Rides a Dread Legion

by Raymond E. Feist

  He considered the reality he knew to be the Demon Gate. He and others in his calling had faced scorn and ridicule over that assertion, being accused of seeking to avoid complicity in the demon assault. But no matter whom he tried to convince, only a handful of magicians, almost to a man practitioners of the darker callings, believed him. One additional ally had proven a surprise, one of the ancient priests, the Elta-Eldar, for Gulamendis had made one observation in passing that had sent the ancient Loremaster to the archives.

  That ancient had sought out Gulamendis when he had been imprisoned. He had asked questions and offered insights, then left the prisoner alone to sweat out his days and shiver through the nights.

  It had been his apprentice, the Lorekeeper Tanderae, who had returned at last to speak on his master’s behalf. Now Gulamendis saw the priest approaching.

  “Gulamendis,” he said in greeting.

  “Fare you well, Tanderae?” answered the Demon Master.

  “As well as one might expect, given our current circumstances.” He glanced around as if to see whether anyone else was listening. He turned to walk next to Gulamendis and put his left hand on the Demon Master’s shoulder, as if two old friends were speaking of personal matters. Lowering his voice, he said, “I suspect you have much to do, and need to be quickly about your business; I’ll walk with you only a little way, for I also am hard pressed by many duties.

  “I just want you to understand that much of what you have brought to the attention of myself and others has not gone unnoticed. You have our thanks.”

  Not entirely sure where this was leading, Gulamendis said, “I only serve.”

  “Yes,” said Tanderae with a slight smile, lowering his voice even more, “yet there are those among the Lorekeepers, Loremasters, and Priesthood who would happily see you burned alive as a heretic.”

  Gulamendis said nothing.

  “Like yourself, I have witnessed the fall of the greatest race from glory to ruin.”

  Still, Gulamendis kept quiet, as they walked past a circle of priests who were incanting a Star Stone. Having been raised by his mother in a small town on the frontier of the Empire of the Stars, he had never seen one created. Their fabrication was rare, yet now seven were being fashioned in this, the People’s new home. He paused to observe this wonder, then finally he said, “None living has not been a witness to tragedy.”

  Tanderae nodded and was silent for a moment.

  The Priests finished their spell, and hovering in the air was a dull grey object, looking nothing so much as like a large piece of unfinished ore, lead or tin. It began to glow, slightly at first and with a pulse. Over the next minute the glow brightened and the pulse quickened. In less than an hour, the stone would glow with the brightness of a star, and to look at it for more than a moment could blind a living being. But the magic would prepare the ground for the most holy of the People’s artifacts, the living, breathing heart of the People, one of the seven great trees known as the Stars.

  Almost muttering, Tanderae said, “I could be burned at the stake for saying this, but all of this is unnecessary.”

  Gulamendis turned to study the Lorekeeper. He looked much as any younger male of the People: tall, regal, with broad shoulders and a haughty expression. His features were unremarkable, much like Gulamendis’s: straight nose, deep-set eyes, a strong chin, and high cheekbones. His hair was dark, however, unlike most of the People, a deep red, almost brown in color. “Unnecessary?”

  Tanderae knelt. He gently rubbed his hand over the dirt of the valley floor, as if stroking a pet, and then picked up a loose clot of dirt. “This is the soil of Home, Gulamendis.” He raised it to his face, sniffed at it, and said, “The magic is already here.”

  Standing again, he looked at the Demon Master. “We needed the tarmancer’s Star Stones in the past, to ready the soil of an alien world so the Seven Stars would flourish.” He took a long, slow, deep breath, and said, “The magic is in the air. I know you felt it when you first came through the portal.”

  Gulamendis nodded. “It’s impossible not to.”

  “We could excavate the Seven Stars, wrap the roots of those mighty trees, and magic them through the portal and plant them, and they would thrive here. This is their home, too.

  “But we are a People who are wed to tradition.”

