by Bruce Blake
“The water.” Athryn glanced at the puddle. “Nothing is safe for us here. The very ground we walk upon resents our presence. But what of the vial?”
“It was Ghaul who took it.”
“In the vision,” Athryn added. “Ghaul’s corpse.”
Khirro conceded the point and thought of the slack, dead face and the ghostly pale baby. He glanced away so Athryn wouldn’t see the disquiet the memory brought.
“Then we will begin with Ghaul.”
Khirro sheathed the Mourning Sword and sighed, relieved Athryn didn’t question what he’d seen nor think him crazy. The man was a magician and had seen and done things Khirro would have difficulty believing.
They returned to the others without worry of noise. Ghaul woke before they roused him, hand reaching for his sword as it did every time he awoke unexpectedly. The sign of a well trained soldier.
Or a man with something to hide.
As he looked at Ghaul, Khirro thought of the corpse in his vision. In wakefulness, the resemblance seemed superficial. The corpse’s face was loose and drooping, its expression blank; Ghaul’s eyes were hard, full of life and dangerous strength, his taut cheeks clean shaven. Perhaps his mind conjured the similarity.
“Give me back the vial,” Khirro said, regretting his choice of words as soon as they spilled from his lips.
“What are you talking about?” A strange look flashed through Ghaul’s eyes, then disappeared as they returned to inscrutability. “I don’t have the vial, you do. Have you lost your mind?”
“The vial is gone,” Athryn said in a tone free of emotion or accusation. Ghaul’s eyes flickered from Khirro to Athryn and back, hand still on the grip of his sword. “Khirro had a vision. In it, you took the vial.”
Ghaul’s hard face became stone. “I don’t have the vial. But perhaps I should. I wouldn’t be stupid enough to fall asleep and lose it.”
Who is he calling stupid?
The hair on the back of Khirro’s neck bristled. From the corner of his eye he saw Elyea sit up, a look of confusion on her sleepy face.
“I was drugged. I saw you take it, now give it back.”
Ghaul released his sword and spread his arms wide in a mock gesture of welcome.
“If you’re convinced I have it,” he said through clenched teeth, “then come get it, farmer.”
Khirro surprised himself by leaping forward and throwing all his weight toward Ghaul’s mid-section. A half-step to the left and an elbow to the small of the back sent Khirro to the ground, his shoulder banging against a sharp rock. He rolled, struggling to regain his feet. Ghaul advanced, dirk in hand. Khirro grabbed for the Mourning Sword, already knowing he wouldn’t have time to draw it, but Elyea jumped between them.
“Stop it,” she said shielding Khirro. “Stop it!”
Khirro stared up at her, his steel partially freed. Ghaul also halted, face twisted with anger and blood lust.
“Don’t imagine it’s your place to come between men, whore. It’s a good way to get yourself killed.”
Khirro couldn’t see Elyea’s face, but he imagined her expression must be like she’d been slapped. She closed the steps between her and Ghaul, stopping with only inches between them, and looked up into the eyes of the man who stood a head taller than her. Neither spoke. Khirro’s breath caught in his throat, stopped by tension fallen on them like a shroud. Athryn finally put a stop to it.
“Darestat is more powerful than we know,” he said. “His influence is everywhere. It is he who does this to us and he who has the vial.”
His words broke the hard stare between Ghaul and Elyea as they both turned toward him. The air changed, grew lighter.
“Then we must find the Necromancer quickly, before he has us kill each other,” Elyea said. “Put your blade away, Ghaul.”
The soldier looked at her, blinking, then took a step away and replaced the knife in the top of his boot, though his hard expression remained unchanged. Khirro felt a boulder lift from his chest, though the pain in his throat and side remained. He dropped the Mourning Sword back into its scabbard.
“Let’s go.” He stood and brushed dust from his breeches. “But don’t drink the water.”
It was a trick of the blue light that made the cavern seem so large. After an hour walking in silence as the picked their way around stalagmites and over debris, they reached the far wall. The blue light ended suddenly at the opening of a tunnel in the middle of the rough stone wall like it dared not cross the threshold.
