Prophet of the Dead botg-5

by Richard Lee Byers

  “You don’t really believe he could slip away from me and all our comrades too? You want to kill him immediately for some other reason. What is it? Do you hate him? Are you worried that if I don’t send you after him right now, it won’t be you who ends up taking his life?”

  “Something like that.” Even as she spoke the words, Jhesrhi knew they weren’t a particularly useful lie. But she was at a loss for anything else to say.

  Lod chuckled. “I promise that if I order his death, you can slay him in the manner of your choosing. For now, though, let’s hear him out.” He looked down the passage, which was now less jammed with doomsepts, direhelms, and the like. Apparently, Vandar had fled, and a number of the undead had chased after him.

  “I’m coming forward,” called Lod. “If you’re a friend, do the same.”

  “Does the august lord,” Dai Shan replied, “pledge that neither he nor his stalwart warriors will harm me?”

  “I do.” Lod glanced down at Jhesrhi. “Don’t worry. We of the Eminence don’t consider a promise to a living human binding.”

  As they headed up the passage, Jhesrhi imagined lashing out with flame, freeing Cera, and fleeing with her. But such a desperate ploy would never work.

  She had no idea if she was a match for Lod, and even if she was, it didn’t mean she could incapacitate him and all the other undead in the immediate vicinity with a single spell.

  She likewise didn’t know Cera’s precise location, only that the sunlady was somewhere toward the rear of the procession. She did know that when she’d last seen her, her comrade had been stumbling along white-faced between two zombies too weak and dazed even to walk without her captors holding her up.

  But suppose, despite all those impediments, Jhesrhi and Cera did somehow manage to break away. Then they’d still be trapped in the deathways just as they were now, and it was worse than unlikely that anyone else would happen along to unlock the way out.

  Thus, Jhesrhi saw no choice but to walk peacefully into a parley with Dai Shan and hope that, somehow, her lies came out more convincing than whatever the Shou had to say.

  She, Lod, and the undead naga’s attendants soon arrived at an intersection of passageways where a statue of Jergal sat writing at a desk and two slain zombies lay on the floor. One of them had Vandar’s spear sticking through its knee. The red metal gleamed, reflecting the little fire burning atop her staff.

  Lod cast around, then fixed his attention on the corridor to the left. “I assume when I see a blind made of shadow,” he said, “that someone is hiding behind it.”

  Dai Shan stepped out of the darkness. His eyes widened ever so slightly, but otherwise, his face was the usual pleasant, imperturbable mask.

  Jhesrhi’s fiery and human sides united in the wish to see him burn, and she had to clench herself to refrain from striking at him. She steadied herself with the reflection that, if things went considerably better than expected, she might be able to force him to tell her what had become of Aoth.

  The Shou bowed and said, “The serpent lord is as majestic as he is unique to my experience. Is it possible he commands the entire fellowship of the undead that my poor departed friend Falconer served so ably?”

  “The Eminence of Araunt has no commander,” Lod replied. “All who belong are equal. Still, someone had to create it, and someone has to guide the campaigns that will fulfill its destiny.”

  “I have every confidence the visionary before me is equal to the task. How strange, then, to find him in the company of Jhesrhi Coldcreek, and she with her mouth ungagged and her staff in her unbound hands. Perhaps, for all his wisdom, he doesn’t realize she’s one of his most formidable and determined enemies.”

  “I’ve explained,” Jhesrhi said, “that I served the cause of Rashemen under magical duress. How, merchant, do you justify yourself? Moments ago, you said you’d kill Vandar Cherlinka. Well, if your word is any good, where is he?”

  Dai Shan gave a slight nod. “Although her motives are suspect, the clever mage poses a fair question. I believed I could render Vandar helpless, but somehow-”

  “Liar!” Jhesrhi snarled. “You let him escape because the two of you together are attempting some sort of trick. Lod, the man before you is Dai Shan. He and Vandar are two of the four champions who promised the hathrans they’d do their utmost to slaughter your people. I was there. I witnessed it.”

  “Is this true?” asked Lod, swaying. “Are you Dai Shan?”

