by J. L. Doty
Chapter 23: War Magic
Packwill dismounted, bent carefully to examine the dust of the trail. Many horses had recently passed this way, and in the dust their hooves had left a message for the trained eye to read. Packwill was heartened to note that none bore the mark of a Decouix smithy, but still he moved cautiously. If he and the Elhiynes failed to exercise care when approaching Eglahan’s camp, they could easily be shot out of hand, and their bodies identified after the fact.
He rose from his examination of the ground and turned to look back at Tulellcoe. He could see much of the old witch Olivia in the lines of the sorcerer’s face, especially her madness, and if anything, two days of hard riding with little rest had hardened the look about him. Packwill raised a hand, signaled for the rest of the party to come forward, and knowing that their lives depended on caution they did so slowly.
“My lord,” Packwill said softly to Tulellcoe. “I am sure the challenge point is just ahead. You must be ready to answer for yourself.”
The sorcerer nodded without speaking.
“Wait here, my lord, if you please. I’ll check ahead.”
Packwill turned and walked up the trail, his sword sheathed, his hands held high, palms out. He knew the moment would come soon, and he prayed that his friends were not too quick with their bows. He’d gone but a short distance when a voice spoke from the edge of the forest: “Stop there if you value your life.”
Packwill halted.
“Now speak your name,” the voice demanded.
“I am Packwill. A scout. Sworn to Eglahan of Yestmark.”
“You lie,” the voice said.
“No,” a second voice interrupted. “He speaks truth. I recognize him. But you, scout, why are you not now with your liege lord? And who is that behind you?”
Packwill addressed the second voice. “I recognize you, Annen, bastard son of Eglahan, as you recognize me. And I am not with my Lord Eglahan because, like most of his men, I thought him dead. Instead I joined with Tulellcoe of Elhiyne to seek revenge by harrying the Decouix army. It is he whom you see behind me in the trail, accompanied by what remains of his men. Now why is it I sense distrust in your voice, Annen, whom I have known since you were a boy-child bouncing on my knee?”
Annen stepped out into the trail. Like his great father he was an average looking man, nevertheless his voice carried the confidence of one who was not easily intimidated. “I trust you, friend Packwill, but not these others who ride with you.”
Behind Packwill Tulellcoe dismounted, walked forward slowly past Packwill to stand facing Annen. Packwill didn’t like the look on Tulellcoe’s face, and when the sorcerer spoke, his voice cut through the air like a freshly sharpened sword. “I am Tulellcoe et Elhiyne. Your father knows me, and so do many of his men. And if you value your soul, puppy, you will learn to recognize me the next time we meet.”
The two men stood eye-to-eye until Annen slowly turned his gaze downward. “My lord,” he said.
“That’s better,” Tulellcoe growled. “Now take me to your father.”
~~~
The hallucination of the shadowwraiths continued as Morgin followed Tulellcoe’s small party, though now he had the impression there were hundreds of them guiding him through the dense forest growth toward the Lake of Sorrows. He even hallucinated that he could hear them speaking to one another, though their voices were so faint that all of them together sounded more like a breeze rustling through the forest leaves.
From the side of the trail he watched the confrontation between Tulellcoe and Annen, watched Tulellcoe’s party admitted to the fortified encampment of what remained of Eglahan’s army. He dismounted, let Mortiss run free in the forest, stepped into a shadow and slipped easily past the perimeter guards. Oddly enough, or perhaps rightly enough, the shadowwraiths did not follow him into the camp.
He reconnoitered the camp carefully before doing anything else, estimated there were six or seven hundred men present, though many were wounded, and he could sense that the souls of quite a few would soon depart the Mortal Plane. He’d never seen the Lake of Sorrows before, but in the moonlight it was a black mirror of calmness reflecting the moon glow.
There was a large tent at the center of the camp. Morgin approached it carefully, stepped into the shadows of a fluttering torch and slipped inside. There he found Eglahan and his lieutenants already meeting with Tulellcoe and France and Cort, and it was obvious they had been at council for quite some time now.
