The Crucible of the Dragon God tok-4

by Mike Wild

  "What is that? Acid?"

  "No, some kind of destabilising agent," Moon mused.

  He had used many, many substances in his alchemical experiments but this was a new one on him. He studied the k'nid more closely and frowned.

  "This isn't right," he said. He took a small vial from his pocket and sprinkled its contents over the corpse. Nothing happened for a few seconds but then the dead creature began to wrinkle and twist, shrink in on itself, until it became utterly unrecognisable.

  "Now that was acid, right?"

  Moon shook his head. "It's the same potion I use to limit the influence of the ogur upon myself — to hold the change in check, as it were. Except, of course, that I just gave the k'nid far more than is safe to use on myself."

  "So, what? You're saying this k'nid was changed like you were? That your potion reversed the changes, made it what it was before?"

  "Exactly."

  Kali pulled a face. "But look at it, old man — it's just a mess. It isn't anything."

  "That's what worries me." Moon stood and sighed. "I saw something happen in the Drakengrats this morning. A great explosion."

  "Well, don't look at me. I was nowhere near it."

  "For once," Moon said, smiling. "The point is, Kali, the k'nid are swarming from the west, are they not?"

  "Moving down in a fan shape from what I've seen. Freiport, Volonne, Miramas, now here. Merrit, do you think there's a link? That this explosion somehow created the k'nid?"

  Moon shook his head. "Reports of their appearance precede that. But there may be still be a link. Something else up there."

  "Any idea what?"

  Moon hesitated. "There's a legend of an Old Race site I came across during research into my own condition. It spoke of a place in the clouds where the Old Races played at being gods. A fearful, unapproachable place. They called it the Crucible."

  "A place in the clouds? You think that means the Drakengrats?"

  "It seems a likely contender."

  "And this 'crucible'? You think that's where the k'nid came from?"

  Moon sighed. "Kali, if I'm right I think they might have been born there."

  Kali took a deep breath. "Then, old man, I guess I'm going to the Drakengrats."

  "And I'm coming with — "

  The old man stopped as there was a distant sound of tolling. "That's the town's sentry alarm. The guards have spotted something on the plains."

  "K'nid. They must be spreading faster than I thought."

  "There's one way to find out. Come with me."

  Kali trailed the old man up the spiral staircase, avoiding falling pictures and ornaments as she climbed, until the pair reached the attic. Moon uncovered the telescope, adjusted its warp lenses, and then tipped it down so that it was aimed towards the town's walls. He peered into the eyepiece.

  "Not k'nid," he said. "Not yet."

  "Then what?"

  "Take a look."

  The old man stood aside and Kali took a look, focusing on the main gate of the town through which a great many soldiers were marching. Their grey canvas and lace epauletted livery marked them out as Pontaine militia, forces financed by the local land barons as a kind of home guard, and guarding the home was clearly what they seemed to be doing — quite zealously.

  Ranks of them were organising the civilians near the gate into small groups, keeping them in place with what seemed the unnecessary threat of their weapons. Unless the militia had suddenly decided to become a dictatorial force, there had to be a reason for their uncharacteristic behaviour. Kali tipped the telescope upward slightly, focusing first not far beyond the town walls, and then further out, at the almost featureless agricultural plains that surrounded Gargas. She could see them stretching away for leagues, or at least would have been able to were it not for the dark fog that covered them like a shroud.

  Except it wasn't a fog, she knew. It was the same pack of k'nid she and Horse had become caught up in. If pack was the word to describe the hundreds and hundreds — if not thousands — of them she could see. It was almost as if, en route, the strange creatures had been replicating themselves. She muttered something with four letters under her breath.

  "K'nid?" Moon said.

  "Oh, yeah. They're here."

  The old man urged her aside and peered into the scope. "By all the gods, they are fast."

  "Here within the hour, I reckon."

  "Then it's time that we were on the move."

