Dawn of Swords

by David Dalglish

  Jacob walked through the center of the room, past the haunted, leering eyes of Karak’s many lifeless copies, and came to a stop before the slightly raised platform upon which the king’s throne should have sat. He stared at the massive portrait on the wall, which depicted Ashhur, Karak, and Celestia together, and then walked up and removed it. He placed it far away, where it would not be damaged by the coming events, and then turned to face his god.

  “We are ready,” he said.

  “Are you certain you are adequately prepared?” asked Karak.

  “I am. This is a delicate procedure, however, one that requires certain elements that I am currently lacking. My steward Roland was to act as my apprentice in this regard, but I misjudged his strength. Now I require a new one, unfortunately.”

  He glared at Clovis. The silver-haired man, Highest of Karak, fell back, a hand on his chest.

  “What is it?” he asked, his usually patronizing tone starting to crack.

  Jacob stepped up to him, grabbing him by the collar of his black tunic. He pulled Clovis close to him, under the gaze of their god, loving the way the Highest’s eyes bulged from their sockets.

  “You stupid, arrogant whelp,” Jacob growled. “Your ego got the better of you. Does Karak even know that you sent your insane son to try to raise the demons himself? I thought not. Do you know what your actions wrought?”

  Clovis shook his head, his body quavering. Jacob turned, addressing his god.

  “Uther kidnapped commoners from Drake to use in the ritual of resurrection. He caused a panic in the town, and do you know what they have now? A whole legion of spellcasters who are learning the craft to defend themselves, and from a powerful caster at that.” He turned back to Clovis. “Do you know the problems that has caused our Lord? Do you know the potential hazards your forces will face, now that your enemies are learning to hurtle fire, earth, and ice with their bare hands? You’ve killed thousands with your eagerness, Clovis, for these people will not to be easily conquered. Your son, you miserable wretch—your son killed my love and trapped me in the mountains. That you live at all is only out of Karak’s mercy.”

  “But…but…I did not know you were the Whisperer!” shouted Clovis in reply.

  “So much you didn’t know,” Jacob said, releasing the man and letting him stumble backward. “Yet that never once stopped you. Because of your actions, you have sealed your fate. You are to assist me in the ritual. You are to take Roland’s place.”

  “You will,” Karak echoed.

  Clovis dropped to a knee. “Anything, Jacob. Anything, my Lord. My body and mind are yours.”

  “Of course,” Jacob said. He shouted, “Captain, bring in the blasphemers!” and turned his attention to the wall where the painting had sat.

  A deep murmur echoed through the vast room as Gregorian entered, dragging Ibis, Adeline, and Ulric Mori behind him. The three were bound and wore tattered rags, their bodies worked over and displaying many bruises and cuts. Thessaly Crestwell was also present, the last member of the court who was not dead or dishonored.

  Ibis and Ulric glared at Jacob, while Adeline cackled through the rag stuffed in her mouth. Captain Gregorian had informed Karak in a letter that father and son had stormed into the castle after learning of Soleh’s and Vulfram’s deaths, shouting curses against king, god, and realm. Ulric had even put his sword through a palace guard in his anger, before being restrained and thrown in the dungeon. Adeline was dragged there with them, having followed her family into the castle, cackling and throwing rotten eggs as she went. Jacob took this as welcome news; he had planned to use a few of the many men who had been wasting away in the dungeon for tributes. Having the three Moris instead was an unexpected bonus.

  Ulric struggled against his restraints, then spit a wad of phlegm in the direction of his god. Karak glared back at him, his glowing eyes growing in brightness.

  Jacob began pacing along the raised platform as the Captain dragged the captives toward him. Ignoring Adeline’s ranting, he removed his journal from his rucksack, set it atop a temporary podium that had been erected on the dais, and addressed Clovis once more.

  “Despite everything, Highest, I must say that Uther’s missteps were not without benefit. I don’t know how he found out what he did, but he learned ancient words and phrases I had never heard of before, and I believe they may be the key to unlocking the demon kings from their prison.”