  Gulamendis nodded in agreement. Entrenched beliefs were difficult to dislodge. So certain were those in power that some nameless demon master caused the invasion of this realm by the Demon Legion, it was only by fortune’s favor he still lived.

  Looking around, to ensure no one was eavesdropping, Tanderae continued. “You and your brother have lived on the fringes, my friend. Masters of Illusion are treated with indifference, but have no place on the Council of Magic. All of the builders, the geomancers, aremancers, the formers of things”—he indicated with a nod of his head the seven priests and magicians who now left the site where they had created the Star Stone—“and especially the tarmancers, they have convinced the People over the centuries they alone are to be entrusted with advising the Regent. Overcoming their bias…” He left the thought unfinished.

  Quietly, Gulamendis said, “Why are you saying these things?”

  With a slightly wry, slightly sad smile, Tanderae said, “I have no magic, Gulamendis. My only gift is a prodigious memory. I speak without false modesty when I say no Lorekeeper before me was as able as I to recall, word for word, every passage in every tome he has read. I know the history of our People better than any elf living, or any who came before me.

  “And I see a pattern.”

  “Pattern?”

  “We have much to talk about, but first you must find us a demon.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Taking Gulamendis’s arm in his hand, the Lorekeeper gently turned him toward a distant gate. “We both know that your obligation to report to the Grand Master for assignment is a formality. You are a free agent, under direct order from the Regent Lord. You have two tasks…” He squinted a little as he studied the Demon Master’s face. “No, you have three tasks,” he said softly. “One of your own, I see.”

  Gulamendis stiffened slightly, but didn’t break stride. “I am to seek out demon signs,” he said. “If I find none, I rejoice.”

  “Oh, I suspect you will find some.” He again studied the Demon Master while they walked toward the distant gate. “Perhaps you already have.” Gulamendis stopped, and Tanderae smiled. “My other great gift is reading expressions and manner.” He waited for the Demon Master to speak, then, when he did not, the Lorekeeper said, “Too long we have glorified power, Gulamendis. It is worthy of note, and when it serves, it is a grand thing, but to seek out power for its own sake makes us little different from those we call the Forgotten.”

  Gulamendis wondered for a brief instant if the Lorekeeper could read his thoughts, for this echoed what he had been thinking only moments before he had encountered Tanderae. Weighing his words carefully, he asked, “What do you advise?”

  Again a quick look around to see they were not being overheard, and Tanderae started moving toward the distant gate. “I will speak to Grand Master Colsarius, which will discharge your obligation to report. He will consider it a burden I saved him from: a meeting with a demon lover.” There was a wry smile and Gulamendis understood he meant the insult as humor. “He might take it upon himself to augment or extend the Regent Lord’s instructions to you, and I’d rather you weren’t distracted from your tasks.”

  Gulamendis saw they were approaching the gate opposite the one through which he had entered the burgeoning city and said, “What do you know of my tasks, Tanderae?”

  “I know the Regent Lord wants you to ensure we are not troubled by demons. And I’m also guessing he wishes someone with a great deal of experience skulking through dark places to investigate a few other things, such as how our distant kin on this world fare.”

  Gulamendis was impressed. His meeting with the Regent Lord had been in private, over the fir
st good meal the Demon Master had been given in months. The Regent Lord was adamant: Laromendis would be kept hostage against his brother’s good behavior while the Demon Master did the Regent Lord’s bidding. And he had set two tasks, to see if they were free of demon taint in Midkemia and to travel the land to the north, discovering what he could about the elves, especially the so-called Elf Queen. Gulamendis wasn’t certain, but he was clearly of the mind that the Regent Lord was in no hurry to surrender authority over the Taredhel to another, no matter what her lineage. She might claim descent from the true kings of Edhel, but it would take more than a garland for a crown and some leather-clad rustics bowing before her to convince him to bend his knee.

