Kingdoms of the Night (The Far Kingdoms)

by Allan Cole, Chris Bunch

  So it proved here. The thorn trees were taller than the gate. But when I forced my weight between the gate and the first tree, shoving branches apart, there was a considerable space — a passageway unintended by the landscaper who no doubt was proud he left room for the gate’s stonemasons to work. All entry would cost us would be a few pinpricks. I motioned my men forward but Janela held out a hand. She plucked a long blade of grass from the ground, bent it back and forth, touched it to one of the thorns on the tree then bent it again, whispering:

  This is your cousin

  Feel how she moves

  The wind turns her

  The rain turns her

  Join with your cousin

  Just for this hour

  Join with your cousin

  She nodded for me to go ahead. The prick of the thorns I’d been expecting was gone and they turned aside like blades of grass. My passage was no harder than pushing through any thick shrub.

  Once all of us were inside the grounds I waited for Janela to check for magical warders. Once more there were none. Quatervals touched me on the shoulder and in the dimness I could see his hand make a circle. I nodded and he vanished into darkness, as silent as any questing beast. Moments later he returned and spread his hands. No physical guards to be seen either.

  We unbarred the gate’s lock, swung it open and I sent Maha and Chons for the horses. When they returned, we swung the gates closed and I left them to guard our rear, with whispered orders to come running if they heard trouble.

  The five of us went swiftly up the long winding drive to the house. Quatervals had wanted us to creep through the gardens but I said no. We already resembled a murder party and I wanted to confront Lord Senac as an equal, not a midnight skulker. I was glad Senac had paved his drive rather than gravelling it like most.

  What little noise we made was covered by the blustering wind and occasional rain-squalls. This was indeed a night for somber deeds.

  There were lights ahead. Someone in Lord Senac’s household was still awake. Just before the house we took cover behind some slender trees whose branches hung down limply, touching our faces with chill fingers and sending a shudder down my spine.

  There were no horses or carriages drawn up in the courtyard, but two big torches flared into the night, hung on either side of the mansion’s immense entryway. This stood open and a long shaft of light stretched out across the yard. In that middle of that shaft was a body.

  There was no movement except for the whip of the trees in the wind and no sound except the branches and the spatter of rain on the paving. My sword came out and I crept forward to investigate. The old movements were coming back to me. How to creep, how to crawl, how to dart, although I’m sure I was still most laughable as I gaited across the open ground to crouch over the corpse. It lay face up and my stomach roiled at the sight. I may have seen worse, but it had been years and the stomach does not retain memory of horror.

  Savaged though his face was, I was fairly certain I knew him as Lord Senac’s castelan and the ragged remains of his clothes were the Lord’s livery. I do not wish to be specific about what the corpse looked like, but if you envision a man tormented to his end by playful hyenas, you know enough.

  I motioned the others up but moved away from the body. Quatervals and perhaps Janela might see what remained of the man without sickening, but not so the other two. Quatervals glanced and his jaw tightened. He drew a question mark in the air — Did I have any idea what could have killed him? Or why? I shook my head. All of us had our weapons ready, except for Janela. I noted she had nothing but that small oilskin pouch ready and wondered what sort of spell or potion she’d prepared.

  She leaned close and whispered, “Now I smell magic. The air reeks of it.”

  I sent Quatervals back for the other two. We had more need of swords here than at our back. In a few moments they trotted out of the darkness. My men were puzzled, well out of their depth. I’d told them we were going to Lord Senac’s to discuss some treachery he might’ve done, but what was this? Had something attacked the Lord’s mansion? Were we now on some kind of rescue errand? They looked at me for reassurance and I tried to look firm, but was as ignorant as they were.

  We went up the mansion’s broad single flight of steps and entered. The house was lit as if expecting guests, but the long foyer was empty. We moved as silently as we could but I swore I could hear the sound of our breathing echoing against the shiny marble walls and floor. We went down the long passageway that led to the dining room and its doors also gaped wide.

  We walked through the portals and I heard one of the men behind me inhale sharply.

  There were three long tables in the room, reaching from end to end. They were set for a banquet. Fine porcelain dishes were placed on the whitest linen where silver settings and crystal goblets glimmered richly and red velvet hangings gave the room an royal backdrop. But there were no diners, no servitors.

  The plates were not empty, waiting for the diners to enter and the meal to begin, but piled high with food and the goblets were filled with wine. It was as if the banquet had been begun and then abandoned six months ago. The food was black and I could smell the reek of decay.

  Yet I knew Lord Senac had hosted a feast in this room not two nights earlier. I heard the buzz of flies as they savored their repast.

  The smell grew stronger. I backed out, my men moving with me. Quatervals was at the door, looking out, reflexively serving as a rear guard. Now the stench seemed to fill the entire house.

  We went on down the passageway. At its end rose the staircase that led, I imagined, to the private rooms and bedchambers. I’d never been above the first floor, however, and knew of no one who had. There was a closed door to the right to Lord Senac’s meeting room, half library, half gallery, half museum, that was often remarked on for its collection of strange and wonderful objects, some known, but more from lands no Orissan had ever touched. We had been told that in their day the Senacs had been a far-traveled family.