It was not a formal council of war. They were not seated opposite one another at a table, nor with a fire between them. The hard ride had taken a heavy toll on everyone in the Elhiyne party, and no one begrudged them a comfortable seat, and a mug of ale.
Eglahan was an older version of Annen, though he sat uncomfortably with one leg heavily bandaged and propped up on pillows. “You know I would join you,” Eglahan said unhappily, “if there were any chance at all of stopping Illalla. I don’t even require a chance of victory, merely of stalemate, but at best I must have something, not just more death.”
“What of this ShadowLord of yours?” Annen demanded. “We’ve heard wondrous tales of his deeds. What about all this great magic we’ve heard of, and all this power? Tell me, where is he? Why doesn’t he stop Illalla?”
At Annen’s question the Elhiynes all glanced quickly into the shadows that danced about the room, but it was Tulellcoe who answered him. “There was a time when I could sense him if he were lurking in the shadows nearby, but he’s now drifted so deeply into the netherworld he could be but an arm’s length from me and I would not have the faintest inkling of his presence. I can only guess that he must be here somewhere near.”
“Bah!” Annen scoffed. “When I was a child I was frightened by such talk, but no longer. Any man who lurks in shadows is a thief, or a murderer, or a coward.”
In the flickering shadows of the lamp Morgin chose one going Annen’s way, stopped immediately behind him, leaned forward and whispered in his ear, “But Illalla now fears his own shadow.”
Annen jumped, started, spun about, but by that time Morgin had moved to another shadow. “What was that?” he demanded.
Cort looked at Tulellcoe. “Is it him, do you think?”
Tulellcoe nodded, smiled. “Morgin. Step forward. Make yourself known.”
There was a moment of silence while everyone waited for something to happen. Morgin hesitated, not sure whom he could trust, and too, it now took a strong effort to extinguish the shadows about him. After careful thought he decided it would yet be best to remain within his shadows.
Annen shook his head. “The ShadowLord is as much legend as he has always been.”
Tulellcoe smiled unpleasantly. “Illalla might disagree with you on that. And then there’s Salula, who’s no longer with us. And there are Decouix graves aplenty that line the God’s Road from here to Yestmark.”
“And the serpent,” Packwill pleaded. “I tell you, my lord, he was bitten by the snake demon. I saw the wound myself, and he survived.”
Annen opened his mouth to argue, but Eglahan silenced him. “And the desertions. Let us not forget the desertions. The reports I’m getting from my scouts tell me that this ShadowLord alone has cost Illalla more than I and my entire army.” Eglahan closed his eyes, sucked in a long, tired breath and exhaled slowly. “But he hasn’t cost Illalla enough. Roland is lucky to have levied three thousand men, half of them farmers with pitchforks for weapons. And I have about four hundred men who can still fight. Illalla’s men, on the other hand, are deserting him in droves, but he’ll still have at least six thousand when he gets to Sa’umbra, and they’re all seasoned veterans. I’ll not order my men against those odds again. Not again.”
Eglahan rubbed his eyes, ran his hands through unkempt hair. “My leg is hurting me. And it’s late. We’ll talk about this more in the morning. Leave me now. All of you. I need rest.”
Slowly they all filed out of the tent. At Eglahan’s orders Annen carefully extinguished all of the can
dles in the tent but one, and then he too left. Only Morgin stayed, waiting in a shadow, finding it hard now not to succumb to the constant pull of the netherworld.
Eglahan peered into the darkness as if he sensed Morgin’s presence. He tilted his head like a blind man cocking his ear toward a sound. The silence grew thick, and then he said, “Tell me, ShadowLord. Why do you linger?”
Morgin struggled to pull himself completely out of the netherworld. And then, with great care, like a barefooted man walking near glass shards, he stepped into the dim glow of the candle. For some seconds he was a specter of shifting, flowing shadows, but then with an effort he extinguished his shadowmagic and stood before the old warrior as one man to another. “You must help us,” Morgin whispered. “Without you and your men it will be a slaughter.”
Eglahan shook his head sadly. “With me and my men it’ll still be a slaughter. We’re not enough. There has to be something more. You have to provide something more. You, ShadowLord. It’s up to you now, and the rest of us are without recourse.”
