by A. J. Ponder
Torri rushed her side. “I should have been here.”
“Nobody can be everywhere,” Capro muttered. He edged closer to assess Sylvalla’s injuries. The rapidly growing bruise contorting half her face was hard to miss, that and a massive blue-black welt down the left side of her body. Her hands were swollen, and some of her fingers were twisted at unnatural angles. He lay his hands over hers, and when he took it away, the fingers were straight again. “She’ll be fine. Although travelling will be hard on her.” Capro turned back to the man still unconscious on the floor. “I am worried about him, though. After getting a sword through his side, he’ll need more than my help.”
“But—” Dirk said.
“But, what?”
Dirk was going to say something scathing. Something about Sylvalla being more important than some man they didn’t even know, only the words died in his throat as he met Capro’s gaze.
“We do what we should and what we must. We cannot change that because Sylvalla is injured.”
“We can hardly go on without her,” Dirk said. “Remember, you insisted—yammering on and on about prophecies.”
“She will go on, and so will we. That is not what worries me.” Capro’s hand glowed as it passed over Dalberth’s body.
A feeble groan.
“It’s bad. Very bad. I’ll need some more of this.” Mr Goodfellow Senior unrolled a handful of leaves from silver foil. They were fat and furry like small pointy caterpillars. “It is called Schaff montagne, and I am sure it grows nearby.”
“That stuff is very rare.” Dirk winced, scanning the mountains. “Is he so important? Will he even last that long?”
“I don’t know,” Mr Goodfellow Senior pulled more bits and pieces from his robes. “But, I need as much as I can, as soon as I can get it, understand?”
“Yes,” Dirk replied, “If I go tonight, I...” He turned, his attention distracted as Sylvalla rolled over and blinked her eyes awake.
Not deigning to exclaim a trite, “Where am I?” she used all her excess energy to scream very loudly as she tried to get up.
Torri rushed to help.
“Dammit Capro! Why’d you do that for, why?” Sylvalla cried, tears running down her face as she cradled her hands. “Dirk and I should have killed him in a clean fight.”
The old man shrugged into his beard. “Of course I stopped the fight. I was saving him. He is…he could be…special. I’ll know more when, and if, he wakes up.”
Dirk shrugged. “Keep your secrets, old man. I had better hurry if I’m to be back before camp breaks.” The skinny warrior stripped off his Avondale attire and set off up the mountain, sword over his back, sharply delineated muscles gleaming in the setting sun.
§
Jonathan felt edgy. The whole world tasted of danger and yet nobody else appeared to be in the same hurry he was. Already, some of the soldiers seemed to be dragging their feet, and with Sylvalla injured and Dirk off searching for herbs, they were sure to be delayed again. Frustrated, he turned to his father. “Why go to all this trouble to save one enemy soldier?”
“Apart from the fact it was the right thing to do, you mean?” Capro smiled wryly. “He may have been possessed by an entirely malignant spirit, but he is still a gateway for prophecy. And it is still my duty, as a wizard, to tend to a potential prophet, no matter what.”
“Even one who’s run amok and threatened the fulfilment of said prophecies?”
“Even so. Possibly, especially so.”
“So what are we going to do?” Jonathan said. “Some of the men have lost their enthusiasm for this adventure. And this incident, not to mention having to babysit so many of Phetero’s deserters, isn’t helping. We can’t hold them all and go on, and we cannot turn back.”
“If there is no one else, I will still go to A’lganathrieal, the Exile of the Damned, and so will Sylvalla and Dirk. Will you?”
“Of course,” Jonathan snapped. “I’m not the one slowing things down.” He sighed. “I think we might go faster if we give some of the soldiers the chance to bow out without losing face. There are already rumours that we are leading them to their deaths.”
“You are right, it’s time I told them where we are headed—and then they can chose either to go home and mind the prisoners, or come with us. Either way, they’ll have to make their decision now. We don’t have much time. Phetero is very close to his destination.”
