The Enemy Within

by Christie Golden

  “You killed Amasa,” she snarled. “It was because of you that I became an outcast! Now you’re here, all alone, trapped like a rat in the den of the cat. Oh, yes, Tristan ‘High Regard,’ I’m going to enjoy this.” She knelt beside him, slowly drawing her dagger. The blade, its cutting edge blackened by poison, glittered dully in the light.

  Again Tristan’s vision blurred. Nausea gripped him, and suddenly he felt jabbing pains in his abdomen. Weakness flooded his limbs, and for a second he felt as though he were about to void his stomach. Dimly, he heard Rozalia gasping in shock. He cried out, once, sharply, before his vision faded to black.

  Rozalia backed away, wondering with alarm what was happening to Tristan. Could he possibly be able to resist her potion? The Claws, too, seemed frightened, but kept their grip on Tristan as his body writhed in their clutches. The knight’s handsome, regular features were twisting as if they had a life of their own. His frame shriveled, contorted. A hump appeared in his back. His hands crooked, fingernails growing long and sharp.

  The hideous creature Tristan had become stared angrily at Rozalia, who had frozen with the blade in her hand. He looked up at the Claws who held him captive. “Whoreson idiots,” he spat in a voice that they recognized, “Leave me be!”

  “M-Malken,” Rozalia whispered, staring upon Malken’s hideous face. Bile rose in her throat.

  The Claws, startled, let go of their master. “Leave us alone!” he demanded. Staggered by the revelation they had witnessed, they fairly ran from the room. Furious, Malken rose on his knees, savagely backhanding Rozalia across the face. The power of his blow laid her prostrate on the carpet. “Bitch!” he screamed. “Do you think my rules do not apply to you? Would you destroy the body that houses me?”

  Rozalia continued to stare, though her ears were ringing and blood dripped down her chin from the force of Malken’s blow. This monstrosity before her was nothing like the handsome if cruel nobleman she had imagined Malken to be. He saw the loathing in her dark eyes, and his anger escalated. He dared not hit her a second time. He knew if he did, he would kill her, and he didn’t want that—not yet.

  Growling like one of his cats, he strode to the table and seized the heavy silver candelabrum. He hurled it at a small statue of a pipe-playing satyr, smashing the delicate porcelain figure. He took slight comfort in the shattering crash and tinkle that ensued.

  Behind him, lying on the carpet, Rozalia had eased herself up on her elbows. Her hand went to her mouth, dabbed at it gingerly. Red wetness stained her fingers. Then, unbelievably, she began to laugh, although it hurt her injured face. It began as a quiet gasping sound, then gathered strength. Soon her peals of mirth were racking her skeletal frame as she shuddered through paroxysm after paroxysm.

  “Shut up,” Malken mumbled.

  With an effort, Rozalia got unsteadily to her feet, wobbling a little as she stood. “Oh, that is rich. So the evil lord of Nova Vaasa is really Sir High Regard, the noblest, nicest knight of them all!” Her voice was full of sarcastic scorn. She began to laugh again, wiping at the tears that streamed down her face.

  “He is my vessel, nothing more.” His quick anger ebbing, he brooded instead on Tristan’s recently discovered ability to block his thoughts. He suspected that the old Vistana woman had a hand in that, but was unable to prove it. He now had to rely on his network of spies, both human and feline, for information about Tristan’s activities. Admittedly that network was vast and thorough, but Malken did not like having to trust so precious a duty to underlings. If it had not been for the eyes of the cats in the room and Rozalia’s ministration of the magic potion, he might not have returned to Tristan’s body in time to prevent an injury. It was a sobering thought.

  Rozalia’s laughter was an irritant. “Go,” he ordered her. “I wish to be left alone.”

  Her mirth faded. She frowned. “Go? But—”

  A dozen cats moved slowly, almost casually, to form a circle around her. The great cats, too, straightened almost imperceptibly. Rozalia bowed, the laughter in her soul extinguished, and left.

  He stared after her, then went to pursue his own amusements. A slow pleasure was starting to spread through him. He had been able to force himself into Tristan’s body when it had literally been a matter of life and death. With time, perhaps his power over Tristan Hiregaard would grow.

