Return of the Paladin

by Layton Green

  “That helps,” he said.

  As the crowds thinned they found themselves in an area of the city filled with plazas and green spaces long since gone to seed. A dark mass of unkempt vegetation had overtaken what must have once been beautiful parkland. As they took in their surroundings, a series of shrieks and growls emanated from the foliage, causing the party to clump together. Weapons in hand, they followed the signs deeper into the labyrinth, increasingly unnerved by their isolation, the city a receding memory. Just as they debated turning back, a pathway of broken mosaic tile led them right to the edge of a huge chasm a stone’s throw from the banks of the river.

  After a nod from Will, Dalen congealed the twilight to illuminate the hundred-foot-wide perimeter of the Nilometer. When the party peered cautiously over the edge, they saw an enormous well with smooth sides extending deeper than Dalen’s light could penetrate. A staircase spiraled downward along the perimeter of the ivory-colored walls, and the structure seemed to have escaped the ravishing effect of the plague.

  Will dropped a stone into the giant well. Long moments later, a faint splash echoed back. “My guess is a few hundred feet,” he said. “At least.”

  “Lucka, did Mala say where in the Nilometer Skara would be?”

  “I wished I’d asked more questions,” Will muttered.

  I was too busy thinking about how her lips tasted.

  Yasmina glanced down the well, then peered into the dense vegetation surrounding them. “I don’t like the feel of this place. There are things inside those woods we don’t want to encounter. Things waiting for the cover of darkness.”

  “No offense,” Will said, “but I don’t need a wilder to figure that out.”

  “Should we retreat to the city while there’s still light?” Mateo asked. “Return in the morning?

  Will’s grip tightened around the hilt of Zariduke. “Every day counts, and I’m not sure spending the night in the docks is an improvement over the current situation.” He peered inside the Nilometer and saw, along the staircase, a number of alcoves dotting the interior of the cylindrical structure. “I think we take our chances here. Maybe Skara lives in one of those alcoves.”

  Dalen looked very small within his cloak. “Maybe something else does, too.”

  “Even if we don’t find her,” Mateo reasoned, “it could be an advantageous place to spend the night.”

  “Agreed,” Will said, “assuming there isn’t another occupant.” He turned to Yasmina. “What do you think? Can you see the bottom? Sense anything dangerous down there?”

  The wilder peered into the depths of the well. “I can’t see the bottom, but yes, something lurking in the water. I can’t tell what, though I think it’s very large.”

  “Is the weird magic of Praha messing with your abilities?” Will asked.

  “Perhaps,” she said, with an enigmatic smile. “I’m not a seer or a wizardess, Will. Just someone attuned to the land. And this particular land is as foreign to me as it is to you.”

  The wild shrieks and bellows from the undergrowth around them grew louder and more intense. Urgent.

  Ready for a meal.

  “We should decide, cousin. Night closes in.”

  Will’s eyes flicked from the darkened woods to the Nilometer, immense and silent. “I vote to descend. If we don’t find Skara, we pick an alcove and hole up until first light.”

  “Aye aye,” Mateo said.

  Yasmina gave a single nod, and Dalen agreed as well. Will led the descent, creeping down the staircase with his shield raised and Zariduke gripped tight. Yasmina followed a step behind, and Dalen illuminated their passage with a halo of insipid gray moonlight. Mateo brought up the rear, letting the tip of his blade trail on the steps, ready to whip into action.

  The interior smelled of dampness and old stone. Ten feet down, Dalen shone his light into the entrance to the first alcove, revealing an ivory corridor extending into the darkness. Elaborate etchings covered the walls, too dim to be made out. Will noticed a pair of metal hooks set into the wall of the Nilometer just above the alcove.

  “Skara!” he called out, deciding to take a risk. “Skara Tenjilk!”

  No response.

  “Should we explore the corridor?” Mateo asked.

  “Let’s go further down,” Will said. “Get the lay of the land first. I don’t like surprises.”

