The Hollow: At The Edge

by Andrew Day

  “He should have killed me when he had the chance,” Dhulrael replied. “Because if I am right, I can help you stop him. Captain, do you have a map?”

  Serrel watched Caellix and Jurgen having a heated discussion with Dhulrael. Beside him, Mouse sat on a log eating a huge piece of salted meat ravenously. Caellix’s remaining dog, Vost, sat at his feet, looking forlorn.

  “Do you believe all this?” said Holly aloud.

  “Ancient relics and magical crystals?” asked Brant. “Sure. Why not?”

  “Who cares?” said Dogbreath, who was lying on the ground with a leather skullcap over his eyes. “Find Ferine, kill Ferine. And if there’s time, eat Ferine. All that other shite is just... details.”

  Holly sighed and poked at the campfire. “Remember when we used to fight normal people? I miss those days. Give me an old fashioned bandit company any day.” She glanced over at Victor, who sharpening one of his many knives. “So what’s your story?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I just heard that you were a mage.” Holly glanced at his black clothes and his collection of sharp, pointed objects dubiously.

  “I am a mage,” replied Victor.

  Mouse swallowed loudly. “He likes to stab people,” she explained. Then continued eating.

  “I also do magic,” said Victor. “I have many talents.”

  “That’s true,” agreed Serrel. “His stitching is beautiful. Who’s your new Captain?” he asked Victor.

  “You’ve never heard of Jurgen, the Master of Assassins?”

  “Also known as Jurgen the Blackblade,” explained Brant. “Or Jurgen the Vicious, Evil Bastard. Or Jurgen the Man You Should Never Accept a Drink From, Ever.”

  “He kills people,” said Holly. “What else is there to know?”

  “You kill people,” pointed out Serrel.

  “Only people who try to kill us,” said Brant. “We’re soldiers. But Jurgen is... pre-emptive.”

  “It’s the job of the Nightblades to go into places without being seen, in order to...” Victor searched for a tactful phrase. “Deal with events before they get out of hand.”

  “By murdering people?”

  “If need be.”

  “Meaning: usually,” clarified Holly.

  “So what’s with the sergeant? She and Jurgen don’t seem overly fond of each other.”

  “Difference of opinion, Fresh Meat,” said Brant. “Jurgen’s always wanted the sergeant on his team, and Caellix believes all assassins should be stabbed in the throat and buried in a shallow grave... Uh, no offence,” he told Victor.

  “None taken,” said Victor, not looking up.

  Serrel glanced at him. “So you’re an assassin now. To be honest, I’m not that surprised.”

  “It didn’t surprise me, either,” put in Mouse.

  “Serrel,” Victor explained, “my entire life was more or less leading to this. If I wasn’t in the Legion, then I’d probably be some dark alleyway somewhere, being paid in silver to take other peoples’ lives. At least this way, I’m killing people who are actually worth it.”

  “Define, “worth it” for me, Victor.”

  Victor looked up at him. “You’ve haven’t been in the Faelands as long as you have without bloodying your hands. Who have you killed?”

  “Ferine. A few of those damn wolf creatures.”

  “And you actually felt bad about it?” Victor asked in amusement. “If you had a choice, would you go back and not kill them?”

  “Of course not. Then I’d be dead.”

  “So you kill, if only to save your own life. Well, the Nightblades, we kill a few people so that thousands of other people don’t have to die. A single blade here, and a little splash of poison there, and an entire war can be averted.”

  Serrel gestured at the surrounding woods. “How’s that working out?”

  Victor shrugged. “Maybe if we had killed Vharaes earlier, this all could have been avoided.”

  “You sound like, Jurgen,” pointed out Brant. “And you may have noticed, but he is one truly mental bugger. I mean Caellix is crazy. Really, foaming at the mouth crazy. But Jurgen, that bloke is... What?” He trailed off when he realised the others were looking over his shoulders. “He’s standing right behind me, isn’t he?”

  “You wish,” said Caellix.

  “Oh, thank gods.”

