Return of the Paladin

by Layton Green

  Will let his weight sink against the cliff wall, feeling shaky from the brush with death. Blood dripped onto his face from the claw wounds on his head, and from Yasmina’s wounds above him. Though painful, he did not think they were serious. He called out to the others and everyone seemed shaken but fine to continue.

  “Thank you, wilder,” Skara said, in a strained voice. “You saved us all.”

  “They’re hungry,” Yasmina replied quietly. “Not malevolent.”

  “Would that have stopped them from drinking our blood?”

  “Let’s just hope their decision holds.”

  “What did you do?” Will asked.

  “It would be hard to explain.”

  “I sort of figured.”

  The party resumed climbing. Less than a hundred feet remained. Just as Will began to feel hopeful, a new sound pierced the air, a keening moan even louder than the din of the bats. It was a vaguely human cry, though filled with a pathos so terrible it seemed to scrape along the inside of Will’s skull. He could hardly stand the noise, and thrust his hand over his ears.

  “The wailing begins,” Skara said. “Stay strong. Don’t let it affect you.”

  How could we not? Will whispered to himself. Will this night never end?

  “Are those the skinwalkers?” Mateo asked.

  “Aye,” Skara said.

  “So we approach the Wailing Wall?”

  “Gypsy, this cliff is the Wailing Wall.”

  More voices joined the first, creating an awful chorus that caused waves of gooseflesh to tumble across Will’s skin like a chill wind, raising his hairs and setting his teeth on edge.

  “Should we turn back?” Mateo said. “Have they not seen us?”

  “They see nothing. Their sense of smell alone guides them.”

  “And the blood drawn by the claws of the bats? Will that not overpower the potions we drank?”

  “Let us pray Master Kuang is the genius I think he is. Now climb.”

  When they reached the top, every muscle aching from the climb, Will joined the others as they faced an awful sight. Standing at the edge of the cliff, spaced ten feet apart as far as he could see in the moonlight, was a line of tall humanoids as white as grubs. At first he thought they were wearing pale suits of some sort, but as they drew nearer, he could see the blue veins threaded throughout their bodies, the bunching of muscle beneath their skin. They were hairless and featureless, with no sexual or facial organs except for the bulge of a nose pushing against taut skin. When Will stared closer, he saw their nostrils opening and closing as if breathing. The skinwalkers were looking straight ahead, their gazes fixed at the edge of the cliff. As he watched them, Will was filled with the certainty that these things, these abominations, had once been normal human beings who were forced to stand sentry for eternity over Old Town.

  And he also sensed they longed, more than anything else in the world, to return to their former state.

  Behind the line of skinwalkers stood the palatial ruins of Old Town, giant smudges of chalk pressing against the darkness. Skara waved everyone on, stepping carefully forward as if afraid to make a sound. Will could scarcely believe the Skinwalkers would not notice when they passed, yet one by one, they slipped between the nearest pair of wailing figures, their still forms filling Will with a terrible sadness. Just after he was through, he heard the sounds of a struggle behind him, followed by a man’s bellow. He whipped around to see one of the pale beings holding Bartu by the arm, and two more converging. More and more seemed to notice, causing them to rush towards Bartu, the wailing increasing in frenzy as if maddened by the catch.

  “Bartu!” Skara screamed.

  Bartu had been guarding the rear of the party, and everyone else was safely through the line. The creatures surrounding the debonair warrior were ripping him apart with their bare hands. Bartu screamed, but it wasn’t the scream of a terrified man. Instead it sounded enraged, inhuman.

  The Skinwalkers moved incredibly fast, more like animals than men, and before Will or any of the others could react, they had surrounded Bartu so completely he could no longer be seen. Skara rushed towards her fallen lover, weapons in hand, ready to plow into the entire pack. Will caught her by the waist and yanked her back. The distraught adventuress tried to shake him off, but Will kept his grip.

  “Let me go!” she cried, raising her cudgel.

  “Look, Skara! Look at him now!”

