The Blackest Heart

by Brian Lee Durfee

  The oghuls closed in around him, crude and vulgar weapons raised high for the killing blows. A screech of unfathomable pain tore from Liz Hen’s lungs. She dropped to her knees and buried her face in her hands. All Stefan could do was grip his perfectly useless bow in hand and watch, arms heavy with fatigue, no arrows left to fire.

  But as the oghul weapons fell, Beer Mug leaped to his feet in a final burst of energy. He dove between the legs of the bloodsucking horde and scrambled away to the north and west as fast as his hobbled body would carry him, blood trailing over the ice in his wake. “Run, boy, run!” Liz Hen yelled. “Run far away and keep going!”

  Several of the oghuls threw their rusted weapons in the dog’s direction, but none gave chase. It seemed they too were exhausted. They turned their attention from the limping dog and glared in frustration at the Company of Nine across the chasm.

  Beer Mug continued on, bloodied, injured, and poisoned, loping away to the north and west in the direction of the jagged gray cliffs rising high above the glacier in the far distance. Liz Hen’s sobs filled the silence.

  †  †  †  †  †

  The mood was somber when they reached the two dun-colored mules staked to the glacier. One was standing hoof-deep in a pool of meltwater; the other was on solid ice, dipping his broad muzzle in the nearby pool to drink.

  “At least they didn’t starve to death or freeze,” Roguemoore said.

  “Or become prey to the oghuls,” Culpa added, hooking Blackest Heart to the leather harness crisscrossing his back. “Damnable beasts are thicker than I imagined they’d be around here.” Godwyn began binding Val-Draekin’s wounds with torn strips of a blanket. The Vallè had four sizable slashes to his left arm and a ragged one across his right shoulder. His leather armor was shredded in spots but had done its job to protect his vitals. Seita wrapped Val-Draekin’s neck with a long strip of the blanket.

  “The oghuls won’t make it over that crevasse anytime soon,” Culpa said. “Still, we must make haste.”

  With Nail’s help, Roguemoore began securing Dokie’s litter onto the back of one of the mules, using what remaining rope they had. The boy’s swollen face poked from the cocoon of blankets, wisps of his dirt-colored hair fluttering in the breeze.

  “What am I to do now?” Liz Hen cried as she watched Nail and the dwarf tie the boy down. “Beer Mug’s run off. And Dokie is dying. The whole rotten adventure has turned into naught but mushy hammered shit. And I want no more part of it. Blackest Heart is a curse and so is this damnable angel stone.” She dug the black stone from her bodice, unwrapped the silk and eyed the small rock angrily. “I should throw it away.”

  Culpa Barra took the stone from her before she could throw it out over the ice. The Dayknight swiftly tucked both silk and stone away in the small leather pouch at his belt.

  “The quest for Blackest Heart was a success.” Culpa grabbed her by the shoulders, looking her in the eyes sternly. “Now some of us will carry on for Afflicted Fire. It’s not over yet.”

  “Not over yet?” She growled. “Are you out of your bleeding mind?”

  “Listen, Liz Hen,” Godwyn stood in front of her as Culpa moved away. “This is where we part from the others. You and I must get Dokie back to Stanclyffe if he is to survive. I will need you to be strong. Dokie will need you to be strong.”

  “But . . . what?” she stammered. “But . . . how will we survive without the others, without Seita or Val-Draekin to fight for us?”

  “We’ll be fine,” the bishop said, though his tone and the grim look on his face bespoke a far different sentiment. “We’ll have plenty of food. We’ll be taking the mules with us. They will bear Dokie safely and securely. What little healing draught I have left is not enough for Dokie, nor the right kind. We must get him to Stanclyffe.”

  “Can’t Seita at least come with us too?” Liz Hen pleaded.

  “We’ll need Seita’s skills at Deadwood Gate,” Roguemoore said. “We can’t spare any more of the company helping Dokie.”

  “You coldhearted little beast.” Liz Hen’s red eyes widened in anger as she stood, towering over the dwarf. “Dokie is no throwaway piece of garbage.”

  “You know that’s not what Roguemoore meant.” Godwyn stepped in front of the girl and gripped her shoulders in an attempt to refocus her attention on him. “Dokie’s life is in our hands now. We must say our good-byes now.”

