by Troy Denning
Brianna rose to her feet and resumed her sprint toward the keep gate. Lanaxis was already upon the queen’s tower. He did not step past to pluck Avner off the open ward, nor did he start tearing the spire apart as he had the others. Instead, he squatted down and wrapped his arms around the entire tower.
The queen reached the drawbridge. The keep’s battered walls obscured her view of Lanaxis, but she could feel the entire building shaking. She rushed into the foyer, where she found a dozen frightened soldiers blocking the corridor. They immediately swarmed toward Brianna, hurling questions at her like ballista arrows. Firbolg boots began to boom across the drawbridge behind her, and a loud crack sounded from the queen’s tower.
“Out of my way!” Brianna grabbed two men and shoved them toward the drawbridge. “Stop those firbolgs!”
The rest of the guards leapt aside to let her pass, then rushed forward to meet the firbolgs. Brianna turned down a smoke-filled gallery that led to the queen’s tower. A tremendous clamor echoed through the passage behind her, followed by the agonized screams of both men and firbolgs.
The queen raced blindly through the corridor, coughing and choking on the acrid smoke that seemed to flow from every opening. A sharp crack reverberated through the keep, and the gallery floor bucked beneath her feet. She reached the stair turret of the queen’s tower and threw open the oaken door.
It was dark inside, and she heard no echoes to suggest Avner was descending the cramped stairwell. She could not be sure he was trapped inside the tower, but she suspected Lanaxis would not be uprooting the spire if there was any chance the young scout had escaped with her son.
A deep-throated cough rumbled down the gallery. The queen looked back and saw a firbolg’s hulking silhouette in the smoky corridor. She stepped into the stair turret, then slammed the door, dropped the crossbar, and rushed up the spiraling stairs. Like all well-fortified towers, this one could not be accessed from the first floor. Brianna would have to reach the second story landing before she could enter the building.
A tremendous rumble sounded from the tower foundations. The stair turret shuddered so violently that she lost her footing and fell. A crash sounded from the barred door below, then the wooden stairs groaned beneath her pursuer’s weight. The smell of firbolg sweat filled the passage.
Brianna turned onto her back and drew her knee to her chest. When she heard the firbolg’s heavy breath coming around the bend, she thrust her foot down into the darkness. Her heel caught the warrior square in the brow. His head snapped back, slamming the back of his skull into the wall, and the warrior slumped onto the stairs without crying out.
The stone walls shuddered, then the stairwell began to shake in steady rhythm. Brianna scrambled up the stairs and came to the second story, where the turret ended five feet short of the dark entrance to the queen’s tower. The ironclad door hung open, swinging on its hinges as the entire spire rocked back and forth. To her right, the queen saw one of the titan’s huge hands grasping the side of the building.
“Avner?” Brianna called. “Answer me!”
Lanaxis gave a mighty grunt. There was a loud bang in the foundations, and a billowing cloud of dust rolled up from void below. The tower tipped away from the stair turret. Brianna swung her arms back and sprang across the broadening chasm, then tumbled into the second-story foyer of the queen’s tower.
10
The Queen’s Tower
Brianna could not stop shaking. She sat in the listing angle where the pine floor met the chamber wall, swaddled in her own fur cloak and the woolen capes of five men-at-arms, but even that heavy armor was no defense against the insidious cold. It hung within the tower’s stone walls like the memory of dead kings, its chill poison seeping through all her layers to spread its biting salve over the soft flesh of her back. It came whispering through the arrow loops on gusts of frigid air, driving darts of icy numbness deep into her frozen bones. Even Kaedlaw’s breath, wet and heavy against her skin, seemed to sink deep into her breast, filling her with such a cool, dull ache that she feared her milk would turn to slush.
The queen knew she should find a way to warm the dark room, for Kaedlaw’s sake if not her own, but she could see no way to do it safely. Even if the hearth did not lie on the high side of the floor, it would have been impossible to keep the burning logs from flying all over the chamber. The whole building was swaying in time to the titan’s limping stride. To keep her from being battered to death, Avner had moved all the furniture into the foyer, where it had promptly fallen out of the yawning hole that had once connected the tower’s second story to its stair turret.