  Step by step, they continued spiraling down the perimeter of the well, casting light into each and every alcove. While some dead-ended, most heralded the entrance to a passage delving deeper into the interior. Where did they lead? How big was the complex?

  A hundred feet down, Yasmina announced she could see the bottom. “We’re about halfway.”

  “What’s down there?” Will asked.

  “Just water, as far as I can tell.”

  “Lucka,” Dalen muttered, “we know it’s not just water.”

  Why so deep? It can’t be the river.

  Still, no longer feeling as if the Nilometer was a bottomless pit, he picked up the pace, slowing whenever they passed an alcove. Once the rest of the party had laid their eyes on the dark surface of the water, far below the surface, they stopped to consider their options. As they were discussing which alcove to hole up in, Dalen yelped and slapped at his back.

  Mateo called out Will’s name in a sharp voice. He turned to find his white-faced cousin plucking a dart out of Dalen’s back. As the illusionist stumbled to a knee, Will felt rough fibers tightening around his middle, pinning his arms. Struggling to get free, he looked up and noticed Yasmina and Mateo also caught by lassos. He looked even higher and saw at least a dozen people sliding silently down the perimeter of the Nilometer along lines of rope clamped between their knees, clutching weapons in their hands.

  -11-

  Using their entire stash of nightflares, probing ground and sky for a sign of the dhampyr, the Roma caravan made it safely through the night. While the appearance of such a legendary creature was cause for grave concern, Mala’s people did have experience dealing with their kind, and as she had told Danior, a single dhampyr pitted against an entire caravan did not overly worry her.

  But if her suspicions proved correct, this was no ordinary dhampyr.

  Mala shuddered at what might have happened had she not spotted the hyena wolf. They might all have been dead by morning, killed one by one under cover of night.

  As they pressed on towards Talintock, wary of stopping outside a smaller and less-protected settlement, Mala’s thoughts turned to another time and place, a journey with a very different purpose.

  A few years after she had left the comfort of the New Victoria Thieves’ Guild to travel Urfe and ply her new profession, she made a rash decision to attempt to join the Alazashin, a secret society of thieves and assassins rumored to be the best at their craft in the world. No one was born into the Alazashin. Every member had to earn his or her way in, and the ritual was the same for everyone.

  Appear at the foot of Alazashin Mountain at dusk. Wait three days, then ascend.

  Face the trials alone. Attempt to reach the top. Pass a final test.

  Then, and only then, would the legendary order offer a seat at the table.

  To this day, Mala was not quite sure why she had made the journey. Part of her wanted to train with the best, to be the best. Part of her was attracted to the mystery of the order and yearned to discover its secrets. Those parts, in fact, she did not regret. But part of her had been young and reckless, and brushed aside the reality of the Alazashin: a mercenary criminal organization that worked for the highest bidder and had no qualms about murdering innocent human beings.

  Mala went to the mountain. She had stayed for three days, sleeping on cold stones, consuming water and dried rations. The mountain simmered in silence above her. On the third day, as the shadow of night consumed the towering peak like a snake swallowing its prey, she set out upon the crooked footpath that led up the mountain, sword and sash in hand, confident and eager.

  Ten hours and m
any trials later, tests of skill and intelligence and endurance that left her barely alive, she reached the summit, a windswept aerie of searing cold and isolation. Though the moon was full, a layer of mist blurred the boulder-strewn landscape and restricted her vision. She breathed in the heavy damp of incipient snow, and her feet crunched on shattered rock from some long ago explosion. Dangerous crevasses lay hidden beneath the mist.

  When she saw the nature of the final test, a man who could change from wolf to human in an instant, a dhampyr, she stumbled to a knee and placed a hand on the ground. Blood poured from the wounds she had suffered during the other tests, and fear of the creature standing before her stripped her of her will to stand.

  “Greetings, seeker,” the dhampyr said, with a cruel smile.

  Mala said nothing, trying furiously to think of a strategy. Even at full strength and with her best weapons, she might not prevail against a dhampyr, especially under cover of night. And a vampire half-breed who was one of the Alazashin, trained by the best assassins in the world?