  Liz Hen’s tears only doubled. “But they are all my friends and I can’t leave them.” She slumped away from the bishop. “Seita won’t be able to braid my hair so nice anymore.”

  “Worry not,” the Vallè maiden said. “We shall meet again, you and I.”

  Liz Hen straightened her posture, wiped the tears from her face with both forearms. “But how can you be so sure?”

  “I trust my intuition on matters of friendship.” Seita gripped Liz Hen’s arm. “Especially when it comes to leave-takings, and especially reunions. And when we meet again, Liz Hen, I shall fix your hair any way you like.”

  At Seita’s pronouncement, the red-haired girl’s face lit from within, as if that one future pleasure of having the Vallè braid her hair would be enough to truly see her through.

  “The mules are ready,” Culpa said with impatience. “Dokie is secure. We mustn’t tarry. We must put as much distance between us and those remaining oghuls as we can.”

  At the Dayknight’s gruff pronouncement, the Company of Nine stood still, somber, the silence between them both a gulf and an acknowledgment of comradeship shared.

  Bishop Godwyn stepped forward and grasped both Culpa and Roguemoore by the shoulders. “May the Blessed Mother Mia go with us all.”

  Soon all the company was offering sullen, but heartfelt, good-byes to both Godwyn and Liz Hen. And when the parting was over, the bishop took the reins of the mules and pointed them toward the ruins of Arco.

  Stefan’s legs were suddenly moving of their own volition. He stepped to the mule bearing Dokie’s litter, reached out and brushed away several strands of stray hair from the boy’s swollen face, dipped his own head, and kissed his friend gently on the forehead.

  †  †  †  †  †

  Half a day later the six who remained in the company were heading due east. Still navigating the arduous maze of the glacier, they plodded along, threading their way through slabs of ice the size of castles and crevasses that dropped into darkness.

  The glacier was a mighty desolation of frozen shards and murderous crags, and Stefan could hear the pounding maelstrom of waters somewhere deep under his feet, the cacophony growing louder with each step he took. His heart was empty, having lost Liz Hen and Dokie and Beer Mug, the bishop too. Nail was his only remaining link to his previous life in Gallows Haven.

  Culpa Barra led the way, followed by Seita, then Stefan. Nail was next, followed by Val-Draekin. Roguemoore dawdled last in line, fatigue from the weight of his plate armor finally showing after all these days of hard travel. The leathery old dwarf gasped for breath so loudly, Stefan could hear his huffing over the roiling rivers below. They were all once again bundled in their gray cloaks, hoods up. Each carried a pickax for safety, occasionally using them to climb and descend blocks of ice that barred their progress.

  None of them were tied together. But there was nothing to be done for it. They had lost most of one rope in the mines under a crushing slab of roof. What remained had been used to secure Dokie’s litter to the mule. Culpa said they could find new mounts in one of the many small logging hamlets when they reached the southeastern end of the lochs.

  They hiked across a relatively flat expanse of ice now, spotted with pools and ponds of meltwater. To Stefan, it looked like this white plateau stretched clear and free to the eastern range. But he was no judge of distance out here on this stark terrain. The sun hung high above and beat down harshly on the ice, making it nearly impossible to focus on any one thing for long. The sound and thud of water roiling and crashing somewhere underneath was growing into
a violent, near-deafening thunder.

  Stefan watched Seita step across the slushy ice a few paces in front of him, her feet always lithe and certain. In contrast, Culpa was trudging heavily along about ten paces ahead of her, slipping occasionally and going down. Stefan felt himself go instantly light-headed as the surface of the glacier seemed to shift under his feet. Disoriented, he stopped walking, regaining his balance.

  Ahead, Culpa and Seita had stopped, both looking back at him. The furious sound of roaring waters below was overwhelming, thunderous crashes and booms, as if great chunks of ice were being tossed about by giants somewhere far below.

  Seita stepped gingerly back toward him, taking his hand in her own. Stefan was shocked to the core when he saw the look of utmost fear in her round eyes. Her terrified gaze moved beyond him to Nail, Val-Draekin, and the dwarf.

  Stefan turned. Nail was no more than five paces behind him, but he was rooted in place, frightened eyes roaming the glacial surface, pickax gripped in a tight fist. Val-Draekin was just behind Nail, his pickax also ready. Roguemoore, some thirty paces back, stood still, unmoving. Stefan felt the reassurance of the ice pick in his own hand.

