Circle at center sc-1

by Douglas Niles

  Yet her hopes were dashed against the reality of a strange odor, a bitter scent of metal and sweat. She gulped and tried to still her trembling, certain now that a Delver Dwarf had somehow found his way into her home. And where there was one of the Unmirrored, there were bound to be others-the creatures could only reach this island by boat, and that meant at least a score of the wretched killers.

  Her next thought was of Karkald, and it spiked her awareness with sheer terror. If Karkald had been surprised by the Blind Ones, then he was already dead. If not, he would be coming for her-but could he know of the menace that had already penetrated their very home?

  Finally she moved to practical questions: What could she use as a weapon? Where should she go? She thought of the lantern and in the next instant the oil-filled jar was in her hand. She found a match and struck the tip, wincing as the harsh sound jarred the darkness. At the same time the smell of burning sulphur permeated the den-and there was a sharp intake of breath from the next room. She had been heard.

  With the lantern aglow she looked across the chamber, to the main doorway. Dark shapes moved there, several Delvers charging toward the sound and smell of the lamp. To the side was the narrow passage that connected with the water room and, beyond, the corridor leading back to the kitchen. In that instant-she had no more time-Darann made her plan.

  Two hideous figures rushed through the door into the bedchamber. In a single glance she took in the blank, eyeless face masks, the triple-bladed daggers clutched in each hand. Locating her by sound, one of the Delvers slashed his way toward her, crossing his lethal weapons with lightning quickness back and forth in front of his armored chest.

  The Seer woman threw the lamp, hard, against the floor between the two attackers. Instantly the ceramic shattered and a splash of oil swept around the burning wick. Flames leapt onto the legs and bellies of the two Delvers, who screamed and dropped their blades as they desperately swiped at their fiery armor.

  Darann was already running, into the water room with its stout door of sheet steel. She slammed the door shut and slapped the lock into place before running out the other side, to find herself in the kitchen. Immediately she stopped, listening, smelling, trying to see through the murky air of the den.

  Some light spilled from the fire that had spread to engulf the bedchamber. The brightness was enhanced by the appearance of a burning Delver who stumbled from that chamber to sprawl, flailing and crying out, across the floor of the main room. Another Blind One, cursing the noise and hysteria, slashed his daggers into the burning form of his cohort. The injured dwarf cried out, then groaned as the attacker, locating the neck, drove the blade in a thrust that instantly silenced his shrieking companion.

  Darann’s arrival in the kitchen hadn’t been heard or smelled yet. She counted five or six Delvers poking through the main room, grasping at her belongings, jabbing at the walls, finding and breaking down the doors to the storage room and the pantry.

  “Silence!”

  The command hissed through the room and immediately the Delvers ceased all activity.

  For the first time Darann’s attention turned to the speaker, an Unmirrored Dwarf who stood in shadowy darkness in the alcove leading from the portico. She heard a gurgling breath, and knew this was the intruder she had sensed initially. He came forward and in the dim illumination she saw that he did not wear the full-face masks of his underlings. This Delver’s moist red nostrils were exposed, and his jaws, while shiny and metallic, moved flexibly when he spoke.

  “There is one Seer here… a female,” said the snuffling Delver. “There!”

  She knew that he had found her, was somehow indicating her location to the other Delvers-though she didn’t know how. Two of the armored dwarves advanced toward the wide arch leading into the kitchen. Her fear thrummed between her ears, and Darann knew that she was gasping for breath, making more noise that she should. Yet even if she could have willed herself completely silent, in these close quarters the Blind Ones would be able to find her by scent alone.

  Not daring to take her eyes from the archway, but knowing the cooking surface well, she reached back and snatched up a cleaver and a long-bladed knife. One of the blades clinked against the metal oven, however, and a Delver, weapons whirling, charged toward the sound. Darann screamed as she brought down the cleaver, gouging deep into the Blind One’s wrist. The attacker grunted, but ignored the pain to slash the dagger in his other hand toward her face.