  Tanderae said, “And there’s another thing, but I don’t know what it is…”

  Gulamendis preferred it that way. This young Lorekeeper was too adept at discerning whole pictures from fragments and glimpses. He might prove a powerful ally, but he would be a deeply dangerous enemy. Still, Gulamendis wasn’t without his own talents in seeing a larger picture when enough information was there. He studied Tanderae and said, “You have ambition, my friend. Is Master of Lore not enough?”

  The young elf smiled, but it was a pained expression. “I am loyal, my friend. But the needs of my people come before any single elf’s needs.”

  Gulamendis nodded and turned to walk out the gate. He understood completely. The young Lorekeeper, gifted only with a keen mind and facile wit, meant to be the next Regent Lord. Now he knew why he had sought out the Demon Master, and why this conversation. He wished the Elf Queen to know there were those within the ranks of the Taredhel who were ready to acknowledge her as rightful ruler of all the Edhel. In exchange for certain considerations, such as being named her Regent Lord in Elenbar, being first among them.

  Gulamendis turned just as Tanderae was about to return to his other tasks and said, “Why are we having this conversation? You already knew my mission from the Regent Lord. But you expose yourself, even if only slightly, by talking as you have to me. Why?”

  The Lorekeeper paused, turned back toward Gulamendis, and said, “Do you know the Tome of Akar-Ree?”

  “I grew up in a tiny village on the frontier. As you can imagine, my education was not formal. I am self-taught.”

  “Impressive,” said the Lorekeeper. “There are ancient volumes that have crumbled with time. Lacunae—holes in pages—often make already metaphorical and poetic lore even harder to understand.

  “Your studies are among those forbidden for centuries, Gulamendis—if we can call them ‘studies’—and what little we know of demons is either ancient lore or bitter recent experience.

  “The Tome of Akar-Ree is a recounting of a great battle during the Chaos Wars, when gods and mortals struggled to seize the very heavens, and much of it is obscure reference to things the reader is supposed to already know, and some of it is imagery open to a myriad of interpretations.

  “But there is one passage, clear as a clarion ringing in the cold air of dawn, without a hint of obscurity, and it is this: demons were summoned to fight in the battle, beings of the deeper realms, and other beings, of light, from the higher realms, answered. They came unbidden, for it was the nature of things that when a creature from the lower depths appeared here, his counterpart appeared somewhere else, and sought him out, and when they struggled, both were destroyed, or returned to their home realm—we don’t know which.”

  “I didn’t know that,” whispered Gulamendis. He knew he was on the verge of hearing something very important.

  “These higher beings, those in opposition to demons, have many names, most commonly they are called angels. Their glory is blinding and their power is equal to those of the demons summoned.”

  Gulamendis’s mind raced, for he had summoned demons for years, yet this was the first he had heard of these other beings, these angels.

  Tanderae smiled. “You see the question, don’t you?”

  Gulamendis nodded. “Where are the angels?”

  Tanderae shrugged. “Unless this ancient tome is a work of the storyteller’s art and has no valid history within, then the balance of our universe has been skewed since the time of the Chaos Wars. The host of demons who destroyed our worlds should have been met by an equal number of angels, and the Taredhel should have continued in peace and health across the worlds we inhabited.”

  “Why do you tell me this?”

  Tanderae shrugged. “There may be no answer, or it may be that work is apocryphal at best. But what if it is true?” He placed his hand on Gulamendis’s shoulder and gently turned him back toward the gate, indicating the conversation was at an end. “It is just that you are about to travel widely, while the rest of us labor to build this new city of glory and plan our conquest of this world, claiming it as ours alone. In those travels you may meet all manner of being, some who may be wise, or powerful, or have access to ancient knowledge, and it would be a shame if you didn’t know the right question to ask. Journey safely.” Without another word, he walked quickly away from the stunned Demon Master.

  Gulamendis walked away from the nascent city, unsettled by what he had just heard, and more, by what he knew was coming. Gulamendis sighed to himself as he trudged up the hill. He didn’t know if his tasks just got easier or more difficult.