Nor could she cast a spell. It required all her concentration to keep her feet braced against the floor and her back pressed firmly against the cold wall, and she could hardly let go of Kaedlaw long enough to make the necessary gestures.
Besides, Brianna suspected warming the room would do little to stop her shivering. She was caught in the grip of a despair colder than the stones at her back, more biting than the icy winds gusting through the arrow loops; with every beat of her heart she felt the fingers of her grief squeeze tighter, filling her breast with a chill lethargy as difficult to battle as the titan. Lanaxis had been born of the gods themselves; he was as old as Toril, and his power was second only to that of his almighty parents. If such a being wanted her son, what could a mere queen do to save the child? There was only one thing, and Brianna was loathe even to think of it.
A muffled groan sounded from the fireplace, and Brianna knew Avner was coming down the chimney-the only route to the third story without a stair turret. The young scout dropped into the empty firebox, then tumbled down the listing floor and came to a rest against the stone wall.
The tower swung as the titan took another huge step. Avner careened into the far wall, and a moment later came rolling back to collide with Brianna. He grabbed her leg and held on, then braced himself and sat up. By the pale slivers of moonlight that spilled through the arrow loops, she could see him rubbing his shoulder.
“What news?”
“None good, I’m afraid,” Avner replied. “Did you hear that crackling a few minutes ago?”
“I thought the tower was coming apart.”
“We’re not that lucky,” Avner said. “We signaled a troop of horse lancers. Lanaxis called a fire blizzard down as soon as they turned toward us. The company was incinerated to the last man.”
“So there won’t be any messengers riding ahead to call for help.”
Brianna’s legs began to shake so severely that her boots started to slide across the pine boards. Her body swayed in time to Lanaxis’s stride, and her frozen back slipped across the stone wall. The queen pulled her feet back into place and redoubled the pressure against them.
In the dim light, Avner apparently failed to notice her struggle. “Even if a messenger had gotten away, it wouldn’t have made any difference,” the youth replied. “No horse alive can outrun Lanaxis.”
“Blizzard could have. She would have found a way.” Brianna allowed herself a moment of silence, then asked, “Can you tell where we’re going yet?”
“He’s seems to be following the Clearwhirl north,” Avner reported. “We see glimpses of the river every now and then.”
“And where are we now?”
Avner swallowed. “We passed River Citadel a little while ago. We could see the turret pennants snapping in the moonlight.”
The cold hand around Brianna’s heart clamped down until it seemed the aching muscle would stop beating. The titan had already carried them across an eighth of her kingdom.
“How long until dawn?” The hour candles had gone out when Lanaxis pulled the tower from the ground, and to Brianna, sitting alone in the darkness, every minute since had seemed an hour. “I think he’ll have to stop then.”
Avner grimaced. “The Bleeding Circle has barely risen above the horizon. We’ll be in the Bleak Plain by dawn.” There was an uneasy pause, then the young scout continued, “We have to slow him dow
n, or Tavis will never catch up.”
“Don’t you think we have troubles enough?” Brianna scoffed.
“Tavis wouldn’t betray you.”
“Then why did he save Galgadayle’s life?” the queen demanded. “And open the gates for the ’kin army?”
“ I would have opened the gates.” The quickness of Avner’s reply suggested he had thought of his answer long before coming down the chimney. “Can you think of a better way to get rid of the ’kin than to let them attack Lanaxis?”
“Avner, you’ll have to do better than that. We both know that wasn’t what he had in mind.”
“We don’t know what he was thinking,” Avner countered. “We only know what you saw, and there could be dozens of explanations.”
“The most likely being that he believes Galgadayle,” Brianna said. “He thinks Kaedlaw is the ettin’s child. He admitted that much.”
Avner remained silent, a sure sign he was struggling against the urge to blurt something out. Brianna could almost feel the words straining at his lips.