  “The demons,” Karak said, a bit of life returning to his eyes. The whole journey back to Veldaren he’d appeared distracted, but it finally felt as if he was standing in the same room as them. “Are you certain I need their aid?”

  “I watched your battle,” Jacob said. “There is a reason you left before either of you found victory: because you knew there would never be a victor. You are too evenly matched. We will need armies, magic, and power beyond measure if we are to tip the balance in your favor. And most important of all…Celestia has not made her presence known.” Jacob met his god’s eyes, saw the smoldering anger in them. “You know she loves Ashhur far more than you. We must have power, power so great that even the goddess will be forced to tremble.”

  “And they will obey you?”

  Jacob smiled, his confidence overflowing.

  “They will have no choice in the matter.”

  Karak nodded, and Jacob cleared his throat. He stared at the pages before him, line after line written in his own hand, chronicling the history of the world and the magic of the unknown. He looked up at Clovis.

  “Your son attempted to raise these demons,” said Jacob. “But his errors were twofold. His first mistake was the location. The inscriptions on Neyvar Kardious’s tomb were written in the first Elven tongue. The loose translation was ‘the very spot where Celestia cast the demons out.’ However, I have come to learn that the old language contains many words that have developed double meanings over the centuries. Mu’tarch does indeed mean demon, though in a different context it can also mean ‘god.’ The most common translation for tragnar is ‘to cast out,’ though I have found that in the early texts it often means ‘to bring forth.’ That changes the entire phrase to ‘the very spot where Celestia brought the gods forth.’ That coincides with the words written on the Neyvar’s tomb: ‘In the place of eternal cold, where the rocks on the earth have been sewn shut and not a blade of grass will grow, where the eternal have wandered, where the air is thick with the musk of creation and dreams of darkness prevail.’”

  Clovis gasped. Karak narrowed his eyes.

  “That’s right. The place where Karak and Ashhur stepped into Dezrel is the area where the wall between the realities is thinnest. And where did that occur?”

  He looked at Karak. The god dipped his head.

  “Right beneath your feet,” he said.

  “Indeed,” said Jacob. “Uther’s second mistake was one of ignorance. For him to think he held even a scrap of the power required to enslave one of the demons is laughable. No matter how many corpses he sacrificed, no matter how much blood he splattered, he was doomed to fail from the start.”

  Pulling out a scrap of chalk, Jacob drew a triangle on the floor just behind the throne, inscribing runes he’d found in the darkest corners of the elven caves. When finished, he returned to the podium, grabbed his journal, and then offered his hand to Karak.

  “I will need your power,” he said. “Are you willing to give it?”

  Karak met his eye, pausing, deciding. “How can you be sure the demon will follow your bidding?” he asked.

  “I am the greatest of your creations, my Lord. I have lived ten years longer than any human in Dezrel, and have learned much. You aided by instilling in me the knowledge of ages when I was created. I know what I must do; I know how to control the beast. You must believe that.”

  “I do, as much as I believe my brother will never surrender to me, and his resistance will devastate this land. You may have what you ask for.”

  The god’s hand engulfed his own.

  Jacob took
in a deep breath, feeling his nervousness and excitement start to overwhelm him. Fingers caressing his journal, he began to speak, uttering words foreign to him, whose pronunciations he had no way of knowing. Nonetheless they rolled off his tongue so fluently, it was as if someone else were controlling his functions. He felt the deity’s power roar through him, the fabric of creation contained within a malleable physical shell. It filled his mind with a swirl of brilliant light and the deepest darkness. He threw his head back, now virtually screaming out the words, and then it happened.

