‘Three thousand years I was trapped in that gemstone,’ she said. ‘Three thousand years! Can you imagine it? And all because of a few senseless taboos about the proper use of magic, and upon whom it is used.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Markos. He had a horrible feeling he was going to have to fight her to get out of the temple alive. The problem was, he felt exhausted. The command spell had taken more out of him than he’d realised.
‘Foolish man. This isn’t a temple... Well, it is, after a fashion, but it’s also a prison. The gemstone was supposed to be my cage. When you stole the amulet, you took a piece of me also. When you poked at it with your petty little magics, you cracked the enchantments, just enough for me to manifest a body.’ She spread her hands. ‘Now, I’m truly free.’
Markos steeled himself, and cut straight to heart of the matter. ‘Are you going to kill me?’
Her lips hooked into a predator’s smile. ‘I could have done that before you awoke.’ She looked past him, towards the sanctum’s door. ‘But I’m afraid your grave-born playmates are almost here, and they’ve found a few friends. You’d better get going, if you want to avoid them.’
Markos swore. It didn’t seem fair to be leaving empty handed. But did he have to? ‘You said I’d be able to take the other treasures. That was the bargain.’
Redelle swept an expansive hand around the room. ‘That was indeed the bargain. Help yourself. None of it is of any value to me.’
Markos reached out a hand towards the nearest statue, and froze. Only three of the four still stood. Of the fourth, the one that had borne the ruby amulet, nothing remained but stone fragments. A prison, she’d said. Were the statues the other prisoners? Perhaps leaving empty handed wasn’t so bad, after all.
Without another word, he left the sanctum, and began the long walk home.
When the young Matthew Ward wasn’t reading of strange worlds in the works of C.S. Lewis, Tolkien and Douglas Hill, he was watching adventure and mystery in Doctor Who, and Richard Carpenter’s excellent Robin of Sherwood series.
In 2002, he joined Games Workshop and spent the next decade developing characters, settings and stories for their Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 universes, as well as for a successful series of licensed books set in J.R.R Tolkien’s Middle-earth.
In 2014, Matthew embarked on an adventure to tell stories set in worlds of his own design. He firmly believes that there’s not enough magic in the world, and writes to entertain anyone who feels the same way. He lives near Nottingham with his extremely patient wife, and three attention-seeking cats.
FORGE AND CRUCIBLE
Sarah Newton
Zanne’s face was pale beneath the grey. ‘I can’t get to it,’ she gasped, white in the freezing air, wiping blood and sweat from her eyes and leaning heavily on her great axe. ‘Jagis’s warband has it too well protected. And that damned dwarf! I’d face Budru on open ground any day – but it’s too dark down there, and with all the ice and tumbled stones... ’
Gimilio laughed humourlessly at the amazon from his lookout. The rays of sorcerous light, which swept out into the darkness from the centre of the amphitheatre, played over his features, a livid gash across his cheek from the recent fighting. ‘They’ve got us surrounded good and proper, princess. Out-thought and out-manoeuvred. Next comes the bleeding and dying.’ He looked around at their makeshift redoubt – little more than a tumbledown pile that had once been a building – and curled his moustachioed lip.
‘You’re just as trapped as we are, pirate, in case you hadn’t noticed. Or are you already plotting how to grovel for your life? I suppose being a slave in a Kaggerdath galley won’t be much of a come-down for you. Assuming they even let us live.’
‘It’d be warmer, at least... ’ The Lammergarian shrugged and turned back to the uncanny flickering light, pressing his lips into a thin, bloodless smile. ‘We don’t even know how many of them there are... ’
‘Are we going to die, Master?’ Tolly, the apprentice, looked alarmed.
Distracted from his deliberations, Sarendar the Grey Stalker, sorcerer of the city state of Lammergar, shook his head. ‘What? No, of course not. Don’t be silly. This is just a minor tactical setback. Now let me think – I must understand what this is.’
They had gotten so close. Tolly lay down again on the frost-covered stones and gazed from the redoubt at Angall’s Crucible. It had been exactly where the ancient map that Master Sarendar had found in Lammergar library had said it would be – at the heart of the frozen city of Frostgrave, emerging from its millennial entombment beneath the ice. But was this what they had come for?