  Some instinct of preservation had compelled her to raise her own knife, and the two blades clinked together. The strength of the Delver astonished her-the force of his blow knocked Darann backward two or three steps. The wounded dwarf charged after as she swung the cleaver again. This time the blade bit into the gap between the Delver’s helmet and his shoulder plate. With a gasp he collapsed, dragging the weapon from Darann’s hand.

  The second attacker came on more slowly, feeling with his feet to avoid tripping over the body of his companion. All the while his triple-bladed daggers whirled before him, effectively blocking any attempt Darann could have made at stabbing him. Instead, she backed up another step, casting around for some avenue of escape.

  She found herself staring into a face of unspeakable horror. Wide red nostrils flared wetly as the Delver reached out to pin her arms to her sides. Jaws of fleshless metal gaped into a grin, and he chortled between teeth that were sharpened steel points growing right out of the bloody bone of his gums.

  Darann couldn’t help herself-she screamed, a full-throated yell that exploded from her lungs and pierced the air of the den. Panic gave her strength, and she kicked and spat, trying to force herself out of that crushing grasp.

  The grotesque Delver only threw back his head and laughed, a wet sound of cruel amusement. Like the others, he had a smooth face-plate over his forehead and the place where his eyes should be, but there the similarity ended. This Blind One revealed his wide nostrils, which flared obscenely as though seeking Darann’s essence. And then there was that horrid mouth, as if a metallic coating had been melted over the creature’s teeth and jaws, then forged into razor-edged fangs. The dwarfwoman sobbed and thrashed, knowing that those teeth could snap forward and tear out her throat at a momentary whim.

  “Cease the attack-I, Zystyl, have claimed the prisoner!” cried the Delver captain.

  Vaguely Darann was aware that she was still clutching the long-bladed knife. She squirmed, trying to raise her hand. As if he sensed the weapon, the Blind One reached down and twisted her wrist. With a gasp of pain she dropped the blade, then slumped against the counter as he pressed her back.

  “Find the male-kill him, however you want!” hissed Zystyl. “This one is mine!”

  A bright red tongue snaked from his mouth, licking along Darann’s cheek, probing roughly against her eye. “Cry, wench!” he demanded. “I would taste your tears!”

  Darann moaned and tried to turn away, but those hands were too strong. She was sobbing, and felt a fleeting impulse to hurl herself onto a weapon, to end her life before this monster could work his unspeakable tortures. But even if she’d made this choice, Zystyl’s grasp was too firm.

  And then coolfyre blazed through the den, sending all the rooms into brilliant relief. Karkald was there, charging in from the portico path. He had thrown a globe of the light onto the floor, and the glass had shattered with a light pop.

  “The male!” shrieked Zystyl. “He has lighted us!”

  Delvers rushed from the other rooms, but Karkald didn’t wait for them to come to him. He lunged, holding his spear by the shaft and deftly plunging the weapon between the whirling daggers of a Blind One. That dwarf went down, but the Seer was already spinning away, bringing his hammer down on a black-armored skull, then throwing his hatchet through the air. The sharp-bladed weapon punctured the face-plate of another Delver, burying itself in the exposed flesh of his wide nose.

  Darann’s captor sniffed at the air, relaxing his grip on Darann as he tried to locate Karkald. She saw her chan
ce and kicked him hard, in the knee. With an oath he stumbled away, and she snatched up the cleaver she had dropped and dashed across the room, hacking the blade into the neck of a Delver who was approaching Karkald from behind. That enemy fell and she stumbled over the body to lean against her husband’s strong arm.

  “Are you all right?” he gasped, his eyes wide with fear-for her, she realized. Even as he spoke he used his weapons with deft skill, chopping away another Delver, then sidling forward to stand before his wife.

  But now more Delvers spilled through the passage Karkald himself had used-a dozen or more who had pursued him from the portico. Across the den Zystyl limped out of the kitchen. His nostrils sought, opening and closing, tasting the air until that gruesome face fixed itself upon Darann.

  “She is there,” the Blind One said quietly. “Bring her to me, and make sure that you spare her eyes until she has watched her mate die.”