  From the runes shone columns of light that swirled with every color imaginable, both named and not. The shafts of light rose to the ceiling, then slowly shifted, coming together in the center. There they mixed and eddied, creating a pulsing sphere so very much like the one Uther had brought forth in the ravine. The spinning colors expanded, the sphere growing larger, until a black circle formed at its center. The blackness grew, and within it Jacob could see luminous balls of gas, the stars from distant worlds. He stepped away from his podium, released Karak’s hand, and approached the churning sphere, continuing his chanting despite not having his journal to guide him. He felt the heat coming off the thing, felt the pull of divine gravity the closer he drew to it, until it seemed his every particle would be ripped apart, every piece of him disassembled.

  The scream grew deep in his breast, a command infused with the power of a god that would not be denied.

  “COME FORTH, VELIXAR, BEAST OF A THOUSAND FACES!”

  From within the portal stepped a formless mass. It swelled and retracted, belching out a green-yellow mist. The mass was translucent, there but not quite, and it began to take shape. What emerged was the form of a man made of clay, with burning red eyes. Tentacles writhed all around its body, as transparent as the rest of it, and Jacob saw that though the beast had a face, the rest of it was skeletal, as if it had been ravaged in a fire. Atop its head, a giant brain pulsed.

  Jacob faced the thing that was there, but not. Its burning red eyes, the only aspect of it that had any substance, glared at him in hatred. Its face shifted with each passing second, becoming various nightmarish images of elves and humans and a hundred things Jacob had never once laid his eyes upon.

  “We are the one and the many,” the beast said, sounding like a dozen voices speaking at once. “Who disturbs us?”

  Jacob did not cower before its anger, did not wilt before its furious eyes.

  “So long,” he whispered as mad winds swirled about the room and Clovis sobbed in terror. “I have waited so very long for this moment.”

  Jacob stepped into the void of the beast’s incorporeal from. Its essence swirled about him, engulfed him.

  “What is this?” the beast cried, pulsing, constricting, trying to squeeze every bit of life from Jacob’s body.

  Words of magic came forth from his mouth, and Jacob breathed in deep. He felt the core of the beast fill him, and though it struggled, the power he had received from his god was enough to overcome the ancient demon’s strength. The creature’s energy infused him, and long-forgotten spells flooded into his memory. In an instant he lived forever, witnessing the birthplace of the stars, the spawning of gods, the formation of the very fabric of existence itself.

  And then he saw something else, something wonderful that made him laugh and laugh…and the beast shrieked, its sentience dangling by a thin umbilical thread. Jacob clenched it tightly in his otherworldly fist, severing the thread, and the Beast of a Thousand Faces drifted off into the blackness of space, its screams fading as it descended to join its long-deceased brother Sluggoth in the timeless void.

  Jacob snapped back into his body and collapsed. The energy he had swallowed, the same energy that had opened up avenues to forgotten magics, impelled him to stand. The portal still throbbed before him, its blackened center opening all the wider as it awaited the coming of another traveler. In the background, the captive Moris screamed in protest.

  Jacob turned, pointed at Clovis, and beckoned him over with one finger. Karak shoved the man, who was as pale as the snow atop a mountain, and the Highest landed hard at Jacob’s feet. He glanced up, and the look he gave Jacob was one of pure horror. Had he not just drank his fill, had the wonders of eternity not been filling him in that moment, Jacob might have wondered why.

  Instead he reached down, grasped Clovis by the shoulders, and lifted him to his feet. He felt so strong, as though he could crush mountains in the palm of his hand. He thrust the screaming Highest toward the portal, just as another, much larger mass of billowing matter leaked out of the gateway. This being was just as transparent as the previous one, but it took shape much more quickly. It grew up, up, until it stood nearly thirty feet high. Huge, rounded shoulders formed, giving birth to scaly arms the size of the oldest trees in the Ghostwood, with paws that ended in curved, razor-sharp claws. Its body was massive, thick and wide on top with narrow hips, and short, stocky legs that were balanced out by a taloned tail. Its head was the last to appear, looking almost like that of a horse, only with a pair of giant tusks that ejected from the back corners of its jowls, curling forward around the front of its maw. The eyes were red and burning, just like those of the Beast of a Thousand Faces, and when it roared, making the air pulse with the pain of rebirth, a mad cackle filled Jacob’s throat.