  He walked to a chest in the corner of the attic, opened it and extracted an equipment belt similar to her own, a few unidentifiable odds and ends which he stuffed into his pockets and then a pink, woollen cloak he slung about his shoulders. Kali couldn't help but smile. The old man had been wearing that cloak the day they'd first met and she hadn't seen it since the day he'd retired — and it still stank of Horse. This was beginning to feel a little like old times. As Moon began to descend the stairs she too dug into the chest, extracting a new bodysuit she'd asked him to keep there for emergencies, and quickly slipped it on.

  "What about your shop?" she asked as she followed Moon down. "You know it'll be at the mercy of those bastards."

  "I doubt a thousand k'nid could make much more of a mess of it than you did, young lady."

  Kali reddened. "For all the Gods' sake, when will you stop treating me like a bloody chil — "

  She quietened. There was a soldier at the bottom of the stairs. Another behind him. And another behind him.

  "Come with us," the one at the front said.

  "Excuse me?" Merrit Moon responded.

  The soldier's face darkened. "You are ordered to come with us. Now."

  "The shop," Moon said warningly, "is closed."

  Kali looked at him, coughed gently and pointed out the front door of the shop which hung buckled and ajar, then a part of the wall which had started to collapse during their battle with the k'nid.

  "Actually," she pointed out, "I think you could say you were still open."

  "Funny. You know they aren't here to buy things, Kali. They're here to interfere, as their kind always do."

  Kali patted Moon's arm. Much as she shared the old man's healthy disrespect for authority of any kind, there were things going on that they both had to take into consideration — not least the clearly scared and trigger-happy militia. Besides, Moon's temper had become noticeably more fiery since the Thrutt incident and, for obvious reasons, she needed to keep him calm.

  She approached the soldier and, despite already knowing what was approaching, asked: "Why are you here?"

  The soldier was blunt and to the point, although a slight bobbing in his throat revealed his nervousness. "Gargas is now under martial law. A curfew has been imposed and any transgressors will be summarily executed. The population is to be evacuated to Andon."

  "Andon?" Moon said. "That's ridiculous… madness! The journey will take days!"

  "We go with them, old man," Kali said, to his utmost surprise. "We go with them. No arguments."

  "Young lady?"

  Kali patted his arm again, this time squeezing it softly but reassuringly too. Because watching the militia enter through the town gate she had noticed something that he had not. But now was not the time to share it with him.

  "Trust me," she said after a second. "We go with them, and we do everything these nice gentlemen say."

  Chapter Six

  "Young lady," Merrit Moon said, with evident disappointment, "I am very, very surprised. It is most unlike you to capitulate so readily."

  Kali smiled. "Oh, I'm not capitulating, old man. You know I never do. I'm just looking after our interests. Ours and everyone else's."

  "And how is that exactly?" The old man stared ahead at the snaking line of people, hundreds of them, six abreast, being marched across the plains, then back at an equal number in similar formation behind them. He snarled at the soldiers who marched alongside, effectively herding the people of Gargas like cattle, as they had been doing for hours. "As I believe I pointed out, this is
madness."

  "Old man, I think they're genuinely trying to help," Kali said placatingly. "If only to guarantee the land barons next year's taxes. It's just that they've never experienced a situation like this before."

  "As you say. But what the hells are we doing with them?"

  "For one thing, there's no way we could have reached the Drakengrats directly — you saw the k'nid swarm yourself. For another, it does take us closer to the mountains, albeit with a slight detour to the south west. But lastly," she added with a prod, "it's your best chance to get across the plains with your scowl intact."

  Moon harumphed and stared into the distance. For the moment the horizon was clear but, having seen the speed of the k'nid with his own eyes, he knew that situation could change at any second.

  "Horse could have had us to the mountains in three jumps," he said.

  "Maybe, if Horse were up to par," Kali patted her mount as he plodded alongside, still weak but recovering from his injuries. Green eyes rolled. "Besides, whether Andon has the best defences in the region or not, I'm a little dubious about the logic of corralling all these people in one place. I want to make sure they're all right."