  Madness. Suicide.

  Yet she used her sword to push to her feet, palming a handful of fire beads. If she must die on this forsaken peak, she would not go out like a lamb. “Come, then,” she said, twirling her blade and eying the nearest crevasse. Perhaps she could use her acrobatic skills to trick the creature into plummeting to its death.

  He stepped aside to reveal a staircase cut into the rock, leading down into the mountain. “Your apprenticeship awaits,” he said. “You need only pass through me to accept it.”

  With a howl, Mala rushed forward, tossing her fire beads and then whipping off her sash. The dhampyr avoided the fire beads with a chuckle, flowing under them like quicksilver, his form blurry as if in the midst of a transformation. He disappeared into the mist, and Mala’s will to battle curdled into fear.

  “What magic is this?” she whispered to herself.

  Having used up her store of items on the ascent, she darted for the staircase, hoping to catch the dhampyr off-guard and circumvent the test. The creature re-emerged right in front of her, knocking her down with a backhand to the face. “If only it were so easy,” he mocked. She recognized his accent as from the ancient city of Myzantium.

  They fought for an entire hour, until Mala could no longer hold her sword. Her numbed fingers dropped the blade and the dhampyr kicked her to the ground. She had not even landed a blow. The dhampyr was extremely fast and seemed to merge into the mist at will. Every time she got close, he disappeared, only to reappear behind her without a sound. He had toyed with her as a jungle cat might play with a wounded rabbit.

  “If I gave you a choice,” he said, standing over her, “to die or become like me, a cursed eternal thing, which would you choose?”

  “You mock me at death’s doorstep? Everyone knows the dhampyr cannot sire others of their kind.”

  “Do you think, little lass, that I am the only creature of the night who belongs to the Alazashin?”

  Little lass? Mala whipped her sash around his ankle and jerked, pulling him off his feet. Fast as a snake, she whipped out a dagger and lunged for his heart. He caught the blow an inch from his chest, gripping her wrist in his hand. “You must know that a stab to the heart will not kill me.”

  “You must know,” Mala snarled, “that I’d rather die than join your infernal kin.”

  The dhampyr gave a soft, low laugh as he plucked the dagger from her hands. “Another choice, then. Would you rather die tonight, at my feet, or swear lifelong allegiance to the Grandfather of Alazashin Mountain, on pain of torture and death should you choose to leave?”

  Mala started. “What?”

  “The test, dear mouse, was not besting me in battle. That is not the province of your kind. You proved your skill and stealth by reaching the summit. You proved your fortitude and will by battling me unto the threshold of your demise.” He produced a silver ring bearing an image of a pair of crossed daggers beneath a crown. “Now you must prove your fealty by swearing an oath.”

  Left with little choice, Mala had kissed the ring and sworn, before she entered the mountain, to carry out the will of the Grandfather and have no other family besides the Alazashin, for as long she lived.

  I didn’t ask for this, she remembered thinking. I wanted adventure and training, not blind allegiance to a deadly cult.

  Yet she knew she had been naïve, and reckless, and blind. What had she thought was going to happen?

  As the dhampyr watched, Mala took the oath, knowing he would kill her if she refused. Once inside, the Alazashin gave her a healing salve and brought her before the Grandfather, who seemed bemused but impressed by her youth and small stature. She underwent more training and passed more tests and uncovered many, but certainly not all, of the secrets of Alazashin Mountain. Along the way, she learned the dhampyr she had fought was named Nagiro, and that he and his twin sister, Ferala, were part of the Zashiri, the twelve assassins of the Inner Circle. Not only that, but Nagiro and Ferala were considered the class of the twelve, due to their vampiric lineage and the weapons they wielded. Ferala carried a knife imbued with a magical poison that never dried up and whose touch meant death. Nagiro wore a garment called the Mirrorcloak that allowed him to flow into the mist and approach almost any enemy unseen.

  It was not just a dhampyr that Mala had fought. It was a dhampyr who also happened to be one of the world’s best assassins, armed with a cloak of immense power.