  The merchant bowed. “I am, and please, accept my apologies. It appears that sojourning in a backward land has had a deleterious effect on my manners. I should have introduced myself to the noble prophet straightaway.”

  Lod looked down at Jhesrhi. “Despite Sarshethrian’s interference, messages did travel back and forth between Nornglast and Rashemen, and thus I recognize the name Dai Shan. He made possible the strategy that will break the witches, and for that reason among others, I consider his claims more credible than yours.”

  Jhesrhi had no idea what it was that Dai Shan had supposedly done to aid the undead, but now that it was too late, she realized she’d never had any hope of emerging from this parley with Lod still trusting her. She raised her staff and drew breath to call for an expanding circle of flame.

  Something slammed into the back of her head, smashing her thoughts into incoherence and pitching her onto her knees. Then other blows pummeled her. The brazen staff slipped from her hand to clank on the floor, and the flames on the end went out. Her mind followed them into darkness.

  The silver mites poured off Pearl-eye’s robes like water. Though he was still a dozen strides away, Aoth’s spellscarred eyes discerned that the tiny things were metal scorpions. Then several of them started swelling larger.

  Aoth had no idea how big they might grow and didn’t want to find out. Nor did he care to spar with them while the ghoul sorceress stood back and cast spells at him. He set the whole length of his spear aglow with power and kept right on charging.

  A scorpion the size of a dog scuttled at him, and he thrust the spear through its head. A cat-sized one arched its stinger to drive it into his leg, and he slammed the butt of his weapon down on its back and smashed it. Grown large as a donkey, pincers scissoring, a third rushed in on his flank, and triggering one of the spells stored in the spear, he blasted it apart with a flare of lightning.

  He raced on toward his true foe over a glinting carpet of the scorpions that were still tiny. Then pains like stabs from red-hot needles assailed his legs, and staggering, he belatedly realized the little golems might well be more dangerous than the big ones.

  A moment after the pain came a wave of dizziness and weakness. He thumped his chest, rousing a tattoo that warded him against poison. That helped him catch his balance, but now the relentless fiery jabbing was torturing his torso as well as his legs.

  The ghoul snarled an incantation, pointed her wand at him, and the desperation in his mind threatened to balloon into utter panic. She threw a fear spell! he told himself, and understanding what was happening inside his head helped him cling to the ability to think.

  Despite the ongoing torment, he managed to gasp out a spell of his own, and a halo of whispering yellow flame cloaked him from head to toe. It didn’t hurt him-he only felt a pleasant warmth-or his gear and clothing either. But the stabbing stopped as the blaze destroyed the tiny automatons that had been skittering under his garments like fleas.

  He still hadn’t entirely shaken off the effect of the venom but knew he couldn’t let that slow him down. He rushed on toward Pearl-eye.

  She still had the wand aimed, and tatters of darkness leaped from the tip to lash at him. He wrenched himself to the side, and they missed.

  Then, finally, the ghoul was in reach of his spear. Still luminous with power, the weapon punched deep into her midsection.

  She screeched and convulsed. He used the spear to heave her down on her back, then spoke the first of the words that would make sunlight shine from the head of the weapon to burn her gu
ts. She was tough-otherwise, the first spear thrust would have finished her-but even so, a trick that could destroy a vampire would likely dispose of her as well.

  And he wanted to. But then the war leader part of him-the part he’d trained always to deliberate and make the results of its deliberations heard no matter how the anger and fear that combat engendered distracted him-suggested that bringing her wand to Shaugar would take precious time, and then the Rashemi would need more to figure out how to use it. It might well be more time than the defenders had left.

  But Pearl-eye was right here at Aoth’s feet, and she already knew how to employ the wand.

  He spoke the next word of the daylight spell and sensed the magic accumulating and eager for release. The ghoul plainly felt it too, and clenched herself against the flare of agony to come.

  “Do you want to go on existing?” asked Aoth.

  Surprised, she peered up at him, then asked, “What do I have to do?”

  “Turn all the golems inert.”