  He did not know how long he could remain in this body until Tristan returned. He decided to make the most of it. Malken debated donning a mask, then rejected the idea. Now, tonight, he would terrorize wherever he chose. He grabbed a wine bottle, uncorked it, and took a deep draft. Carrying the wine with him, he strode purposefully through Darkhaaven until he came to the room with the caged girl.

  He knew she was beyond terror when her eyes fell upon his distorted features. He drank deeply, then regarded her with a vague shudder of disgust. Her face was, if such a thing was possible, even more hideous than his own. The cats had done their job. The former soldier’s face had been practically eaten away entirely.

  “You still don’t want to dance for me.”

  For a moment, there was no response. Then the woman muttered an unintelligible string of words. Malken frowned, tempted to strike her, then hesitated. He went and retrieved one of his discarded masks. Placing it over her eyes, he said, “If you dance for me, no one shall ever again see your face.”

  The head, covered by a bizarre butterfly mask, lifted slowly. Blue-green eyes stared through the eyeholes. There was a flicker of life in them. She stirred in her chains, but did not seem to be fighting them. She spoke again. The words, rendered nonsensical because of her deformity, sounded somehow different than before, placating, almost crooning. Malken took the key that hung tantalizingly out of the woman’s reach and undid her manacles. She rose, moaning at the pain of stiff muscles, and moved her weight on her legs. One foot lifted, dropped. The other did the same. Her hips lurched from side to side. She was dancing like a zombie, but she was dancing.

  Malken threw back his head and laughed.

  For the second time, Malken deposited the unfortunate knight in an uncomfortable place. Tristan came to his senses in the chill predawn hours to find himself lying facedown in a puddle of fetid liquid. He gagged and hastened to sit up. That was an unwise move, he found out almost immediately; a tight band of sharp pain encircled his head like a malicious crown. Malken had apparently gotten very drunk last night and left Tristan with the hangover. Tristan muttered under his breath. The small alley in which he had been dumped—that was the only word for it—was deserted. He softly murmured the words to the teleport spell he had been using so often, and manifested in his chambers. His bed had never looked so inviting.

  After a few hours of sound sleep and a hot breakfast, Tristan felt restored. There was still a whisper of a headache left, throbbing deep within his skull, but he ignored it. If Malken was becoming strong enough to force his way into Tristan’s body when the need was great enough, as had apparently happened, Tristan could not afford to spend any waking moment not working on separating himself from the monster.

  There were more spells to be tried, and he would attempt them all. He busied himself with brewing a cup of the tea, the wonderful tea that shielded his thoughts from the evil fiend who stalked him from within, and sipped it as he went through various books. With grim humor, Tristan realized that, if he survived the present danger he would have more magic at his call than anyone he had ever known.

  If he survived.

  He returned one book to the shelf and searched for another. Pulling one at random, he perused it as he finished the tea. He frowned. This one seemed to house darker spells than the others, spells that called for blood as an ingredient. Few positive enchantments were found within its black covers; most concerned themselves with murder, power, and curses.

  Curses. What was it Madame Terza had said? A terrible thing was done, that was it. Tristan examined the words. Terza would not speak carelessly. Each word was chosen. A terrible thing was done. Not happened—w
as done.

  “I’ve been cursed,” Tristan whispered softly. His flesh erupted with goose pimples, and he knew he was on the right track. Filled with a renewed sense of urgency, he examined the spells. There were many spells to bring about curses, but none to cure them. He was beginning to despair when his eyes caught an addendum to a curse spell. It told how to reverse the “evil eye of the curse.” He breathed a sigh of relief; if he had indeed been cursed, he could cure himself. At least, he desperately hoped so.

  He practiced the hand movements, which seemed sharp and disharmonious to him, and mouthed the strange words until he felt comfortable with them. At last, as prepared as he could be, he stood erect. He closed his eyes and began to chant. His fingers fluttered, clutched, his arms swayed and straightened.

