The Kingdom of Shadow

by Richard A. Knaak

  Several yards in, he came across the skull.

  “Ah, lad! Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes—or just a sore sight, from the look of you!”

  “I am not ready to join you in the afterlife, Humbart.” Exhausted again, the spellcaster sat down on a large rock. “Tell me exactly what happened to me.”

  “After the two beastly hands clamped tight on you, you dropped the blade. I worried then that they might flatten you like a bug, but instead those rocky mitts began moving along the walls, heading toward the cavern. They ran you right through the collapse, sending more rock tumbling to me—you know I almost got cracked like an egg?”

  Zayl could appreciate the skull’s apprehensions, but he wanted to hear the rest. “Go on.”

  “That’s it. You vanished from sight, there was a flash of some ungodly light, then I started shouting my head off.”

  “And I thank you. You saved me.”

  The skull somehow made a snorting sound. “Well, I had to! Who else is going to carry me out of this place?”

  Zayl frowned as he looked past Humbart. What the skull could not see, apparently could not guess, was that farther ahead a ton of debris now sealed the entrance quite thoroughly. The necromancer doubted that he could either dig or magic his way through. That meant finding an alternative route of escape.

  “Come, Humbart.” He picked up the skull and started back into the cavern.

  “You’re going the wrong way, lad.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  A moment of silence, then, “Oh.”

  The pair entered the vast chamber. Holding up the dagger, Zayl surveyed his surroundings in every direction.

  “We go that way,” he finally said, indicating the mouth of a passage up near the very top of the chamber.

  “That way? And by what route?”

  Humbart had asked an excellent question. At first glance, there seemed no humanly possible manner by which to reach his goal. Zayl searched through the ragged remains of his cloak, but found that the rope he had earlier used had vanished. Still, according to the charts he had memorized, the gap above represented his best hope of finding a way out of Nymyr’s gargantuan belly.

  Staring at the slick surface leading up to the passage, Zayl took a deep breath and replied, “I climb, of course.”

  “Climb?” The skull sounded positively aghast. “Climb that? Zayl, lad, do you think—” The rest of his protest became muffled as the spellcaster stuffed him back into his pouch.

  The necromancer needed no discouragement, his trust in his skills already quite limited. If he slipped on his way up, Zayl very much doubted that he had enough will to cast a spell sufficient to keep every bone in his body from shattering on the harsh surface below. Regardless of that risk, though, he had to try.

  What Zayl had not told Humbart, what he had only come to realize from his own predicament, was that whatever secret existed in Ureh planned soon to reveal itself . . . and that could not, in any way, be a good thing.

  Gorst came to see Kentril, the giant not at all in a good mood.

  “Albord’s not back.”

  Still trying to find some comfortable fit in the dress uniform, Kentril paused from adjusting the jacket to eye his second-in-command. “It’s nearly the dinner hour. You check his room?”

  “Aye, Kentril. His things are still there.”

  “Maybe he decided to stay in the city for a little while after the others left. Maybe their going made him a little homesick.” The captain himself had felt so after bidding his men farewell. Even the pleasure of Atanna’s company had failed to eradicate the feeling completely.

  “Could be,” Gorst grunted, not sounding any more convinced by Kentril’s words than the captain himself had been.

  For once, Kentril wished that he did not have to meet Atanna. Albord’s absence did not sit well with him. “Scout the palace as surreptitiously as possible. Make sure that you’ve searched anywhere Albord might’ve gone. If I get a chance, I’ll try to do some of the same.”

  “Aye.”

  “Any hint of Zayl?”

  “His stuff’s in his rooms, but he’s still missing, too.”

  And that, in some ways, seemed to bode even more ill than the young mercenary’s disappearance. Zayl did not seem the type just to go wandering off, not after the concerns the necromancer had expressed.

  “Gorst?”

  “Yeah, Kentril?”

  “Go armed.”

  The giant nodded, patting the sword dangling at his side. “Always do. You taught me that.”