  “Without them, the rest of my band will die!”

  “It’s them or you. Choose. Now.”

  She shuddered. With anger, he sensed, not pain or fear. “Curse you. I need to be within sight of the devices.”

  “Then get up.”

  “Your spear is still in my belly!”

  “Where it will stay. We’ll sidle along like crabs.”

  Jet watched Aoth chase down a ghoul through the midst of a larger battle and yearned to help. But he seemed to be paralyzed like many of the automatons caught in the glowing pentacles. Or perhaps he was some sort of ghost, bodiless, capable of perception but nothing more.

  Ultimately, he saw with relief-albeit relief tinged with an underlying bitterness-that his master didn’t need his help. He captured the ghoul with the pearl in her eye socket and forced her to deactivate all the golems. After that, the masked men on the ledges made short work of the rest of the undead attackers, and their victorious cheers echoed through the caverns.

  The shouting woke Jet, or so it seemed, woke him to the ache of his wounds and the winter sunlight shining down on the section of the wall-walk he’d chosen for his nap. Then he realized the dream had been a bit muddled but essentially true, a vision of Aoth’s recent struggle slipping across their psychic bond.

  He prepared to reach out with his thoughts, make absolutely sure Aoth was all right, and ask what the war mage meant to do next. Then a shout rang up from the courtyard. This, he realized, was the noise that had actually woken him.

  He peered down. Red sword in hand, Vandar was running toward the steps that ran up to his location. Something was manifestly wrong, but for another moment, Jet couldn’t tell what it was.

  Then undead erupted from the doorway into the central keep. Some were loping ghouls and running skeletons. Others were entities unlike any Jet had ever seen, animate suits of half plate floating through the air. All were in pursuit of the berserker.

  What had the idiot human done? How had he managed to go looking for Jhesrhi and Cera and come back with dozens of angry phantoms and living corpses chasing after him?

  Shaking off his astonishment, Jet realized that at the moment, how didn’t matter. What did matter was that there were too many foes for him and Vandar to fight by themselves, and no refuge in the ruined castle that, even if they could reach it, would keep the creatures out for long.

  That left only one recourse. Straining because his injuries had made him stiff and the angle was awkward, Jet clawed and bit at his splint and the bindings holding it in place.

  Dai Shan had said that despite a month of recuperation, his wing wasn’t ready. If so, would trying to use it prematurely cripple it for all time?

  No, no need to worry about that, because if Jet couldn’t use it now either the undead or a second fall would kill him, and by all the winds that blew, if that happened, so be it. At least the waiting and fretting would be over!

  Using his beak, he ripped away the last strip of cloth and shook his wing out. It throbbed and stank too. Pus seeped from raw spots where feathers had yet to grow back. But at least he could move it.

  Panting and soaked in sweat, Vandar scrambled onto the wall-walk, whirled, and slashed the fey broadsword in a horizontal arc. The ghoul that had been about to cut him down from behind toppled off the steps and out of sight with its mold-spotted head half severed.

  “Get on my back!” Jet rasped.

  Vandar glanced around. “You’re sure?”

  “Do you have a better plan? Move!”

  The Rashemi ran to him and clambered on. Even the paltry weight of a human being produced a fresh pang of pain.

  But Jet didn’t let that slow him down. He lunged at the parapet, leaped atop a crenel, and bounded on out into space.

  And his outstretched pinions transformed what would otherwise have been a plummet into a level glide. He lashed them and began to climb.

  Every wing beat hurt, and flight was a labored, awkward progress. But he was flying, and he rejoiced.

  He wheeled and beheld a couple of the animate suits of half-plate floating after him. Uselessly. Despite his weakened condition, they weren’t flying fast enough to catch him.

  Still, he wheeled, lashed his wings, and hurled himself at the closest. It attempted to swing a broadsword at him, and he caught its weapon arm in one set of talons and its helmet head in the other.

  The armored phantom pulled apart in his grasp. He dropped the pieces to clatter on the ground, turned to avoid flying over the courtyard-there might be archers and spellcasters down there by now-and drove onward.

