The Iron Tower Omnibus

by Dennis L McKiernan

  “Now yield me the names of your comrades.”

  Only Laurelin’s sobs answered him.

  Spittle drooled from the corner of the Troll’s mouth.

  Clack!

  Vanidor’s wrists bled, and his ankles were disjoint. Wordless sounds came from his throat.

  “Think you that it was an accident of nature?” Modru’s viperous voice asked. “Nay, ’twas my Master’s doing: And a great weapon it is. How deem you the Dimmendark is made: What’s that: You cannot say: Then I shall have to tell you: by the Myrkenstone, fool: It eats the cursed sunlight, sending Shadowlight in its stead. And with it I control the reach of Winternight, to the woe of the world. But when my Master comes, I and my minions will be set free from the Sunbane, then nought will stop our rule.”

  Modru’s clenched fist smote the rack, and he loomed darkly over the Elf. “Names, fool, names,” spat Modru.

  “Oh, my Lord Vanidor, speak!” cried Laurelin. “Please speak!”

  Cries were wrested from Vanidor, but he said no name.

  The great Ogru’s lips smacked wetly.

  Clack!

  “Ride, Flandrena, ride!” Vanidor’s cry was rent from his screaming throat.

  “Flandrena?” hissed Modru. “Is that one of your companions?”

  Vanidor’s hoarse shrieks filled the tower and Laurelin jerked at her chain and wrenched back and forth and cried in great gasping sobs and tried to reach the Elf.

  Clack!

  “Gildor!” Vanidor’s tortured scream shattered through the tower, and then was no more, for the Lian warrior was dead.

  ~

  Laurelin fell to her knees, her arms clutched across her stomach, and she doubled over, rocking back and forth in torment, great sobs racking her frame. Yet, she was driven so deeply into grief that no sounds issued from her throat. And she was but vaguely aware of Lôkha unshackling her from the iron post and leading her back down the twisting stairwell; for the torturous murder of Vanidor Silverbranch had pushed Laurelin beyond her uttermost limits. And as she stumbled blindly down the steps, behind her sissed Modru’s sibilant laughter.

  She was taken down to a main corridor, but the Lôkha forced her not back to the dark cell. Instead she was given over to two scuttling Rukha who led her into a richly appointed room.

  “‘Unblemished,’ he said,” croaked one Rukh.

  “But, sss, the arm, the arm,” hissed the other.

  “The drink’ll heal that, you stupid gob,” snarled the first, “after we bind it.”

  Ungently, the two Rukha stripped the foul clothing from the Princess, hauling her this way and that. And when she was naked they used iron shears to cut the wrappings holding the splint in place. And all the while they worked, Laurelin sobbed quietly, tears smearing through the grime on her face.

  At last the injured arm was bared, and although the bone had already begun to knit—for it had been twenty-three days since it had been broken—still the Rukha set Laurelin’s break in a binding made by dipping long, wide strips of cloth in a liquescent paste and wrapping them ’round her arm where they quickly dried. When the two were done, the stiffened wrap went from above her bent elbow to below her wrist.

  And they poured the hot burning drink down her throat, the same fiery liquid forced upon her by the Ghola on the long ride to Modru’s Iron Tower.

  They took her into another room and sat her in a hot bath, and with harsh soaps and rough hands they scrubbed her hair and scoured the filth from her face and elsewhere. And Laurelin paid but little heed to their unfeeling ministrations.

  ~

  That night she slept in a bed, but her dreams were of the Iron Tower, and she woke up screaming, “Vanidor!” And, weeping, she fell back into exhausted sleep.

  And in her dreams, a golden-haired Elfess came to her and soothed her.

  And then a sad-eyed Elf stood before her. Are you Vanidor: Are you Gildor: But he said nought, smiling gently.

  Lastly, she had a vision of her Lord Galen, and he stood in a dark place and held her locket at his throat.

  ~

  When she awakened, she found she was weeping, and her mind kept returning to those unbearable moments in the tower: unspeakably cruel, ruthless moments that endlessly repeated in her thoughts.

  The mute Rukh brought her food, yet she touched it not, and sat abed watching the fire in the chimney with unseeing eyes: grieving. All ’Darkday she sat thus, cold horror clutching her heart; for what the slaughter of a waggon train had failed to do, what eighteen ’Darkdays at the hands of the Ghola had failed to do, and what five “days” locked in a filthy, lightless cell had failed to do, being forced to watch helplessly the torture-murder of Vanidor had at last done: it had driven her spirit into a dark realm of no hope.