  Merrit Moon sighed and shook his head, but Kali could tell she'd been forgiven. "You want to make sure they're all right. An admirable sentiment, but I don't really see what you can do to help and, I repeat, this is madness. Do you honestly think we can avoid the k'nid for the three or four days it will take us to reach Andon?"

  "I don't think it's going to take three or four days. Look ahead."

  Maybe a tenth of a league further on, a dust storm was beginning to brew on the plain, vast spirals of flotsam thickening moment by moment. "Oh, wonderful. We'll be blinded too."

  "I don't mean the storm. I mean what's causing it. The people at the front. Look."

  It was then that Moon noticed the gestures being made by a group of six individuals leading the march. Garbed in thick, plain cloaks but with hints of far more colourful robes beneath, they appeared hardly to move under their covering — except for a subtle but complex flexing of their hands.

  "Are they what I think they are?"

  "Yep. League of Prestidigitation and Prestige. Saw them with the soldiers at the gate. And they're weaving. In fact, they're brewing up the storm."

  "But why on Twilight would they do that?"

  "Perhaps to disguise what's inside it." She nodded forward, into the storm itself. There was a distinct glow visible inside, a swirl of energy that Moon recognised instantly.

  "My Gods, they're creating a warp portal. They're going to teleport these people to Andon."

  "Without them even realising it," Kali said with a twinkle in her eye. "It wouldn't do to let the general public know just how much magic was around them, now, would it?"

  "These people aren't stupid, they'll realise."

  "They're scared, tired, hungry and facing the unknown. When they arrive in Andon, they won't even care enough to ask."

  "You knew what you were doing all along, didn't you?"

  "Oh, aye."

  Kali, Moon and Horse continued forward and soon entered the storm. Cloaks or hands raised against their faces to protect themselves from the swirling dust, no one other than Kali and her companions realised what was happening. Even when the teleportation magic took hold of their bodies, causing a slight tingle of the flesh, a barely noticeable buzzing in the bones, as they suddenly left one place to arrive in another. Or at least they thought no one else had noticed. Because as the marching refugees emerged from the other side of the dust storm, finding themselves amidst the skeletons and ruined machines of war that littered the outskirts of Andon it was, ironically, Harmon Ding who noticed something amiss.

  Towards the front of the line, the small twitchy man sniffed the air and bobbed his head from side to side, his brow furrowing in confusion and consternation and his fingers rising as if to question the soldiers and the mages at the forefront of the march. Thankfully, they ignored him for the most part, but then Ding's continuing and questioning gaze looked back down the line, spotted Kali, Moon and Horse in its ranks, and his face whitened. He grabbed one of the soldiers and pointed in their direction.

  "This we can do without," Kali sighed. "Excuse me."

  She began to work her way down the line, and the closer she came to Harmon Ding the clearer his entreaties to the soldier became.

  "Don't let them into your city! They're not normal. This crazy woman has, well, a thing, and her friend, the old man, he isn't an old man at all, he's some kind of monster. A big, green monster. They're in league with those other things, I tell you. Armoured horses and big green monsters and crazy women and… and gloves that fire circles in the air."

  "Excuse me officer," Kali said in an approximation of a backwoods accent. She could tell from his expression that the soldier had already decided he was dealing with someone less than a full tenth, so that made her task a lot easier. "Is cousin Ding botherin' you?"

  "He seems to think your grandfather is a big, green monster, ma'am."

  Grandfather, Kali thought with a smile. Oh, the old man was going to love that.

  "Pssshh," she said, dismissively. Kali extracted a bottle of thwack she had palmed from the Greenwoods on her way down the line and shook it at the soldier, feigning clumsiness as the cap she had deliberately loosened came off and the noxious brew splashed all over Harmon Ding. "Sorry, cousin," she said. "But at least you can't stink of it any more than you already do."

  "But — but I haven't touched a drop!" Ding protested. "Not a dro — "

  Kali looked at the soldier and shook her head sadly. "Denial," she said, and rammed the neck into Ding's mouth, whacking him subtly in the stomach as she did so he couldn't help but gulp the thwack down. "There, there. You know it makes you feel better."