Jonathan looked up to the silhouette of the mountains in the moonlight. “And Dirk, will he get back in time to join us?”
“We will break camp slowly. Dirk should be able to catch us, unless…” Capro left the “unless” hanging.
The Road to A’lganathrieal
Jonathan looked up from the book, his eyes aching from all the sharp cuts and blows the malicious little blue-black sigils had dealt them. He was, for just a moment, bathed in paradoxes. The world swirled around him in words that were strung in webs between him and his fellows. They enticed his understanding… But whether his visions lead to truth, or evil, or simply bad eyesight, Jonathan could not say. It was hard to focus.
Dirk was up there in the mountains somewhere amongst the cliffs and gullies and rocks and the odd twisted Schaff montagne plant clinging to the slopes. If they were lucky.
It was a long, hard journey for a novice to collect the rare plants this early in the season. Far too soon to be expecting him back yet, and still Jonathan’s hope kept seeing someone moving on the slopes…
The prisoners and ten Avondale soldiers were helping out for the last time and the camp was already disappearing fast.
A flurry of snow blew into his face.
Hurry, Dirk.
With only a dozen soldiers, Torri, and the injured queen, herself, they needed Dirk if they were going to successfully face Phetero and Dothie and his remaining military.
A vision of Dirk, wearing little more than his loincloth waved at Jonathan, a bunch of flowering plants in his hand.
It wasn’t a mirage, but it was crazy—even wizards had a bit more respect for these icy temperatures.
“Back so soon?” Jonathan asked, trying not to shiver.
“I took a gamble and it paid off.”
Jonathan waited, but Dirk didn’t elucidate. Eventually Jonathan filled the silence with words. “You’ll be pleased to know Sylvalla is doing well.”
“Where is she?”
“This way. We’ll stop by Mr Goodfellow first. It won’t take long.”
“How long? Every minute wasted here is time Phetero’s using to get away.”
“Or worse,” Jonathan said, hurrying toward the camp. “But don’t panic. We’ll get there in time.” We have to. “There’s another way through to the other side of the mountains—to where they’re going,” he said, parsing the truth with the skill of a dragon. The only faster way was magic.
Mr Goodfellow Senior strode toward them, hoar-frost crackling under his feet. “Dirk, excellent. We have to hurry—there’s magic, dangerous magic calling out, I can feel it.”
A scream of pain and frustration came from the last remaining tent.
“Sylvalla?” Dirk asked.
Capro smiled. “She’s fine. I believe she’s helping[77] Torri pack as we speak.”
“Moving already, are you sure that is wise?”
“We have no choice—time may be endless, but it never comes back twice. Come, your remedy may save this man, and help Sylvalla through the journey ahead.”
Jonathan watched Dirk dash away, and turned to his father. “How has Phetero managed to move so quickly?”
“No doubt at the expense of their men and their horses. Hurry, Jonathan, we’ll take the wizard’s path—from now on every second will count.”
§
Phetero grinned and raised his arms in a grand and magnanimous gesture at the imposing arch that led into the mountainside. “Can you not feel it?”
Dothie hid a laugh. This place called so loud he’d felt its power days ago.
Phetero paused
as if listening. No one was speaking. “Yes, it is a perfect place for an ambush,” he muttered.
And it was. The path funnelled through rocks and overhangs that would hide their little army more than sufficiently. “Commander, have the army set camp to defend this position.”
The commander bowed. “My Lord, we shall slaughter them.”
“No!” Phetero snapped. “I want her alive! Do you understand? And the wizards. I think it will be fitting that they participate in my rise to godhood. Kill the rest.”
“I hear and obey, sir.” He clanked off.
Dothie looked through the arch and into the darkness. It called to him alone, he was sure of it. Not just Phetero’s two false deities, The Nameless One and He Who Should Never Be Named, but all of A’lganathrieal’s exiled gods.
“Come,” Phetero said to his wizard. “Time to become a god.”