  “Look down,” Seita said, her words almost drowned out by the din of booming waters. With the toe of her boot she brushed aside the watery-gray layer of slush between them, revealing the living, frothing terror that was underfoot.

  They were standing on naught but a whisper-thin sheet of clear ice, sweeping waves of raucous water visible below. His heart thudded realizing they were right above a roiling, colossal glacial river. A coil of sheer panic twisted around Stefan’s heart as he took three deep breaths of air. But the breaths did nothing to help calm the terror crawling up his spine.

  There was a thunderous crack and crash. Stefan whirled to see the surface of the glacier slowly sag directly underneath Nail and Val-Draekin.

  There was another riotous boom and the entire landscape tilted. The ice dropped out from under Nail, Val-Draekin, and the dwarf. A fifty-foot slab cracked like an eggshell right in front of Stefan, every shard plummeting into the most horrendously torrential nightmare he had ever seen, taking his three companions with it.

  Roguemoore dropped thirty feet straight down into the raging torrent, the violent lash of the frothing current instantly sweeping him away and over a growling, rumbling waterfall that disappeared into a violent cavernous hole under the glacier.

  Nail and Val-Draekin landed on a sloping wall of ice just above the roiling river, and both instantly slammed their pickaxes into the ice above their heads in a desperate attempt to slow their slide toward a vicious watery death—a vicious death that had just claimed Roguemoore.

  Stefan’s heart hammered as the ice cracked under his own feet. Both he and Seita fell back, scrambling to find purchase on the solid surface of the glacier, legs frantically churning for safety. The Vallè woman spun and used her pickax to climb free of the tilting ice whilst Stefan slid farther down. Culpa latched onto the hood of his cloak and pulled him roughly away from the savage, boiling crevasse.

  Stefan clung to the solid surface of the glacier, heart hammering still.

  “Take off your cloaks!” the Dayknight shouted. “Tie them together and make a rope!” Stefan levered himself to his feet, frantically shedding his cloak and tossing it to Culpa, eyes fixed to the horror just over the rim of the ice below. Ten feet down on a plunging slope of white and blue was Nail, his swollen face stretched in a taut grimace as he stabbed his ax down again and again, iron pick battering into the ice, trying to find purchase. Val-Draekin had slipped twenty feet below Nail, the point of his own pickax digging a trench in the slippery slope as he continued sliding toward the raging waters.

  Beyond the Vallè, the ferocious ice-filled river itself was a horror. A hundred paces wide, emerging from an enormous hollow shaft in the glacier some distance to the north. Great hunks of ice, boulders, sections of trees, all of it came boiling up from the heaving and thrashing stew at intervals, all of it sucked under and swallowed just as swiftly. The foaming current of ice and sludge and furious white waves raced down a pitched and jagged chute, plunging over an underground cliff into a thunderous gaping blue darkness. And Roguemoore sucked down there somewhere! Dead!

  The slick incline Val-Draekin and Nail clung to was soon awash with rushing water, a frigid, seething flow that now dragged at the Vallè’s feet. Culpa tossed his makeshift rope made of cloaks down toward Nail, who latched on and held tight.

  “Help pull him up!” the Dayknight yelled. Stefan and Seita grabbed ahold of the cloak and heaved with all their might, pulling Nail toward safety.

  Then a thick shard of glacial ice was thrust brutally up from the river, scraping Val-Draekin from his perch, launching him straight into the fierce flow and over the murderous waterfall.

  “Pull!” Culpa yelled at Stefan and Seita. “We can’t lose Nail, too!”

  But the sheet of ice Nail clung to tore loose with a ponderous snap, sliding into the ravenous river. The cloak tore free of Nail’s grib as the sloping slab of ice folded over onto itself, buckling under the weight of the cruel crushing current, burying the Gallows Haven boy under brutal white waves and sweeping him over the crushing falls behind Val-Draekin.

  Stefan’s mind was hollow torment, stricken to the core. Three would not make it, Seita had predicted. And now her vision had come to pass.

  Roguemore. Val-Draekin. Nail.

  Dead.