  That night, again Laurelin dreamed of the golden-haired Lady. And this time the Elfess planted a seed in black soil. A green shoot emerged and swiftly blossomed into a beautiful flower. Just as swiftly, the flower withered and died. And a wind blew, carrying the shriveled leaves and petals swirling up and away, but also bearing silken fluffs floating upon the breeze. And the Elfess reached up and caught one of the fluffs and held it for Laurelin to see. And lo: it was a seed.

  Laurelin awakened, and sat in the flickering firelight and pondered the fair Lady’s message, and the Princess at last thought she knew its import: From Life comes Death, from Death comes Life, a never-ending circle.

  And in that moment, aided by a golden-haired Elfess she had never met, Laurelin’s spirit began to heal.

  5

  Drimmen-deeve

  Up the long staircase they climbed, Brega and Gildor first with the lantern, Tuck and Galen after. And from below pounded thunder as the maddened Kraken hammered upon the Door: Boom: Boom!

  At the top of the steps they paused, catching their breath.

  “Two-hundred treads,” said Brega, and turned to Gildor. “It is odd that a trade route would start with such an obstacle as a two-hundred-step rise.”

  “Nevertheless, Drimm Brega,” answered Gildor, “this is the way I came. Mayhap heavy goods are borne by train a different way, perhaps out through a level passage from the chamber below; yet when we trod under the Grimwall through Drimmen-deeve those many years past, this is the way we were led.”

  Brega merely grunted.

  Boom: Boom: Boom!

  “Let us move on,” said Brega, “else the Madûk may jar loose the hidden linchpins to bring these passages down upon us.”

  Onward they went, along a high curving corridor, passages and fissures alike boring blackly off to either side. The floor was level and covered with a fine layer of rock dust, and no tracks could be seen in it except those they left in their wake.

  Boom. Boom. Behind, the Kraken raged on, the rolling echoes fading with distance as the four strode forth: boom . . . boom . . . oom . . . until finally they could hear the savage hammering no more.

  The floor had begun to slope downward, and still corridors and crevices radiated outward, away from the passageway they followed. But Gildor stayed in the main tunnel and did not turn aside.

  Down they went, deeper under the dark granite of Grimspire Mountain, and their pace was swift. Four miles, five miles, and more, they marched away from the Door, their hard stride carrying them onward. For as Galen put it: “We must be away from this Black Maze ere the Ghola can bear word to the Gargon that intruders now walk his Realm.”

  But each one of the four was weary, exhausted by the long pursuit ere they had set foot into Black Drimmen-deeve, and so, when they came into an enormous long hall, nearly four-hundred yards in length, perhaps eighty yards wide, set, according to Brega, some seven miles from the Door, Gildor called a halt.

  “We must rest and eat, and let me study the ways before us,” said the Lian warrior, waving a hand at the four major portals gaping blackly into the chamber, “for I must choose the proper path out.”

  Grateful for the chance to rest, Tuck slumped to the floor in the middle of the hall. He fi
shed around in his pack and gave a biscuit of mian to Galen while keeping one for himself. They sat in the shadows in the center of the chamber and watched as Gildor and Brega made the rounds of the exits, peering down each and discussing the paths that they saw. At last the Elf and Dwarf came and sat beside the Man and Warrow and took food for themselves.

  Brega wolfed down his ration, yet Gildor but barely touched his food, seeming pensive, troubled.

  “Elf Gildor,” said Brega, sipping from his canteen, “be there water along this path of ours?”

  “Yes, if I step it out true,” answered Gildor. “Water aplenty for the drinking, sweet and pure when I came so long ago.”

  “Elf Gildor,” Brega spoke again, “while we rest ere we go on, you said you would speak of some events of long ago, after the Châkka abandoned Kraggen-cor. How came the drawbridge to be up: The Door to be closed: The Black Mere to be made?”

  “Ah, yes,” said Gildor, “I did promise you that tale. Hear me, then, for this is what I know:

  “When the Dread broke free of the Lost Prison, the Drimma fled Drimmen-deeve, and some Elves fled Darda Galion, for such is the Gargon’s horror. Drimma fled east and west, turning north and south; so, too, did the Elves that ran, or they rode the Twilight Ride.

