Nether Kingdom

by J. Edward Neill

  “Get back!” Marid tore his sword from his scabbard and stood beside her.

  “No.” She stepped forward.

  The rider drew nearer. The fat stallion snorted, two clouds of mist bursting from its nostrils. Come, she thought. Show yourself. Some twenty paces away, the rider lowered his lantern. She saw his face better than before, her Nightness gaze no longer foiled. She saw his bearded chin, his calm, unbreakable collectedness, and her fists fell open.

  “Is it you?” She staggered toward him.

  “Ande?” said the rider.

  Her eyes glittering, her heart pounding in her chest, she walked right up to the rider’s stallion and took gentle hold of its reins. I know this man. His brown curls were flecked with grey and his girth was greater than she remembered, but it is him. A scholar, a warrior, and my fiercest friend.

  “Saul of Elrain,” she uttered.

  He dropped down from his saddle and set his lantern on the ground. She clasped her arms around him and buried her cheek in his chest. He smelled of soil and rain, but mostly he smelled like home, of all that might have been hers had she followed him back to Graehelm five years ago.

  Sniffling, beating back her tears with a dozen bats of her eyelashes, she held him at arms’ length. “Saul…” She managed only his name.

  “Ande, what are you doing out here?” He squeezed her arms and hugged her hard. She saw his tears streaming into his beard, his smile wide as a river. “These storms, Ande,” he said. “This rain. What madness drives you toward Shivershore? And how is it you’re so skinny? I hardly recognized you!”

  She felt like a child caught in the midst of some unexplainable tomfoolery. She managed a laugh and an accidental sob, serving only to make Saul hug her again.

  “Ach,” he bellowed. “I ask too many questions. To think I was worried about you! After what they said about you at Muthemnal, and after all the stories I heard, I thought…well…never mind what I thought. I’ve been looking for you. By the grace of you and your little friend doing so little to hide your tracks, I found you.”

  “You came back.” A single tear dribbled down her cheek. “What took you so long?”

  Whispers of Worse Things

  An hour after sunset, Andelusia sat on the oak’s gnarled roots and drank in the sight of Saul.

  Darkness had claimed the entire forest, but by the light of Saul and Marid’s lanterns, she watched him. Humming a tune she had never heard, Saul unloaded his stallion’s packs, stirred a crackling campfire to life, and set a pot of broth to cooking.

  He came back for me. Why now, of all the times?

  “Come and sit.” She patted the soft grass beside her. “You must be starving. Save the work for later.”

  “Soon enough,” Saul grunted as he removed a final pack from his stallion. “I’ve books to keep safe. From the looks of the clouds, the storm might catch us. Again.”

  “Books?” she asked. Of course. He never goes anywhere without them.

  “Aye.” He dropped a bundle beside her. “Good ones, too. Brought several just for you.”

  Of all the people she had ever met, none were kinder than Saul. His gallantry was but one of his qualities. As he stirred the cooking pot she took a quiet moment to recall the rest. Liberator, she remembered. Saved me from death in Cairn, and better still, from a life of drudgery and despair. Wisdom and solemn sensibility. He took me to see the wonders of Graehelm, the glades of Grandwood, and to Rellen. And a gentlemen, never once lusting. And honest, no matter how hard a truth.

  After watering his horse and pouring himself a tin of watered wine, Saul seemed at last ready for conversation. With a heaving sigh he plunked down beside the fire, a smile crinkling the corners of his eyes.

  “Ah, well then. Where do we begin?”

  “You met Marid,” she remarked. And the lad has never been quieter.

  “Yes.” Saul nodded. “Marid of Muthem. I’m cooking enough for the three of us, young ser. Much obliged for the carrots.”

  Marid sulked beneath his own oak. Jealous? she saw him and wondered. No. Surely not of Saul.

  Saul ceased stirring and looked at her. “I’ll refrain from asking the obvious.”

  “The obvious?”

  “Why you’re headed for Shivershore.”

  “Oh. That.”