  There was blood, a great pool of it, just in the middle of the passageway. It stretched from wall to wall and appeared more than one man could hold. We stepped as carefully as we could but when we went on each of us left a sticky red trail on the white marble. There was no body, nor any signs of a struggle on either side of the gory pool.

  At the stairs I started up, then decided to look into the meeting room. I opened the doors quietly. A fire guttered low at either end of the high-ceilinged, dark wood chamber.

  In the center of the room crouched horror.

  It was blood-drenched and I could see bits of what it had feasted on lying the room, fouling the carpets.

  Imagine a direwolf, but a direwolf bigger than the most drunken fur hunter could imagine, perhaps twenty feet tall. Now imagine such a beast without a pelt but with a parchment-yellowed skin, stretched impossibly tight, so the creature looked starved or mummified. Where a direwolf’s eyes gleam yellow this thing’s shone red, like the embers of a fire. Its twisted fangs were brown and stained. Instead of a wolf’s claws there were curving talons like a lion’s that incessantly went in and out of the paws. I could smell it across the room, a stink of corpses and decay.

  A sound came from it, part growl, part high whine, like a dog finding a scent.

  The demon rose from its haunches and came toward us, unhurriedly. There was no need for haste — there was no way we could have reached the exit even if this were a mortal creature.

  Fear grabbed me, fear like I hadn’t known for years, but I refused its embrace. Instinctively we spread wide, as hunters try to circle a cornered wolf or boar.

  Janela had her wand out, moving first in a small circle, then over her head, then in a small circle in front of her. She began speaking and I was amazed because her voice as calm and certain as if she were discussing her plans for the day:

  Let the mirror lie, let the vision blur

  The few of us are many, the few of us are strong

  The steel we bear is doubled />
  The hate gouts up

  The fear is gone, the fear is gone

  It pours like water

  Out to our foe.

  The laws are here, the laws are now

  The rules are of this world not another

  Let that from another be ruled

  Let that from another take heed

  The death is here

  The death is real

  There is no gate, there is no door

  There is no return

  His doom is now.

  And yes, the fear was gone and courage bloomed afresh. I heard growls of rage from my men as her spell took effect on them as well.

  Across the room the demon was still snarling but the note was higher, almost as if it were taken aback at our mettle.

  The first part of Janela’s incantation had also taken and looking at my tiny band of servants-turned-warriors was like looking at a reflection in a pool shaken by ripples. Now I saw one, now I saw several, now I saw many, shimmering, changing.

  All of us but one and that was Yakar, the man who’d refused the spell. The demon’s snarl grew louder and he padded toward us. Yakar may’ve been afraid of magic before but his heart was great now. He shouted, not a battle cry but a scream of blind rage and charged, brandishing his sword. No soldier, no warrior, he waved it like a club as he went.

  The demon sliced at him once with its foreclaws and ripped his body almost in half. Yakar began to topple. Before he could fall the demon’s jaws snapped, ripping a chunk of flesh from my poor gardener’s corpse. The night-beast swallowed and bayed triumph and the walls shook around us.

  I forced myself forward and Quatervals ran at the monster from the side. The demon lashed out at Quatervals but he ducked away and slashed at the creature’s foreleg. The demon howled and his blood — not honest red of this earth but dark, decaying green with golden flecks in it — sprayed.

  Its head turned toward me, fangs dripping and I swear I saw knowledge flash in its eyes. It knew me and I was its only prey, just as a boar will choose one hunter to attack from those who have him mewed.

  It lunged at me and I tried to duck but old bones betrayed me and my feet went from under me on the slick room’s floor and I fell heavily. But even as I thudded down I managed to roll to the side, my sword coming up, not thrusting so much as trying to ward off a blow and it stuck firm in the demon’s paw as it lashed down.

  Again the horror bayed pain, if that was what it felt and snapped its paw, flipping my sword out like a beast would rip away a thorn and its jaws gaped wide. I saw Quatervals and the others running to my aid but they were moving slowly and would be too late.

  Once more I heard Janela’s voice, although I couldn’t see where she stood or what she was doing. It was still calm, still certain, but this time it filled the entire room.

  This foulness is not ours

  This terror is of another

  Earth take heed

  Earth defend

  Earth give of yourself

  Give me desert sand

  Give me desert wind

  Earth reach out

  Earth give

  Help your sons

  Help your daughter

  Mother Earth listen

  Hear the plea.

  Between me and the demon a small tornado began, no more than a dust-devil I might’ve ridden past in the Wasteland beyond ruined Gomalalee, and then I could feel the bits of sand drive at me and sting my face as the wind grew and firmed and I could see it, gray, turning black.

  The demon-wolf snarled and snapped at it, then yapped almost like some earthly creature as the bits of earth drove into him.

  Still the wind grew and I dragged myself back, feeling it suck at me. The demon howled and the wind howled louder still until I could hear nothing else.

  The cyclone reached from floor to ceiling and began to move, swaying, seductive, like the hips of a dancer and it closed on the demon and took him into its embrace.

