Chapter Eleven
“Can’t you kill one for me, like you did last night?”
I stare at her. She is being difficult again and my patience is wearing thin. A long time passes while she waits, standing on the balcony with her hair rippling in the wind. The miner’s moon, Neerie, rises at her back, bursting forth from parting clouds.
“Well?” she asks, the model of innocence.
“I told you, it is time you learned to kill for yourself.” I try not to show my impatience, but she is making it difficult.
“I don’t want to kill anyone like this,” she replies. Pausing a moment, she then continues, “It is wrong.”
It is her warrior’s code again—the tattered vestige of her former life, rearing its ugly head to spoil my plans. “You’d rather I’d kill them for you?” I ask. “That is the solution to your moral dilemma? They’ll wind up dead just the same. And you will still drink their blood.”
“But master ...”
“Yes, Master is the word,” I snarl, finally pushed to anger. “And as your master, it is my will that you make the strike. I have other endeavors to pursue. Now take the bat’s form, as I have shown you.”
Her voice rises to near hysteria. “I can’t kill innocent people!”
“Fine. Hunt the wicked for all I care. It matters not to me. In time, you will come around. Now, change your shape.”
Reluctantly, she bows her head, closes her eyes in concentration, and slows her breathing. The night bends down around her, comforting, soothing, ... engulfing. Her body quivers, trembling in rapid bursts. She cries in pain as she drops to her knees and her body violently contorts as if trying to implode. Dark black fur sprouts along her arms and face, turning her flesh to shadow. Her hair crawls back inside her skull; her ears writhe into sharpened points. With a distorted mouth, she lets loose a violent scream and then her arms rip open into leathery wings. She sobs in pain, dropping to the ground, a grotesque figure caught between two worlds, half-woman, yet half-bat.
I tower above her. “Complete it.”
“I can’t,” she sobs.
“Your performance as a vampire leaves much to be desired. You can’t even walk like that, much less fly. Finish your work, or would you prefer to starve?”
With a pained, all too-human sigh she closes her eyes and steadies her breath once more. This time the changes come quickly. The sprouting fur completes its course and her legs withdraw into small clawed feet. With an audible clap, her body collapses inward and her small leathery wings open to catch the wind. She hovers briefly, a mere foot or two above the ground, then drops lightly to the stones, chirping and wheezing in the tongue of her kind.
Smiling at her triumph, I reach out with my mind. That is much better, my dear.
It seemed a little easier the second time. Her thoughts are weak, but not inaudible.
It will come more quickly with every effort. Now come, it is time we made our way to Drisdak. In an instant, I have changed my shape and am speeding off through the night. Startled, her response is slow; she makes to follow, but hers is an awkward flight and she soon falls behind. I reduce my speed, then fly in a circle to cut short the growing distance.
It is time I leave you, love. I have much to do tonight and cannot spare anymore time. Make your way to Drisdak and please, use discretion when you kill. I shall meet you at the castle before the coming of dawn.
She seems too hard-pressed on flying to gather sufficient strength for response, so I leave her there, and speed off toward Drisdak, flying on wings no mortal bird could ever challenge. Neerie is less than half its way toward zenith when I finally glide down toward the guild. As I begin my slow approach, my thoughts turn toward my mission. I have two purposes tonight. First, I must secure my foothold in the guild; I have grown weary of repeated invitations. Second, I must find another mage. I have also grown lazy. I need a steady meal or two. Perhaps, I can use an apprentice to sharpen Clarissa’s teeth as well.
I circle once.
Nothing.
I circle again.
Still, nothing.
I approach the highest tower and land on the sill of the window I exited just a few nights past. I pace once along its length, then tentatively peek inside. Nothing. No resistance. Nothing. It seems my unwelcome shared Arcalian’s fate. Chirping in glee, I glide inside.
It is much different than before. The walls are streaked with soot and the floor has been replaced by wooden scaffoldings. My fire did its work: nothing of Arcalian’s glory remains intact inside his chamber. He has been wiped from existence as befitting a maggot of his ilk. With a sneer I plunge through the depths and land on the cold stone floor far below.