  “Explain later.” He smiled. “For now you can tell me everything else, everything I’ve missed. I want to hear about your new life, your new friends, and exactly what it is you did to anger the Duke. I could’ve brained him when I heard what happened. I might’ve, had he not just left for Denawir.”

  She looked at him. Though it felt childish, she feared that if he knew all the things she had done, he might judge me a fool.

  “Let us talk of something besides me,” she exhaled. “I missed you, Saul. I missed everything. Tell me something good. Is it true Father lied, and Lady Gryphon yet lives? And King Jacob? Have the people taken to him? What about you? Not one letter in all these years. My fault, I reckon. I dreamed a hundred times about writing, but none of my thoughts took very well to paper.”

  Saul set his ladle in the pot and sighed. “It’s true. Sara Gryphon lives. She’s a stalwart woman. She dampens her sorrows by throwing all her energy into the affairs of the keep.”

  “That is good.” She blinked back a tear for Sara’s son, Rellen.

  “As for King Jacob, he and his family have a chance to rule Graehelm for many, many generations,” said Saul. “They’re a fair, even-tempered lot, and House Nurė is much beloved.”

  “And you?” she asked. “Did you settle in Gryphon? Did you find happiness?”

  He paused, briefly silent. A mote of sadness flickered through his eyes. “I did. Seems I’m fit to be a husband after all. I married three summers ago. Would you believe it? Her name is Helena, an old friend of Rellen’s. Our second child is due ere this winter. You’re saying to yourself, ‘Saul, a papa? Who’d marry a man who’s always in his books?’ But it’s true. Helena shares my passion for books and tolerates my beard. We’ve a son named Jacob, in honor of the King. I wish you could meet him. You’d love him. I know you would.”

  She felt joy, unfamiliar and welcome, course through her body. She moved to Saul’s side and leaned into his shoulder. She glimpsed Marid scowling, but paid it little mind. This is Saul’s moment, and mine.

  “If your next child is a girl, will you name her after me?”

  “I will. But only on one condition.”

  “Oh? What condition is that?”

  He poked at the fire. “You come home with me.”

  It was spoken too soon, too unexpectedly. Her chest knotted, her smile vanished, and she pulled away. The thought of home, of bounding atop the sun-warmed cobblestones of Gryphon and dawdling through endless days in the company of old friends, rushed into her mind in a flood of emotion.

  It was the obvious reason for Saul’s arrival, to take me back to Gryphon, and yet she dared not suffer such a hope to live beyond a single breath. She returned to her oak roots, her gaze roving into the night once more.

  “Everything well?” Saul worried.

  “Home,” she uttered. “No. I cannot go.”

  The fire crackled and the pot boiled over. Saul paid it no mind. “No?” he said.

  “No.”

  “I know what you feel, Ande.”

  “Do you?”

  “Of course. You think I came here just to haul you back? You think I forgot what happened? I remember. I’ll never forget Rellen, and I think of Garrett every time I lay my head to sleep. I know you’ve many memories tied to this place: all the death, all the pain, and—”

  “…my father.” She finished the thought. “Marid pretends not to believe me when I tell him what Father did, but he knows.”

  Riveted, Marid reacted none. It fell to Saul, whose expression changed from calm and peaceful to something else.

  “Ande.” He shook his head. “You say you can’t come home, but why? Your father? I won’t believe it. You’re
banished from Muthem. You’re penniless. Your quiet friend notwithstanding, what could possibly make you want to stay?”

  “If I leave, the storm will follow.”

  He stopped cooking and stared at her.

  “It goes where I go,” she explained. “It ruins everything in its path. It is tied to me, tied to my…magic.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Anywhere I go. To Shivershore or to Gryphon. The storm will track me down. If you doubt it, ask Marid. He knows. He has not said it yet, but he knows.”

  Saul gazed northward. The oaks did little to hide the truth. Even in darkness the great storm welled like a world-spanning bruise, blotting out the stars. It weighed upon all hearts, she knew. It needs no fuel but the darkness inside me.

  Saul gaped, and in that moment the joy betwixt her and him faded. “So it’s true then.” He exhaled. “You’re like your father?”

  “You believe me?”

  “Yes.”

