The Golden Orb

by Doug Niles

  The advent of the first of the nightless days was a time of rare beauty and profound ceremony throughout the Icereach. In the mountain fortress of the ogre king, the rituals dated back more than five thousand years, remnants of histories written in realms thousands of miles away from here. But in none of those lands, no other corner of the world, Grimwar felt certain, was there the start of a day when the sun would never set. The ritual would occur at midnight, and the sun flickering low on the southern horizon inevitably provided a perfect symbol of light and power when viewed from up here, atop the great, glacier-shrouded peak of Winterheim.

  The land fell away to all sides, shades of black rock and stark ice contrasting with the pale green of tundra and meadow. Distant peaks ringed them, and these were haloed in purple and pink as the low-lying sun cast rays across them all. To the north, the waters of Black Ice Bay were shrouded in the mountain’s shadow, while the distant White Bear Sea remained shiny in the lingering daylight.

  The route to the summit emerged from the Royal Quarter, the upper level of the mountain’s hollow core. A massive gate, consisting of two granite slabs hewn from the bedrock of the peak, stood open to admit the summer breeze into the mountain’s heart. At the same time, it allowed passage from the cavernous interior onto a lofty shoulder of the massif.

  From the gate, a winding trail angled across the steep terrain. Now, in high summer, the ground was alive with wildflowers and copses of lush, low grass. Streams spilled between rocky outcrops, and waterfalls were common. These sparkled like diamonds in the bright sunlight, and Grimwar paused to relish the sight—and catch his breath—before he climbed the last dozen steps up to the mountain’s small summit platform.

  This was a square clearing no more than three paces on a side. Stones had been carefully fitted to make a smooth floor. Every spring, masons climbed to the top of the mountain to repair damage wrought by the winter snow and ice. These workers only crawled when they came onto the platform, for these stones were hallowed—they would bear no feet except those of the monarchs of Suderhold.

  The King’s Roost, it was called, and Grimwar treasured this place and this ceremony more perhaps than any other aspect of his kingship. He watched the shadows play across the plaza as the sun, still visible at midnight on the southern horizon, cast its rays horizontally across the platform, highlighting the numerous tiny irregularities. A pebble stretched a shadow as long as his finger. The rim of a tiny crack loomed like a bluff over a plain.

  He heard Stariz cry out, “The moment of zenith is now!”

  That was his cue. Knowing that the hour was exactly midnight—as accurately as that hour could be identified by his high priestess—the ogre king strode onto the small platform, planted his great fists on his hips, and turned his tusked face southward, squarely facing toward the sun. There was little warmth, for the sun was too low in the sky, but there was undeniable brightness there. He squinted, his eyes pained by the unaccustomed light.

  He looked below to see the other nobles of Winterheim moving into their places. The baron of Glacierheim stood with his wife and several companions on a small, smooth clearing a little distance below. The baron was Stariz’s uncle, a proud and haughty bull with a thick mane of gray hair, now an honored guest who had come to Winterheim for this ceremony. His eyes were fixed upon the king, and he nodded with great dignity when Grimwar’s gaze fell upon him.

  Beyond, the monarch saw Lord Quendip, stumbling, leaning on the sturdy arms of two human footmen, struggling to make it to a patch of level ground on a ridge some distance below the king. Queen Stariz stood just below the Roost, her expression invisible behind the huge black mask of Gonnas. The tusked image of the ogre god stared sternly up at Grimwar as his gaze swept across the rest of the crowd.

  Thraid was a stone’s throw away, amidst a small crowd, resplendent in a dress of metallic gold, the material shimmering like a liquid in the bright sunlight. The king dared to allow his gaze to linger on her voluptuous form for a moment, before his wife’s ostentatious cough drew his attention back to the matter at hand. Grimwar straightened, staring at the sun again as Stariz began to intone the ritual benediction.

  “Gonnas the Mighty! Willful deity of ogrekind—Lord of Suderhold, and master of tusk and talon! Hear our pledges, and be pleased!

