The Iron Ghost

by Jen Williams

  Joah nodded, once. ‘Fine. It will be a pleasure.’ The mage bowed low, and Nuava forced herself into a run, knife flashing. The Prophet turned towards her, slowly, uncaring, and then Nuava was barrelling into Joah himself, stabbing wildly with the knife and striking nothing. She could smell rot, deep in the folds of his cloak, and the sound of her own screams echoing in her head.

  He laughed once, and his arms tightened around her.

  ‘Coming along with me, little one?’

  And the world around her twisted away into nothing.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  Sebastian passed Wydrin a fresh cup of tea. The three of them were huddled closely around the small fire the Narhl had allowed them, although it was starting to snow again, and Sebastian thought it wouldn’t last much longer. The last light of the day was now a distant dirty smudge on the low-hanging clouds to the west.

  ‘Fine, I’m fine.’ Wydrin took a slurp of the tea and waved his concerns away. ‘I just ache a little, that’s all.’

  ‘I honestly doubt that,’ said Frith. The young lord was poking their fire with a stick, with more violence than was strictly necessary. He hates to be disarmed, thought Sebastian, and I can hardly blame him. ‘The cold this Prince Dallen cast down on me was an agony. I wouldn’t be surprised if we both suffer for this later on.’

  ‘I guess I’m just tougher than you, princeling.’

  Frith shook his head at that and turned to Sebastian. ‘What is our next move?’

  ‘We do as Dallen says and go back to Skaldshollow,’ said Wydrin. ‘I tell them that the werkens are sentient beings and what they were doing is essentially slavery. Then we leave, and they can argue about the Heart-Stone all they want. We go somewhere very warm where I can lie on a beach and drink rum all day.’

  ‘Are you mad?’ hissed Frith. ‘We are still prisoners here, and you want us to obey this prince? We shall be caught in the middle of a war.’

  ‘Prince Dallen wants peace,’ said Sebastian. He glanced over to the Narhl camp, where he could see the shape of Dallen standing with his second in command. They were near the supplies, and the bulky shape of the Heart-Stone. All their weapons were there too. ‘I think we can trust him.’

  Frith snorted in disgust. ‘Trust? How much do you suppose they trust us? Have they returned your weapons, Sebastian? They asked Wydrin to risk death today, and yet they don’t even return her dagger. And they still watch me, constantly, waiting . . .’

  There was a flash of blinding blue light, illuminating the space around them as if it were midday, and for a moment Sebastian thought Frith had decided to punctuate his argument with a demonstration of the unbridled mage powers, but when his eyes recovered he saw a stranger standing between them and the Narhl camp. He wore long green robes, and his loose brown hair swirled about his shoulders.

  ‘Who the hell is that?’ gasped Wydrin, spitting half her tea back into the cup.

  Sebastian stood. He could see now that there was a girl with the man, crouched down by his feet and half hidden by the robes.

  ‘Is that Nuava Nox?’

  The Narhl soldiers were shouting commands to each other, quickly fanning out into a circle around the man. Sebastian could see Dallen approaching, his eyes wide with shock.

  ‘Look at him,’ whispered Frith urgently. He was standing now too, and was helping Wydrin to her feet. ‘Look at his arms.’

  The man had spirals of white linen around his arms and hands, and all of them were inked with strange, looping patterns. Sebastian had seen Frith at work often enough to recognise what they were. All at once he missed his broadsword more than ever.

  ‘Who are you?’ shouted Prince Dallen. He pushed to the front of his soldiers, clutching an ice-spear in one hand. ‘What do you mean by coming here?’ Sebastian could hear the confusion in Dallen’s voice, barely overridden by caution.

  ‘This is quite the place,’ said the man. He sounded relaxed. The girl who had been crouching at his feet suddenly ran, skittering towards their small campfire and running to Wydrin, who grabbed the girl to her. The man watched the girl go, and then paused to brush some snow from his shoulders. It was coming thicker now. ‘I came here once, a long time ago. It is as haunted as it ever was.’

  Olborn stepped forward, her spear jutting upwards, aimed at the man’s throat.

  ‘You will answer our prince or you will die.’