‘I don’t get it,’ Gimilio hissed, as if divining Tolly’s thoughts. ‘Why doesn’t Jagis just take it, if that’s what we’re all here for? A gem that size would be worth kingdoms.’
As he spoke another beam of light swept across his face, momentarily dazzling him. He looked away, screwing up his eyes, and spat.
‘She’s waiting for something... ’ Sarendar said. A hundred yards away, in a bowl at the centre of the rubble-strewn circle which had once been the tribunes for an audience long-dead, the fist-sized gem shone like a fallen star. It floated above a pedestal of frost-fractured marble and rotated, slowly, bathing its surroundings in a scintillating display of light. A crucible. Angall’s Crucible. But a crucible for forging what?
‘Waiting... ’ the sorcerer repeated. ‘Perhaps we should wait, too... Aah!’
A cry broke from his lips, and he clutched at the dagger which suddenly protruded from his back, his face distorted in pain.
‘Then let’s pass the time together, old man!’ A ruddy-faced villain leapt from the overhang of fallen stones behind them, his sword blade flashing in the gemstone’s rays.
‘Ambush!’ Zanne cried, scrabbling to her feet. ‘Another attack!’
From the shadows bowled a second shape – low and solid, like a patch of shadow bristling with spikes. The twisted features of the black-bearded dwarf snarled in the flickering light, and a huge maul, bigger than he was, swept a lethal arc before it. ‘Still trying to run, little sister?’ it leered.
Zanne spun. Heaving her great axe into a clanging, shuddering parry, she stumbled backwards out of the redoubt and into the amphitheatre, silhouetted by the kaleidoscope light. The black dwarf thundered after her, bellowing, forcing the fight into the open.
Behind Tolly, Gimilio drew his cutlass, and sprang between the ruddy-faced assassin and Master Sarendar, who still clutching in agony at his back.
‘Get out of here, lad! Both of you!’
Tolly turned, but a roaring wave of sound slammed into him, and he was deaf, all hearing muffled. Tendrils of smoke coiled round his limbs, round his neck, nose and mouth, pulling him away. He fell backwards, clutching in panic at his face, unable to breathe.
A pale figure in dark robes stepped from the shadows, his outstretched hands manipulating the spell of suffocation. As young as Tolly, yet his face was twisted with fear and desperation.
Tolly’s vision darkened, the charm of dispelling dying on his lips.
Dimly, he saw Sarendar stagger over him. A blinding flash of light, and a bolt of energy screamed from the sorcerer’s hands and slammed the pale intruder in the chest, hurling him from the hollow. The youth shrieked with pain, and suddenly the coils binding Tolly were gone.
He gasped for air. His eyes flashed, as if everything were brighter. No... everything was brighter: the gem at the heart of Angall’s Crucible shone with renewed brilliance, illuminating their struggle as light as day.
‘Jagis!’ Sarendar shouted, half collapsing against the stones. ‘Show yourself! Is this what the Kaggerdath Domain has come to? Backstabbing and ambushes in the dark?’
The sorcerer broke off, buffetted by Gimilio, retreating before the scything hail from the assassin’s sword.
‘A little help, Sarendar!’ the pirate cried.
A scream of rage and agony split the air above the amphitheatre. In a fresh blaze of light from
the floating gem, Zanne staggered backwards, her face streaked with blood and fury, her left arm dangling useless at her side. Her good arm dragged her great axe along the ground, and she struggled to gain purchase and lift it.
Budru the black dwarf hefted his maul again, and bared sharpened teeth in a steaming, infernal grin.
Gimilio shouted in frustration. His eyes flicked desperately to Sarendar, then he renewed his attack on the assassin with a flurry of cutlass blows. ‘Help her!’ he yelled.
Wracked with pain from the dagger in his back, the sorcerer spat the incantation through clenched teeth, his hands raised like claws. Between them, the air glowed then burst into flame, and in a wild gesture of abandon he flung his arms forward, hurling the conflagration through the air.
Too late, the dwarf reacted. His face fell, and then the bolt of fire slammed into his side, splashing like molten metal to engulf his squat frame. He screamed, collapsing to one side under the impact, thrashing and wreathed in flame.