  Yasmina gasped, Mateo swore softly under his breath, and Dalen took a step backwards in shock. Skara finally looked up and saw what the rest of them had noticed: a pulsating pillar of flesh where Bartu should have been, changing shape and color as it rose out of the circle of Skinwalkers. At first Will thought the monsters had caused the phenomenon. But as Skara stopped moving to stare at the awful spectacle, she lowered her cudgel and whispered, in a horrified voice, “Doppelganger.”

  The creature changed form into a variety of shapes as the Skinwalkers tore into it: first a sticklike insect a foot taller than a man, then a werewolf bristling with fur and claws, and then into another Skinwalker that seemed to blend perfectly with the others. Yet somehow they knew the difference, and continued to tear into the creature. Finally it turned into Bartu once more, sobbing, pleading in the fighter’s voice for Skara to save him. Will had loosened his grip, and she moved towards the thing as if seeking a final moment with her companion.

  Will caught up to her and wrapped his arms around her. The Bartu-thing had disappeared again, enveloped by Skinwalkers. Will cringed at the sound of flesh ripping apart, but the circle was so tight that, thankfully, he and the others were spared the sight of the carnage. Skara collapsed into his arms, leaden with grief.

  “Skara,” he said gently. “It wasn’t him. We have to go.”

  “I knew something was different. I knew it wasn’t him. I knew it. Back in that dark room . . .we heard him groan . . . the doppelganger must have taken him.” She spat. “The filthy bastard. I’ll hunt its kind to my dying breath.”

  “Will!” Yasmina said sharply.

  He looked up and saw, to his horror, that one of the Skinwalkers had broken from the pack and started walking in his direction, sniffing the air like a bloodhound.

  “We have to go,” he said to Skara. “Now.”

  She complied, but it was too late. Somehow the rest of the pack had picked up the scent and moved to encircle the party. When Will and the others tried to walk quickly away from the edge of the cliff, and then run, the wailing Skinwalkers loped to surround them.

  “Any ideas, Yaz?” Will asked in desperation, but she had nothing to say. Like the rest of them, the wilder was backing away from the enclosing circle. There was nowhere to run.

  “Why aren’t they attacking?” Will asked in a low voice.

  “I think I know,” Skara said, as she reached into her pack and withdrew the wafer, careful to use a rag instead of touching it.

  “Let me,” Mateo said, holding out the palm of his metal hand. After a moment’s hesitation, she passed him the green disc, and he held it high above his head.

  The skinwalkers lifted their snouts and drew nearer, sniffing the air as Will and the others pressed closer together. The creatures drew to within five feet of Mateo then stopped moving. They stood in place for a long moment before some of them moved away and returned to their posts. Nine remained behind to form a line beside the party. These nine fell silent and began walking in unison towards the ruins of Old Town.

  “Aike, what are they doing?” Dalen said.

  Mateo was still holding the wafer above his head, afraid to lower it and upset the skinwalkers. Will looked from the wafer to the pale humanoids and back again. “I think they want us to follow them.”

  -27-

  When Caleb could see again, he was back where he had started the odyssey, inside the Tower of Elarion. Only this time, he was standing on an iron platform atop the spiral staircase, looking down at the floor far below. All of his pain had disappeared. He checked his arm and felt his b
ack; the frostbite marks were gone.

  At least one tangible reality had endured: he still held the mace in his hands. It was about three feet in length, from the bottom of the black wooden handle to the tip of the crystalline, diamond-shaped head. Though heavy, it felt balanced as he swung it back and forth, and the craftsmanship was exquisite. He knew he could learn to use it.

  There was no railing to keep him from plunging off the precipitous platform, and the vertigo was making him dizzy. As he started to climb back down, a voice in his head startled him.

  Reach up.

  Caleb whipped his head around but saw no one.

  Reach up, it repeated.

  It was not the same disembodied voice from the room with the ghost. This was the voice of an old man, and it possessed a gentle, even melancholy, timbre.