  Carrying an ax around would have drawn some suspicion, but a sheathed sword did not raise many eyebrows. Nor would the fact that the massive fighter wandered the halls of the palace seem too out of place. Clearly, as a foreigner, Gorst would be curious about the grand edifice, and, besides, for a giant of a man, the other mercenary had the stealth of a cat.

  Gorst started to leave, then hesitated. “Kentril, if I don’t find Albord in the palace at all, should I maybe go take a peek in the city?”

  Captain Dumon thought it over, weighing options and lives. Finally, hoping that Albord would forgive him, he answered, “No. If it comes to the point of searching the city, we go together, or we don’t go at all.”

  Alone again, Kentril tried to finish dressing, but this latest news refused to sit well with him. Now both the necromancer and Albord had gone missing. The captain gave thanks that at least Jodas and the others had left when they had. If not, how long before all of them would have disappeared?

  Disappeared?

  Albord had been last seen escorting the rest . . .

  “No . . .” Forgetting his garments, forgetting even Atanna, Kentril burst from his rooms and ran to the nearest palace window that gave him some glimpse of the torchlit city. He stared down at the shadowed buildings, listened to the celebrating throngs, and tried to convince himself that the horrific thought he had just conjured up could not have happened. Surely the six who had chosen to leave had exited the outer gates and even now journeyed through the sunlit jungle. Surely they, at least, had reached relative safety . . .

  Yet some churning feeling within would not let the captain accept what seemed a most reasonable possibility.

  “Atanna.” She would tell him what was going on. She would show him one way or the other whether his fears had merit.

  He strode through the regal halls, ignoring the salutes of the helmeted guards he passed. Kentril had only one focus—Juris Khan’s daughter—and for once he did not seek her for pleasure.

  One of the almost faceless servants confronted him as he neared the grand hall. Before the pasty-faced man could say anything, Kentril seized him by the tailored collar and demanded, “Where’s your mistress? Where’s Atanna?”

  “Why, I’m right here.”

  Startled, Kentril released the servant and turned. The beautiful crimson-haired princess wore a robe similar to the one in which she had been clad when aiding in the release of her father from his curse. Far behind her, Kentril vaguely noted a door he had never seen before.

  “What is it you want, my love?”

  He had the greatest urge to take her in his arms, to forget his problems, but despite how simple it would have been to do so, Captain Dumon could not forget his men. At least three had definitely gone missing and possibly seven more, excluding the necromancer.

  “Where were you?”

  “Helping my father,” she responded offhandedly. Her lips pursed in concern. “You look troubled, Kentril. Have I offended you somehow?”

  Again he had to fight the desire to drown himself in her. “I want to talk to you”—Kentril recalled the servant—“in private.”

  “We’re quite alone,” she said with a teasing smile,

  Glancing over his shoulder, the captain discovered the liveried figure nowhere to be found. Truly they were swift of feet and as silent as the night.

  Atanna suddenly stood at his side, her arm entwined with his. “Let’s take a walk, shall we?”
r />   She led him toward the balcony where Lord Khan had made his appearance after being freed by Quov Tsin. Kentril wanted to question her even as they walked, but Atanna put a finger to his lips and shushed as if he were a child. Gazing into those entrancing eyes, Kentril could do nothing but obey.

  The air outside had a slight chill to it that caused the mercenary officer to shiver. How he looked forward to when Ureh could withstand the sun and the shadow of the mountain would only mean the aging of the day.

  “I so enjoy it out here,” his companion murmured. “I know we only sit upon a hill, but it feels like a mountain as tall as Nymyr!”

  It could have been so easy to follow her lead, to let the mood take him. Kentril refused, though. He had lives to consider. “Atanna, I need to talk with you.”

  “Silly! You already are!”

  Now he grew slightly angry. “Don’t play games! This is important! At least three of my men are officially missing, and now another seems to be nowhere to be found. I’m even growing concerned about the six who left, not to mention Zayl. Too many people are unaccounted for, and that, in my book, means something terrible’s going on.”