  Karkald raised his weapons, but now he faced a full circle of Delvers. Grimly, with snorts of triumph, they closed in.

  3

  A Knight of the Temple

  Proud Jerusalem!

  Philistine, Roman,

  Muslim Christian Jew;

  All bleed red beneath thy holy walls.

  From the Tapestry of the Worldweaver, Chronicles of a Circle Called Earth

  The witch lived at the top of the steepest crag in the Lodespikes, but Sir Christopher would go willingly, gladly, up the precipitous trail. Dismounting at the foot of a steep slope of boulders, he leaned his shield-upon which could still be seen the red cross of a Knight Templar-against a nearby stone. The symbol would ward against evil and the horse wait patiently, Christopher knew, while the man went about the work of God.

  He started upward with his sword sheathed at his side, using a stout staff as support on the jagged, rocky mountainside. The rod was smooth and dark, higher than himself by a foot, and showed the gleam of meticulous oiling and no little polish.

  In his other hand the knight carried a leather sack, holding the bag away from direct contact with his body. The serpent confined in the leathery prison twisted and writhed, hissing angrily, occasionally poking outward with a lethal fang. Sir Christopher was well satisfied with the vitality of the asp he had captured.

  Surely the witch would do the rest.

  Finally he came upon a trail that led him out of the boulders, then twisted up to a knifecrest of lofty ridge. A single step to either side would have sent him tumbling to his doom, but he marched forward resolutely.

  Now his goal was in sight, a tiny hut of stone and thatch standing at the crest of the domed summit. It was simple and rude, but from what Sir Christopher knew of witches, the interior would be well-furnished and spacious.

  She was waiting in the doorway, watching as he strode onto the broad cap of the mountaintop. Though he was winded, the knight betrayed no sign of fatigue as he walked up to the witch and stopped.

  His first thought was that she looked old for an elf. Her gray hair was incongruous on one of these folk who so rarely showed any sign of age. In his experience, even elven witches were vain enough to slick their hair with gold as they grew older.

  “You are human, but no druid,” she said.

  “I am a knight in service to Our Lord Jesus Christ,” he declared. “And I come seeking a boon from a witch.”

  “I am the sage-enchantress Allevia… I am not a…”

  The woman’s voice trailed off as she stared, wide-eyed, at the white pearl that Sir Christopher drew into his hand. He extended his clenched fist, allowing the stone to swing on its chain of gold. A crimson shape, a mark in the shape of an X, blazed from the face of the stone.

  “You bear the Stone of Command,” she said, awestruck. “The talisman of Caranor, my sister-how came you to hold it?”

  “She bestowed it upon me,” Christopher replied. “And now you must perform the task I request, correct?”

  “I will perform your task,” the witch said without hesitation.

  Sir Christopher seized the bottom of the sack, inverting it to dump the thrashing viper onto the ground. Instantly it coiled, then struck at the narrow shin of the elfwoman’s leg. The witch snapped a single word, a sound unlike anything Christopher could have duplicated, and the snake halted in mid-strike. Jaws wide, fangs extended, it was frozen like an image carved in wood.

  The knight tossed his staff to the ground beside the immobile reptile. “I want the snake to become the staff-and the staff, the snake. I desire a rod of righteousness, and you will give it to me.”

  “Of righteousness?” the witch said in wonder. “I do not know that word.”

  “It is not necessary that you do,” Sir Christopher replied. “Righteousness is the Immutable Law of God, and that law is carried in my heart and my immortal soul.”

  The witch turned to her preparations as Sir Christopher followed her into the hut. As he had suspected, it was very large inside, at least as spacious as the knightly manor he had owned in England-before the calling of the Templars had carried him to Jerusalem so long, long ago.

  He watched intently as the elfwoman prepared for her spell. She spoke a word of incantation and a blaze crackled into life, radiating fiercely from the hearth. Though Sir Christopher looked closely, he could see no sign of fuel within the fireplace. The witch then lifted a bucket of water above a sturdy table, pouring the liquid onto the tabletop as she croaked more guttural, arcane words. The knight was careful to conceal his astonishment as he watched the water turn to ice.