  “With the Drimma gone, Rucha and Loka began to gather in the Black Deeves, coming to serve the Gargon in his dread-filled Realm. Many were the skirmishes with the Spaunen, and the Lian set watch upon the portals: Dusk-Door, Dawn-Gate.

  “The Rûpt, too, set wards at these entrances, though why they guarded this place, it is not known; yet guard it the Spaunen did. Perhaps they feared the Lian Guardians would enter, yet even the Lian cannot withstand Gargoni: it was but through the power of the Wizards of the Black Mountain of Xian that these dread creatures were held at bay during the Great War of the Ban. And had there been more Gargoni, even the Wizards would have failed.

  “Yet the Spaunen guarded the Door, though none else would enter, and the Lian watched patiently as the seasons passed into one another and the years flowed by.

  “Then came a time five centuries past when two great Trolls came each night and quarried stone, building a dam across the Duskrill. A year they labored, until it was done at last. No longer did the Duskrill tumble down the linn in a graceful waterfall; instead the water was trapped behind the Troll-dam. And the Black Mere grew swiftly and soon filled all the swale up under the Loomwall.

  “Another time passed: one more year, I think. And then in the dark of night a mighty Dragon came winging.”

  “Dragon!” burst out Tuck.

  “Aye, Dragon,” answered Gildor, nodding.

  “Then the old tales are true,” responded Tuck. “Dragons are real and not just fabulous creatures of legend, not just hearthtale fables.”

  “Aye, Tuck,” confirmed Gildor. “Dragons are real: Fire-drakes and Cold-drakes, both. Once, all Dragons gushed flame, but those who aided Gyphon in the Great War were reft of their fire to become Cold-drakes; and they suffer the Ban, for the Sun slays them, though they die not the Withering Death: their Dragon-scaled hides spare them that. Even so, Cold-drakes are awesome enemies, and their spew is terrible: though it flames not, still it dissolves rock and base metal—even silver corrodes under that dire drip, and the spume chars flesh without fire.”

  “Then where are they, the Fire-drakes and Cold-drakes?” asked Tuck. “I mean, if Dragons are real, why don’t people see them around?”

  “They sleep, Tuck,” answered Gildor. “For a thousand years they hide away in lairs in the remote high mountains, only to awaken and ravage the Land, bellowing their brazen calls. Five-hundred years agone they took to their lairs to sleep; five-hundred years hence they will awaken, and they will be hungry, and begin a two-millenia rampage ere they sleep again. They are dire creatures all, especially the Renegades and Cold-drakes, for they are not bound by the pledge.”

  Tuck frowned. “Renegades: Pledge?”

  “Long past,” said Gildor, “in the First Era of Mithgar, Drakes came unto Black Mountain bearing a great token—the Dragonstone. In return for the Mages pledging to hide the stone away forever and to leave its secrets unlearned and to ward it from all who would do otherwise, most of the Dragons pledged to limit their raids to that needed for sustenance—a cow, a horse, or other such now and again. Too, they pledged to refrain from mixing in the affairs of other folk, unless these folk first meddled in the affairs of Dragons, in which case they are free to take just retribution. They also pledged to not plunder—but for sustenance—unless they were first plundered by others. They also pledged to not seek treasures owned, though abandoned treasures were and are fair game.

  “Some of the Drakes refused to be bound by the pledge, just as some of the Mages also refused to be bound by their part of the bargain, and these are Renegades all.”

  “Evil will be the day when Dragons wake,” said Brega, grimly, “for they are the bane of all Folk, especially, as you say, Lord Gildor, the Renegades and the Cold-drakes. The Châkka have often suffered from these dire creatures: Dragons would plunder our treasuries and hoard our hard-won wealth.” Brega turned to Gildor. “But the Dragon that came through the night to the Dusk-Door, was it a Cold-drake, like Sleeth?”

  “Aye, like Sleeth but not Sleeth, for that Orm had already been slain by Elgo,” answered Gildor. At the mention of Elgo’s name, Brega’s eyes flashed with ire, and he seemed about to speak, but Gildor went on: “When the great creature winged south from the Northern Wastes, at first we thought it was mighty Ebonskaith himself, but then we saw that instead it was Skail of the Barrens. And he bore a great burden—a writhing burden—something evil and alive, and he dropped it in the Black Mere.”

