Song Of Mornius

by Diane E Steinbach

  Only the boy clutching at her arm steadied her pounding heart. “Don’t fight them,” he pleaded, glancing up. “Please! She’s my mother!”

  “Back away!” Avalar warned the strangers. “Do it and I shall give you this child; do it not . . .” Her control shattered, and she howled. “Get away!”

  Kray’s mother stumbled as she complied, her face haggard. “Kray?” she called. “Are you injured?”

  “The giant saved me!” Kray yelled over the indignant cries of the watching men. “I fell in the river. A prowler chased me!”

  The woman hesitated, and Avalar scanned her closely, glimpsing beneath the grime and careworn features the protective mother she was to Kray, not so unlike the parents of giant children. “She is very beautiful, Kray,” Avalar said. “What is her name?”

  “Lianna Middleton!” the boy answered as he stretched out his arms. “Mother!”

  Lianna waved the others back behind the trees. Reluctantly, the men obeyed, arguing in their rough Thalusian tongue.

  Avalar bent to lay the child on the ground, freeing him from her heavy cloak. She met Lianna’s stare. “Please,” Avalar said. Again she spoke in the same guttural language she had used with Kray, feeling grateful for the first time in her life for her tedious lessons at Freedom Hall. “You are famished, and I have food.”

  The little people went very still, and Avalar opened her pack, sensing how their hungry gazes tracked her every move, their interest intensifying. “Your son was injured, and I succored him. Now, if I may, I wish to give you aid. Have the prowlers taken so much? How many of you have perished?”

  Lianna motioned to the trees. “Sherin, my brother, take Kray. Do it now.”

  A tall, balding man skulked forward to claim the boy. Avalar allowed it, winking at Kray while his uncle swept him up, hastening the child away from her sight.

  She lifted a greenish sphere from her opened pack, the color of reef-bulb she had designated for dried fish. Carefully she placed it on the frozen ground and stepped back. “Hold it with your knees,” Avalar instructed the woman, “and press along the seam to pry it open. It’s smelly, but it will lend you strength for your journey home.”

  Hesitantly Lianna lowered her weapon and Avalar smiled, hoping belatedly it would not be taken as a threat. “Prowlers prefer their own territory,” Avalar said. “It seems to me they have claimed this area. I am not wise, but I say you would do well to settle elsewhere.”

  Nodding a mute farewell, Avalar retreated. She ducked under the branch of a massive pine, keeping her sword at the ready while checking repeatedly behind her. Focused as she was on putting as many trees as possible between her and the humans, Avalar failed to notice how the winter birds had hushed.

  A swift, soft panting alerted her. She spotted the dark smudge of a figure crouched low beneath a fern, the glimmer of its steady amber eyes peering up.

  Avalar stopped short. “Are you pursuing these humans?” she asked. “Should I be hunting you?”

  “Fish,” the creature hissed. “Grubby paws, I smell. Give me!”

  Avalar considered the hidden figure. Despite its petite stature, she felt a tingle of fear. “You are rude,” she told it. “Why should I give you anything?”

  “I notter trail humans,” came the sibilant voice. “Fish better.” It paused, and Avalar heard a quick series of grunting breaths. “Fish, give me!”

  “Show yourself,” said Avalar. “Let me see you first.”

  The branches swayed. Slowly the creature stalked toward her, bounding into her sight. It was lithe and lean, its color that of pale sunlight filtered through leaves both golden and brown.

  Avalar caught her breath, stunned by the prowler’s unexpected beauty.

  The predator was naked, its flat, lean muscles sliding beneath a short, tawny-red coat dappling into gray along its flanks and shoulders. Stripes of ebony reached from its calves and elbows to its furry black paws. It was small, half the size of a human, its limbs designed for running on all fours. Its sharp ears flicked in her direction, pricking atop its domed skull.

  As Avalar watched, the hooded, wide-spaced eyes glinted up at her, the blunt muzzle lifting, jaws parting into a needle-toothed smile. “She-prowler,” the creature purred. “Beautiful, yes? You like?”

  Avalar inclined her head, entranced by the creature’s golden stare. “You are beautiful,” she said. “Were you following me? What is your name?”

  A raspy thrumming came from the carnivore’s throat. “I, Shetra. I notter harm giant. Notter hurt life of world. Prowler protect!”