  The monster roared in agony, rose on its haunches and I could barely see it as the hard-driven grains of sand lashed at him, cutting him like millions and millions of razors and again I saw his green ichor spurt and I felt sticky spray across my face.

  There came a final scream and the wind was gone, although it took me moments to realize what I was hearing was no more than the roaring of my ears.

  The demon fell back on its front legs and its skin was gone, flayed away by the wind. Once more it bayed, a howl of rage and betrayal, as if this world and its puny peoples should have had no defense against it, then fell heavily and rolled to its side.

  It still writhed and twitched in death spasms, but Quatervals paid no heed to its death agonies and raced in, his curved sword lifted high. He hewed once, twice and then Otavi was beside him, with his butcher’s ax and he struck, and the beast’s head rolled free from its body.

  My hearing came back and the room was silent. I could hear the small crackle of the dying fires at either end of the room.

  I picked myself up. Death being gone, at least for the moment, my body allowed itself the luxury of feeling the pain of the fall.

  Janela was beside me. “I... wasn’t sure that one would work. I’ve only cast it once before and that was in a magus’s study.” No longer was her voice sure and certain but shaken and her face was as pale as the rest of ours were as we realized what we’d just faced.

  I was about ask what boon I could grant for her saving my life when I heard a shouted oath from Quatervals.

  Lying in the middle of the floor in a blot of blood where the demon’s head had been was the severed head of Lord Senac.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE VOYAGE BEGINS

  We rode away from Lord Senac’s estate at a gallop. Behind us the building roared into flames and firegongs began sounding alarms across the city. We’d deliberately fired the mansion as a cover for what had happened, although I sensed the night’s affair wouldn’t be cleansed as easily. We lit fires in several rooms and found other bodies, all members of Senac’s retinue, all butchered as gruesomely as the castelan. We did not venture upstairs — Janela said the place reeked of sorcery and was afraid watchguard spells still lingered. The orders were welcome — none of us had the slightest desire to explore a demon’s home, even after he was dead.

  I myself torched the library and noted as the flames grew that the body was slowly changing from the wolfish form back into the human shape of Senac. Janela said she supposed that meant a most powerful enchantment had been cast for the creature, even in death, to retain an unnatural form.

  We cut across open land as soon as we could and rode a circuitous course back to my villa. We went unobserved and unchallenged.

  At the villa I roused two hostelers and bade them to take care of the horses. I led the rest to my study. It was just dawn and the kitchen staff was awake and the fires burning. But after Yakar’s death and the horror we’d seen, none of us had an appetite.

  I took our party into my study, had wine and spices sent in with a pot and Janela mulled it over the fire. I added a dram of brandy to each tankard as I served it. My three servants appeared uncomfortable being served by their master, but said nothing.

  I said a prayer for Yakar and said we would sacrifice to his memory in a day or so. He came from a village outside Orissa, but no one knew if he had a family there. I told the others I would find out and, if so, would see they were provided for.

  When the three finished their mugs I told them to go to their quarters and get what sleep they could. I asked them to please try to refrain from telling of tonight’s events and they so vowed.

  As the door closed behind them Quatervals said, “I remember my first battle and the first time I saw dark magic. I’ll vow most of them’ll spend the hours staring at nothing.”

  “They’ll sleep,” Janela said. “I said words over the wine as I added the spices.”

  Quatervals half-smiled and rose. “Then I’m for my own chamber, before the spell hits me and leaves me spr
awled in the hall. Wouldn’t want anyone thinking I’m a simple drunkard.” He went out.

  Janela sipped from her mug and looked at me curiously. “A question, no, two, Amalric. You could’ve asked me to cast a spell of silence over them. Or you could have offered them gold to keep their lips sealed. Why did you choose neither course?”

  “I could have,” I agreed. “But gold’s more likely to cause talk than not. I’ll reward them in quieter ways in time. As for asking you to cast a spell of silence or forgetfulness, I don’t think anyone who commands has the right to force obedience with magic. Not if he is anything other than a tyrant.”

  Janela nodded approval and changed the subject. “This is a very dark matter,” she said.

  I managed a wry smile. “Somewhere in your travels you’ve learned to bring understatement to perfection. One of Orissa’s most respected magistrates is a murderous demon... yes, I’d perhaps call that dark. Or at least twilit around the edges.”

  Janela laughed. “I meant that at no time did I sense Senac’s presence and demons most generally broadcast an aura even a non-magician might feel. Was he ever a man? And what was his purpose? I come fresh to Orissa so I’ve got no theories.”

  “I’ll wager the one we called Senac was never a mortal. Think about the convenience of a poor family, living in a remote area, suddenly finding riches and being able to return in triumph to Orissa. That is the stuff of romance. I think this was an immense spell or series of spells cast over the years. When it began... I have no idea. Why is a better question and that is what frightens me.”

  Janela sat waiting. I told her about the dread that’d been haunting me for the past few weeks and how long it’d taken before I’d identified it as that sense of being watched I’d known so long ago in Janos’ time.