  The man glanced at her, seeming mildly surprised by her existence. ‘Oh, I am here for them,’ he gestured over to their fire carelessly, and Sebastian automatically took a step backwards. Was this a rescue? Somehow, he thought not. The girl, who was indeed Nuava Nox, gave a low moan in the back of her throat. ‘But I would just like to try something.’

  Olborn charged forward, throwing her ice-spear at the man’s unarmed chest. The man held out one hand and the spear froze in mid-air, hanging like an unlikely toothpick, and then he threw out his other hand, and the snow on the ground around them began to churn.

  ‘He’s a mage,’ spat Frith. ‘Where has he come from?’

  ‘Not any mage,’ said Nuava, and her voice was low with dread. ‘That is Joah Demonsworn, Joah the Mad. H-he killed my brother.’

  ‘Bors? Bors is dead?’ Wydrin was supporting her now. The front of the girl’s tunic was crusted with dried blood.

  ‘The animals that make their nests here also bury their dead here. Did you know that?’ continued the rogue mage. He flicked one hand, almost distractedly, and the ice-spear flew off into the dark. He was looking at the ground with great interest. ‘Not all of their young make it to term, you see. It’s quite fascinating, because they don’t discard or eat the bodies like most animals do. They bury them, and with great reverence.’

  The ground at Joah’s feet burst open, and a pair of pale bundles rose into the air. It took Sebastian a moment to realise what they were, and then one of the bundles turned slowly, a single skeletal leg peeling free.

  ‘I fear it has been very, very cold for them, all these years,’ said Joah. ‘But I think, with the right push, I might be able to wake them up.’

  Wydrin blinked rapidly, fighting a wave of dizziness. The girl, Nuava, was leaning on her heavily.

  ‘What’s happening, Nuava?’

  ‘The Prophet brought him back from the dead somehow. He attacked the city, killed hundreds of people . . .’ She sucked in an agonised breath. ‘The Prophet ordered him to find you and kill you.’

  The rogue mage knelt down and traced something in the snow with his finger. Wydrin couldn’t make out the pattern, but when he stood up, the snow all around them began to churn violently.

  ‘What is he doing?’

  ‘That was a mage’s word he wrote into the snow,’ said Frith, his voice low and urgent. ‘One I don’t recognise.’

  The two dead arachnos young hanging in the air began to twitch, and then as Wydrin watched, their long skeletal legs unfolded. Their bodies were like hollow baskets made of bone so thin it was almost see-through, covered in dark downy fluff that would eventually have become thick white fur, but the ends of those skeletal legs ended in cruel-looking pincers, and these started to flex ominously.

  ‘We have to get to our weapons,’ said Wydrin, taking a few shaky steps forward, but now the ground all around them was erupting, and the dead arachnos young were tearing their way out of their graves. Sebastian leapt back as one scrambled at his boot.

  ‘Stop!’ shouted Dallen. ‘Stand down or we will kill you! Send these creatures back.’

  ‘Stand down?’ The rogue mage sounded genuinely amused. ‘Don’t you want to see what these things do?’

  The ground was alive with the spider-like creatures now, each one about the size of a dog, each one flexing razor-sharp pincers. There was a moment when they seemed confused, their long legs tangled with each other in the snow, then at a gesture from Joah Demonsworn, they surged forward, all towards Dallen’s soldiers.

  ‘Ice-spears!’ bellowed the young prince. ‘Now!’

  Ther
e were several deafening cracks as the spears fell among the writhing creatures, but although a few were caught in the freezing traps, most surged on and over, and in seconds they had overwhelmed Dallen and his men. Wydrin had a moment to see Olborn trying to wrestle one off her leg as its flexing pincers sheared her flesh away from its bone, and then the woman fell, immediately vanishing under the swarm of animals.

  Mendrick?

  The werken stood from its crouched position in the snow and came over to her. The screams of Dallen’s soldiers were growing frantic.

  You called?

  Shaking off Nuava, Wydrin ran to the werken’s side. ‘You’re talking to me now?’

  The link has been deepened. Our minds are meshed.

  Wydrin scrambled up onto his back, and waved to the others. ‘Follow me,’ she said. ‘I’ll clear a path.’