As if kindled, the gem shone brighter still. A blinding nimbus now surrounded it, masking the ruins behind, a wall of light taller than a man, spreading upwards and downwards and to the sides. Sarendar raised his hand to shield his eyes; at its heart he saw a shape where the gem had been – shards of an image, as if looking through a door. A door opened by the dwarf’s agonised cries – as if empowered by his blood and anger.
Realisation flooded into him. He took in the ritual at a glance. A ritual, which drew its strength from their struggle, led by...
Zanne had turned her face from the wave of heat which swept from the blazing dwarf, and stumbled, exhausted, dragging her axe; she collapsed to her knees, bleeding, against the icy shadows of toppled stones, flickering in black and red. But not just stones...
‘Behind you!’ Sarendar raised an arm in warning.
Too late.
From the shadows stepped Jagis of Kaggerdath. Tall, made taller by her elaborate headdress, and clad in green and gold brocade in intricate symbols of power, the olive skin of her face twisting with a look of exaltation and triumph. Serpentine forces of darkness writhed between her hands, reaching for the helpless amazon.
‘Jagis! No... !’
She laughed, her eyes flashing. ‘So you’ve figured it out, at last? You fool, Sarendar! Angall’s Crucible is powered by the shedding of blood – and I have to thank you all for your sacrifice! The ritual is almost complete – with this amazon’s death, the portal will open, and I will seize the transcendence which Angall offers!’
Behind Sarendar, Gimilio and the assassin lowered their blades.
‘Sacrifice?’ the assassin spat, his eyes burning into the sorceress, his erstwhile liege. ‘We believed in you!’
By Tolly, the pale apprentice flicked his gaze from the assassin, then stared at Tolly in fury and disbelief, before turning, too, to hear the sorceress’s words of betrayal.
Zanne tried to heave her axe in her one good arm. Jagis laughed and uncoiled the serpentine spell.
In the redoubt, Sarendar whirled on Tolly. ‘Lad – pull the blade from my back! Use the Dweomer of Dulcimer to stop the blood!’
The apprentice stood open-mouthed. ‘Master – Dulcimer’s may do nothing. The pain!’
‘Do it!’ the sorcerer gasped, turning to expose the cruel blade. ‘Obey me!’
Eyes half-closed, Tolly reached for the dagger and wrenched it from his master’s shoulder blades. It came free and spilled a gout of blood. The sorcerer’s cry split the night air, and he fell to his knees.
The Crucible responded. Drawing the energy from Sarendar’s blood and pain, it flared with light, the portal gaping wider, opening fully to reveal glowing shapes of power beyond.
Surprise seized Jagis’s features, replaced by disbelief, then scorn. ‘You sentimental fool!’ she laughed. ‘You’d risk yourself to save this... ’ she looked down at the bloodied amazon ‘... mercenary? Really?’
She lowered her arms, and the serpentine darkness dissolved in shreds. ‘Very well – the amazon lives! And I claim my prize!’
Without hesitation, the sorceress swept her robes and strode triumphant into the portal of blinding light.
Everything stopped. Even the flames licking the corpse of the dead dwarf seemed to slow, then froze. Tolly felt the spell of Dulcimer, knitting the bleeding wound in Sarendar’s back, grow still beneath his hands.
Before the gemstone a hole gaped in the ground, a tunnel where none had been before. Above, the blazing light shifted, and reformed itself into the vast features of a man. A man of inestimable power and incontestable will. The face of Angall. The face of a god.
Its voice boomed into the air.
‘Those who would be gods – know this! True worshippers are not slaves, acting out of fear, but supporters and friends, acting out of love. They give their lives freely, not because they fear punishment, but because they believe in something greater than themselves!
‘This portal was opened by suffering. But who suffered? By whose command? Gods are born from suffering, so now must you be! Only worship can free you to become what you might be – worship, and struggle, and sacrifice. If you are worthy, your followers will give their all to rescue you. If you are not, you shall suffer until your pride and folly are burned away.
‘This is the truth of Angall’s Crucible, in which gods are forged.’