  “Another man might ask what the point was of pausing to kill that one creature,” Vandar said, still breathing heavily. “But I’m a berserker. I understand.”

  Jet didn’t bother answering. He was busy peering ahead for a place of concealment he could reach before his strength gave out.

  7

  Over the course of her long life, Yhelbruna had listened to countless messengers standing outside Witches’ Hall to request that she and her sisters attend the Iron Lord. Such callers were always respectful, but in subtle ways, their manner varied.

  Generally, the messengers were extremely deferential, conveying that their master understood the hathrans would come if and when they pleased. But if a matter was urgent, and particularly if it pertained to the Iron Lord’s primary role as warlord, then his emissaries communicated that urgency. While still asking for assistance with all the rhetorical flourishes protocol required, they nonetheless made it clear that the Iron Lord expected representatives of the Wychlaran to attend him without delay.

  The messenger that had arrived this afternoon had been of the latter variety. Still, Yhelbruna had expected to find Mangan Uruk inside the castle. Instead, he stood in the courtyard amid scurrying, shouting warriors, some of them his own personal retainers, others carrying shields painted with stags, snow tigers, and other totems of Immilmar’s berserker lodges.

  Spying the half dozen hathrans entering through the gate, he waved to them. “Over here!”

  The hathrans advanced, the warriors made way for them, and, when they reached him, Mangan bowed.

  “What is all this?” Yhelbruna asked.

  “I’ll let him tell you,” Mangan said. He held out his arm, and, its little brown-feathered body translucent in the winter sunlight, a wren fluttered down to light on his wrist.

  Yhelbruna felt a pang of dismay. Despite all the distracting commotion, she ought to have sensed the presence of a spirit animal. It was one more indication that her mystical strength was waning.

  “I am Rosesong!” chirped the wren. “I live in Belvata!”

  “Yes,” Mangan said. “Please, tell the learned sisters what you told me.”

  “I am Rosesong! I live in Belvata! Dead things came in the night! They killed men and women! They killed chickens and pigs! Hathran Yulzel sent me to fetch help! I am Rosesong! I live in Belvata!”

  “Thank you, friend,” Mangan said. The phantom bird leaped o
ff his wrist and fluttered up toward the battlements.

  The Iron Lord then gave Yhelbruna a wry smile. “So you see, hathran, you were right. Whatever may have happened in the North Country, the threat from the ghouls and wraiths is not over, and I have to go end it once and for all. I’ll need witches to help me, and naturally, I’d like the aid of wise Yhelbruna most of all.”

  She took another look around the crowded courtyard with its men tying bundles on braying donkeys; whining, sparking grinding wheels sharpening blades; and all the rest of its bustling, noisy preparations. “It looks like you’re taking every warrior you can lay your hands on.”

  “As I said, we’re going to put an end to this menace as fast as possible, and the way to do that is to bring all our strength to bear.”

  “I see the logic. But Belvata is a small village.” To be precise, it was a hamlet on the far side of the River Rasha a hundred miles to the south. “If a great host of undead raided it, how likely is it that anyone would have survived to send word?”

  For a moment, a hint of something less cordial, a flicker of impatience, perhaps, showed through Mangan’s smile. “You listened to Rosesong. He’s a brave, loyal creature, but I doubt he has the wits to give us a more detailed explanation of what happened. Maybe only a few undead, scouts or foragers or whatever, turned up in Belvata. The fact remains that of late, no one has sighted any of the vile things anywhere else. Accordingly, I have to assume they’ve all moved south.”

  Yhelbruna frowned. “That’s not as logical. What if-”

  “Curse it!” Mangan exploded. “Enough of this!”

  Startled for a moment, Yhelbruna could only stare, and in that instant, the Iron Lord appeared to realize he’d overstepped. He bowed a second time and far more deeply.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I revere the Wychlaran. I’ve spent my life serving you to the best of my ability. You know that.”

  The apology, offered to placate an anger Yhelbruna hadn’t actually experienced, made her feel tired and lonely. Still, she replied with the austere composure Rashemen expected of her.