  “Good,” Avalar told her. “For I am battle-trained by Grevelin

  Mistavere. No giant knows combat so well as he.”

  The catlike creature lashed her rust-colored tail. “I notter match for giant. Fish?”

  Avalar snorted. Again, she shrugged off her pack, keeping her blade at the ready for the predator to see.

  Her last reef-bulb landed with a soft crunch at the prowler’s feet, but on impulse Avalar leaned in, the threat of her blade holding the creature back. “Promise,” she said, “none of your people will stalk these humans. If they do, I shall know it. We giants have a way of knowing these things. We thwarted your Raider cousins in the south, and if we must, we will stop you.”

  Shetra’s breath puffed her cheeks with an agitated rhythm. “No prowler hunt. Cruel human take human meat, notter prowler!”

  “You lie,” Avalar said. “Last night a child was injured by one of your kind.”

  “Shem.” Shetra opened her jaws in a toothy yawn of disgust. “Bad male is outsider. Heem hurt here.” With a splay-toed paw, she tapped at her temple. “Notter good.”

  Avalar drew back her weapon, surrendering her last bulb. “To protect the humans, I will kill this Shem if I find him. If you have love for him at all, warn him to leave this land at once.”

  Shetra sprang forward and fastened her jaws on the glistening green sphere. A second great leap took her sailing over the low-hanging branches of the trees.

  Avalar stared at the spot where the prowler had been. Something sinister preyed on the town of Firanth, feasting on its people.

  She forced her thoughts to more immediate things like hunting for her dinner and replenishing her stores. “I am your companion once more,” she told the river. “Until I reach this Lake Crinath, where we shall again part ways, for I am marching to Tierdon!”

  Ponu had mentioned a path between the mountains. Yet right now, from where she stood, it seemed unlikely they would ever end.

  Chapter 7

  GAELIN SIGHED AS he braced himself on his staff. He stood on a hill with his shoulders to the wind more than a league away from the town of Heartwood. A few hours ago, he had visited the Seeker elves’ temple, strolling barefoot next to Everove through its pristine hall, oblivious to the doom tightening a noose around Heartwood’s inhabitants. Now, viewed from a distance, the cluster of peaked rooftops glittered like hammered blacksteel under the rays of the setting sun, the alabaster temple gleaming pink and gold behind them.

  The appearance of Terrek on his plunging white gelding at the base of the sanctuary’s steps, and afterward the wild ride into the hills, had shocked out of him any lingering benefit he had gained from the temple’s tranquility.

  “We ride to battle!” Terrek had shouted, and Gaelin’s wrist still ached where Terrek had seized him to help him mount. They had ridden hunched over the racing horse, reining Duncan from side to side to avoid the dachs’ diving attacks from above, the winged creatures striking at them with primitive sabers.

  At least twenty humans from Heartwood had joined Terrek’s forces, or so it seemed to Gaelin as Terrek threaded his lathered horse around the heaps of dead branches and other debris the men had piled between the two hills.

  “The dachs fear sunlight,” Gaelin mused with a glance at the clouds. He recalled Terrek’s hasty explanation to his new men: “They attack any burning thing. We’ll lure them to the fires and come down at them from both sides!�
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  A bell ringing from the town interrupted Gaelin’s reflections, and he saw Heartwood’s streets emptying below, the fearful people hurrying into their darkened shops and homes.

  He started when Mornius’s pulsing gem crackled close to his ear, and a quiet, stern voice entered his awareness, entwining itself with his thoughts: “I am here.”

  Gaelin winced at the pressure mounting in his temples. A sickness roiled in his belly, the familiar nausea he experienced whenever he heard the staff’s voice inside his head. He pulled his blue cloak higher up his neck, hugging its folds to his chest while he watched the sun settle behind the mountains.

  The forest, separating the valley from the surrounding peaks, spread out along the fringes of the harvested fields. He could see a commotion in the dimming treetops and in the woodland’s outgrowth of pines between the town and himself. The branches moved where the enemy crouched, the dachs waiting for the cover of dusk as obligingly the twilight gathered, creeping out across the rolling hills.