  Caellix slapped him hard across the head, and joined Serrel at the fire.

  “I meant crazy in the nicest possible way,” Brant explained.

  Caellix ignored him, and patted Vost on the head. The dog licked her hand consolingly.

  “I’m sorry about your dog,” said Mouse.

  Caellix stiffened. “He was just a dog,” she replied. “Just a big, stupid dog.”

  “But he was your dog,” Mouse went on regardless, either not seeing, or purposely ignoring the cease-and-desist hand gestures Brant was making at her. “You must be sad. I remember when my cat died, I cried for weeks.”

  “Really?” Caellix looked coldly at her. “I suppose your cat was a gift from your father, trained by you from the moment it could walk to hunt at your side? I suppose that you and your cat had a bond so great that when you were together, you moved perfectly as one being? I suppose that when your cat was gutted by an abomination, you felt like one of your limbs had been torn off, and you weren’t sure if you could ever feel whole again?”

  Mouse chewed thoughtfully, and swallowed. “No. Not really. He was a little white kitten I found hiding in the stables. I called him Snowy, and used to feed him kitchen scraps, and then one day the head butler drowned him in a water barrel and left his body on my bed for me to find.”

  Sympathy given and story completed, Mouse returned calmly to her meal as the others gaped at her.

  “I really preferred it when she didn’t talk,” muttered Victor.

  “That is easily the most horrible thing I have ever heard,” commented Holly.

  “Give her time,” said Victor. “You’ve only just pierced the top of a very deep wellspring of despair, fear and utter, unadulterated rage.”

  “But I’ve been feeling much better lately,” replied Mouse, offering them minor comfort.

  “Anyway,” Caellix started, trying to get back on track. “We’re moving out soon, so get your things ready.”

  “Where are we going?” Serrel asked her.

  Caellix hesitated. “We’re heading north, to Vollumir. But first, we’re making a quick diversion off to the east. There’s an old quarry not far from here, where they got the stones to build the bridge. According to the elf, the area’s one of these... thinner places, where the ether bleeds through. He thinks that’s where the Ferine would take their magical relic of doom to recharge.”

  “And if we find it, we destroy it, right?” said Holly.

  “If we find it, most likely it’s going to be heavily guarded. Jurgen and the elf want to go in and destroy it, but there are only about a dozen or so of us here that can still fight. If we go against them, it’s going to be brutal. Especially if this relic is as powerful as the elf says it is.”

  “What other choice is there?” asked Serrel.

  “We scout the location, then head to the rest of the Legion and come back with more people.” Caellix snorted. “By then the Ferine would have moved on, or filled that relic with enough energy to kill us all. It’ll be bloody either way.”

  “It always is,” said Dogbreath with a grin. “But you know me. I follow you anyway.”

  “Sure, but you’re an idiot.”

  “I’d have to be. Heheh.”

  “Then get ready, you lot. We’re moving out in fifteen minutes.”

  Altogether, fourteen of them set out for the quarry Dhulrael was adamant the Ferine would be using to recharge their Illudin. Fifteen if you included Vost. A few other soldiers were left behind to guard the wounded and dying. Along with the Hounds, and the three Nightblades, there were four other soldiers who had survived the attack on the Legion and were still in good
enough shape to fight. And Mouse. She got up and left with the group without a word, as though it were just expected of her.

  “You don’t have to come,” Serrel told her. “I saw you weaving before. You used up a lot of energy. You sure you don’t want to rest and recover your strength?”

  “Don’t you?” Mouse replied, but without malice.

  “I have to go. The rest of my squad’s going.”

  “The rest of my unit are all dead,” said Mouse. “I don’t have anywhere else to go. Besides. You might get into trouble if I’m not there to save you.”

  Serrel opened his mouth to object, feeling that he didn’t exactly need someone to save him from anything, but Victor clapped him on the back.

  “I’m glad you’re coming along, Mouse,” Victor said.

  “Thank you.”