  “God of my kings, I hereby pledge to secure your sacred kingdom against all threats,” Grimwar chanted, reciting the words he stated every midsummer. “Your enemies are mine. I wage war against them at your will and maintain my mastery over all your realm. Hear my pledge, and be pleased!”

  The prayers rippled farther down the mountain, then, as the other noble ogres made their promises of faith. The commoners began soon after, and the noise of thousands of voices merged together into a placid rumble. The king was soothed by that sound, borne upward as if it freed him from the bonds of gravity.

  After the stolid resonance of the prayers, Stariz ber Glacierheim ber Bane advanced. All eyes went to the high priestess, who loomed even taller than usual in the great mask of her god. She stalked toward the base of the King’s Roost with manifest urgency. Many ogres gasped when it appeared that she would actually set foot upon the sacred stone, but she halted at the last instant and stood motionless, staring up at Grimwar.

  “Speak, my queen, priestess of our mighty god!” he declared, eyeing her warily. Would she keep her side of the agreement?

  “I may speak for the god on some matters, but in matters of his will you should listen to Gonnas alone.” She looked at him pointedly. “It must be you, my king, who beseeches his sign. Only then shall you know if you truly work the will of the god.”

  “Indeed.” The king lifted his head again, then turned back to the south and raised his massive arms. He knew this ritual too. Grimwar considered himself a faithful servant of Gonnas, but he didn’t expect the god to speak to him directly, now or ever. Smugly, he began.

  His two great hands extended toward that midsummer’s beacon, as if he would embrace it. He roared the traditional words in a voice that boomed down the mountainside and echoed from the faces of glacier and cliff.

  “Gonnas the Mighty! God of my fathers and my sons! If you are displeased with my loyal efforts to work your will, give me a sign! Show me … show my people. We will obey!”

  Facing that sparkling sun, the king allowed his delight to spread across his face. He would make the attack on Brackenrock when he wished, not when his wife commanded. Indeed, it was Stariz herself who had, all unknowingly, suggested to him the means to prove his god’s favor. He closed his eyes, savored the tiny bit of warmth he could extract from those feeble rays. The favor of his god was like a blessing on his skin, and he exerted his strength, holding the pose for a very long time. He knew that he was a masterful figure, that the eyes of all his people were upon him. Gonnas himself would approve.

  Someone gasped. “What’s happening?”

  “The sun—it grows dark!” cried another.

  Grimwar opened his eyes and stared in alarm. Surely they were imagining it, old women cackling like frightened chickens! The sun was still bright, painful to look at as it blazed on the horizon.

  The mountaintop seemed cloaked in an eerie shadow, and that shade seemed to be growing. Grimwar stared now in disbelief—it was if as something had taken a bite out of the sun, obscuring more and more of the fiery disk. Dumbstruck, the king of Suderhold realized that the sun was being swallowed, darkened and obscured by a black presence of unmistakable might.

  “Gonnas?” he croaked weakly. “Are you displeased?”

  The answer was clear, even before Stariz articulated the sign for those who might have trouble understanding.

  “It is the will of our god!” cried the priestess, sounding awestruck herself. “He has heard your cry, and he sends the sign!”

  Grimwar stayed on the King’s Roost for a long time, determined not to show his fear as his world was plunged into a chill and artificial night. The weeping and crying of his people, bold warriors as well
as women and youngsters, was a cacophony of terror across the whole vast summit of Winterheim. Some turned and fled, while others huddled in misery and fear, looking from the sun to the king and back again.

  The king knew when he was defeated. Grimwar bowed his head, and pledged to do the will of his god, muttering the statement, then raising his voice and crying aloud his mission. Very slowly, the daylight brightened, the midnight sun escaping from the grip of the shadow to once again wash Icereach in its pearly light.

  Grimwar was the last one through the gates into the city, following right behind Stariz. He watched her, that lofty mask and the wide-shouldered ceremonial robe, and thought again about the darkening sun.

  He wondered how his wife had done it.

  he breeze out of the south was strong, and judging from the chill it would get stronger, and colder, sometime during the next few days. Kerrick knew from long experience that squalls, complete with lashing rain, cold winds and violent seas, could strike the White Bear Sea at any time, even in the midst of summer. Now one such storm brewed ominously, dark clouds forming an image like a mountainous horizon far to the south of Brackenrock.