  She pictured what she wanted, no longer sure how this would work, and then she felt Mendrick’s agreement in her head. They surged forward, crashing over the churning spider-creatures. In the snow and the confused dark she spotted Joah, standing with his arms crossed and watching the fighting as though this were some faintly entertaining spectator sport. Above them, the wyverns descended, summoned by the Narhl soldiers. They came, jaws wide and snapping, but Joah lifted a hand and as one they burst into flames, becoming brightly burning comets. Wydrin cried out as they crashed to the ground some distance away, their screams abruptly silenced.

  ‘To him then.’ She leaned forward. ‘Let’s see if we can’t take this bastard down before we see any more of his tricks.’

  Immediately, Mendrick leapt to the right, skidding slightly on the icy ground, and they pounded straight for Joah’s back. There was a high-pitched scream of warning, probably from Nuava, and suddenly Joah turned to look straight at them, robes flying.

  ‘Oh, don’t think I’ve forgotten about you.’

  He gestured towards them and Wydrin gasped as the ground dropped away. She flung her arms around Mendrick’s neck, watching with horror as they floated higher and higher. She could see Sebastian below them, now at their packs and frantically searching for their weapons. Frith was near him, his face turned up to her. From up here the battle looked already lost – the dead arachnos young had swarmed over Dallen’s soldiers, and she could see bodies on the ice, their blood a dark smear against the grey.

  ‘I don’t suppose you can fly?’ she whispered in Mendrick’s pointed stone ear.

  I am a mountain.

  ‘How’s the view?’ called up Joah, his voice full of laughter. ‘These stone monsters of yours are extremely clever, but I have noticed they are quite heavy. In fact, I rather tire of holding you up there.’

  Wydrin tightened her grip round Mendrick’s neck, and they dropped like a stone.

  ‘No!’

  Frith watched her fall with his heart in his throat – unbidden, he remembered their flight across Ede, Wydrin falling from her griffin over the Horns – and a great pulse of light issued from his chest. As it had in the Queen’s Tower, the Edenier reached out and held everything still, including Wydrin and her werken. The power churned deep inside him, desperate, and he staggered. Everything else lurched back into motion, but Wydrin and her mount came down slowly, landing in the snow with a soft crunch. Next to him, Sebastian had retrieved his broadsword and Wydrin’s sword belt.

  ‘Quick, give this to her.’

  Frith snatched it up and ran to the dark form where Wydrin had landed. She took it gratefully, pausing to lay a hand on his arm.

  ‘Nice catch, Frith.’

  He nodded, still amazed that the Edenier had acted by itself again, when they all became aware of an eerie silence. The arachnos had all stopped moving, their skeletal forms falling away as the false life Joah had imbued them with vanished. Wydrin saw Dallen still standing, blood running from a number of wounds, a short sword clutched in his hands – the rest of his squad were bloody mounds on the ground.

  Joah Demonsworn was standing in the midst of the arachnos corpses, staring back at their small group. Even in the poor light and the whirling snow, it was possible to see the surprise on his face.

  ‘What’, he muttered, ‘was that?’

  Wydrin was hurriedly tying her sword belt back on. Sebastian appeared at her side, his hands full of long silk strips.

  ‘They didn’t throw them away,’ he said, handing them to Frith. ‘They were in the pack with all our stuff.’

  ‘What was that?’ Joah repeated.

  ‘Looks like we’ve upset the lunatic.’ Wydrin took a silk strip at random and tied it around Frith’s arm. ‘Let’s get armed up.’

  There was no time. Joah turned on them and the night was lit with balls of fire, streaking towards them like yellow suns. One hit the pack horses and exploded, and everything was fire and screaming and the scent of burning horse flesh. The arachnos-corpses too were moving again, lurching out of the shadowed dark, hungry pincers clutching blindly. Wydrin’s sword, Glassheart, whirled back and forth, shattering the delicate forms where she could, while Sebastian swept his broadsword from side to side, trying to reach the prince.

  Frith glanced down at the spells he’d managed to tie around his arms. The words for Fire, Ever, Guidance and Cold. It would have to do.

  He broke cover, moving to get a clear shot at the man calling himself Joah, and he threw up a wall of ice. It struck the man low, freezing the lower half of his body. He saw the man turn, incredulous, before melting the ice away with a sweep of his hand. He looked up at Frith and their eyes locked.

  ‘You,’ said Joah, strangely clear amongst the carnage. ‘Where did you come from?’

