by William King
Malekith studied the raven that strutted backwards and forth in front of him. The barbarian warlords he had brought to heel looked at him nervously. Enormous anger burned within him. He knew that his assassins had failed, that General Dorian had failed. He knew that one element of his great plan had failed.
The Everqueen was still alive and free. She had been saved by the elf called Tyrion. It was a name he was familiar with. It was a name that most elves of Naggaroth were familiar with. It was a name that N’Kari was certainly familiar with. He sensed a rage even greater than his own burning within the daemon’s breast. He knew that if he wanted to, he could put that anger to use. He turned and looked at the Chaos creature.
‘Tyrion!’ N’Kari said. The venom in his voice could have poisoned an army. Malekith knew that at that moment he and the daemon were totally of one accord.
‘You think you could kill him?’ Malekith asked.
‘You jest. The last time I encountered him only the god Asuryan saved him.’
‘He has grown more skilled since then.’
‘No amount of skill can save him from my wrath.’
Malekith considered the risks and potential rewards of the situation. If he unleashed the daemon, he was certain that he could kill Tyrion and bring him the head of the Everqueen. On the other hand, if anything went wrong, he would lose the services of the one creature that provided the advantage of mobility to his armies. He would be stuck here on the plains of northern Saphery with only his mirrors to keep him in touch with his distant forces.
It was an enormous gamble.
It would take only a few days for the daemon to hunt down the troublesome elf prince and the ruler he guarded. Everything else was going so very well. His armies were triumphant everywhere. Nothing could stand against them. In the north, the remaining horde of Chaos barbarians was laying waste to an entire kingdom. Nothing could go wrong.
‘Go, N’Kari. Use all your power. Slay Tyrion and return with the head of the Everqueen as soon as possible. I will place it on my standard and use it for my war-banner.’
‘It will be my very great pleasure,’ said N’Kari. For once, the daemon sounded entirely sincere. His shape altered and twisted, becoming once again the monstrous four-armed being that Malekith had first bound into his service. It let out a roar of rage and pleasure and snapped one massive claw together.
‘I will take the head of the Everqueen with my own claw.’ It turned and loped from his presence without another word. A gate opened in front of it and it vanished.
Chapter Nineteen
He was alone in a darkened land. The sky burned. Strange patterns of elemental fire underlit the clouds. Armies of daemons marched. The greatest flight of dragons ever assembled swept by overhead. Fleets full of mutated monsters ploughed through the dark and stormy seas. From the back of a huge dragon, he watched everything pass.
He was burning up. He walked closer to a flame. He had seen it before. It was the sacred fire within the Shrine of Asuryan. A horde of richly clad elves watched him and laughed. It was odd, he thought. You were supposed to burn when you passed through the flame, not when you reached it.
He was cold, so cold it burned. His teeth chattered. In the distance, the black fangs of a giant mountain range marked the edge of the sane world. Beyond that lay only the Realm of Chaos, a place where daemons walked and the flesh of mortals became warped beyond all recognition. He was marching towards it, a black blade burned on his hip while an army of elves followed. He did not want to turn and look back because he knew he would not like what he saw.
Tyrion sat bolt upright, eyes widen open. Above him the waning moon glared down through the branches of trees. Sweat dripped from his brow. His limbs felt weak. His breathing rasped from his chest.
‘What is it?’ Alarielle asked, looking over at him. A frown marred her brow. He could tell by the way she stared that she was both worried and frightened.
He tried to rise but his limbs felt weak. He almost collapsed so he let himself slump to the ground again. She moved over to where he lay and placed her hand on his forehead. It felt like it was made of flame.
‘You are sick,’ she said. ‘You are burning up with fever. If you go on like this, it might well kill you. You have put too much stress on your body over the past few days. The last fight was too much. That and the march out of the tainted forest.’
He laughed at that thought. He could not die this way, of a fever in a forest far from the fighting. It did not make sense. Teclis was the sickly one, not him. He told her this.
‘Lie quiet,’ she said. ‘We don’t want you raving if the druchii come this way.’
‘Maybe they will catch whatever I have and it will kill them,’ he said. The thought was oddly amusing.
‘Not fast enough,’ she said.
‘Don’t you have any magic for this?’ he asked.
‘I have been trying to remember, but her memories won’t come.’
‘Her memories?’ Tyrion said. ‘Why not yours?’
‘We are the same. Sometimes I can remember what she has seen and done. Often I cannot. It takes calm and clarity and time.’
‘And you are not calm?’ he said, trying to make a joke of it.
‘I am alone in a forest surrounded by deadly enemies who want to hand me over to the most evil elf who ever lived. My only companion is sick and raving. Why would I not be calm?’
‘Good,’ said Tyrion. ‘You had me worried for a moment there.’
‘Be at peace, Prince Tyrion. I think there may be some herbs around here which will help ease your condition. I will see if I can find some.’
‘I am supposed to be protecting you,’ Tyrion said. ‘That is the champion’s duty.’
‘So you have finally accepted that you are my champion then?’
‘I don’t see anyone else here,’ Tyrion said. He fell back into hallucinatory dreams.
