t know, not for certain. Your mother never displayed the gift.”

  “The gift…” Rowen said in a hollow voice, then she looked up at Pendrake, her eyes burning. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Pendrake placed a hand on her shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, my child. I wished not to burden you, if this day never came.”

  Rowen’s eyes filled with tears.

  “Will it … will it get worse?”

  “I can’t say. This outbreak of werefire is the worst I’ve seen, and that is probably why you have been affected so powerfully. In time, with me here to guide you, you should be able to control the visions.”

  Rowen wiped her eyes. She stared fixedly in front of her, not looking at anyone. Then she lay down on the bed, shivering, and turned away from them. Will watched her anxiously, wishing there was some way he could help, then he gathered with the others by the window.

  “That creature that looked in at us,” Finn said. “Another servant of the Angel?”

  “I don’t believe so,” Pendrake said. “It looked as startled as we were. Still, with this city in such a state, it would not be difficult for Lotan to find allies here. We need to be wary, and ready to flee at a moment’s notice.”

  “Then we should leave this house now,” Finn said. “Before we bring worse trouble to these good folk. And there’s Rowen to think about. What this place is doing to her.”

  “I’ve considered all that,” Pendrake said, and Will heard anger in his voice. “But I also have faith in Moth and Morrigan. If danger threatens, they will know, and find a way to warn us. We will leave in the morning.”

  He turned from the window. His eyes met Will’s briefly then looked away.

  “The best thing for all of us is sleep,” he said wearily.

  Take thee unrefined Brimstone and the skin of the Batrachian worm, ground to powder in a mortar of mulciber-marble. Dissolve in unrefined Essence of Story and let stand for one waxing and waning of the Moon. Heat in the alembic to Vulcan’s degree and let the concoction seethe well, then cool with thirteen dollops of blood from a black Unicorn. Of the resultant potion take but three drops in a vial of purest crystal. One drop more, or less, and all is ruined…

  — Greymould’s Sorcery For Dunces

  AFTER HE LAY DOWN, Will deliberately kept himself awake. A suspicion had entered his mind when Pendrake had looked at him, and he wanted to confirm it. He was not sure how long he waited, but after what seemed hours of listening to the steady breathing of the others, he finally heard a sound, opened his eyes, and saw the old man rise, don his coat and take up his staff. Before he left he bent over Rowen, gazed at her for a long moment, and stroked her hair. Shade, who was resting beneath the window, raised his head, but made no sound.

  Will sat up. Pendrake turned, saw him, and shook his head.

  “You should be sleeping,” he chided.

  “You’re going to the keep, aren’t you?” Will asked in a whisper.

  “To look around, yes. You’re safe here with Shade and the Watch. Get some rest, Will. I’ll return as soon as I can.”

  “What about Rowen?” Will asked. “What if something happens to her while you’re gone?”

  “She is sleeping quietly now, thank goodness. If I can do something about the werefire, perhaps it will help her.”

  Will looked at the wolf, who was silently watching this exchange with his calm, penetrating gaze.

  “You should take Shade with you,” he said. “You’ll need him … out there.”

  “I go where you go, Will Lightfoot,” Shade said quietly.

  “And you are not going to the keep, Will Lightfoot,” Pendrake said emphatically.

  “No, Grandfather,” Rowen said, and they all turned
at the sound of her voice. She was pulling on her cloak. “Will should go to the keep.”

  Pendrake gave her a searching look, his brows knitting.

  “Rowen, you’re not well. You don’t know what you’re saying—”

  “I do know what I’m saying. You know I do. Will should go to the keep. And so should I.”

  Her eyes met Will’s and he remembered what she had told him outside the Golden Goose. He took a deep breath.

  “Then I’ll go,” he said.

  “And so will I,” Shade said.

  “Listen to me now, Will,” Pendrake said, his face darkening. “This city is dangerous. I cannot let you take that risk.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Rowen said firmly. “If I do have this gift, then you should let me try to use it. Maybe I can help you.”

  “Rowen, you need to rest…”

  “I won’t stay here without you.”

  “We may be going straight to the source of the werefire. It could be too much for you…”

  “Please, Grandfather. I have to do this.”

  Pendrake stared at the three of them, his jaw working. At last he sighed and shook his head.

  “And I thought I’d slip out of here unnoticed,” he muttered. “I’ve become clumsy in my old age. Soon I’ll be huddled in front of the fire, dribbling soup down my chin.”

  “Not for a while yet, I hope,” Finn said. He was standing on the other side of Will, already slipping on his coat. Pendrake laughed softly and shrugged.

  “Well, since stealth is now out of the question, we had better wake Ragnar and tell him what we’re up to. We don’t want to go blundering around his house in the dark.”

  As it turned out, the blacksmith met them at the bottom of the stairs. He carried a lit candlestick in one hand and a sword in the other.

  “I thought it was you, but I had to be sure,” he said with an embarrassed sideways look. “Now, Master Nicholas, I want you to know there’s no blame at all. This city is best kept away from, I know that, so please don’t think twice about leaving…”