The wizards had their chance to thwart me, but that chance has passed: their guild house is open to me now. I pause a moment, listening. The wind outside is remarkably calm; its voice raises only an occasional howl, and that is one of weariness not of rage. Down, however, inside this cursed guild, echoing along its ancient halls, I hear voices. Many are still awake inside the wizards’ fortress ... and only one is needed to sound an alarm.
A quick perusal of the room reveals a large crack in the corner: a small rat hole. I flutter over to it and sniff the ground. Nothing. Whatever rat made this has not returned for many, many years. Well, what one rat can make, another can use.
I change shape again and plunge into the hole, whipping my diminutive tail behind me. I take but five steps and stop, gagging. The scent of magic is strong in here, much more so than the tower walls. Perhaps wind and fire had masked its strength above, but now in its depths it returns at full force. It is troublesome, but not insurmountable. I continue on, at a slackened pace.
With my clawed feet clicking lightly on the stone, I plunge deeper and deeper into the keep to spread my presence. No mage will rid this guild of me, not in a thousand tenfold years. I will be free—to come and to go, to hunt the proudest of mankind’s men, to drink the blood of wizards and grow strong.
One thing, however, grows more and more perplexing as I travel: the absence of other rats within these tunnels. Surely, some type of vermin must have dug these paths, but I have yet to encounter even a single one. I reach out with my mind, searching, scanning, calling. Yes, they are here, but far away. Deep, deep in the stone below the guild, in the depths of the darkest catacombs buried from sight. I call to them. They answer, but cannot heed my wish. Something holds them back. A presence. A power. Something I cannot quite fathom.
Suddenly, there is pain. Scurrying along I am shocked as sparks flare up about me; they singe my fur and drive me back. The acrid scent of magic rises strong in the air, and an intricate pattern is traced in light on the floor. Retreating, I watch a glowing sigil fade to darkness at my feet.
So this is it. A simple sigil inscribed by a mage. A ward against rats and similar vermin. A normal rodent would be crippled, perhaps even dead. I, however, am simply annoyed.
I look around. How this sigil came to be here is a mystery that surpasses me. There are no nearby holes, no access for anything as large as a man ... Well, the wizards can keep one mystery, of its origin I do not care; its continued existence, however, is not within my plans.
A human sneer crosses my rat-like features and I advance, bearing my strength before me. The sigil flares up in brilliant orange defiance, tracing a complex pattern across the stones, a pattern weaved by scintillating lights. Sparks fly toward me, but die before they reach my fur. I can feel the resistance. It is like a wall of rock as I drive my body forward. A moment passes while I struggle, locking my will with the age-old spell.
A spark flares red and the sigil cracks. The wall of stone becomes as cloth, then mist, then nothing but emptiness to impede my path. I glance back as the broken sigil flares a final time; then the light dims, and the stone grows cold.
Without a second thought, I continue forward through the long abandoned tunnels. Rats are not all that is missing in these depths. No insects, no spiders, nothing at all. It seems the wizards enjoy a well-cleaned ho
use.
I encounter two more sigils, but deal with them as I did the other. Turning from the last of these fading wards, I am startled by a noise, or rather ... a name. Scurrying forward with my senses primed, it takes me but a moment to find the source. A hole lurks up ahead, a fountain from which light and sound intrude. Carefully, I crawl up to the edge.
My probing eyes look into a room, a small, cozy chamber with three occupants. One man sits at a desk with several sheafs of paper spread out before him. A second, with feet crossed, reclines upon a cot propped up on his elbows. He is shaking his head repeatedly as if troubled with his inner thoughts. The third man, a monster in size, leans out a window and stares listlessly at the sparkling sky. Further study shows all three men are armed, though not with anything that could possibly cause me harm. Still, my curiosity is piqued.
Drasmyr (Prequel: From the Ashes of Ruin) Page 14