  With deft movements the woman called Allevia used her hands to curl the ice, which was somehow pliable, into a long trough. She set the staff in that trough, then took up the snake. This time her spell-casting was like a reptile’s hiss, and abruptly the serpent stretched, still rigid and now straight as the shaft. She placed the creature into the trough of ice, beside the rod of wood.

  Finally she took up the long container, which had not yet begun to melt. She called a harsh sound and Christopher skipped backward with undignified haste as the fire advanced out of the fireplace to snap merrily in the middle of an ornate rug. He was not surprised to see that the carpet suffered not at all from the flames-even though he could feel the heat clearly warming the skin of his face.

  The witch fed the trough of ice slowly into the fire, and the ice hissed into steam, obscuring the heart of the yellow brightness.

  Christopher went to the far side of the blaze to take the object that came out of the flames. The wood was cool to his touch, and he could clearly feel the ripples of thin scales on the surface. It had an admirable heft, with a head that was wooden, but carved into the perfect visage of a striking snake, jaws gaping.

  “You have your staff,” Allevia said, staring at him with a directness that made him uneasy. “Now, are you righteous?”

  “Aye,” he replied without hesitation. “Aye, witch, I am righteous.

  He smashed her in the left shoulder with the blunt end of his staff, hard enough to break the bone-though he was careful not to kill her. She flew against the wall and slumped to the floor, gasping, her good hand pressed to the awkwardly twisted shoulder.

  Sir Christopher crossed to her and stepped down, hard, on her slender shin. Once again he heard a sharp snap, and-as always-he was startled by the brittleness of elder elven bone.

  But, strangely, this elfwoman wasn’t crying. Usually the folk of this corrupt and hedonistic race, so unused to pain or violence, would break down pathetically under the severity of their punishment. Angrily he tapped her broken shoulder, hard, with the end of the staff.

  “Why do you attack me?” she asked, and those clear eyes pinned him with a fire that seared toward his soul.

  “You are an abomination-a tool of Satan, cursed to eternal Hell.” He spoke the words mostly for himself, knowing that she wouldn’t understand. They never did, these witches that he punished.

  “The stone!” she insisted, her voice surprisingly strong. “Give it to me!”

  He laughed. “Yo
u are wise in the ways of witches, but overall a fool. The Stone of Command is mine, now.”

  “No!” For the first time he saw real fear in her green eyes. “You cannot-”

  His next blow smashed her jaw so hard that, for a moment, he was afraid he had killed her. But no-once more those emerald eyes were watching him, albeit with a look that grew ever more dull and clouded. Still, she followed his movements as he pulled wooden shelves onto the floor, smashed furniture to kindling, and tore many of her books into shredded tinder. He was fortunate enough to find several jars of oil, and these he poured over the gathered wood, forming a ring around the witch.

  A single spark from his tinderbox started the blaze, and he quickly retreated from the hut, backing away even farther as flames swiftly engulfed the structure. Soon the fire was high, and so hot that even the encircling cornice was hissing, lending a cloud of white vapor that swirled about the pyre of smoke.

  “Good… snow boiling into steam. It is perfect.”

  Sir Christopher smiled as he started down the mountain, certain that God would enjoy the irony.

  N atac was aware only of a consuming laziness. Even though he knew vaguely that it was light outside, he slept for long hours, luxuriously buried in the plush furs, sated by lingering memories of a night of impossible passion. There were screens across several windows, muting the bright daylight, and he allowed himself to languish in comfort, drowsy enough to avoid the questions that otherwise would have gnawed him to agitation.

  Eventually it was the need to empty his bladder that compelled him to move. When he sat up in the bed he also became aware of fierce thirst, and hunger growled insistently in his belly. He stood at the side of the sleeping pallet, for the first time wondering where the woman had gone. He remembered her beauty, wondered for a fearful moment if it had all been a dream. But he touched his chest, found no wound there. His flesh was healed. And the pallet was the same… he saw the lamps in the niches on the wall. All the details of this place were the same.