  “Just so long as I don’t get caught between you and the enemy,” Victor went on. “I don’t want to get incinerated and your weaving seems a bit... uncontrolled.”

  “I know,” Mouse conceded. “I’m trying.”

  “You really have changed a lot, you know that?” he commented unexpectedly.

  “I know. It’s been a very trying week. You haven’t changed at all, though.”

  Victor shrugged. “I’m just in my element.”

  “And you managed to find more knives,” noted Serrel.

  “Like I’ve always said: you can never have too many knives.”

  Jurgen and Caellix walked far ahead, Vost at his master’s side, checking the trail was clear. When she looked over, Caellix noticed Jurgen’s mouth lifted in a tiny satisfied smile.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing. Just thinking that I finally managed to get you to work with me,” replied Jurgen in amusement.

  Caellix shook her head. “Enjoy the moment. This is the one and only time.”

  “I still don’t understand your reluctance,” Jurgen said. “We aren’t that different, Caellix. How many men have you hunted down in your life?”

  “There’s a difference between hunting a man and ending his life in fair combat, and killing a man in his sleep.”

  “Semantics,” replied Jurgen dismissively. “The end result is the same. We kill a few, and save a few more. We do terrible things so that the world can keep on turning. Times like this, the Empire needs people like us.”

  “True. Doesn’t make the things you do any less wrong,” replied Caellix. “And for a master assassin, you’re making an awful racket. Why don’t you shut up before something hears you and kills us all.”

  Jurgen just shrugged.

  The first sign of trouble was the sight of an elf, slowly walking through the woods, clearly patrolling the area. A second could be seen further off.

  The group dropped low to the ground, staying out of sight. Jurgen made a quick gesture to Victor, who nodded, and slipped silently off through the trees. Jurgen turned to Caellix and gestured to the closest elf.

  Caellix made a face, and mouthed, All yours.

  The assassin pulled up his hood, and slunk quietly towards the elf.

  The elf was Ferine. It paused in its patrol, and sniffed the air. The scent of humans was suddenly very strong to its enhanced senses. It turned, trying to locate the source of the smell, when Jurgen appeared behind it, and slipped a knife through its back.

  The second elf heard the rustling of the undergrowth, and turned towards his companion. A knife through the ribs stopped him in mid-step, and Victor caught its body and lowered it to the forest floor.

  Caellix waved the group forwards. Slowly and quietly they sneaked through the woods towards their target.

  The trees disappeared, and the ground beyond sloped into a steep incline to the floor of a fairly small quarry. There was another elf guard on duty at the edge of the tree line, leaning his back against a tree and wearing a bored expression. He didn’t even see the black figure who killed him with a single thrust of a blade.

  The group squatted half hidden behind the trees and stared into the quarry. It was bordered on two sides by tall walls of white stone. A single road, wide and clearly well maintained led in and out. The Ferine had set up camp in the center of the quarry. There were a few threadbare tents set up randomly across the quarry floor, but they seemed rather small for the number of Ferine that could be seen loitering around. A large number of Ferine were asleep around a large camp fire. They slept curled up on the ground without bedding, rather like wolves.

  Right in the very centre of the camp, protected by a ring of Ferine, was a tall red crystal that seemed to pulse from within with red light. The red light flared and died rhythmically, like a heartbeat. Serrel didn’t know if this was an Illudin, but it matched the description Dhulrael had given.

  Caellix stared at the camp with a grim expression, then signalled for the group to retreat. They slipped a safe distance back into the trees, and gathered together.

  “There’s too many of them,” said Caellix. “Normally that wouldn’t bother me, but it’s in the open, in broad daylight. They’ll see us coming.”

  “Why don’t we just shoot the damn thing while its just sitting there?” suggested Holly.

  “Because if I am right, that would cause the Illudin to explode and kill everything in the area,” Dhulrael whispered quickly. “Destroying the Illudin will not be difficult. It is destroying it without destroying ourselves in the process that presents the challenge.”