They stood at the edge of the tunnel’s mouth, peering into the darkness they’d hoped had been left behind when they entered the cavern. Khirro dreaded the idea of leaving the soft blue light behind. As threatening as it seemed after his hallucination, the black was worse. A minute passed, no one moving; Khirro’s growling stomach reminded him how much time had passed since he last ate.
“There’s nothing to do but go in,” Ghaul said, finally breaking the hour long silence, but he didn’t move. No one did. Time crawled.
What are they thinking?
Khirro longed for the comforting warmth of the king’s blood against his chest. Was it the darkness before them that made him dread pressing on, or the emptiness he felt from the missing vial? He needed to have it back and moving on was the only way to get it.
Khirro pulled the Mourning Sword from its sheath and held it in both hands before him. Unbidden, his lips whispered a foreign word and the blade sprang to life. Bright white light burned up the steel, the red runes and black blade disappearing behind its radiance. The others stared at Khirro, expressions of surprise and disbelief on their faces. He looked back at them knowing his face showed the same.
“How did you…?” Elyea whispered, voice trailing off.
“I don’t know.”
“Dragon fire,” Athryn said. Blue iridescence and harsh white light flickered and fought across the surface of his silvered mask like beasts competing over their territory. “There is magic in you now, Khirro.”
“No.” Khirro shook his head. “Not me. It’s this place.”
Once, as a child listening to his mother’s fables, he might have imagined himself a wizard, but those days passed with his youth. Power and responsibility were things he didn’t crave. The Shaman gave him the responsibility for the blood of the king and twice he lost it. Being a farmer, being entrusted with another’s love, these were all the responsibility he wanted, but his life would never be like that again. He looked at the others staring at him and the glowing sword in his hand. Some things couldn’t be avoided, no matter how much you didn’t desire them.
He strode into the tunnel and his companions followed.
Darkness fled before the light of the Mourning Sword like a hare before a fox. The harsh white glow lit yards ahead bringing Khirro comfort, as did the feel of the hilt in his hands. What would happen to the light if he used the Mourning Sword as weapon rather than torch? And could he make it stop, or would the sword glow for the rest of eternity? He considered asking Athryn but decided against it until they were safe.
If we’re ever safe again.
The tunnel differed from the one they’d followed into the glowing blue cavern, angling upward slightly as water trickled down its walls here and there. The rivulets reminded Khirro of the thirst raking his throat but, though they didn’t glow blue, he dared not touch the water to his lips. He wouldn’t trust anything as long as they remained in this cursed place, not even himself.
As they moved down the passage, patches of moss appeared on the walls, sparse at first but growing thicker and more frequent the farther they went. The air changed, too, becoming fresher, less cloying. Khirro occasionally thought he felt it shift. Somewhere ahead, there must be an air shaft or an opening to the outside.
Outside.
The word sounded good. It would be a relief if they didn’t have to retrace their steps through the cavern, past the dragon, to regain their freedom.
Will it be day or night when we reach the surface again? Summe
r or winter? He sighed as he walked. If we reach the surface.
Time had lost meaning since they descended the twisting wooden staircase…how long ago? Lakesh made its own rules.
Khirro walked on, parting the darkness as he went, finally feeling like they drew closer to their goal. But it also felt like they no longer traveled alone. His companions trudged along behind him.
Do they feel it, too?
On the tunnel floor at the edge of the sword’s light, a glint caught Khirro’s eye. He halted and his companions stopped beside him.
“There’s something ahead,” he whispered, pointing with the tip of the Mourning Sword. Ghaul stepped forward, but Athryn stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
“We go together,” the magician said.
Khirro stared ahead as they crept forward shoulder to shoulder, but he knew the others held weapons in hand. He’d heard the gentle stretching of Ghaul’s bowstring and the scrape of steel against leather as Athryn and Elyea drew sword and dagger. Khirro breathed slowly through his nose, felt no sense of foreboding, no fear, only emptiness.