  It’ll be different this time, Gaelin reminded himself, his fingertips tingling. Terrek expects me to kill.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  AS THE LAST streaks of daylight faded in the east, a flock of winged dachs, with their long gray bodies and lashing tails, exploded from the trees on all sides. Screaming, they arrowed toward the blazing fires the warriors had built, hurling fistfuls of snow or dirt in their haste to extinguish the flames.

  “Now!” Terrek’s breath plumed as he shouted, and when his horse reared up, his fighters charged. Down the twin hills they rushed in their mismatched armor, their weapons flailing at the descending winged horde.

  More black figures burst from the forest with their sabers drawn, Erebos’s flightless dach army pouring from a shadow behind the benighted pines. Gaelin rubbed his eyes. The mind-touch from his staff, its earlier intrusion of words in his skull, had made him feel oddly detached. He squatted, cognizant of the men launching arrows and spears at their winged foes above him.

  He saw movement in the distance beyond the trees. The flimsy fence that surrounded Heartwood was growing. Touched by the golden light from the bonfires, the circle of dead sticks came alive under their knotted twine, their new branches sprouting, weaving together as they rose swiftly to the height of the town’s gabled roofs, the sharp thorns forming a defensive dome.

  A hand slapped his cheek, jerking him back to his place on the hill and the clash of men and dachs in front of him. He flinched when hard fingers seized his shoulder.

  “Gaelin!” Terrek yelled into his face. “Do it now!”

  Gaelin lifted his gaze, groaning at the pain knifing through his head. Terrek’s eyes were intense, his expression fierce as the pressure of his grip triggered memories—Seth Lavahl and his years of torment. Crying out, Gaelin recoiled. “Stop! Let me—”

  “Release him!”

  Gaelin tottered. The booming voice came from his throat, but it was not his own. In shock, he stumbled and fell, and a flash of white light from Mornius smote Terrek’s chest, sending him careening into his horse.

  Gaelin stared at his staff’s dissolving power, the lavender-blue tongues of it rippling down his arms. He fought to breathe, to see Terrek’s stunned dismay through the glare of Mornius’s multicolored gem. “I’m sorry!” he called. “I don’t know what happened. I didn’t mean—”

  Terrek wheeled to parry a dach’s blow aimed for his neck, grunting as he threw his attacker back. The creature paused, the fanned spikes along its spine exuding poison, and Gaelin caught a glimpse of the enemy’s face, its human skin melted and stiffened to form scales. The open mouth twisted into a pointy-toothed grimace, its crimson eyes blazing over the ridge of its nose.

  Gaelin staggered when a fighter crashed into him as he tried to climb to his feet. Everywhere he looked, the mindless creatures struggled. He had observed them from afar, but never so close. They’re people, he thought, tortured like me.

  Mornius’s Skystone flared above his hand while from some distant, echoing place, he heard weeping.

  “Grakan’s teeth!” Terrek’s voice seemed muted as he yelled, “Vyergin, stop!”

  “They suffer.” Gaelin cringed when the voice within his skull drowned out his benefactor’s words. He transferred Mornius to his left hand, the staff’s power swirling between his fingers. Frantic now, he skidded after Terrek across the shadowed half of the hill, his staff vibrating against his palm.

  A scream, cut short from somewhere below him, sent him ducking behind the trunk of a tree as a clamor rose, the clash of metal and the thumps of weapons striking flesh. Under his staff’s pale light, Gaelin spotted several bloodied men struggling past the bluebark pine concealing him, their legs trembling as they continued to fight the pursuing dachs.

  A battle-ax’s wooden shaft protruded from a body nearby. Without thinking, Gaelin lunged for it, grabbed at its haft, and yanked it free. He sprinted, catching up to the last dach, swinging the ax wildly at the creature’s shoulder.

  Instinctively Gaelin heaved backward, dislodging the steel blade. He spun around, cleaving his adversary’s temple as it collapsed.

  Fluid jetted, the hot blood splattering him, and he lurched, gagging, to his knees, the ax falling from his grasp. In a flash of brutal memory, Gaelin visualized Seth Lavahl’s dismemberment. Once more, he breathed the stench of his crime; transfixed, he gaped at his hands.

  He winced, two swords clanging close to his head. Wren Neche joined him, his slim blade deflecting the dach’s attack. Beyond Wren, metal flickered under the moonlight—the enemy’s sabers felling warriors he knew, men like Terrek, who needed him to kill.