  Still, the elf was eager for this mission, sailing with Moreen across the Bluewater Strait, carrying her to a meeting with the Highlander king. His feelings regarding Strongwind Whalebone were far from fond. The strapping, bearded king was a powerful man, handsome and persuasive, and he had been smitten by the chiefwoman of the Arktos eight years before. Now Moreen was going to seek his help, and Kerrick didn’t want to speculate on what she might have to give up to gain the Highlanders’ aid.

  Yet the thought of a half day alone with Moreen as they crossed the strait before the threatening storm was enough to negate all his other concerns. The arrangements for the council had been made quickly by means of carrier pigeons. Strongwind Whalebone would arrive at Tall Cedar Bay today, and by the twin gods of Zivilyn and Chislev the chiefwoman was also determined to get there today. She was the Lady of Brackenrock, and she did not want to keep the proud Strongwind Whalebone waiting.

  The elf’s fingers tightened on the tiller as he turned the sleek prow slightly to deflect the blow of a looming breaker, bracing himself for the pressure against the hull as if it was a slap against his own skin. As the boat crested the swell and pressed on, he took the same pleasure he would have gained from sloughing off a powerful but misjudged attack. The clouds were dark, but still distant, and he didn’t doubt but they would make a fast crossing.

  It pleased him that Moreen was here, to see his skill, to ride his ship through this lively sea. As the spray lashed across the chill waters, soaking his oilskin slicker and stinging his eyes, he drank in the sight of the black-haired woman. She looked back at him from her position fore of the cabin, where she balanced on the pitching deck to look over at the elf from the small compartment in the stern cockpit. He loved her wry, half-turned smile, the way her dark eyes flashed when she noticed him watching her.

  “Do you want me to take in some sail?” she called, flexing her knees as the bow rose sharply beneath her.

  “Yes,” he replied, as much because he wanted the trip to last a little longer as to avoid the jarring and bouncing of their wild ride. Even if Strongwind couldn’t be expected to wait too long, it wouldn’t hurt the king to stand around for an hour or two before the lady got there. This was a time, a moment in his life, that Kerrick wanted to savor.

  Moreen adjusted the lines, playing out the boom so that more wind slipped past the main sail. She skirted the cabin to come back and sit beside Kerrick.

  “Are you worried?” she asked, after studying his thoughtful expression for a moment. “Do you think we should turn back?”

  “Worried? No. Why do you ask?”

  “It was the expression on your face … like something was wrong.”

  Kerrick shook his head. “I was thinking about the dream I’ve been having. I’ve had it several times now, variations of the same message. It’s a dream about my father and my homeland.”

  She was silent for a moment, gazing across the windtossed waters of the strait. “You haven’t spoken of Silvanesti since you came back to Brackenrock, but I know you must miss your home, don’t you?”

  Kerrick shrugged. “Actually, I’m not so sure I miss the place as it is right now. It’s more as though I long for the place it was when I was a child, when my father was there.”

  Her laughter was wry. “You’re not the only one to have such longings.” Her gaze turned ahead and her eyes narrowed as she peered at the horizon. “You know, you’ve never told me much about your father—only that he was captain of that galley, Silvanos Oak, that sailed to the Icereach.”

  “He was captured by ogres,” the elf declared bluntly. “Grimwar Bane renamed my father’s ship, made it Goldwing, the ogre flagship. My father suffered—the gods know how he must have suffered!—in the king’s dungeon. If he was lucky, he died quickly. At best, he could have survived a year or two. This is all I’ve been able to find out over the last several years. Only tidbits and rumor. But the notion that he might have escaped and returned home … ridiculous! Just ridiculous.”

  Kerrick sighed. “What’s the point in knowing how he died? Or who killed him? There are some revelations better left in the dark.”

  Moreen shook her head with a slight grimace. “When I saw my father killed by the ogre’s spear it was a horror, a nightmare, but at least I was there, I saw it, and I know he’s gone. There’s a comfort in that.”