  Her mouth fell into a flat, emotionless line. “You know what I am. You have always known. When I left Muthem, I knew this weather would stay with me. I want to go home and meet your wife and son, but I dare not. The storm is deadly. If you went to Muthem, you saw it. You know.”

  “Yes. I saw.” He touched his forehead, feeling at a hidden pain. “How do you know it’ll last?”

  “Because it will.”

  “You say it with such certainty.”

  “I am the storm, and the storm is me,” she said, deadly serious. “I dreamed this would happen, this and much worse. I waited and hoped it would not. But here we are.”

  Saul and Marid took many moments to absorb the truth. For it is no easy thing. She watched them, wanting their understanding, yet knowing that even if they decided to believe her, they would never look at her the same way again. Marid sat dumbstruck, while Saul poked at the fire, never minding the water roiling over the cooking pot’s lip.

  “Lest you forget,” he said at length, “I’ve seen magic before.”

  “In Furyon. And in the Undergrave,” she remembered.

  “Does this mean what I think? You still have that damnable book, the one you should’ve let me take away?”

  “Yes.”

  Saul condensed his open palm into a fist. His beard quivered, his eyes red and full of sorrow. “It’s the Pages Black, Ande. You shouldn’t have kept it.”

  “Too late now.”

  “I didn’t come here on a whim.” He looked at her. “I always hoped you’d return on your own, but now…”

  “Now what?” she pressed.

  “Your choice to stay isn’t wise. Even if you were safe and happy in Muthemnal, I’d beg you to come back. That’s why I’m here. This place isn’t safe. I’ve heard the rumors, the tales of what passes beyond Thillria and Graehelm. Forget the storm. Home awaits. Throw the book away and come with me.”

  “I never thought you would be the one to suggest throwing a book away.”

  “It’s no ordinary book.” He glared. “You know that.”

  A long silence passed. Saul took the food off the fire, but left it sitting in the pot. She sat in the shadows, waiting.

  “There’s something you should know,” he finally said.

  “I am listening.” She closed her eyes.

  Saul glanced to the sky. “Cast your mind back,” he bid her. “Let yourself recall our blackest days. Your father. The shadow men. The Undergrave. We were far beneath the earth, so deep we forgot the sun still existed. Do you remember?”

  “I do.”

  “If you remember that,” he sighed, “you’ll also remember your father wasn’t solely to blame. He was enslaved by another. I know you’ve not forgotten him. Grimwain, or Grim, as we who were his prisoners knew him.”

  “I remember,” she said. How could I forget? His white eyes. His pale swords dripping with Rellen’s blood.

  Saul, solemn and weary, commanded her attention with his hardest stare. “Grim lives, Ande. We thought him a finished man. He’s not. We hoped after his and your father’s failure, he would have faded into obscurity, but no. He survives, and he does so with a vengeance.”

  Grimwain. His name entered her ear like a poison-tipped needle. He had played as her father’s servant, his loyal protector, but such was never the truth. Grim had always been the true mastermind, the teeth behind her father’s smile, the dagger in the darkness. The thought of him made her heart spasm and her lips quiver with rage. He killed my love. He stole Garrett. He tried to free the Ur and butcher us all.

  “Things have changed, Ande,” said Saul. “Grimwain is no longer content to hide. He’s usurped all of Romaldar. He killed the Romaldarian king, conquered the capital, and declared himself Master. He bestows himself with the title Lykaios, lord of an army he calls the Wolfwolde. He enlists men of Romaldar and Yrul to help him, gathering them by the thousand under the oriflamme of a black-maned wolf. I always knew it was possible. I listened and read and traveled far and wide to hear the truth, and now that I know these things I wish I did not.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “You know why,” he rumbled. “If Grim desires another warlock to enslave, you’re not safe, especially out here. He’ll hear of your storm and know it for what it means. He’ll come for you just like he did for your father, and if you resist, he’ll kill you. He’s ruthless, Ande. You know as well as I.”

  “You came here because you are afraid,” she said calmly.

  “Yes. Aren’t you? His agents could be hunting you even now. They’ll hurt you. They’ll do horrible things.”