Step by step they advanced, the light of the Mourning Sword reflecting on what Khirro quickly recognized as the blade of a sword. He resisted the urge to stop, inspect it and draw conclusions from afar. A few more steps and the circle of light cast before them fell on a booted foot. He stopped. The others did, too.
“Is it a man?” Elyea whispered.
No one answered. Ghaul stepped forward, motioning for them to follow. They moved again, taking small, cautious steps, the edge of the light crawling farther ahead with each footstep.
The leather boot led to a leg clothed in rough spun breeches. An empty scabbard hung on one side of a wide belt encircling the person’s waist, a dagger at the other. The glow passed the waist, casting light on a dirty red tunic and reflecting on glimpses of mail hidden beneath. Nothing indicated it to be anything other than a man prone on the tunnel floor before them. The sense of emptiness grew in Khirro, becoming a feeling of loss. The clothes looked familiar, the armor recognizable. He knew what the sword-light would reveal and dreaded taking the last few steps before the glow fell across the man’s face.
“Shyn,” Elyea cried putting words to what Khirro already realized, perhaps known from the moment the light reflected on the sword.
They hurried forward, forgetting caution as they rushed to their fallen comrade’s side. Elyea kneeled beside him, searching for signs of life, but Shyn’s eyes stared sightlessly at the ceiling, the Mourning Sword’s light gleaming dully on their glassy surface. Gray feathers poked in places from his head and neck, showed under the collar and sleeves of his tunic. A shiver ran up Khirro’s spine as he gazed upon Shyn’s face looking dead and half-transformed as it had in his vision.
What does it mean?
“How did he get here?” Athryn asked. He turned to Ghaul. “You were not gone long enough to have traveled so far.”
Ghaul mumbled something Khirro didn’t hear as he concentrated on remembering his vision, but it was no use. Instead, he found grief. He’d liked Shyn, would have befriended him under any circumstances. He examined the border guard’s face, his expression frozen in a skyward stare, lips pulled into a half-smile. Only a few feathers had pushed completely through his skin; most were trapped halfway so it looked as though he’d been skewered to death by a flock of birds. Khirro’s eyes trailed down his chest to the wound in his belly. Dried blood caked in the rings of his mail and stained his tunic dark brown but none pooled on the ground beneath him.
“He didn’t die here,” Khirro said interrupting something Ghaul said.
“That’s what I said,” Ghaul said, annoyed.
Khirro ignored him, his gaze falling on feathers poking through the sleeve of Shyn’s tunic in a testament to the violence of his transformation. No wonder he normally removed his clothes before changing. Khirro shook his head.
This doesn’t make sense.
If the battle had been so sudden and desperate he didn’t have time to change, how had Ghaul escaped unscathed? And why was Shyn here, so far from where he fell? As Khirro mulled over the circumstances, he noticed Shyn’s hand curled into a fist and shifted the Mourning Sword to cast its light upon it.
He held something in his hand.
Khirro knelt to retrieve it as Ghaul did the same, their hands coming to rest on Shyn’s at the same time.
“It might give a clue what happened to him,” Ghaul said brushing Khirro’s hand away. Goose flesh rippled on Khirro’s forearm. He knew Ghaul didn’t speak truthfully, though he didn’t know how he knew.
“We both know what it is,” he said uncurling Shyn’s stiff fingers. The blood in the vial glowed under the sword’s harsh light. Ghaul snatched at it but Khirro retrieved it first.
“I told you we shouldn’t trust him,” Ghaul snarled as he stood. “The bastard stole the vial from you in the throes of your hallucination.”
He kicked Shyn in the ribs, the toe of his boot landing with a dull thud. Elyea cried out on Shyn’s behalf, pushing Ghaul’s leg away.
“His wound is too grievous,” Athryn said shaking his head. “He could not have taken it then come here to die. Someone placed them here together for us to find.”
