He gestured to the dark circle of trees around them as he spoke, and, faintly, the small group heard that deep, evil chuckle again. Trobar hung his head in shame and fear.
"Sor'y, Ma'ther," he said miserably. But there was no forgiveness in the sorcerer's glaring eyes.
"Sorry? No good to be sorry, fool. You have woken him, and now I must protect us all."
The Skandians had listened wide-eyed to this exchange. Perhaps more terrifying than the events in the forest, and Malkallam's arcane appearance, was his callous, unforgiving treatment of Trobar. The Skandians had been around long enough to know that Malcolm usually treated the deformed giant with kindness and soft words. This was a different person altogether.
Will, having regained a little equanimity now that they were out of the trees, watched with narrowed eyes. He realized that Malcolm and Trobar were playing a part for the benefit of MacHaddish. He leaned close to Horace and whispered, "Go along with it."
Horace nodded, but at the slight sound, Malkallam rounded upon them, one arm outstretched, the forefinger adorned with a long nail pointing at them like an arrow.
"Silence, you idiots! This is no time for chatter! Serthrek'nish is awake!"
And at the name, there was a reaction from MacHaddish. The Scotti let out an involuntary cry of terror and sank to his knees, huddled over the heavy log that Trobar had dropped. Malkallam stepped toward him, standing over the crouching figure as he spoke.
"Yes, MacHaddish. The dark demon Serthrek'nish is abroad in this forest, watching us as we stand here. You know of him, I think? The shredder of bodies and renderer of limbs? The red-fanged destroyer of men?"
He paused. There was a strangled sob of fear from the Scotti. He remained bowed over the heavy log that secured his chain, refusing to look up, as if fearful of what he might see.
Malkallam continued inexorably.
"Only the light of my fire is keeping him back from this clearing. But Serthrek'nish won't be denied for long. He's gathering his courage now, and he knows the flames will soon die down."
As if in answer, a deep-throated chuckle sounded from the darkness outside the clearing.
MacHaddish's head snapped up. Even from several meters away, Will could see the whites of the man's wide-open, terrified eyes against the blue paint that covered his face.
" We've no time to waste. I have to build our defensive perimeter," Malkallam said. He ignored the staring general, gesturing to his assistant. "Trobar! Take those men over there!"
Trobar led the Skandians to a point near the edge of the clearing indicated by his master. The sea wolves looked fearfully at the dark wall of the trees as they approached it. They would have preferred to remain right in the middle of the clearing, near the fire.
"Sit," Malkallam commanded them, and, following Trobar's lead, they sat cross-legged on the damp ground. The sorcerer then moved around them, muttering incomprehensible incantations as he poured black powder from a sack in a large circle around them.
"Don't touch the circle," he warned them. "The soul stealer can't touch you if your circle is unbroken."
He ushered Will and Horace to another point in the clearing. Motioning them to sit on the ground, he poured more black powder in a circle around them. He began the mumbling incantations again as he moved around Will and Horace, then in the middle of it all, without changing intonation or volume, he said quietly, in his normal voice, "Don't try to guess what I'm doing. Don't discuss it. Just look scared to death."
Will nodded and saw an almost imperceptible nod in return. It made sense, he realized. If he and Horace were to sit here calmly and analytically trying to second-guess his actions, they would destroy the atmosphere he was working to create.
Malkallam – it was almost impossible to think of him as Malcolm in this context – moved away from them now and formed another black circle around MacHaddish. The Scotti had recovered a little by now and watched him as the black powder fell around him. Malkallam met his gaze as he completed the circle.
"You're safe if the black circle is complete," he said. "Do you u nderstand?"
MacHaddish nodded, swallowing heavily. Malkallam's face d arkened.
"Say it!" he ordered. "Say you understand!"
"I… understand," the Scotti said. There was a thick accent to his speech that made the words almost unrecognizable.