  She took it in, barely breathing in the silence that followed. Foolish to forget Grimwain, she scolded herself. Why would he relent? Why, when the Ur are everlasting?

  “You say he and Father failed.” She held Saul’s gaze. “They did not. Whatever Grim wanted in the Undergrave, he found.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because…” She grimaced, “Garrett told me before he abandoned us.”

  Saul shivered. She watched him trudge to his horse and pull a second wineskin from his satchel. “Tomorrow.” He took a long drink. “We should depart. Since your friend here is banished with you, he’s welcome to join us. If we make good time, we can be back in Gryphon by summer’s end. We’ll find some way to break the storm. We’ll study together. We’ll control it, whatever it takes. Grim thinks he’s powerful, but even the Wolfwolde can never hope to assail Graehelm. Our armies are strong. We can live out our lives in peace.”

  It would be easy. Saul is right. Gryphon might cure what ails me. Contentment might break the storm. But…

  “If only I could.” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “But then I would be a coward.”

  “A coward?” Saul paled. “Nonsense. You’ve nothing to gain by staying, nothing to lose by leaving.”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “Enlighten me.” Saul gestured at Marid. “Please. Enlighten us both. Why would you stay?”

  She felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her belly, a crackle of Nightness in her fingers. Willing herself to show no discomfort, she shut her eyes and went stiller than stone.

  “Try to understand.” She flexed her fingers, unconsciously dimming the campfire. “If Grim dreams of waking the Ur, I would be a coward to flee. Father always told me I was the last, the one, the only wizard remaining after himself. What if it’s true? Let us suppose Grim is gathering his power and all the happenings in Romaldar are but a prelude. If I am the only one strong enough to stop him, what kind of woman would I be if I cantered off to Graehelm? How could I ever live in Gryphon, home of the man I loved, the man Grimwain took from me?”

  “Ande…” Saul stammered, “what could you do? Grim’s no ordinary man.”

  “He might not be a man at all,” she added.

  “Well…exactly,” Saul reasoned.

  Never in her wildest dreams had she imagined her reunion with Saul would begin likewise. Shadows, borne in the darkness of her heart, drew
down upon the camp, thickening in the air like fog. Thunder drummed in the distance, rattling the trees. She looked at Saul and Marid, holding them in a moment’s thrall, and when she opened her mouth she felt the Nightness tickle her tongue.

  “I will kill him,” she said. “I will fan the Ur flames over him and cook him to ash. I kept the Pages Black for a reason: to master its secrets. I could slay a hundred Grimwains, to say nothing of one.”

  A raindrop plunked on a leaf high above her head. Saul and Marid noticed nothing, but the droplet echoed in her ear like the first falling spear in a vanguard of millions.

  The storm blossomed.

  The rain shattered the night.

  Marid ran for cover. She stood beside her oak and saw the fear in Saul’s eyes. Too wise for his own good, she thought. He knows about magic. He knows of the Archithrope.

  I am one of them. He knows that, too.

  “The rain.” He stood beneath the storm, rivulets of water darkening his shirt. “Yours?”

  “Yes.”

  “Ande, are the Ur real?”

  “Yes.”

  “Years ago, you were unsure. But now?”

  “I am certain. I hear them whispering. I see signs of them everywhere.”

  “But why? Why would Grimwain want them here?”

  “Before I kill him, I will ask.” She imagined such a moment were possible. “Though I doubt he will say.”

  “And if I try to take you home against your will?”

  “I would never harm you, of course.” She showed him the barest glimmer of a smile. “But nor will I allow it.”

  The rain fell harder. Saul hoisted his bag of books and retreated to his stallion. The anxious beast stamped the wet earth, doubtless hurting from the rain. With the campfire all but extinguished, Saul kindled his lantern, within which a fluttering light sprang to life. “We should find shelter,” he said. “We’ll go deeper into the trees.”

  For a few breaths, the rain softened. From darkness, Marid wandered back into the camp. He was already dripping, wet as a dishrag, looking terribly meek and tired.

  “I’ve a question,” Marid asked miserably.

  “Yes?” Saul faced him.