N’Kari moved along the trail away from the tournament grounds, head down, tracking by scent like a hound. It felt good to be wearing something like its normal battle-form again after weeks bound into the form of an elf-maid. The chains were still there, still binding it, but at least it was enjoying some variety. It chafed its protean nature to be confined to one shape for so long.
Of course, it was not as powerful as it should be. The chains bound it to this world but they inhibited its ability to draw on its full powers. It was far stronger than anything it was likely to meet in this pitiful plane, but it had only a fraction of the strength it normally possessed even here. Still, it should be more than enough for the mission it was supposed to perform.
It sniffed again. The trail was an easy one for it to follow. It knew the accursed scent it was following only too well. It was Tyrion, and judging by the faint taint of corruption in it, he had been wounded and poisoned.
Good, he deserved it. Of course, it would be a pity if he died before N’Kari could reach him and enact its vengeance.
There was another descendant of Aenarion with him, a female, one touched by an extraplanar being. This would be the Everqueen. N’Kari had to give Malekith credit for something – this was a task it was truly going to enjoy. It did not mind being bound to complete it in the slightest. The only thing that troubled it was the compulsion to complete the task and return as quickly as possible. This was something it wanted to savour, to derive the maximum possible pleasure from. Well, no doubt it would find a way to do that and still stay within the letter of the command that Malekith had laid down.
For the moment, it was enjoying being free to hunt and prowl. It made a pleasant change from being a mere ferryman for the druchii armies. That thought sent a ripple of fury through N’Kari. At some point, it would find a way to take its vengeance on the Witch King too. With that thought, it bowed down over the trail once more and, scuttling along on multiple limbs, began to follow a trail that might have baffled the most sensitive bloodhound.
‘Better?’ Alarielle asked. Tyrion nodded and drank more of the bitter te
a. The fever had subsided. Strength was returning to his limbs. He felt strong enough to grasp a sword once again.
‘You were right,’ he said.
‘Did you ever doubt it?’
‘Yet again, I find myself feeling very foolish,’ Tyrion said. Moonlight filtered down through the branches. It was the middle of the night but the drugs in the tea made him feel strangely restless.
‘Why?’ Alarielle asked.
Tyrion swallowed another bitter mouthful. ‘I sometimes think I am very stupid.’
‘I don’t see it.’
‘No? I spent my boyhood thinking I was very stupid,’ Tyrion said.
‘You?’ Alarielle said. ‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘My father is a mage. My brother is a very powerful and very gifted one. My mother is dead. We lived alone in the mountains except for one old servant. I understood nothing my father and Teclis talked about, and it was so important to them. Nothing I was interested in was important to them.’ He smiled a little sadly at the thought. ‘I think I was very lonely. It was only when I went to Lothern that things were different. People preferred me to Teclis.’
‘Women, you mean.’
‘No. I mean people in general. It had never occurred to me that it might be the case. Then my grandfather started talking to me about politics. It was obvious he had ambitions for me. He was one of the Lothern cabal who helped put Finubar on the Phoenix Throne. He thought he could do the same for me. In many ways, he was an evil old elf, but he treated me as if I was someone who mattered.’
‘Of course you matter.’
Tyrion looked at her and saw that she was sincere. ‘I found out quite young what my real gift was for.’
‘What was that?’
‘Killing. I have always been good at it. No. I have always excelled at it. And I have always loved it. You were right about that too.’
She looked troubled. ‘I was angry when I said that…’
‘You were still right. I used to think I wanted to be a hero. I could not be a mage but I could be a mighty warrior. I told myself that many times. The truth was I simply liked killing things. There was a great anger in me, very well hidden. I liked proving I was better, stronger, faster than all the people I killed. It made me feel superior to them. There was no more conclusive proof, was there?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Believe me, if you stand on a battlefield and look down on the corpse of someone who has tried to kill you, you will be glad, and you will think you were stronger, tougher, or maybe just luckier. No matter. You will never feel more alive. It is certainly how I felt.’
‘I think I can understand how you might.’
‘And it was a game I was good at. Most of my life has been like that. It’s been a game I knew I could win. It stopped being that when the dark elves attacked your court.’
‘You have fought them before.’
‘I fought them in their own land. I fought them at sea. I helped beat off an occasional raid. I never saw anything like this… I never even believed it was possible.’
‘I don’t think anyone did. Who would have thought it – druchii in the heart of Avelorn, the Everqueen their captive. Until it happened I would have said it was impossible.’
‘I find myself wondering how he did it, how Malekith did it,’ Tyrion said. ‘He forged this invasion force in secret – he’s done that before, it is part of his pattern. He is good at deception. But how is it possible that he managed to infiltrate an army into the heart of our realm without it being detected? I can only think of one instance of this happening before, and…’
The thought hit Tyrion with the force of a warhammer hitting a shield. He had seen something like this before. It had been part of his own life. The sickness and the chase had hidden it from him for a very long time.
‘What is it?’ Alarielle asked. ‘Has the fever returned?’
‘I am stupid. I should have seen it before now.’
‘Seen what?’