  ‘I might ask you the same question,’ muttered Frith, before pushing his hands out in front of him and summoning the words for Ever and Fire. A stream of blood-red flames gushed out of his fingers, sending up clouds of steam from the icy ground below, but again Joah turned this away as though it were nothing. Instead, he began to walk towards Frith, sending no counter spells himself. The look on his face was one of intense concentration.

  ‘Bezcavar told me they were all gone,’ he said. His voice was soft now, but Frith could still hear it. ‘And yet it is true the demon lies, sometimes.’

  ‘Get back!’ Frith tried another stream of extreme cold, briefly turning the other mage’s robes pure white, but his spells didn’t seem to be able to grip him. ‘I’m warning you . . .’

  Part of the night fell down from the sky in a thunderbolt of black feathers; Gwiddion, enormous and powerful in his griffin form, flew at Joah, razor-sharp beak snapping dangerously. The rogue mage fell back, shouting in surprise, and the griffin flew on past, missing Joah but tearing a long strip from his robes. As Frith watched, Gwiddion banked sharply in the air, coming in for another attack, and Frith felt a moment of fierce joy – who else could command griffins? – and then Joah threw his arms up and Gwiddion was no longer there. Instead, something soft and half broken landed at Frith’s feet. Back in his bird form, Gwiddion lay stunned, small beak opening and closing.

  ‘No.’

  Taking no notice of Joah, who was now moving swiftly towards him, Frith bent down and gathered up the small body of Gwiddion, hiding him within his furred cloak. He could feel him there, small and warm next to his chest. Not dead, he told himself. Not dead yet.

  ‘So many surprises.’ Joah was an arm’s length away now, and once more he looked relaxed and happy. He was smiling at Frith as though he’d just found something extraordinary. Without turning away, he reached out with his right arm and a bulky shape rose from the piles of their supplies; it spun gently, and part of the covering slipped away to reveal a bright chink of green crystal. The Heart-Stone. It floated swiftly through the air towards them and hung just behind the man called Joah. To have such control, to be doing all this at once, thought Frith. I have only just begun to scratch the surface of what a mage can do.

  He glanced over to where the others were, surrounded by the spidery dead and still fighting. He caught Wydrin’s eye briefly,
and saw her look of alarm as she realised how close he was to the rogue mage. He saw her mouth open, saw her shouting to him, and then Joah’s hand was on his shoulder, and he was embracing him like an old friend.

  ‘There is no need to fight,’ whispered Joah into his ear. ‘You are with me again, brother.’

  The world around them began to twist and warp strangely, and just before he vanished, Frith distinctly heard Wydrin calling his name.

  26

  The two men appeared from nowhere in a blinding flash of light. Grondel, who had been preparing that night’s fire, staggered back from it and hurriedly kicked snow over the glowing embers, but a second’s observation showed him that neither man was Narhl, and they had not spotted him within his ring of rocks.

  Crouching low, Grondel peered closely at the two men. They were deep in the heart of night by now, but the skies were clear this side of the Adrean pass and the bottom of the hill was filled with moonlight. One man wore strange, scholarly robes, while the other was thin, his hair a shock of unruly white. As he watched, the man in the robes took hold of the other man, who had fallen to his knees. He could just about hear a voice, but could make out none of the words.

  Grondel relaxed slightly. Whoever they were and whatever strange magics had caused them to drop down out of the sky, they weren’t Narhl, so they wouldn’t be interested in him and his fire. He would wait for them to leave, and if they didn’t, well, his seeing-charms would have to wait for another night.

  Now the slimmer man was struggling, staggering back from the other as if he dearly wanted to get away. There was another flare of light, yellow this time, and it was as if the white-haired man had shot a comet from his hands. It missed the man in the robes, arching up into the night and fading.

  ‘Such magic,’ muttered Grondel, forgetting himself. ‘To be able to summon fire. I could conjure all the seeing-charms I wished.’

  There was a fierce argument ongoing between the men. Grondel saw more crackles of light, crawling across the snow like the spirit lights that sometimes hung in the sky to the north. Inside his chest Grondel’s heart quickened; he was a shaman and an outcast, a Narhl who suffered the torments of the fire for the visions it sometimes accorded. He wondered what visions he would see with such magical fire. He half stood, dangerously silhouetted against the snow. Perhaps, he thought, perhaps if I ask them they would lend me such light.