Morgin looked into the soft flame of the candle. The air in the tent was so still it didn’t even flicker, and like the candle’s flame Morgin felt lifeless and empty. He’d played the game of the ShadowLord to its conclusion, and it turned out to be an empty game, with no substance or meaning.
“I’ll make a deal with you,” Eglahan said into the silence. “I’ll bring my four hundred men to Sa’umbra if you can convince that bastard Wylow to bring four hundred of his own, and if you match his warriors and my warriors each with a warrior of your own. Do that, oh ShadowLord, and I’ll come.”
Morgin was desperate, even to the point of lying. “It’s a deal,” he said flatly, wondering what price he would have to pay when Eglahan finally learned he’d been deceived.
Eglahan flinched. He’d not expected Morgin to agree to such a ridiculous proposition, but he recovered quickly. “Where will you get eight hundred men?”
Morgin extended his hand. “Leave that to me. You have my word. You have the word of AethonLaw et Elhiyne, the ShadowLord.”
Eglahan reached out warily, clenched Morgin’s hand with almost crushing force, and in that instant Morgin extended his shadowmagic, let it encompass both he and the Yestmarkian Lord. Eglahan gasped as the shadows surrounded him. “But remember, Eglahan ye Elhiyne. If you break your word; if you’re not there at Sa’umbra, then you will see me next in the shadows of your dreams.”
Morgin left Eglahan in his tent, though he took with him his shadows.
~~~
Mortiss rode like the wind, gusting at times into bursts of blinding speed, then cutting back to a steady, inexhaustible gale that blew on and on and on. Morgin clung desperately to her back as she charged through the shadows of the night, never quite sure if she rode the ways of the netherlife, or galloped beneath the glow of a mortal moon. Time and distance seemed unimportant on the roads that Mortiss traveled, for the sun never rose to clear the perpetual shadows that enveloped them, and the leagues were devoured beneath her hooves as Inetka grew closer with each passing shadow.
There came a time when the shadows cleared, though a thick blanket of cloud obscured the moon overhead. Mortiss trotted down the Gods Road at an easy pace, and Morgin was relieved to find that the night air he sucked into his lungs was mortal, though a large part of him remained well within the netherlife no matter how hard he tried to withdraw it. From the terrain he guessed they must be somewhere near the fork in the road that led to Sa’umbra.
Suddenly Morgin sensed another rider on the road up ahead. He pulled Mortiss to a stop, closed his eyes, listened to his soul as the man approached, recognized immediately that he’d come upon the messenger they’d sent to Inetka with JohnEngine and the rest of the wounded.
Morgin waited in the middle of the road with Mortiss. He didn’t want to startle the man, but since no light from the moon penetrated the cloud cover, he cast a faint glow about him and Mortiss. The rider ahead turned a bend in the road, saw the glowing apparition waiting there for him and pulled his horse to an abrupt halt. He hesitated nervously, then asked, “Who are you?”
Morgin spoke softly. “I am Morgin et Elhiyne.”
The man relaxed visibly and nudged his horse forward, stopped before Morgin and bowed his head. “ShadowLord,” he said.
“Are you bearing a message?” Morgin demanded.
“Yes, my lord,” the man said uncomfortably. “From Lord Wylow to Lord Tulellcoe.”
“Speak this message to me.”
“Yes, my lord,” the man said. “But please remember that the words I speak are those of Lord Wylow, who commanded me to speak them exactly as he himself did.”
Morgin nodded. “You will not be held accountable for repeating Wylow’s words.”
“Thank you, my lord. Lord Wylow told me to tell Lord Tulellcoe that he was a bloody idiot if he thought Inetka would allow itself to be slaughtered with Elhiyne. He said we could all go to the Ninth—”
“Enough,” Morgin interrupted. “I get the gist of the message.”
Morgin thought for a moment, realized he’d have to go to Inetka, though he wasn’t sure how he could convince Wylow when Val had failed. “Continue north,” he told the messenger. “You’ll find Tulellcoe and Eglahan riding south with the remnants of Eglahan’s army. Deliver Wylow’s message to Tulellcoe exactly as it was spoken to you. Then give Eglahan a message from me. Tell him I want him to remember our bargain. Tell him I still intend to keep my part of it.”