  Pain shot through his chest, and his limbs went numb. Horrified, Tristan tried to gulp air, but his lungs wouldn’t work. He was having an apoplectic seizure. The next instant, he was looking down on his body. His skin was pale, his frame rigid. Then it began to jerk spasmodically. Two clearly colored nimbi were flickering wildly over his heart. One was a palpitating, healthy colored blue. The other was a violent, bloody red. Tristan knew somehow, with a knowledge he couldn’t fathom, that his … soul, for lack of a better word, was doing battle with the evil force that sought to subdue it.

  The two glowing radiances fought fiercely, their hues waxing and waning, darting and chasing one another about Tristan’s seemingly dead body. Slowly, the red deepened to an almost magenta hue, at the same time changing the other aura from a bright blue to a sluggish, bruise-colored purple. Then, as abruptly as he had left it, Tristan had returned to his body.

  A sense of failure washed over him, sickening him. He had indeed been cursed, but had been unable to dispel the malediction. He was unspeakably weak from the battle his good side had apparently lost, and yielded to an exhausted slumber. When next he woke, he was ravenous. He rose unsteadily and went on wobbly legs to ring for Guillaume.

  He fell upon the good food the loyal servant brought as if he hadn’t eaten for days. A chill passed through him as he wondered just how long he had been unconscious. “I’ve been very busy in here, Guillaume,” he said cautiously.

  “Yes, sir. I was quite relieved when you rang.”

  “How long have I been working?” Tristan didn’t want to just come out and ask, but there was no other way.

  Guillaume looked at him strangely. “Why, two days, sir. Give or take a few hours.”

  Inwardly, Tristan groaned. Two full days of work gone. If today was the fourteenth of Mahai, and if Malken kept to his schedule of reappearing every four days, he would take over again tomorrow. That meant more innocent women dead, more webs woven about the hapless citizens of Nova Vaasa.

  He would have to make this next day count. “I’m sorry, Guillaume, what did you say?”

  “There are a few notes for you, sir, should you care to look at them.”

  Tristan shook his head. “No. Not right now. I’m too busy. That will be all.”

  The servant bowed and left, closing the door behind him. Immediately after he had gone, Ailsa appeared. Her face was a horrific sight, caught between the beauty of her living days and the monstrosity she occasionally became. She was wringing her hands and floating three feet above the floor.

  “Ivaar’s in trouble, Tristan,” she said in a voice that trembled.

  For an instant, he believed her. He was reaching for the rope to call Guillaume back, ask him if Ivaar had sent the messages, but Ailsa’s next words stilled him.

  “He’s broken my favorite goblet.”

  Tristan closed his eyes, sympathy warring with exasperation. Ailsa was not speaking of present danger, only of a decades-old incident. “I’ll take care of it, darling,” he said, forcing himself to speak tenderly. “Go and rest, now.”

  Her face brightened, and the hideousness left it. Again, she was her beautiful self. “You will? He’s in so much trouble!”

  “I’ll take care of it,” he repeated. Smiling, reassured, Ailsa faded and disappeared.

  Tristan returned to his magic books. On the table, ignored, sat a letter from Ivaar.

  Malken blinked awake, enjoying the feel of the smooth sheets against his face. One thing he and Tristan shared was an appreciation for luxury, though the knight lacked Malken’s keen joy in destruction. He rose and dressed in Tristan’s too-loose clothing. He would change into his own clothes and mask once he reached Darkhaaven. As he shrugged into a shirt, he noticed Tristan’s journal lying on his desk.

  Excitement raced through Malken. Tristan, the bastard, usually hid his journal. Now that he no longer had access to Tristan’s thoughts, Malken hadn’t been able to find it. Apparently, though, the knight had gotten careless tonight. Eagerly Malken reached for the book.

  As his gnarled fingers touched the binding, a flash of light exploded in his face. The world turned upside down. Gray mists suddenly manifested, reaching for Malken with greedy, grasping tentacles. Horrified, he realized Tristan had placed a spell on the book, a spell to exorcise him to the nothingness whence he came.