  The bottle extracted, Ding sucked in a gulping breath. "Armoured horsh," he said, dribbling thwack while his eyes rolled. "Big, green monshter, gloves that — that…"

  "I'm sure you have enough to deal with, so I'll take him off your hands," Kali said to the soldier. "I'll look after him, now."

  "Thank you, ma'am."

  "No problem."

  Kali took Ding by the arm and force-marched his protesting form back towards Moon. As they neared Horse she took a quick look around to make sure no one was watching and then suddenly elbowed Ding in the face, knocking him cold. She slung the body over Horse and then fell back into step with Merrit Moon.

  "Nice work," the old man commented.

  "Shucks, it were nothin'… grandpa."

  The old man turned to protest, but then thought better of it as the exodus neared the walls of Andon itself.

  They were formidable — and it was immediately clear why the barons had chosen to evacuate the populace here — because in addition to the normal ranks of catapults, trebuchets and giant crossbows that lined their tops, additional defensive weapons had been added to their number. Some, by the look of them, magical in their design. If — make that when — they came, the k'nid would certainly have a battle on their hands.

  The soldiers at the front of the line called out and, with a massive rumble, the gates began to open. Gradually, the line filed beneath the stone arch, until it was the turn for Kali, Horse and the old man to enter.

  It was then that the first of the problems Kali had envisaged hit them. Inside the city walls, refugees not only from the northern towns but, by their local dress, Fayence to the south-east, milled about in an ever thickening crowd, threatening to block the main thoroughfare. Nor did they just mill. Many were crying in fear of what they had been told might come; others beseeched the soldiers for help they could not give; still others protested volubly about the situation they had been forced into. It was, in short, chaos, and the soldiers looked as confused as they did.

  Kali approached one of the city guards, asked what was to happen next.

  "To be honest, Miss, it's kind of every man for himself. All accommodation is already taken, and the situation isn
't helped by the fact that many have already barricaded themselves in their homes, threatening to put a quarrel through the heart of anybody who approaches. Frankly, the barons have made something of a mess of all this. All I can offer you is stabling for your, er, horse. We're stabling all the beasts in the bunkers in the city walls, should be safe enough there."

  "Can't these people use those bunkers?"

  "They could Miss, but try persuading them. If you knew things straight from the hells were heading for the city, would you hide in the first place that might be breached?"

  The soldier had a point. For that very reason, she wasn't happy leaving Horse there either. But there was no other choice and he would, when it came down to it, be safer there than out in the open. Kali slipped Harmon Ding's unconscious form from her mount and patted Horse on the neck, before handing the soldier his reins.

  "Could you see to him for me? I need to find some shelter for our peop — "

  Kali's words were drowned out by a sudden series of urgent cries from the city walls and a flurry of activity above as soldiers took up positions. There were mages amongst them too, standing tensed and slightly hunched, their faces dour, fists balling and beginning to flare or crackle with energy waiting to be unleashed. Within seconds there was barely an inch of space left on the walls as Andon's defenders readied themselves.

  "They're coming! Seal the gates!"

  My Gods, so soon?

  Kali raced up the steps to the walls, needing to know what the city was facing. Pushing her way between soldiers she stared out over the Killing Ground — or at least, what she could see of it.

  The advancing swarm of k'nid completely obscured the abandoned battlefield as they tumbled, rolled and scuttled rapidly towards Andon's walls. As the k'nid came, Andon's defenders responded with devastating force, unleashing a rain of missiles and magical bolts that should have created an impassable wall of death but which, after the initial volleys ended, appeared to be having very little effect on the k'nid at all. It seemed, in fact, that for every k'nid that was pounded by the defensive assault, another two appeared. As prepared as it was, Andon looked as though it was about to be overwhelmed. Sure enough, only seconds later, the first wave of k'nid reached the walls, scaled them and rushed straight into the ranks of the now panicking mages and soldiers.