  “I’d say the small army of Ferine between us and the shiny rock would be a bit of a challenge,” put in Caellix. “How long will it take them to charge that thing?”

  “I have no way of knowing,” said Dhulrael. “Hours, days, seconds, your guess is as good as mine.”

  “We can’t wait for nightfall,” said Jurgen. “Even if they are still here by then, they would have noticed their missing guards and come looking for us.”

  “There’s no way we can sneak in,” Caellix pointed out. “And only two entry points. The moment we break cover they’ll be all over us.”

  “The road will be guarded,” said Jurgen. “It’ll slow us down if we try that approach.”

  “A distraction maybe?”

  “Anything in mind?”

  There was thoughtful silence.

  “Well,” said Holly. “If we did shoot at the thing...”

  “Have you not heard a single word I have said?” asked Dhulrael in exasperation.

  “To be honest, I sometimes glaze over. You have one of those voices.”

  “If you shoot at it-”

  “Quiet,” Caellix hushed them. “Wells makes an interesting point.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “If that thing is as fragile as you think it is, then the Ferine will need to protect it. Nothing will get their attention like some idiot taking a few shots at it.”

  “If nothing else, it’ll make a few of them piss themselves, heheh,” added Dogbreath.

  “If it really is the force of wanton destruction that we think it is, they’ll be falling over themselves to protect it. They’ll send out a force hunt down their attackers.”

  “The first thing they will do is weave a shield over the Illudin,” said Dhulrael. “A shield empowered by that object will be unbreakable. Especially in this place. The amount of energy flowing into it at this very moment must be massive.”

  “So we put a shield over it first,” said Serrel. “Even if we launched an all out attack, if even one of them gets to that thing before we do, he could kill us all in a heartbeat. But if I weave my own shield over it first, I can stop anyone from getting near it.”

  “Assuming the link between the Illudin and a spell caster is a physical one.”

  Serrel shook his head. “Even if they can siphon off energy from that thing, my shields are two way barriers. Nothing can get in or out. Not even the ether.”

  “The Fresh Meat does know his shields,” Holly conceded.

  “In training, he was the best at shields,” said Mouse.

  Caellix looked at Jurgen,
who shrugged.

  “Other than waiting for nightfall, or running in there head on, we don’t have much option,” the assassin said. “At the very least, a little magical artillery might thin out their numbers and even the odds in our favour.”

  “All right then,” said Caellix. “Here’s what we do...”

  The leader of the Ferine camp, oddly enough, was not a Ferine himself. Mostly it was the weak and the downtrodden who were offered the chance to become something greater. But the transformation had a way of... dulling magical talent. He had, once upon a time, been a very talented mage, the top of all his classes, and could have gone on to greater things except that he was incredibly outspoken and made clear his feelings of distrust and hate of the Empire. People did not like that in modern Elsbareth. It only brought trouble.

  In the end the only person interested in his ability to weave had been a mysterious elf named Vharaes who had shared the same views as him regarding the Empire and its domineering ways. And so the mage ended up a commander of sorts, leader of an army of transmogrified elves who were, as far as he could tell, only a few steps away from licking their own genitalia. It was not a perfect arrangement. Most of the Ferine were about as loyal and susceptible to instruction as the average stray dog. And the less said about the so-called “master” the better. The mage had met the creature once, and honestly didn’t know whether to be disgusted or utterly terrified.

  Two things made the experience bearable. One was the fact that he was in a position to kill Imperials, and would soon, according to Vharaes, bring the fight to the shores of the Empire itself. The second was the relic that Vharaes had entrusted him with. Vharaes and the eternally unsettling “master” had assured him that the relic was indeed one of the Illudin of legend. The mage found that somewhat hard to swallow, until he had connected with the crystal and felt the near bottomless supply of ether energy within.

  The first time he had drawn from that power source, had let it fill him with energy to the point of bursting, it had been intoxicating. It was like living in a desert your whole life, learning to horde and conserve your water supplies, and then being shown a waterfall. He had wanted to gorge himself, to drink until he drowned.