  She gave him an almost petulant frown. “Surely you’re not saying that I did anything to them?”

  “No, of course not. But something’s amiss here, and I don’t know what to think. Nothing is as it should be, not even Gregus Mazi—”

  “Gregus Mazi?” Her gaze hardened. “What about that viper?”

  Kentril decided he had to tell her. Surely Atanna did not know the truth. He gripped her by the shoulders. “Atanna, your father didn’t slay him.”

  “What do you mean? Father said—”

  “Listen to me!” He leaned close, letting her see in his eyes that he spoke only the truth. “Atanna, I found him . . . Gregus Mazi, that is. He’d been cursed, turned into a part of the caverns below, and used as some sort of hellish sentinel.”

  “What were you doing down there? How did you know where to look for him?”

  Kentril glanced briefly over his shoulder in order to make certain that no one spied upon them, then answered, “Zayl found out. He’d been to Mazi’s sanctum and there tried to summon the sorcerer’s shade in order to question him about—”

  Turning back to the view of darkened Ureh, Atanna muttered, “The necromancer . . . of course, he would be able to do it.”

  Frustrated, Kentril spun her to face him again. “Listen to me! You know your father best. Has he acted at all different? Is there anything about him that might be of question to you?”

  “My father is exactly the way I expect him to be.”

  “But something’s not right here, Atanna, and because of the two of us, I’ve ignored it much too long. Men who depended on me may be dead, and whatever took them could still be lurking in Ureh. If your father—”

  She put a hand to his cheek, caressing him and making it hard for Kentril to concentrate. “Nothing can touch us here. This is the palace of Juris Khan. I have you, and you have me, and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?”

  How simple it would have been to agree. Her very touch thrilled him, made all else inconsequential.

  “No!” As he shouted, he grabbed her wrist. “Atanna! You’ve got to take this seriously! I can’t stay here and pretend nothing happened! At the very least, I have to go searching for Albord and the others! They—”

  “You can’t leave! I have you now, and I won’t let you go!”

  Kentril gaped, caught unprepared for the vehemence with which the young woman spoke. Her eyes held a fury he thought not possible.

  She took a step toward him, and to his surprise the hardened fighter backed up.

  “I asked Father for you, and he said I could have you! All I wanted was you. I didn’t want the others. Just you, don’t you see?”

  The fury had abated, but in its place Kentril discovered an unsettling look, a look that seemed to cut through him, see him inside and out. Without thinking, he took another step back.

  Her face softened. “It was so lonely there . . . so lonely save for him and the few others . . . and when they were gone, I yearned for something more.”

  Every hair on Kentril suddenly tingled. As Atanna proceeded toward him, the wind seemed to catch her hair and robe, making the former flow wild and sensual and the latter pull hard against her curved form. Her smile promised everything as she eyed him under her lashes.

  “I want you with all my heart, my soul, and my body, Kentril,” she cooed. “Don’t you want me, too?”

  He did. He wanted her. He wanted to give himself to her in whatever manner she desired. The captain wanted to serve her, protect her . . .

  But as Juris Khan’s daughter reached out for him, something made Kentril throw himself forward.

  The mercenary collided hard with Atanna. She let out a startled gasp, then fell backward, completely off-balance.

  And dropped over the rail.

  “Atanna!” Straining, Kentril tried to reach her, but already she had slipped completely out of sight. He stumbled to the rail, peering down in horror for some sign. Unfortunately, the deep shadow made it impossible to see anything. Kentril listened, but heard neither a scream nor the sounds of discovery.

  He fell back, his heart seeming ready to explode. It had never been his intention to kill her! All Kentril had wanted was to break whatever hold she had upon him. He knew that she had been a wielder of sorcery like her father and that in her fear of losing him she must have thought that it would be all right to cast a glamour over him, make him love her more. If she had only understood—

  Her father. Whatever concerns Kentril had once had about Lord Khan, they paled now in comparison to this situation. How could he face Ureh’s master and tell him that his only daughter had plummeted to her death after having been pushed by the man she had loved? How?