  Caleb looked up and saw nothing but the rough, tapered stone ceiling of the cylindrical tower. With a shrug, he reached up a hand—

  And found himself standing outside, his feet planted on a white stone surface, bleached and pitted from the elements. He squinted from the sudden brightness of the sun, and a cool breeze caressed his skin. To his left, far below, a midnight blue ocean heaved against a rocky shore. A line of golden-brown hills stood on his right.

  The scenery was all very familiar, and he knew he was standing atop the Tower of Elarion.

  “Er, behind you,” the voice said. “I seem to have faced you in the wrong direction. Not quite as impressive that way.”

  Startled, Caleb turned to find a spindly old man with wispy gray hair, a sloping forehead, and gnarly eyebrows. He was dressed in a white dress shirt, dark wool slacks, and a tweed jacket, all of which had seen better days. He looked to Caleb like a semi-retired, adjunct professor at a community college on Earth.

  “You’re the owner of this joint?” Caleb asked.

  “I’m afraid not. Elarion died long ago. He was a good friend of mine, though. Or let us say he was an interesting friend. Actually, he was just interesting.”

  “Then who are you?”

  “Ah, yes. I forget we’ve never met. The third brother. Or second, to be exact, if we’re discussing birth order. You really do favor the clans, you know.”

  Caleb took a long look at the old man’s knowing silver eyes glittering with intelligence. He remembered a story Will had told them when they first arrived on Urfe. “You’re Salomon, aren’t you?”

  The old man bowed.

  “According to my brother, you’re either a crackpot or a two-thousand year old wizard of immense power.”

  Salomon looked wounded. “That awful birthday is at least a decade or two away. And immense is a relative term, my boy. Let’s call me . . . seasoned. No, that sounds like a steak. How about weathered? No, that’s even worse. Capable? Tenure material?”

  “Do you control the tower now?”

  Salomon spread his hands. “This thing? I had nothing to do with it. I merely decided to meet you here and have a little chat after your ordeal.”

  “About what?”

  “I’m curious as to what happened inside. Every experience is unique, you see, and I’m interested in yours. Congratulations, by the way. You’ve accomplished a very rare feat.”

  “You mean you don’t already know what happened?”

  “Why does everyone think I’m omnipotent? Higher technology to a less advanced civilization . . .” he muttered, trailing off. “I know many things about the tower—one of Urfe’s most fascinating landmarks, by the way—but nothing of the individual journeys. The exclusive eternity of the mind and all that.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “To be honest, I don’t either. Elarion was a genius. He coined the term quantum magic. Urfe’s equivalent of Sigmund Freud, Einstein, and Tesla all rolled into one.”

  “Um, how do you know about those people?”

  “I’ve taken quite a liking to your home world. I lived there for some time, you know. Prague, Vienna, Berlin, New York, Knoxville. A fascinating place in so many ways.”

  Caleb waved a hand in dismissal. He just wanted to get down to business. “Did you heal me?”

  “Your wounds were not the sort to survive a metaphysical journey.”

  “You mean they were all in my head?”

  “Yes, and no. They were very real within their particular milieu. A death in the tower is a death on Urfe. So, too, is the decision final if you choose to remain within one of the scenarios.”

  “But how can that be real?”

  “I believe the answer to that question, my boy, is rather the point.”

  “What do you think about it?”

  “What do I think?” Salomon said, surprised. “Hmm. Well, I suppose that denying the self or the multiverse is a rather pointless task, in the end. Time and death may be illusions, but is the very illusion not real to itself? The world, unfortunately, is real; I unfortunately, am Salomon.”

  Caleb thought about it for a moment, then slowly nodded. “I can dig that.”

  “It’s rather profound, no? Except Borges said it, not I. Wordsmithing was never my gift.”

  “You said that every experience is unique. So I’m not the only person who has made it out of the tower?”

  “Who told you that?”

  “The Brewer.”

  “Hmpf. No, there have been others, over the centuries. Not many. The vast majority of travelers perish or choose to remain inside, in another reality. Or the same reality, in another mind or multiverse. I’m unsure how to parse it.”

  “If lots of people die, then why are there no bones in the tower?”