  “The Kraken,” said Galen.

  “The Madûk,” echoed Brega.

  “Aye,” answered Gildor, nodding, “though then we did not know what it was, today, five-hundred years later, we four have discovered to our woe it was a Hèlarms.”

  “Hèlarms?” Again Tuck bore a puzzled look. “Whence came this creature?”

  “I deem it most likely that Skail bore it here from the Great Maelstrom off the Seabane Islands in the Boreal Sea, for that is a haunt of these creatures, hauling ships down into the great whirlpool, there where the Gronfang Mountains plunge into the brine,” answered Gildor. “Yet it could have come from other places as well: It is told that fell monsters from beyond the borders of time inhabit the deeps—not only the great ocean abysses, but also the cold, dark lakes: the Grimmere, Nordlake, and others. And the waters rushing in blackness ’neath the Land—the lightless undermountain torrents, the rivers carving stone, the bottomless black pools—they too, are said to hold dire creatures, and are better left undisturbed.”

  Tuck shuddered and gazed about into the shadows mustered near as Gildor spoke on: “Skail dropped the burden into the Black Mere and then winged north, anxious to be safe in his lair ere the Sun arose. And with this Monster now in the waters, when daybreak came, the Lian Guardians saw that the drawbridge was up and the Dusk-Door closed; the Rûpt no longer stood watch at this portal.”

  “There was no need,” said Galen, “for the Krakenward now guarded this entrance.”

  “Aye,” answered Gildor, “and now we know why the Ghûlka attacked us not: they feared the Hèlarms.”

  Again Tuck shuddered. “What a vile Monster: lurking in black waters, waiting to snatch innocent victims.”

  No one spoke for a moment, and then Galen quietly said, “I loved Jet.”

  “And I Fleetfoot,” Gildor added.

  Again no one spoke for long moments, and tears glimmered in Tuck’s eyes. Even Brega seemed stricken by the deaths of the horses who had given to their uttermost limits only to be cruelly slain by a hideous creature, for Brega said, his voice husky, “No two steeds could have given more.”

  At last Galen stood, saying, “Be there ought else, Gildor: We must press on.”

  “Only this, Galen King,” said Gildor, rising to his feet, also, �
�the Monster was put here at the behest of Modru, on this you can mark my words, for none else would do such a vile thing. Hearken unto this, too: the power of the Evil in Gron must be vast to cause a Dragon to bear a Hèlarms from the Great Maelstrom to here, and to cause a Hèlarms to suffer being borne.”

  “Perhaps,” said Brega, shouldering his pack, “there is something to the legend that Dragons mate with Madûks.”

  “What?” burst out Tuck. “Dragons mate with Krakens?”

  “’Tis but a legend,” answered Brega, “yet it is also true that no female Dragons are known to the Châkka.” Brega cocked an eye at Gildor, who merely shrugged and agreed that no female Dragons were known to the Elves, either.

  Once more they set out upon their journey, striding to reach the Dawn-Gate ere they could be detected. And the deeper they strode into Drimmen-deeve, the more uneasy Tuck became, yet he knew not why.

  The corridor that Gildor chose continued to slant downward, and less than a mile from the “Long Háll,” as Brega called it, they came to a wide fissure in the floor, nearly eight-feet across; the passage continued on the other side. And from the black depths of the crack came a hideous sucking sound.

  “Ah,” said Gildor, “now I know we follow the path I trod long ago, for this slurping crevice I remember well. Yet there was a wooden span when we crossed it.”

  “What makes the suck?” asked Tuck, peering down into the blackness but seeing nought, then pulling back. “It sounds as if some hideous creature lies below, trying to draw us into its maw.” Tuck’s thoughts were upon Gildor’s words about monsters living in deep, dark places.

  Brega listened. “A whirl of water, I think. Had this place a name, Elf Gildor, when you last were here?”

  Gildor shook his head, and Tuck said, “Then I name it the Drawing Dark, for it seems to want to pull us down into its lost depths. A slurking whirl of water it may be, but a sucking maw it sounds.”

  “Think you that you can leap this, Tuck?” asked Galen.

  Tuck eyed the distance, the jump a long one for a three-and-a-half-foot-tall Warrow. “Aye,” said the Wee One, “though I’d rather have a bridge.”