“Yes,” said Dothie, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
Desperation
“We have to go, now!” Jonathan snapped at Mr Goodfellow. The old man was dithering between the ten soldiers who’d volunteered to come with them, and those who planned to leave with the prisoners and the severely injured Dalberth.
“But we can’t leave him like this. A prophet with no wizard—unthinkable. I’ll send a message. Maybe someone from Bairnsley can come take him.”
“I promise my men will look after him, won’t you lads?” Sylvalla beamed her best confident smile at them.
The soldiers who’d been slumped in their saddles, looking shifty and untrustworthy, perked up.
“This man is a witness to Phetero’s crimes against our gods. He must get back to Greybeard and Francis, whole and well.”
“Yes, yes,” Mr Goodfellow Senior said, “but can any of you write? I need someone to write down everything Dalberth says. Just in case.”
There was total silence.
“We don’t have time for this,” Jonathan insisted.
“Then let’s go,” Sylvalla said. “We didn’t start this war with the evil Phetero, but by the gods, we’ll finish it.”
The ten brave soldiers who were staying to accompany Sylvalla and the wizards cheered. Did they even understand what they were getting into?
But still Capro was still fussing over Dalberth. “Is he going to be okay? Will you look after him properly?”
“Here,” Sylvalla said. “The soldiers who are staying with me will be paid well, so you should be too. A gold piece to each of the litter bearers now, and a gold piece for each of you who makes it back to Scotch Mist with your prisoners alive.”
Ricky, Lars and Grimmo rushed to take Dalberth’s litter. “We’ll look after him, good,” Grimmo said.
“Hey, will you pay me if I write?” one of the prisoners said.
“Two gold,” Capro Goodfellow Senior said.
“Three.”
“Done,” both Goodfellows spoke at once.
Capro handed out ink and parchment. “I hope that’s enough.”
“Awaken to the night!” Dalberth yelled. “It’s coming!”
“I think that’s our cue to go.” Sylvalla jumped onto her horse.
Capro turned to the scribe. “Just write that down—and anything else he says.”
Sylvalla turned back, to see the scribe furiously writing and Torri encouraging her horse to follow Sylvalla’s.
“You’re coming too?” Sylvalla asked.
“I promised,” Torri said. “And I keep my promises.”
The soldiers also followed on horses, but Jonathan and Mr Goodfellow Senior tarried a moment to leave their horses with the returning soldiers, before racing after Sylvalla and her followers faster than is humanly possible.
§
Fergus stared at the archway. “A’lganathrieal,” he whispered, hardly believing he was here. He grunted a prayer. This place was not the Thurgle artefact many believed it to be and Fergus did not revere it, so much as fear it as a vestige of the ancients[78] themselves. A’lganathrieal, a near impossible word for humans to pronounce, from a time too long ago for mere humans to remember, meant the Exile of the Damned. Legend said the ancients had released Something here. But for slower, longer-lived creatures like Thurgle, it was difficult to forget—because of What Came After.
The Desolation.
Legend also said that the Ancients who’d occupied this site had been both noble and wise, but that wisdom had been eroded as they worshipped a power of unfathomable evil. Corrupted, the priests emerged from their mountain hideaway to slaughter everything in the valley that lived and breathed, at the last falling on themselves.
At least, that was the official Thurgle recount of the history of A’lganathrieal. A story that both venerated and loathed the Ancients that had left their mark on the landscape, and disappeared. There were other stories, forbidden stories, little more than whispers in the dark. These stories said that the Something had Power untested and unheard of, and that it would grant you anything you might wish, but only if you were willing to sacrifice enough.
Should I warn the humans? Or is the opportunity too great?
Fergus struggled to understand his duty, grappling with what he knew, what he feared—and what he wanted—to be the most celebrated Thurgle adventurer of all time.
He prayed some more while Phetero and Dothie hastened inside, leaving all but a handful of their most trusted soldiers outside.
A part of Fergus argued that this was fate—that he was meant to be here at this time, that taking this opportunity would be a glorious gamble for the ultimate fulfilment of power for his kind.