  It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

  The image of the beast began to waver as its mass was pulled back toward the swirling vortex. Jacob chanted louder, clutching Clovis’s arm so that he could not escape. Then he thrust the man front and center before the flickering beast, forcibly tilting his head back with one hand and prying his mouth open with the other.

  “Accept this vessel!” he shouted. “Your physical form may be no more, but I offer another to you!”

  He recited primeval verses he hadn’t known until moments before.

  The monstrous, ghostly beast suddenly lost all structure, becoming a swirling tube of shadow that first crashed against the ceiling of the room, then careened downward. Lightning and gale-force winds rocked the interior of the room, making all inside hold on for dear life lest they be flung against the walls; only Jacob and Karak withstood its rage. The murky, twisting shaft plummeted into Clovis’s mouth, and his face throbbed as the force invaded his body in a revolting frenzy. Finally the last bit of shadow disappeared; the air grew still; the lightning ceased to flash; and the thunder rolled no more.

  At long last, Jacob’s chants ceased. He collapsed to his hands and knees as the portal vanished, dissipating in a flash of white light that momentarily washed out all color. He remained as he had fallen, panting, still feeling the lingering effects of the power and acumen he had ripped from the demon before he crushed its conscience beneath his superior will.

  “I am the child of two gods,” he gasped. “I am the oldest. I…am…victorious.”

  Slowly, he once more became aware of the sights and sounds around him. The captives were screaming, struggling against the might of their lone jailor. Karak stood off to the side, leaning on a bronze statue of himself, looking mildly curious. Clovis lay motionless, half on and half off the raised platform, his head resting in the center of the triangle, the chalk lines burned into the floor as if drawn with molten rock.

  Jacob swiveled his head and caught his reflection in a mirror the size of a divan that had been stowed against the far wall. He looked just as he ever did—all but for his eyes. The blue of his irises had been charred away, replaced by a deep crimson that shone as if a fire burned in the recesses of his skull.

  Clovis moaned, rolling over onto his back. He sat up slowly, clutching at his stomach. The skin on his face rippled—as did his body beneath the tight black leathers he wore. The silver hair atop his head began to fall out in clumps. He started to screech, his jaw protruding outward as if something inside him were trying to escape.

  Jacob faced Captain Gregorian, who was gawking at the scene with his jaw hanging open.

  “Captain!” he shouted. “No
w! The feast!”

  It took a moment, but finally Gregorian got the message. He reached down and grabbed Ulrich and Ibis, dragging them behind him as they kicked and protested. Jacob rushed over, gathering up a laughing Adeline and searching for Thessaly to assist him. He didn’t have to look far. Unexpectedly, Clovis’s third-born had rushed to her father’s side; she was kneeling before him, putting her hands on each spot of his body that swelled with bone and muscle. There were tears in her eyes and in her father’s.

  “You have been chosen,” Jacob said to her. “It is an honor.”

  She glanced over at him as he yanked Adeline by her hair, and Thessaly sadly shook her head. She was about to say something, but she never got the chance, for suddenly her father was upon her, his mouth opening wider than humanly possible. His teeth had become daggers, and they tore into Thessaly’s face, ripping the flesh from her skull. Her only form of protest was a bloody gurgle. Her father opened his maw wider, taking her head, her shoulders, her entire upper body into him. His neck bulged as his daughter was pulled down his throat, and the rhythmic cadence of a thousand snapping bones filled the air. Ibis and Ulric shrieked and struggled, while Adeline guffawed, until Jacob gave the order. Captain Gregorian silenced all three with his sword, and their slit throats bled out onto the polished floor of the Tower Keep’s great hall.

  Thessaly’s feet disappeared down her father’s gullet, and after a few more seconds of snapping bones and jaws, the thing that had been Clovis Crestwell pivoted around. His flesh still rippled, but it seemed more under control now, as if the beast within had been satiated.