  “Maybe it was the same thing for me when I saw the galley under Grimwar Bane’s control. Did you know, my father drew the plans for Silvanos Oak himself? He helped with every phase of the construction. To see that beautiful vessel corrupted to the ends of the ogre king … that was proof enough of my father’s death.”

  “If you hadn’t come here when you did, that ship in our enemy’s hands probably would have been our undoing. The gods work in strange ways,” Moreen replied. “I don’t know if I ever really thanked you for designing and installing the harbor boom.” The chiefwoman changed the subject quietly. She looked at Kerrick with dark eyes, soft and pensive, and he felt a stab of irrational guilt.

  “It was little enough,” he declared, not very truthfully. “Now you’ll get help from the Highlanders, too. Strongwind was eager to meet with you, or he wouldn’t have agreed to come to the bay on such short notice.”

  “No doubt he’s worried about the possibility of a new ogre weapon; I warned him about that in the message. He’s got his own interests to look out for and will want to know everything we can tell him,” she said pensively.

  “Yes. Some new horror of unspeakable power.” The elf found himself wishing that he had interrogated the thanoi aggressively, had learned more—something useful! But the creature was in such a bad way, and Kerrick had felt only pity for him.

  Moreen looked past the cabin, along the bow. “It’s possible that Strongwind will already know something about it. He surprises me, sometimes, with his sources of information … with …”

  “Will … will your meeting with him take very long, do you think?” asked the elf warily.

  “I’d like to get back to Brackenrock by tomorrow night,” she replied quickly. “There’s so much to do.”

  “Okay, fine. I’ll stay at the bay, probably sleep on the boat. We can go whenever you want to leave in the morning.”

  All too soon, for the elf, the forested ridges of the strait’s eastern shore darkened the horizon. Long familiar with this section of coast, Kerrick needed only a slight course adjustment to bring them sailing directly toward the little cove that in the past eight years had become home to a small but prosperous fishing village.

  Tall Cedar Bay was sheltered by the promontories of evergreen-studded cliffs that reached out to enclose the anchorage in protective arms. Only when Cutter glided though the gap between those sheltering ridges did Kerrick relax his grip on the tiller and allow Moreen to haul in more sail. The wind and storm, blocked by the flankin
g heights, dropped away almost to nothing, and the jarring motion of the boat settled into a smooth glide.

  As Cutter sliced through the calm water, Kerrick looked to the shore and reflected on how much this place had changed. It had been his first landfall when he had reached the Icereach, nine summers ago, though then it was merely a grove of wild evergreens and a rocky, wild shore.

  Now he sailed past five fishing curraghs, the sturdy boats anchored just offshore, a stone’s throw from the solid rock piers that flanked the small waterfront. On one of the banks a stone fishhouse belched smoke from its squat chimney, while the odor of salmon hung in the air.

  Nearer to the anchorage, the wide log façade of the Tall Cedar Inn occupied a commanding position on a small rise of land, overlooking the bay. Several burly Highlanders were lounging about on the veranda, and they came down to the wharf as the sailboat slowed and finally came to a stop. Kerrick glanced at them, then turned his attention to the front door of the inn.

  Strongwind Whalebone, king of the Highlanders, stood there, his arms planted on his hips, his straw-bearded face split by a wide grin of welcome. To Kerrick, as he turned the boat to allow the wind to flow past the sail, the day suddenly seemed to get much colder.

  Moreen walked up the gentle hill and accepted Strongwind’s warm embrace, the bristly kiss on each of her cheeks. She even returned the hug with enough pressure to let him know that she was glad to see him.

  Surprisingly enough, she was. There was a sense of competence and strength in his familiar, bearlike presence. Here, with his arms around her, she felt safer than she had in a long time. Here was the only place she where she could let someone else take charge, at least for awhile.

  “I see Randall’s tent over there,” Kerrick said, when she finally broke away to look at the elf. His expression was strangely pinched, and she wondered, again, about the secret pain that lurked within him.

  For now she only nodded, looking at Strongwind. “We’ll talk at the inn?” Tall Cedar Bay boasted but one sprawling inn, the large cabin on the rise above the waterfront and the bay.