The booming words died in the frosted night air, still dazzling with sharp black shadows and icy brightness. The look of triumph on Jagis’s face, frozen, now cracked and fell, replaced by despair – and spite. She snarled, her eyes white and round as she glared from the portal – at the warband she had used and betrayed, who stared back, impassive and cold.
The weight of her doom fell upon her. She screamed, and the portal blazed, and she faded from view.
Tolly blinked. ‘Master! The door’s shrinking! It’s going to close!’
Sarendar wrenched his eyes from the fallen Zanne. Like flames licking at parchment, the light from the gem was already eating away at the edges of the portal. In moments it would be too small to pass.
‘Never mind!’ Sarendar said. He stumbled forwards. ‘Zanne needs our help... ’
Gimilio reached for him. ‘Our help, Sarendar – not yours! Go through the portal – that’s what we came for, isn’t it? To claim the treasure?’
The sorcerer stopped, looking at him wide-eyed. Before them gaped the tunnel the gem had opened, the entrance to Angall’s Forge, where Jagis twisted somewhere in agony, distant and unseen.
‘We’ll come for you, Sarendar. We’ll take care of Zanne. Trust us... ’
He reached out and clasped Sarendar’s arm. The sorcerer nodded, once.
‘Go! Before it’s too late!’
Taking one last look around, the sorcerer met Tolly’s eyes, and gave a grim smile. Then he turned, and threw himself into the dwindling portal. As he passed through, there was a flash of light, and a soundless explosion. Then – nothing. The portal was gone, and the frozen night closed in. Somewhere, perhaps, the fading cry of Sarendar, trapped in Angall’s Forge, on the cusp of transcendence, waiting for aid.
* * *
A pool of light shone from a single torch. All around, the toppled stones of the ancient amphitheatre loomed in the darkness, glistening with frost, as if a childish giant had kicked over building blocks in the snow.
Lygus the assassin and Apollin the apprentice fastened the charred remains of the black dwarf to a sled.
‘Jagis would have left him to the wolves,’ the assassin said to Gimilio, by way of farewell.
Gimilio nodded. ‘You fight well.’
‘You, too.’
‘Are you sure you won’t come with us? We could use you in Angall’s Forge. You’d have an equal share in whatever we find.’
Lygus shook his head. ‘This isn’t my fight, brother. Another day, perhaps. Look me up at the Black Galley Inn if you’re ever in Kaggerdath.’
Gimilio nodded, a grim smile. ‘When the war ends?’
; ‘When the war ends.’
Behind them Jagis’s apprentice looked down at Tolly, tending as best he could to Zanne’s wounds. ‘Here,’ he said, holding out a phial of green glass, stoppered with wax.
‘What is it?’
‘A potion of quick-heal. It’ll help. She’ll need it for what lies ahead.’
Tolly looked up at the apprentice, uncertain for a moment. Then he reached out and took the phial. ‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘Are you really going to try and save him?’
Tolly regarded Apollin’s frown. ‘Yes, of course. He’s my Master. And my friend.’
The youth shook his head. ‘Jagis would have sacrificed us all to open that portal,’ he said, bitterly. ‘I wish... ’ He trailed off.
Tolly nodded. Unstoppering the phial, he leaned forwards and poured the syrupy liquid between the amazon’s lips. Zanne licked at it, and swallowed. Almost immediately, a flush came to her cheeks, and the fingers of her dead arm twitched. She opened her eyes.
‘Damn... whatever the hell that is, it’s good stuff. I feel like I’m ready for anything.’ She lifted her head, and looked at the yawning entrance to Angall’s Forge, baring her teeth in a strengthening smile.
‘I wonder if Sarendar is?’
Sarah Newton is a writer of fiction and roleplaying games, co-owner of Mindjammer Press and fiction editor of the British Fantasy Society Journal. Her works include the far future transhuman science-fiction Mindjammer (novel, short stories, and award-winning RPG), The Chronicles of Future Earth, Legends of the Anglerre, Burn Shift, Achtung! Cthulhu and numerous short stories. She lives in a field in France, surrounded by farmyard animals.
THE THIEF OF TIME
Tales of the Frozen City Page 2