Will's eyebrows shot up. It was the first time the Scotti had spoken since they had captured him, the first sign that he understood the Araluen language. Although, he thought immediately, it would have made little sense to send someone who didn't speak Araluen to negotiate with Keren.
Now, not only had MacHaddish spoken, he had done so in response to an order from Malkallam. It seemed that the sorcerer was beginning to assert dominance over the stiff-necked Scotti. Will glanced quickly at Horace, saw that the young warrior's eyes were lowered, his head bowed, and realized that he was looking altogether too interested in the proceedings himself. He copied his friend's example and lowered his head, pulling the cowl of his cloak farther forward. From inside the shadow of the cowl, he could watch Malkallam at work without risking his features being seen.
The tall figure strode across the clearing now, reflections from the silver hat flickering across the trees, and picked up a long blackthorn staff. The wood was gnarled and highly polished from constant handling over the years. He held it above his head.
" The three black circles are complete," he called to the forest. "I hold the sacred blackwood scepter. We are protected from you, Serthrek'nish!"
An angry snarl resonated through the trees in answer. On the southern side of the clearing, the side they had approached from, there was a sudden glare of red light as something flashed between the trees. Then it came again, closer this time, circling the clearing as it moved to the west.
Malkallam backed away from the trees toward the fire in the center of the clearing. Will looked around at the others. In their circle, Trobar and the Skandians were wide eyed and staring, their eyes searching the trees for the next sign of light or movement. MacHaddish was the same. Will glanced at Malkallam and saw that he was watching MacHaddish carefully. Once he was assured that the Scotti's attention was distracted, he reached into his cloak and took a small package from an inner pocket. Moving closer to the fire, he dropped the packet into the embers at its edge.
There was another flash of red in the trees, moving to the northwest side of the clearing now. Then, at the spot where it disappeared, a thin curtain of fog began to rise from the ground, just inside the tree line.
Malkallam began to back away again, moving toward the huddled figure of MacHaddish.
"Stay back, Serthrek'nish!" he called. "The flames of fire and the circles of power forbid you to enter this clearing!"
Even as he said it, there was a sudden flare of red from the fire itself. A red flash leapt from the flames, followed by a thick red mist that bloomed up from the side of the fire – right at the point, Will realized, where Malkallam had tossed the small packet only a few seconds before.
The Skandians, Trobar and MacHaddish all cried out in shock. A little belatedly, Will and Horace added their voices to the reaction. Then, as the strange red mist spread over the fire, the flames began to dwindle, as if being smothered. The clearing grew darker as the flames died down. Malkallam's tall figure threw a distorted, elongated shadow across the ground and the trees seemed to press in closer to them.
"Gorlog's claws!" shouted one of the Skandians. "What the devil is that?"
Everyone followed the direction of his pointing arm. In the bank of fog that was rising among the trees to the north, they saw a sudden red flare of light.
But this was more than just light. This was the shape of a terrible face, looming through the mist. It was there for an instant and then gone, but it was indelibly printed on their memories. A triangular face, with hollow, slanted eyeholes and a leering black mouth set with long, canine fangs. Wild tendrils of beard covered the chin, and the hair was a red ma
ss of tangles, with two curved horns visible through them.
Then it was gone and a shattering laugh split the night. The laugh ran around the circle of trees that surrounded them, and their eyes followed its movement involuntarily.
Then, high in the sky above the clearing, the face reappeared, this time glowing as if lit by an inner light. It swooped low, then soared across the clearing, climbing back into the trees and seeming to explode and disappear in a shower of sparks that left the darkness even blacker as they died away.
Malkallam had recoiled as the apparition swooped low overhead, then tried unsuccessfully to strike at it with his blackthorn staff. He staggered and dropped to his knees. Then, maintaining his hold on the staff, he pointed to the fog bank again, where the horrible grinning face had appeared once more.
"Go, Serthrek'nish! I forbid you entry! Go!"