  Tristan blinked dazedly. He was standing in front of his desk. Had he walked in his sleep? Then he realized that the warding glyph had vanished from the journal’s cover. “I’ve done it!” he cried as he realized what had happened. “I’ve cast him out!”

  Then the room spun. Helpless, Tristan fought in vain to retain his own identity.

  Malken drew a shuddering breath. “Good, Tristan, very good,” he said aloud. “You almost did it that time. I’ll punish you for that one.”

  He turned to the mirror, passed his hand over it, and stepped into the swirling mist.

  Ivaar stared for the thousandth time around at the small room that had become his prison. Unknowingly, he hugged the threadbare pillow to his chest as he had done with rag toys when he was a little boy.

  From her nearly permanent perch at the foot of his bed, Kesh stared back at him with eyes that glowed in the dim light of a single candle. He now loathed the animal as much as he had once loved her, and she sensed the change in him. Kesh now watched him constantly, hissing and scratching whenever he came near her. Somehow, he knew, she was reporting his every move to Malken. He had done nothing that would arouse suspicion. He had boldly written his father in full view of Kesh, knowing the letter would be opened and read with an eye toward betrayal by men he had once called brothers. He had written in a desperate, makeshift code subtle enough to pass the Claws but, he hoped, recognizable to his father.

  When the note drew no response, Ivaar assumed the letter had never been delivered. Silently, he cursed his own gullibility. He had been played for a fool from the moment Malken had arrived to charm the Lights of Liberty. Malken had used him and his connections. The youth paled suddenly when he thought of the “inner sanctuary” in Stonegard, next to the Prince’s rooms, which he, Ivaar, had instigated and established.

  A knock came on his door, and he started violently. Kesh hissed at the disruptive movement and scratched his leg. The door opened, and the sharp features of Sister Rozalia peered in.

  “It’s time,” she said.

  It was the first banquet to be hosted in Darkhaaven, and Malken was determined that the celebration be long remembered. The large feast hall, like the spider in the center of the web of Darkhaaven, was the focal point of Malken’s underground stronghold. Previously left empty save for roaming cats, Malken had ordered it decked out in its most gilded finery.

  He stood, clad in a sumptuous outfit of silk and black velvet, and surveyed with satisfaction the work of several days. Dozens of torches blazed, illuminating the room. Each of the ten long tables in the hall had several small oil lamps on it for more light. The benches and tables were of fine wood, polished to a high shine. Tapestries—even more complicated, colorful, and obscene than those in his receiving room or private chambers—adorned the stone walls. Statues depicting satyrs and nymphs in lewd and violent activities filled every corner and alcove. Ab
ove the tables, providing further degenerate entertainment for Malken’s guests, hung twenty cages. Inside were dancers of both sexes, naked save for a few scraps of clothing, the complicated masks that held their faces, and the chains that adorned their wrists and ankles like sadistic jewelry. The high table, unlike the others, was covered with a gorgeous linen cloth. The places were being set. Soon, the guests would arrive.

  Malken chuckled to himself. He could hardly wait.

  The first few guests arrived. Like Malken and the slave dancers, they wore masks, for tonight’s revel was a masquerade. Malken maneuvered smoothly through the growing crowd, greeting each reveler who entered through the secret passageway by which he had told them to arrive. He noticed young Ivaar among them. The boy tried not to show his fear, but his large eyes gave him away. Malken smiled to himself.

  Tidbits and wine on silver platters were passed around by masked Claws. The guests sipped and nibbled. In time the last of them arrived, and all was in readiness. Though Malken’s place, clearly marked, was yet vacant, Rozalia took her accustomed place at his left, and Ivaar seated himself at his right. The others at the high table were Lord Bevis, Mayor Laars, Othmar’s chief advisor Hadwinsson, and Lord Adal.

  Ivaar glanced up, trying not to give himself away as Malken swept over to the table.

  “Ivaar, my boy, you will feast tonight on a little richer fare than is your wont,” Malken promised, seating himself. He clapped his hands. At once, a quartet of minstrels in a corner of the room began to play. The gentle sounds of lute, harp, and recorder proved to be accompaniment for the dancers. The cages were lowered until they hung little more than a yard above the seated diners.