  Deep down, Captain Dumon knew that his mind still did not function properly. Contrary thoughts vied with one another, seeking domination. While a part of him worried over Atanna’s death and its consequences, another part still battled the question of the disappearances and the truth about Gregus Mazi.

  One way or another, he had to face Juris Khan. What Kentril had done could not be ignored. He had to face Khan.

  He recalled the door he had seen far behind Atanna, the one from which it seemed most likely she had come. She had claimed to have just come from helping her father, which suggested that the elder monarch could be found wherever the door led.

  Without hesitation, the mercenary ran from the balcony. The hallway echoed with the sounds of his booted feet, but nothing else. Of the servants and the guards, there existed no sign. Had they heard what had happened and gone to find their mistress’s remains? Why had none of them come to the balcony to investigate what had happened?

  Such matters faded in importance as he came upon the door. Throwing it open, Kentril saw that it descended deep into the lower levels of the palace. No torches or lamps lit the way, but some illumination enabled him to see a fair distance down.

  Veteran reflexes almost made the captain reach for his sword, but then he recalled what had just happened. How would it look to come to explain Atanna’s fall while wielding a weapon?

  As he started to descend, Kentril thought about going back to find Gorst, but then decided that his friend should be no part of this. This had to be between Juris Khan and Kentril.

  With great trepidation, the scarred mercenary followed the steps to their end. At the bottom, a gargoyle head with a ring in its mouth savagely greeted him from an ancient iron door. With nowhere else to go, Kentril tugged on the ring.

  A cold yet soft breeze swirled briefly around him.

  Tezarka . . .

  Startled, he let go of the ring, then turned in a circle. Kentril could have sworn that he had heard Atanna’s voice, but, of course, he had made that forever impossible. Any hint of her presence could only arise from his overriding guilt.

  Reminded of why he had come down to this place, Kent
ril decided to try the ring once more. He already knew that it would not work, but at least—

  With a slow groan, the iron door gave way.

  Kentril stepped inside.

  “Aaah, Dumon! What excellent timing!”

  In the center of the chamber within, near a tall stone platform covered in mystic symbols, a smiling Quov Tsin reached an almost friendly hand toward the mercenary. The silver runes of the Vizjerei’s Turinnash blazed brightly, and the diminutive figure seemed almost years younger, so enthused was his expression.

  Baffled, Kentril slowly walked toward him. “Tsin? What’re you doing down here?”

  “Preparing for a sorcerous feat such as I could have only imagined! Preparing to delve into powers no other Vizjerei has touched in centuries, if ever!”

  Kentril looked around, but saw no one else in the vast room. Even though he had interacted with sorcerers in the past, even visited them in their own sanctums, this place filled him with an inexplicable dread. “Where’s Lord Khan?”

  “Returning shortly. You might as well wait. He wants you here, too.”

  But Kentril paid him no mind. “I’ve got to find him . . . explain to him what happened to his daughter . . .”

  Tsin frowned. “His daughter? What about his daughter? She left but a short time ago.”

  “I think the good captain fears that terrible harm’s come to my darling Atanna,” a voice behind the fighter boomed.

  Startled, Kentril stumbled away from the door. Through the entrance stepped Juris Khan, looking stronger, more fit, despite his elder years, than Captain Dumon had so far seen him.

  Lord Khan smiled benevolently at the dismayed figure. “She surprised you. She caused you to react instinctively. Atanna can be a creature of moods, good captain. You only reacted as was warranted.”

  “But—” Kentril could hardly believe that his host could speak so pleasantly about such a terrible accident. While it relieved him that the robed monarch did not hold him responsible, that did not change the fact that the man’s child had fallen to the rocky landscape below. “But Atanna’s dead!”