The man bowed his head. “Yes, my lord.”
While the messenger’s head was bowed, and his eyes were averted, Morgin slipped a shadow over both he and Mortiss and disappeared. He turned Mortiss toward Inetka, and a short time later it began to rain. It was a cold, wet, driving rain that soaked through the Kull cloak he wore, and he began to hope that if Mortiss chose to travel the ways of the netherworld, it would at least be out of the rain. But if she did carry him there for a time, it was in no way obvious, for it rained there too. The night and the rain lasted all the way to Inetka.
~~~
With Morgin astride her, Mortiss walked the Nether Plane into Castle Inetka, a path that left no traces in the world of mortal men. In the netherworld the stone of the castle seemed insubstantial and ill-defined, though Morgin had no trouble treading its halls. He found Wylow abed with his wife.
The Inetka lord snored loudly, grumbled something in his sleep. He lay on his face with an arm thrown haphazardly over his wife. Her name was Carmet, Morgin remembered, though she seemed to live in the shadow of her husband and rarely took an active role in the politics of the clans.
Still deeply in the netherworld, Morgin climbed up on the footboard of Wylow’s bed, sat there irreverently with his muddy boots crossed in front of him making a mess of the blankets near Wylow’s feet. Morgin watched his hand move of its own accord, as if he was a puppet dangling from a web of strings with his actions dictated by some puppet master looking down from afar. His hand settled on the hilt of his sword, pulled it silently from its sheath, extended the tip toward Wylow’s face. He pulled the Inetka leader into the netherworld with him, then nudged the man on the cheek with the dull side of the blade.
Wylow growled something incoherently, swatted at his face as if brushing away a bothersome fly, settled back into sleep. Morgin nudged him again. This time his eyes opened with a start, and though the room was wholly dark they settled instantly on the sword tip only inches from his nose. Morgin withdrew the sword to a safe distance.
Wylow rolled over on his back, sat up, squinted into the darkness and could obviously see nothing more than a faint silhouette at the end of his bed. “Who in netherhell are you?”
Morgin shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Name yourself, damn it.”
Morgin tried to speak his name, but as in the dream where he’d met Aethon, and found JohnEngine on the Plains of Death, he could not, and by that fact he knew he was dreaming. He decided to dream there was more light in the r
oom, and there was.
“Ah!” Wylow said. “It’s you. What the hell are you doing in my dreams?”
Morgin laughed. “What are you doing in my dreams?”
Wylow threw his head back and laughed heartily. “So the ShadowLord has a sense of humor. What do you want?”
“I want you to come to Sa’umbra.”
“Not on your life, lad. There’s no reason Inetka should fall with Elhiyne.”
“And why does Elhiyne have to fall?”
“Look at the facts, lad. The odds are against you.”
“What if I get Eglahan to come to Sa’umbra. He still has four hundred mounted men that can fight.”
Wylow squinted at Morgin distrustfully. “So that old fool’s still alive, eh? Four hundred men, eh?” Wylow appeared to consider the situation carefully, but Morgin could sense the scheming going on behind his eyes. The Inetka leader appeared to come to a decision that he liked. “All right, lad. I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll bring four hundred men to Sa’umbra if you can convince that bastard Eglahan to bring his four hundred, and if you match his warriors and mine each with a warrior of your own. Do that, oh ShadowLord, and I’ll come.”
Morgin couldn’t believe his ears. The bargain Wylow offered was identical to that Eglahan had offered, and spoken in almost the same words. He wondered for a moment if the two old warriors had conspired against him, but they couldn’t have known in advance that he would play such a role in the coming events, nor had they had the opportunity to communicate since the battle at Yestmark. In any case, while Morgin had no hope of coming up with eight hundred warriors of his own, if he agreed to the bargain it would at least get Wylow and Eglahan to Sa’umbra with their warriors. He had no idea how he’d convince them to actually join the battle once he failed to fulfill his end of the bargain.