The face disappeared again, and the watchers cried out in terror as a new apparition formed. Black and shimmering in the fog – or rather, Will realized, on the fog – a huge figure took shape: Massively built, wearing a huge horned helmet and holding a jagged-edged ax, it towered above them for a second, then faded to nothing.
The Night Warrior, Will realized. He had seen the dreadful figure the first time he had ventured into Grimsdell Wood, and it had terrified him. A few days later, Alyss had discovered it was nothing more than an illusion, using fake lights and a magic lantern projector, created by Malcolm to scare away intruders.
The fire was nothing but a small pile of coals now. Malkallam rose unsteadily to his feet. He pointed the black staff, threatening the trees that encircled them.
"Stay back, I warn you!" he called. But now a series of red flashes and flares ran through the trees, circling the clearing, throwing huge, twisted shadows across the small open space, shadows that were there and then gone in an instant. And as this happened, they heard Serthrek'nish speak for the first time, his voice deep, resonant and blood-chilling.
" The flames have died. The power of the circles is weak. I will have the blood of one of you."
One of the Skandians went to rise, battleax ready in his hand, but Malkallam's outstretched hand stopped him before he had gone above a crouch.
"Stay where you are, you fool!" his voice cracked like a whip. "He says he wants one and one only. He can have the Scotti."
"No-o-o-o-o-o!" MacHaddish's cry was high-pitched and agonized. To the Skandians, the demonic red face was a terrifying apparition. But to MacHaddish, it lay at the very heart of terror. It was the basis of all fear for Scottis, instilled in them when they were children. The flesh eater, the renderer, the tearer of limbs – Serthrek'nish was all these things and more. It was the demon, the ultimate evil in Scotti superstition. Serthrek'nish didn't just kill his victims. He stole their souls and their very being, feeding on them to make himself stronger. If Serthrek'nish had your soul, there was no hereafter, no peace at the end of the long mountain road.
And there was no memory of the victim either, for if a person were taken by Serthrek'nish, his family were compelled to expunge all memory of him from their minds.
With Malkallam's words, MacHaddish knew he was not facing just a terrible death. He was facing a forever of nothing. He looked up now into the implacable face as the wizard stepped toward him.
"No," he pleaded. "Please. Spare me this."
But the blackthorn rod had moved out and begun to scrub an opening in the circle of black powder that surrounded
MacHaddish.
Frantically, MacHaddish tried to restore it, pushing the powder back into place with his hand, but his efforts only succeeded in widening the gap. His breath sobbed in his throat, and tears of abject terror scored a path through the blue paint on his face.
Then the face reappeared in the mist, seeming to be more clearly defined now. It flickered, faded and disappeared again.
MacHaddish looked up at the wizard's painted face. All traces of the proud, unbending Scotti general were gone now.
"Please?" he said. And the staff stopped its work.
Malkallam paused. "No," he said impassively.
MacHaddish, already on his knees, now bent forward until his forehead touched the ground – making sure that he remained within the circle, Will noted.
"I'll give you anything," he said. "Anything you ask. Just keep the demon away."
Malkallam's staff moved toward the thin black line once more, touching it, stirring the grains of black powder that marked it out, slowly separating them, deliberately working to form a breach in the circle. The general watched the tip of the staff at work, watched his safe haven slowly being scraped away.
"Please?" he said, in a voice that was cracking with fear.
The staff stopped moving.
" Tell me," Malkallam said in a deliberate voice, "what are you planning with Keren?"
23
MacHaddish looked up quickly, suspicion mixed with fear on his face as he heard the terms. He had expected something else from the wizard – a demand for riches or power or both. Information was the one thing he hadn't expected Malkallam to ask for.
"It's a simple question," Malkallam continued. "Tell me what you have planned."
In spite of the terror that gripped his insides, the discipline MacHaddish had learned over long years as a warrior and leader reasserted itself. To disclose plans like this was treachery, nothing less. His jaw set in a hard line, and he began to shake his head.