“Avner, what is it? You have something to tell me.”
“No, Majesty.”
Brianna cocked an eyebrow. “Don’t lie to me, Avner,” she warned. “You’re the first defender now, not a street orphan.”
Avner sighed heavily. “As you wish, then. I won’t lie-but I respectfully decline to say more. Call it treason if you like.”
“Perhaps I will!”
“I’ll carry the execution order to Dexter myself,” Avner replied. “And that’ll be the last thing your first defender ever says.”
Brianna fell silent, considering the young scout’s bluff. She knew he would not carry the command to the guards on the third floor, as surely as he knew she would never issue it, but Avner preferred subtlety and subterfuge to grand gestures. The queen could think of only one sentiment that would compel the youth to make such a statement.
“Avner, you’ll only make things worse by trying to protect Tavis.”
“Tavis loves you!” Avner hissed. “He could never violate the oath he swore!”
The young scout’s boots scraped against the floorboards as he scrambled up to the fireplace, and Brianna realized that the icy hand grasping her heart had finally squeezed too hard. She felt more than despair; she felt alone and utterly without hope. Avner was right: Tavis did love her, had always loved her and always would-and that was the very thing that made him so dangerous. Tears began to stream down her face, leaving freezing trails of stinging water on her cheeks.
“Avner, why do you think I’m so scared?” Brianna called. “I know Tavis loves me-but that won’t stop him from keeping his oath. If he believes Galgadayle’s prophecy-and he must, or he’d recognize his own child-then I know he’ll kill Kaedlaw. His oath requires it.”
The scraping of Avner’s boots stopped, and Brianna heard his heavy breath up near the fireplace. “What if you saw the ettin’s face when you looked at Kaedlaw?” he asked. “Wouldn’t the oath you swore as queen of Hartsvale demand the same thing?”
“But I don’t see the ettin,” Brianna countered. “I see Kaedlaw’s father. I see Tavis!”
Avner fell silent for a moment, then he asked, “Do you really believe Tavis Burdun would kill your son on sight?” The youth’s voice was brusque and scornful. “Give him time. Eventually, Tavis will see what you see.” “And if he doesn’t?”
“Trust that he will,” Avner replied. “It’s your only hope, because I doubt anyone else can save you-or Kaedlaw.”
Brianna heard the young scout’s clothes rustling as he climbed into the chimney. If she let him go now, she would have nothing left but a hollow, achy feeling as empty and cold as the dark chamber in which she sat.
“Avner, wait!” Brianna ordered. “I know how to delay the titan-but you’d better be right about Tavis!”
An occasional tremor shook the ravaged castle, as though deep in its foundations the citadel still felt the distant strides of its debaucher. A haze of moonlit steam rose from the crater where once had stood the queen’s tower, and a cold wind moaned through the rents in the northern curtains, where Lanaxis had kicked his way through the castle walls. Packs of verbeegs and fomorians rummaged through the ruins of the inner ward, searching for treasure and food, while the Meadowhome firbolgs stood by with scowls of uneasy disdain on their bearded faces.
Tavis studied the scene with growing anger. He sat in the shadow of the dilapidated flag tower, listening to Galgadayle and Raeyadfourne argue with the chieftains of the verbeeg and fomorian tribes about the conduct of their warriors. In the meantime, the looting continued unabated while the cries of the human wounded-as scattered and weak as they were-went unanswered. The high scout had already tried to aid the men himself, but each time his captors reminded him that he was a prisoner of honor and forbade him to leave his seat.
From around the corner of the flag tower came a grinding, crunching sound, like a wolf gnawing on the bones of a felled moose. Tavis stood. His head reeled as the blood rushed toward his feet. His vision narrowed, and he would have fallen had Basil not steadied him.
“Sit down,” ordered Munairoe, the firbolg shaman. He had packed a layer of mud around Tavis’s broken arm and cast a healing spell on the limb. The bone felt as if it were cooking from the marrow outward. “The spirits have not finished mending your arm, and there is still the matter of your honor.”