  CHAPTER 9

  WARNING

  Brandos paced.

  Amirantha sat patiently in the anteroom, waiting for a summons that never seemed to come. This was his fourth day waiting for an audience with General Kaspar, Chancellor to the Maharaja of Muboya. The new palace in Maharta was an exercise in ostentation, something Amirantha had come to expect from royalty, but he was forced to admit that along with the ostentation came a fair dose of beauty. Some of the décor was actually tasteful, a rarity among those to whom fashion was a function of how much gold it cost to build something.

  The two of them had arrived at the capital of the young and vibrant Kingdom of Muboya. The Maharaja had ended over twenty years of campaign and annexation when he reached the sea, uniting all the city states along the River Veedra, from the grasslands to the west to the City of the Serpent River to the east. It was the largest political entity on the continent of Novindus in history, and, like all young and sprawling nations comprised of diverse cultures, nearly impossible to govern.

  While waiting, Amirantha had gained some sense of the tasks set before this Lord Kaspar. Nobles from many parts of the nation, envoys from other states in the Westlands and even from across the sea, paraded through this antechamber into his reception hall or private chambers or whatever it was Amirantha imagined behind massive wooden doors.

  He and Brandos had presented themselves four days earlier, both wearing their finest clothing, so there was nothing of the vagabond or poor petitioner in their appearance. They simply told the secretary, a fussy and self-important little man, they wished to speak to Lord Kaspar on a matter of some urgency and importance to the Kingdom.

  And for three days they had been soundly ignored.

  Brandos sat down next to his friend, about the fifth or sixth time—Amirantha had lost count—and said, “Do we need to bribe the secretary?”

  “Tried yesterday, and almost got us arrested.” He turned to look at his companion and in low tones said, “Seems what we’ve heard about this Kaspar of Olasko is true; he’s running a very principled state.” He leaned back against the wall, carefully—he was conscious of his white robes with black and gold trim and the need to keep them free of dirty surfaces—and said, “Given the rogues and mountebanks who pass as government agents in most places, it’s a surprise, but I’m not sure if it’s pleasant or unsettling.”

  “Well, if you can’t bribe to get in to see this General, and we seem to be growing moss waiting, do you have any other ideas? Not that I don’t enjoy sitting and doing nothing for days on end…”

  Amirantha said, “Very well. I guess I could send him a more compelling message.”

  The Warlock sat up, closed his eyes, and bar
ely raised his right hand, but Brandos instantly recognized a summoning. This was hardly the time or place, in the old fighter’s judgment, to call forth a demon, but he trusted Amirantha’s instincts, even if they had come close to getting him killed on a number of occasions. More times though, they had saved his life.

  A faint “pop” sound heralded the appearance of a tiny figure, about knee-high to the fighter. It was the imp Nalnar, oldest of the Warlock’s summoned creatures. In their flimflamming of the gullible, Brandos and Amirantha had relied on a half-dozen summoned beings, all having different abilities to amaze and terrorize the onlookers out of their gold, but few posed any real danger.

  The dark-skinned imp, his hue shifting from deep blue to purple, depending on the light, was the most intelligent. His bright yellow eyes with black irises regarded Amirantha from under flame-red brows. He grinned, revealing an array of razor-sharp teeth, and pointed one talon-tipped finger at the Warlock. “You have summoned me, Master. I await your bidding, Master.”

  The secretary looked up from his desk at the unusual sound of the imp’s voice, and suddenly his eyes widened. Amirantha pointed to the entrance to Kaspar’s office and said, “Beyond those doors is another room, in which resides a man of importance. He is General Kaspar, Chancellor to the Maharaja of Muboya. Bear to him a message that I, Amirantha of the Satumbria, seek audience, for I have a dire warning and need to speak with him now.” Lowering his voice, he said, “Can you remember that, Nalnar?”