Another part of him remembered the old wisdom. “Whoever should wake the power of A’lganathrieal may take one of two paths: be destroyed immediately, or arrive at the heights they aspired to—and lose their soul.”
Something fluttered in his mind. A memory. “Victory rides on the coat-tails of someone else’s despair.”
It wiped away any earlier pessimism, and filled Fergus with new hope.
He rushed in to join the others and take this opportunity. He had aspirations, too. Not just to travel, not just to carve out a life away from his people, but to live in luxury unbeholden to any other, and to have his people not only forgive him—but beg to have him forgive them.
§
We must be close now, Sylvalla thought, her bruised and battered arm throbbing in time to the staccato of hoof-beats.
An icy breeze swept down from the mountain.
Sylvalla shivered and Capro and Jonathan jumped—immediately alert.
“Are we close enough?” Jonathan muttered.
“Hmmm.” Capro frowned.
The pace quickened. Sylvalla’s horse had barely lengthened its stride, but now the scenery was little more than a blur and the road seemed alive. It was an uneasy feeling, but the soldiers made no comment. Perhaps it was just one more oddity to add to the collection of strangeness. Or perhaps they did not feel the sensation—Sylvalla thought it best not to ask the wizards what it all meant.
Before long, they stepped back onto a frozen path. An ordinary path.
“Dismount, and keep it quiet!” Sylvalla snapped, her words echoing in the small canyon.
“It’s a bit late for quiet,” Dirk said as armed men emerged from behind rocks and scraggly bush to surround them.
There was a rasp of steel as the soldiers drew their swords.
Sylvalla’s sword joined the others, albeit slow and clumsy in her bandaged hand. The pain was excruciating, but it did not hurt nearly so much as her attempts of packing had. And it didn’t even come close to hurting as much as the realisation that the scrags of rock above probably contained hidden archers.
A tall man with far too many medals barred their way. They looked ridiculous and clinked with every step he made.
Sylvalla gripped her sword tighter, scowling. “Let us pass,” she said between gritted teeth.
“You can pass.” The man smiled. “And the wizards. But your men and horses can’t.”
Di
rk’s eyes flicked from side to side before shrugging his shoulders unconvincingly.
Capro looked up at the surrounding cliffs. “Dirk, I don’t want to waste innocent lives. Maybe you should stay behind like they say.”
Dirk surveyed the forces arrayed before them. “Don’t forget I can kill you all,” he mentioned as if in passing. “How about you let me go through, too, and if your king is right—and he is a god, then he can deal with us, and if he’s wrong...well, I think we’ll all be happy then, won’t we?”
“The girl and the wizards may pass, no other.”
Torri moved forward.
“Not her, the other one.”
Sylvalla exchanged glances with Torri. “People traps,” Sylvalla whispered.
Torri nodded.
Good. Dothie could not be allowed to escape. And it would be best if none of these soldiers ran off either.
“The sorceress queen and the wizards,” the soldier said, his authority backed up by sharp pointy things that could hit from a distance.
“Fine. Then, I’m a wizard.” Dirk bowed. “I don’t suppose you’ll take my word for it?”
“No,” the man replied, not amused.
“That’s a shame. Behold, my first feat of magic. I will pass through you as if you do not exist, and appear on the other side.”
The man’s sneer faded as Dirk made good on his boast, barging through the opposition faster than they could raise their swords against him, and holding the leader at sword-point.
“I didn’t see no magic,” a soldier said loudly.
“Ahh.” Their leader coughed. “It looked pretty magical to me.”
There was a general chorus of assent, especially from the soldiers closest to Dirk.
Dirk grinned. “The really magical part, the bit I’m most proud about, is that nobody is dead.” He let that sink in a bit before adding, “Remember that, because if I come out and you’ve so much as harmed a single hair on any of these boys’ heads, I won’t be holding back.”
“Enough of this. Let us through,” Capro banged his staff and thrust it out in front of him as if considering using it as some sort of weapon.