Malkallam's staff begin its inexorable work again, wiping out the circle that protected the Scotti. MacHaddish knew his own folklore. He knew the black circle was his only protection against Serthrek'nish. He knew that once there was a gap in the circle wide enough for the demon's hand to enter, it would be the end of him.
Serthrek'nish would drag him, screaming, from the circle and into the black night under the trees – and into a greater blackness beyond.
He watched the gap widen. A lifetime of loyalty and discipline struggled with a lifetime of superstition, and superstition won. He reached out and grabbed hold of the tip of the staff, stopping its deliberate movement.
"Tell me what you want to know," he said in a low voice, his shoulders slumped in defeat.
"Your plans for attack," Malcolm said."How many men are coming? When are they going to be here?"
There was no further hesitation from the Scotti. He had committed to betray his trust, and he could see no point in hedging.
"Two hundred men, initially, from the clans MacFrewin, MacKentick and MacHaddish. The commander will be Caleb MacFrewin, warlord of the senior clan."
"And the plan is to occupy Castle Macindaw, then spread out farther into Norgate Fief, correct?"
MacHaddish nodded. "Macindaw will be our anchor point, our stronghold. Once we have neutralized that and occupied it, we can bring more and more men through the passes."
A few meters away, Will and Horace exchanged worried glances. Both knew the potential danger of having an armed force of two hundred men loose in the province. And those two hundred would be just an advance party. Once a foothold was gained, more would follow in their tracks.
It would take a major army to dislodge them, and that army would have to come from the south. It would be months before King Duncan could put a large enough force together and then march them north. By then, the Scottis would be firmly entrenched and it might well prove impossible to drive them back through the passes to the high plains of Picta – particularly if they held Castle Macindaw in strength. If this went unchecked, it could mark the beginning of a long, drawn-out war, with no guarantee of victory for the Araluen forces. You could almost redraw the maps of Araluen and Picta and move the permanent border fifty kilometers to the south.
But most of this they had already guessed. There was one question still remaining that needed answering. And that answer might well hold the key to Norgate's future.
"When?" Malcolm posed the question. This time MacHaddish did hesitate. He knew as well as they did that this was the vital question, and fo
r a moment his loyalty reasserted itself.
But not for long. Malcolm twisted the point of the staff from his grip and moved it toward the thin black line of powder once more.
" Three weeks," MacHaddish said, a note of surrender in his voice. "Three weeks from yesterday. Caleb MacFrewin is already gathering the clans. They're marching to the border now. It will take time for them to get through the few passes that are open and then reassemble into marching order. They'll be at Macindaw in three weeks."
Malcolm stepped back a pace, studying the crouching figure before him. He saw the slumped shoulders, the downcast eyes and the look of defeat. MacHaddish was a broken man, a man who had betrayed his own honor, and Malcolm had no intention of crowing over the fact. Nor did he plan to reveal to MacHaddish that he had been tricked. But that was less because of any sympathy for the man and more because he realized that there might come a time when he needed more information.
"Thank you," he said simply. He took a sack from an inner pocket and bent forward, pouring black powder onto the ground to restore the gaps he had forced in the circle.
Then he walked quickly to the smoldering remains of the fire and threw another handful of powder onto the coals. There was a deep hoof, and a vivid yellow flash, and the flames reignited instantly, climbing high into the dark sky above Grimsdell Wood. He looked at the three Skandians, who had watched the proceedings in terrified silence.
"We're safe," he said. "Serthrek'nish can't harm us now."
The tension went out of the Skandians' bodies as he spoke. They gripped their weapons a little less fiercely, although Will noticed that they didn't actually let go of them. Then, from behind Malcolm, they heard an unexpected sound.
MacHaddish was sobbing. But whether from shame or relief, no one could tell.
They spent the rest of the night in the clearing. Throughout the hours of darkness, Malcolm replenished the flames whenever it seemed necessary with the strange chemicals he carried. He was determined to maintain the illusion that he had created for MacHaddish's benefit.
The siege of Macindaw ra-6 Page 13