“I have no intention of breaking my word,” Tavis retorted. “But I have seen enough of your allies’ debauchery!”
Tavis stepped past the shaman and hobbled around the flag tower, clenching his teeth at his pain. He felt bloated and hot inside, as though someone had gorged him with boiling oil, while every breath of the chill air filled his lungs with a keen, biting numbness. He found a fomorian hunter standing in the corner where the tower abutted the battered keep.
The brute had thrust his head and arms through a breach in the second-story wall, so that only his hairy, pear-shaped back was visible. The gnawing sound came from inside the building. At the fomorian’s feet lay a suit of mangled armor splashed with blood so fresh it was still steaming in the cold night air.
A fiery, seething rage boiled up within Tavis, filling him with a fury almost too great for his battered body to withstand. The color drained from his vision, his ears started to ring, and a sour, acrid taste burned the tip of his tongue. He pulled a broken length of floor joist from a nearby rubble pile and stepped over to the fomorian, raising the board in his good hand.
“What are you doing?” gasped Munairoe, coming around the flag tower. “Need I remind you-”
Tavis swung the timber as hard as he could, smashing it into the back of the fomorian’s legs. A strangled shriek reverberated inside the gallery. The hunter’s knees buckled, then dropped to the rubble-strewn ground with a tremendous clatter. His head popped out of the breach in the wall, his loose jowls shaking and the mangled thigh of a human warrior dangling over his blubbery lip. He spit the leg against the keep and roared in pain, then turned toward his assailant. When he saw who had assaulted him, the look of astonishment and hurt in his eye changed to resentment.
“Why hit Awn, you?” The fomorian raised his fist. “Awn smash, yes him should!”
Tavis could barely hear the words over the ringing in his ears, and the marrow in his bones had changed into something like molten lava. He stepped forward and smashed his club into Awn’s ribs, then slipped away to avoid a counterblow. The astonished hunter doubled over, holding his ribs and grunting for breath.
“Maybe this… will… teach Awn not to… eat the dead!” The acrid taste in Tavis’s mouth had so dried his tongue that the words seemed to stick to his teeth.
The high scout raised his club again. Before he could strike, Raeyadfourne came pounding around the flag tower and jerked it from his hand. Awn spun toward Tavis, his own hand raised.
“Now Awn mad!”
Raeyadfourne reached over Tavis’s head and pushed Awn into the wall, then quickly inte
rposed himself between the two combatants.
“This is a firbolg prisoner,” the chieftain warned. “He’s under my protection.”
“Not when him hurt Awn, no.” The fomorian pointed to a red welt where Tavis had smashed the floor joist across his knees. “That hurt plenty-and him do it for fun!”
Raeyadfourne glared at Tavis. “You promised to behave as a prisoner of honor.”
“I am.” Tavis pointed at the mutilated remains in the corner. His vision faded, and the bloody scene appeared to him in shades of gray and black. “He was eating the dead.”
“So, what that matter?” The fomorian chieftain, Ror, stepped around the tower. He was nearly twice Tavis’s height, with slender, sticklike legs that hardly look capable of supporting the huge belly above them. “Awn gots to feed.”
“It’s cannibalism!” Tavis objected.
“To you, perhaps-but then, you are a traitor to your own race.” Orisino, the horse-faced chieftain of the verbeegs, followed Ror around the tower. His gray lips were curled into a sneer that showed two rows of vile yellow teeth filed to sharp points. “Who are you to say fomorians shouldn’t eat humans? The gods have seen fit to let wolves eat foxes.”
“It’s not the same thing.” Tavis kept his attention fixed on Raeyadfourne.
The chieftain did not meet Tavis’s gaze. “We have discussed the matter at length,” he sighed. “It’s not cannibalism, and there’s no law against foraging for food during time of war-however disgusting that food may be.”
“The spoils go to the victor,” added Orisino.
“You’re hardly victors,” Tavis snarled. “I opened the gate!”
“ After we hit it with our ram,” the verbeeg countered. “As I understand firbolg law, that means you surrendered the castle.”