‘A daemon once moved regiments of warriors around Ulthuan. It was hunting me and my brother and others of the line of Aenarion. It laid siege to the Shrine of Asuryan.’
‘N’Kari?’ she whispered.
‘N’Kari.’
Alarielle’s face went pale. ‘She remembers N’Kari. The daemon commanded the Rape of Ulthuan in the Age of Aenarion. But surely it must hate Malekith as much as it hates us. He is Aenarion’s son.’
Tyrion shrugged. ‘I am not sorcerer enough to know what is possible. Perhaps Malekith bound it or made a pact with it. It almost killed me once… it will want to kill you.’
‘These are very worrying things, Prince Tyrion.’
‘We live in a very worrying world, your serenity.’
They both fell silent for a long time. Tyrion felt tired but could not sleep. Alarielle lay down beside him and closed her eyes. Absent-mindedly he stroked her hair.
N’Kari studied the bodies intently. The corpses were old and they had been left to lie. A few had been bitten and chewed on by massive jaws that N’Kari guessed belonged to Cold Ones. The scent of Tyrion led to this place. It had taken it a little time to pick it up when it crossed the river, but it was using magic as much as its nostrils and it had found the scent again though a hound might not have. It was obvious that Tyrion had passed this way and had been joined again by the Everqueen nearby. It was curious though about what had happened here. It was curious whether the one it hated was even still alive. Fortunately, it knew a way to find out.
It extended a claw and inscribed the sign of Slaanesh in the mud around one of the corpses. It spoke the words of an ancient ritual and felt power flow from it into the body. A sigh emerged not from the mouth but from a gap in the cadaver’s chest as the lungs wheezed rotten air. The corpse sat upright and its head swivelled until it looked at N’Kari with empty eye-sockets.
‘What do you want with me? Why have you disturbed my soul’s dissolution in the realm beyond?’
‘I would ask you the three questions allowed by spell and ritual.’
‘Ask away then and let me fly back to hell. It is too cold for me here now.’
‘Who killed you?’
‘An elf with a flaming sword. He stepped out of the night and slaughtered us as if we were children.’
‘Why?’
‘Because we were enemies, why else?’
‘Is his soul with yours in hell now?’
‘Not to my knowledge, and I would know for he was my killer.’
‘Then go, you are dismissed.’
‘I go.’
The corpse slumped and the witchfires died in its eyes. N’Kari laughed long and loud. Its prey was out there still. It was good to know. Now it was only a matter of finding it.
‘I feel like I have just woken up, like all of my life I have been playing a game and things have only just now become serious.’ Tyrion felt the sadness in his voice even as he spoke. He was so weak now he could barely even move. He knew he was dying. He had tried to get her to leave him, but she would not. All he could do now was talk.
‘Why? Because you saw your friends killed?’ She sounded as if she wanted to sneer or cry or perhaps both. He shook his head.
‘I have seen friends die in battle before. I killed one in a duel once. But I have lived in a world where these things have had no real consequence, except to make me admired.’
‘I don’t follow you.’
‘I have raided the coasts of Naggaroth. I have fought against the warriors of Chaos. I have defended our shores against the Norse, but there was never anything at stake before except my own life.’
‘Surely that is enough.’
‘You would think so, wouldn’t you? But it’s not.’ He paused and stared into the fire for a moment, trying to find the words to say what he meant. They were not easy for him to uncover. ‘If Malekith succeeds in what he is doing, our kingdom ends. Our world will be changed irrevocably and not for the better. And his capturing you or killing you makes this mo
re likely to happen. You are the last link to one of our old gods, one of the things that makes us who we are and not druchii. That is why he must destroy you.’
‘And why is this important to you?’
‘I don’t want him to win, and not just in the way I don’t want someone to beat me at chess. I don’t want him to win because I hate him and his people and what they stand for.’
‘And what is that?’
‘They are us, without you.’
‘And you said you were not a poet. That is a very pretty phrase.’
She tilted her head to one side and looked at him thoughtfully. ‘You are not quite what I expected you to be, Prince Tyrion.’
‘No one ever is. That is the truth of things.’ He started to cough. The world spun. The shadows lengthened, his sight became very dim. He felt as if he had only the slightest grip upon his life, as if the smallest breeze could separate his spirit from his body.
She reached down and stroked his brow. Her hand felt very cold. She pulled it away as if he burned. She seemed to have come to a decision. She closed her eyes and murmured what might have been a spell or a prayer. Her face twisted as if she were in agony or undergoing some great internal struggle.
Tyrion looked up at Alarielle.
She was not there. Someone else was. Someone much older and calmer and altogether more majestic. The spell that normally surrounded her was much stronger. He had the impression of other elf-women superimposed on her, many of them, all of whom resembled her but were not quite the same. When she moved, she moved differently as if a stranger were wearing her body.
‘Who are you?’ Tyrion asked.
‘We are the Everqueen.’ He did not need to ask why she used the plural.
‘Where is Alarielle?’
‘She is with us.’
Tyrion knew he was somehow looking at a composite of every personality of every elf woman who had ever been the Everqueen and upon something more, something tinged with divine power. Even as he watched they seemed to go in and out of focus. An expression of pain flickered across her face.