  “They suffer!” said the voice, and Gaelin howled.

  To kill!

  Gaelin clambered upright, anger swelling in his chest, slashing crimson across his sight. Against his will the staff erupted, blasts of blue power bursting from its gem in all directions. He blinked, dazzled by Mornius’s brilliance, its alien magic exploding through the trees and setting the ground afire.

  The dachs screamed. Blistered bodies tumbled and fell, twisting in agony under each consecutive pulse from the stone.

  “Lavahl!” Wren shouted. “Behind you!”

  He wheeled, and another blast shocked him. More creatures fell, their writhing shapes curling, melting like wax into smoldering ruin.

  Gaelin shambled among the ashy husks that had been his foe. He sensed the presence rousing in his staff, the entity in the Skystone longing to heal the misery it saw, and yet the warder’s efforts only intensified the staff’s power, the magic whipping into a frenzy.

  Gaelin crested the hill and saw the bowman he knew as Grenner sprawled on his back. At once his mind cleared, the fire from his staff sputtering out. The wounded man stared at the stars, his hand gripping his mail. Gaelin stumbled toward him. “Did you drop your bow?” he asked, kneeling at Grenner’s hip. “I don’t see any blood.”

  “My side!” the marksman wheezed. “A polearm hit me. I can’t . . . breathe!”

  Closing his eyes, Gaelin tilted his staff above Grenner’s hand. Grenner, the one who likes to whistle, he thought. He pictured the fighter strong and whole as he positioned Mornius higher. Because of his inner turmoil, he had lost control of the staff’s power. Yet now he focused, reaching with his mind into the Skystone.

  Grenner lashed out, and Gaelin hissed as the bowman gripped his forearm. Lowering his staff, Gaelin pressed its stone against the warrior’s chest. Power crackled, spilling in ripples over his fingers. Grenner’s legs thrashed and then stilled.

  Gaelin sat back when Grenner released him, his hand tingling as he set Mornius in the grass. He bent, probing his patient through the rings of protective mail, finding the broken ribs knitted and whole.

  Grenner staggered to his feet and grinned.

  “Stay.” Through a haze of fatigue, Gaelin reached to detain the determined battler. “You need rest.”

  Grenner pulled free. “We’ll stop them, Staff-Wielder!” he cried. “This w
on’t be like Kideren!”

  Gaelin opened his mouth to protest, but the warrior was already striding across the hill with his sword drawn. Dazedly, Gaelin bent to collect his staff before limping to follow.

  The forest burned below him, its flames glowing orange over the lumps of the blackened trees. Gaelin stumbled as he neared the base of the hill, overwhelmed by the destruction his staff had caused, his hand shielding his eyes from the noxious smoke.

  The flightless dachs huddled, trapped between the bonfires and the reduced ranks of Terrek’s men. Their bloodshot eyes staring, the hapless creatures cringed at their airborne counterparts’ attempts to save them. In a cluster, they gibbered and sobbed.

  Gaelin screwed his eyes shut. From far away, he heard the dachs’ screaming and the ugly thud of metal on flesh as Terrek’s fighters finished their work.

  Terrek rose in his stirrups, his bloody blade held high, his white horse pawing the smoldering ground. The weary men—many of them carrying or dragging the wounded—converged toward their commander.

  Gaelin leaned on Mornius. The cries of the injured caught hold of him, driving him through the worst of the carnage. The hills and trees wavered in his dwindling sight as he fought to stay erect. His shoulders aching, he raised his staff.

  Terrek waved back over his triumphant men. When he shouted, his words were unintelligible, yet Gaelin caught the note of command in his voice.

  Gaelin sank to his knees and pressed his cheek against Mornius’s crystal. His consciousness penetrated the gem, the Skystone’s intricate matrix guiding him deep into a restless fog.

  As the mist brightened around him, he heard the sound of weeping, spied a figure transforming itself while he watched—first into a dragon, next a wolf, and then a man. After a final convulsion, the entity became a lion stretching out its massive forepaws, and Gaelin felt its power filling his chest, a frigid pressure ensnaring his heart.

  He struggled for breath, feeling the ice spread through his arms. His fingers clenched. Healing fire erupted from Mornius’s stone, arcing across the hills.