  Salomon frowned. “Good question. Maybe no one’s survived for a thousand years? Maybe the body follows the mind? Maybe animals wander in and take them? I’ve no idea. Now, suppose we discuss your experience—”

  “Why has no one ever taken the mace before?”

  “You see, that’s part of the reason I came. That was Elarion’s personal weapon. It disappeared with his death, and I’ve heard of no one seeing the mace on their visit to the tower.”

  “When was the last time you interviewed a survivor?”

  Salomon squinted as he thought. “Twelve hundred years ago?”

  Caleb put a hand to his temple. “Maybe you just forgot? Sometimes I can’t remember what I had for breakfast.”

  “No, no, I wouldn’t have forgotten something like that. I’m quite sure.”

  “Does the mace have any powers?”

  “I don’t know that, either.”

  “Can’t you, you know—” Caleb wriggled a hand—“figure it out?”

  Salomon’s eyes slipped downward. “Ah, no. I’m afraid not.”

  Caleb’s eyes narrowed. “You can’t or you won’t?”

  The archmage fell quiet for a moment. “I’m truly sorry for your loss.”

  His words caused Caleb to stand rigid, clutching the mace as if it were a buoy thrown to someone drowning at sea. “This is all your fault,” he said, taking a step forward as his face darkened. “If you hadn’t sent us here in the first place, they wouldn’t have died.”

  “It’s possible they might have died even sooner,” Salomon said gently.

  “OR NOT AT ALL!” Caleb roared. “Get the hell away from me, old man! Get me off this tower!”

  “I will,” the wizard said. “You have my word. Just as soon as I hear about your journey.” A mug of beer appeared in his hand. “Here, maybe this will help you—”

  Caleb smacked the mug away, and it shattered on the ground. He stepped on the broken glass and snarled. “Why are you so interested in my family?”

  Salomon clasped his hands behind his back and formed a meek, lopsided smile. “I’m afraid I can’t speak to that. I’m truly sorry.”

  “Then I’m afraid I can’t tell you what happened inside the Tower.”

  Salomon grimaced and wrung his hands. “Fair enough, I suppose. Fair enough. What if I were to propose a trade?”

  Caleb’s voice was low and venomous. “What sort of trade
?”

  “In exchange for your story, I agree to transfer you not just off this tower, but to a location of your choosing.”

  Caleb thought about the implications for a moment. His first impulse was to go straight to Lord Alistair and attempt to kill him. No, he decided. That would be foolish without the Coffer, or without any idea what the mace does. I’ll only get one chance at Lord Alistair, if that, and I have to be ready.

  Or at least more ready than I am now.

  He thought some more. “You can’t bring them back?”

  Salomon’s eyes were faraway. “I’m afraid no one can do that.”

  Caleb swallowed his disappointment. “Can you heal my mother?”

  “The injuries of the mind are beyond the power of even the most accomplished cuerpomancers, which I most certainly am not. Transfer to a new location is all I have to offer, as that is a minimal . . . intervention.”

  Caleb crossed his arms. “Fine.”

  Salomon rubbed his hands together. “Wonderful.”

  “Take me back to Bruce first. He’ll want to know I’m all right. I’ll tell you both what happened at the same time.”

  As soon as the words were spoken, Caleb found himself standing near a fire pit by the entrance to the tower, with Salomon right beside him. To their left, the Brewer was sitting cross-legged on the ground beside their packs, strumming a homemade stringed instrument that resembled a lyre. When he saw them materialize, his eyes grew very wide, and he leaped to his feet and began belting out a deep-throated song about returning home from a journey.

  It took the rest of the day for Caleb to relate his experiences inside the tower, and Salomon listened intently to every word, interrupting only to clarify a description or to ask a follow-up question. According to the Brewer, Caleb had spent three full days inside the tower. The Brewer had tried to check on him, but the door wouldn’t open, and he could find no other way inside.

  Caleb refused to elaborate on any of the reasons for his various decisions, which disappointed the archmage. The Brewer sat open-mouthed throughout the tale, refilling Caleb’s flask of water whenever his throat grew dry, and roasting a pair of quail over the fire once the sun began to set.