  * * *

  Some claim Vallè crystals mixed with forged iron and silver will glow with a certain light and mist when handled by a mortal man. But the foul tools and weaponry formed of such fey alchemy ought not be trusted nor ever used.

  —THE WAY AND TRUTH OF LAIJON

  * * *

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  NAIL

  10TH DAY OF THE ANGEL MOON, 999TH YEAR OF LAIJON

  SKY LOCHS, GUL KANA

  The howling cavern swallowed Nail whole, straight down into its raging blue maw. Horror punched a hole through his jumping heart as he plummeted. Bubbles and froth and shards of ice and stabbing cold waters, his sight reduced to just a receding prick of light far above. I’m dead!

  What wind remained was crushed from his lungs as he slammed into solid ice, snapping his head back with a stunning blow, sending him spinning and hurtling uncontrollably down another dark chute in the captive flow. It was utter darkness now and he lost all sense of up or down. The scorching cold of the water strangled his entire body in its frigid grip—a cold more powerful than when he’d jumped from the Lady Kindly to save Zane.

  He clenched his eyes shut to stave off the agony as hunks of ice tumbled and sliced past him in the current. His arms and legs were rendered useless by the swirling cold torrent, all limbs flopping uncontrollably, numb fingers grasping at nothing but churning frigid violence. Ice-torn lungs frantically trying to grab a breath, sucking in water. Nose and mouth frozen with suffocating pain that lanced clear to his heaving chest. His face was raw agony.

  Then his shoulder kissed something solid, scarcely grazing it. But it was enough to send him spinning head over heels, and suddenly he was sailing weightless into a vast black nothing. Upside down he dropped, arms and legs flailing, lungs purging a vomitous river of icy sludge into air. One solid breath. He opened his eyes, a brief flash of blue light, and he was dashed face-first into a another block of ice that had raced up from nowhere. As he careened off the ice, thunderous water crushed and pounded him from above, thrusting him farther down, burying him deeper and deeper into a foaming stew of bubbles and debris.

  He floundered, drifting underwater, halfheartedly kicking out with legs nearly dead from pain, sensing a faint light seeping in from somewhere, lungs again desperate for a breath. He tried to swim, but his arms and legs were tortured, heavy, aflame with pain. He had seen some light above, eyes barely cracked open. He couldn’t tell up or down, but he felt the weight of his armor and sword were dragging against his efforts.

  He tore off his belt
and sword, scrambled to release the leather bucklers of his armor. But he was too slow, his fingers too numb, scarcely able to move. Still, he wriggled free of the chest plate, stripped the shoulder plates off, kicked his heavy boots free. His limbs were near useless, body totally spent, but he slowly glided toward the light.

  Surrounding him was naught but thunderous sound. A brief glint of silver in the bubbling dark, a twinkling flash. Mermaids! Then it was gone under the swirl of familiar images, visions clouding his mind. A burning tree—a pillar of fire stretching to a starlit sky. Under the tree a white knight in a peculiar horned helm astride a brilliant white stallion. A thin blond girl, green-eyed, on the steed before him, her hand a metal claw—

  And his head broke the surface of the water.

  He gasped. Air! His eyes darted about. Startled by the immense roar of the waterfall booming into a cavern off to his left, he paddled away. But he gave up quickly, legs and arms so numb he could scarcely move. It was a battle just to keep his head above water. He bobbed, helpless. Faint light filtered in from above, barely illuminating his surroundings. He was in a rippling pool of dark water, floating amidst hunks of ice and drifts of wood, a jagged roof of blue ice overhead.

  A hand latched onto his shoulder with a firm grip and pulled him under. When he resurfaced, Val-Draekin’s stark face rose up from the frigid waters right in front of him.

  “I can’t make it.” The Vallè’s voice was barely audible above the din of the waterfall. “My leg is broke. I’ll need your help.”

  Nail clutched Val-Draekin to him, thrust his arms under the Vallè’s armpits, and held him above water. They floundered helplessly together, both kicking a losing battle against the deep, both sinking under the skin of the water. Val-Draekin shoved free of Nail and latched onto a nearby chunk of jagged ice the size of a horse. Nail reached for the ice too, but it tipped in the water when he tried to scramble atop it, sending him back under water, Val-Draekin too. They bobbed back to the surface, both powerless as they watched the ice drift away.