  No warrior had bested one of the dhampyr twins in single combat, she had learned.

  Ever.

  In time, Mala began to undertake missions of her own, rising through the ranks of the Alazashin. She became a favorite of the Grandfather and was able, for the most part, to select her own assignments. This allowed her to undertake jobs that involved stealth and theft, and avoid assassinations of which she did not approve.

  Yet her ascension worked against her. The Grandfather thought so much of her talents that he offered her a place in the Zashiri.

  No, he did not offer: he ordered.

  The price of admission? An assassination of the Grandfather’s choosing, carried out to perfection. Perhaps knowing of her qualms, the task he chose for Mala was the murder of a fourteen-year-old Mayan princess, at the request of a rival kingdom. The Grandfather gave Mala one month to complete the task.

  That night, Mala returned from the Throne of Daggers and sat lotus style at the foot of her cot, deep inside the mountain. She was no assassin and never had been. She had yet to kill someone who did not deserve to die, in her mind at least, and she knew that if she crossed that line, then she herself would not deserve to live.

  How had she let this happen?

  Instead of planning the assassination, Mala spent her time planning her escape. In the end, she came to the conclusion that while she might leave the mountain, she would never escape the Alazashin. There was nowhere on Urfe she could hide. The Grandfather would send his assassins after her until one of them found her in a remote village, or on a heath-covered moor, or in a cavern at the bottom of the Darklands. Someone would find her and kill her.

  So she made a choice. A terrible one.

  Or at least convinced the Grandfather that she had.

  One of her previous clients had hired her to retrieve a magical shield from a wyvern’s lair in the Ural Mountains. Along with the other loot, Mala had found a curious philter in a small, stoppered jade bottle. She had it analyzed by a potion master and was told it was a reverse love potion. A Tincture of Desire, the potion master called it. An insidious magic used to both ruin and ignite relationships, the tincture worked by imparting the memory of a night of unbridled passion to two people who shared the same drink, spiked with the elixir. Anyone unaware of the potion would never know the difference.

  As did most men she had met, Mala knew the old man desired to possess her. Seducing him was not hard. It was considered a rite of passage for female members of the Zashiri and, if rumors were to be believed, some of the males. Yet Mala had alway
s resisted, and she knew it had inflamed his passions. The next night, before she left on her mission, she entered the Grandfather’s chambers and told him she was ready to succumb. The old man smiled and ordered his guards to leave. Mala debated killing him but chose not to. She would never have escaped the mountain alive, and even at his advanced age, she feared his knife hand and his legendary stock of magical items.

  With a deep breath, Mala emptied the tincture into a glass of shared granth when the Grandfather turned his back. They both drank deeply. The room swam, and she fell asleep on his bed. When she woke, the Grandfather gazed at her with eyes of satisfied indulgence. Though she knew the truth in her mind, she would have sworn with all her being that she had spent the night in his arms.

  She resisted his advances that morning, claiming she did not want to spoil him further until she was a member of the Zashiri. Now, she said, it was time to complete her mission. He agreed, and claimed she had inflamed his desire to an unbearable level. He claimed, in fact, that he loved her.

  Six weeks later, when Mala returned from hiding and the Mayan princess yet lived, the Grandfather summoned her into his chambers, as she knew he would.

  “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “I cannot save anyone, not even you, from the fate of neglecting a mission.”

  “What about your unborn son?” she lied. “Can you save him?”

  The Grandfather took a step back, his face crumbling as if she had just speared him through the heart. It was common knowledge he had no heirs worthy of undertaking the trials, and was desirous of a strong son. In fact, he looked so stricken she feared he might have a stroke and ruin her plan.

  “I’m leaving the Alazashin,” she continued, pulling a dagger from her sleeve and pressing it to her own belly. “I will hide our child until his eighteenth birthday. Only then will I tell him of his lineage. If you do not release me from service—and I know that you have this power—then I will kill your child myself, right now. Before your very eyes.”

  “How do you know the child is a male?”