“But how?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Ghaul snapped. “The treacherous thief stole the vial. How he comes to be here isn’t important. We have to find the Necromancer before we all end up like him.”
Khirro stared at Ghaul, begrudgingly accepting his words. Whatever killed Shyn might be stalking them, but he didn’t believe Shyn betrayed them. The border guard was no traitor. He had proven himself in Khirro’s eyes many times over.
“We should bring him,” Elyea said. “The Necromancer can raise him, like Braymon and Maes.”
Athryn shook his head. Shyn’s sightless eyes and frozen face reflected in the magician’s mask, transforming it into a death mask as he looked upon the dead soldier.
“No. There is no living blood in Shyn. Darestat cannot bring him back.”
“We can’t leave him,” Elyea said but Khirro could hear the resignation in her voice.
“There is nothing else to be done,” Athryn said.
“Then let’s go,” Ghaul said. “I don’t want to run into those things again.”
They moved on leaving Shyn’s body behind, silence born of caution and grief following their steps. Something felt wrong about this, but Khirro didn’t know what. Everything had been wrong since they came to Lakesh, more so since they reached the keep. No sense of reality, no control.
Why did Shyn have the vial? How?
Ghaul claimed to see him slain, yet he still quickly named him traitor and thief. Too many questions couldn’t be answered, not here, not now.
Maybe the Necromancer would provide the answers.
Chapter Fifty
Trumpets blared and rose petals drifted from high windows as boulders thudded sporadically against the fortress wall. Therrador’s horse whinnied nervously as it pranced along the narrow street, its shoes throwing up sparks as they clicked against flagstones. An enameled red eagle spread its wings across Therrador’s golden breast plate, the tips touching his epaulets; another eagle perched atop his helm and a red velvet cape draped from his shoulders. The horse’s blanket, spun with gold thread, matched its rider’s gleaming plate.
People lining the street clapped and hooted as he rode by at the head of his entourage. He hid his disappointment at how few people there were, but what could he expect in a fortress under siege? There would be more at the coronation and the reception afterward, and well-wishers would pack the palace when he returned to Achtindel.
The Kanosee army had fallen back from the walls since Therrador’s arrival, moving all but a few trebuchets out of range of the Erechanian war machines. They still launched boulders to keep the Erechanian forces from venturing out of the fortress, but they did little damage at such a distance. Soldiers marveled at the effect having Therrador there had on the Kanosee
. The king-to-be let them have their assumptions, but he alone knew the truth of it.
“I don’t like it, m’ Lord,” Sir Alton Sienhin had blustered of the Kanosee’s latest tactic as the two mounted their horses. “They’re up to something. I think it’s a mistake to take so many men from the wall.”
Therrador had steamed at his words. What good was a coronation if no one shared in it? What kind of king was crowned in secret? He managed to control his words as he answered.
“They will not advance again,” he said confidently. “They cower before our might.”
Sir Alton had moved as though he’d say something else but then thought better of it.
Sienhin rode to Therrador’s right and a length back followed by the royal guard and all those who’d make up the royal court-a hundred people in all, every one ahorse, clip-clopping along the lane, spilling into the courtyard beyond. More people lingered in the courtyard, cheering tentatively and cowering each time a boulder thumped the wall. Therrador guided his horse to the door of the great hall, waving half-heartedly. This wasn’t how he’d imagined things. In his mind, he saw rabid crowds cheering and hollering and Graymon, the future king of Erechania, riding at his side. His chest tightened. He missed the boy, prayed he was safe.
The doors swung inward and Therrador urged his charger across the threshold, the wind snapping his cape one last time before he passed into the still air of the columned hall. The click-clack of hooves bounced and echoed into the high ceiling as his horse high stepped on the marble tiles. They passed under archways and into the cavernous great hall, brightly lit by the sun beaming through its massive windows. More trumpeting announced his arrival, the notes ricocheting from one wall to another, collecting and multiplying in the lofty roof. The crowd filling the room exploded with cheers and whistles, whoops and hollers turning the fanfare into a cacophony.
