by William King
“They sell good pies,” Kormak said. “But I doubt they will be as good as you remember them.”
“Nothing ever is, is it?”
“Probably not.”
“You ever plan on going back to Aquilea?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“There’s nothing there for me now.”
“No kin? No friends? Nothing?”
Kormak shook his head. “How about you?”
“I had brothers and a sister. No idea whether any of them is still alive. When I had some money I considered going back and taking a look for them.”
“You didn’t. Obviously.”
“I found an urgent need to spend gold on wine, women, and other luxuries.”
“You sound as if you regret that?”
“Maybe I do. Maybe I should have bought passage back to Trefal. I had enough money to buy my old man’s shop and all its stock. I spent it in a brothel in Maial.”
“A soldier gets into the habit of spending big.”
“You ever do blow a score of Solars?”
“Never had that sort of money.”
“Never? You must have killed some monsters that had huge treasures. They always do in the stories.”
Kormak laughed. “In this life, the local lord usually claims the money as tax. My Order gets anything I find if I don’t spend it as part of my expenses.”
Disbelief etched itself onto Anders’s face. “You give the money to your Order?”
“Mostly, if there’s anything left over.”
“I fight for pay.”
“I took an oath to do what I do. My Order feeds me and clothes me and provides me with a roof over my head.”
“My old man would have said you were mad.”
“Is that just a polite way of saying you think the same without taking responsibility for the saying of it?”
“Maybe. Why do you do this? Really. Why go to the ends of the earth in search of monsters and men who want you dead.”
“I told you. I took an oath.”
“And that’s it?”
“I enjoy it.”
“You enjoy almost getting killed?”
Kormak thought for a moment. “I enjoy the hunt. I like the sense that I am doing something important. I like the idea that I am protecting people.”
“That’s important to you is it?”
“When I was eight years old an Old One killed everyone in my village except me. It told me it would come back for me one day. It has done that to some children over the centuries. The man who found me in the ruins was a Guardian of the Order of the Dawn. He took me back to Mount Aethelas. They gave me a home, trained me, made me into what I am today.”
“And you feel you owe them?”
“Them and the monster who killed my people. I decided a long time ago I am not going to spend my life being afraid.”
“I wish I could achieve that through sheer willpower. Somehow the fear stays with me, before every battle at least.”
“That’s just your body telling you it wants to stay alive.”
“That’s one way of looking at it, I suppose.”
“That’s what my masters taught me back on the Holy Mountain. Being afraid doesn’t make you a coward. Giving into your fear is what does that.”
“So this does frighten you?”
“Sometimes.”
“But it doesn’t stop you.”
“No. It doesn’t stop me.”
Anders fell silent for a minute then said, “You think we’re going to find Balthazar, don’t you? And you are going to kill him.”
“Yes.”
“Good,” Anders said. “I hope I am there when you do.”
“Thank you,” Kormak said, keeping the sourness from his voice. “We’d best get back to the line. It will be dark soon, and we’ll need to make camp.”
Chapter Nine
Balthazar strode through the assembled crowd of warriors and shamans.
All eyes were fixed upon him. All were waiting to hear what he had to say. After making his plans with Red Talon, he had slept in the temple throughout the day, troubled by visionary dreams. The warriors of the Jaguar Lodge had spent the day moving through the camp spreading rumours about what had happened after the sacrifice. Now he had emerged, and all were curious.
The shamans looked at him sidelong. All of them knew the message that Coiled Serpent had given him from their god. They sensed the new power within him and those who had followed him into the temple. They knew something important had happened and were waiting to find out what it was.
“You have returned from your spirit walk,” said Coiled Serpent. With his right hand, he toyed with the necklace of human fingerbones hung around his neck. He could not help but notice that Balthazar was surrounded by an honour guard from the Jaguar Lodge. An honour guard that was headed by his son. He deliberately ignored Balthazar’s failure to abase himself. Balthazar knew this was noted by the watchers.
“I have returned, brother,” said Balthazar. “I have spoken with Xothak.”
Silence descended on the group. They all looked at Balthazar with respect bordering on awe.
“This is indeed great news,” said Coiled Serpent, who made it sound as if it was anything but. “Did he give any word for his loyal followers?”
“He says the time of Shadowfall is almost here.”
Whoops of ecstatic joy greeted this announcement from all except Coiled Serpent. The shaman king studied Balthazar closely as if trying to perform a divination on the entrails of a sacrifice. He must know that more was coming and that it would undermine his position and strengthen Balthazar’s.
“He says there is a thing that the tribes can do to aid its coming.”
Coiled Serpent gave a frog grin. The humour did not reach his flat cold eyes. What he had expected was about to materialise.
“Lost gods will be resurrected,” Balthazar said. Coiled Serpent’s sharp look almost impaled him. Perhaps he had not been expecting this after all. “I have been entrusted with freeing them and bringing them back to life.”
“That is a mighty trust.” Coiled Serpent said. There was a note of irony in his voice.
“There are those who seek to oppose the will of our master.”
“There always are. They shall be overcome,” said Red Talon. His glance at Balthazar was almost worshipful. The Count knew he had an ally here.
“Tell us more concerning these foes,” said Coiled Serpent, wishing to know what he was committing himself to before the enthusiasm of the others could tug him into doing something that he might not want.
“They are Sunlanders from over the sea,” Balthazar said. As always that got the tribesmen worked up. They hated the colonists who had stolen their lands. They hated the Solar God the colonists served even more.
“Who else would they be?” Coiled Serpent asked. He tilted his head to one side. There was mockery in his eyes. “Are they your kin?”
The other shaman chiefs fell silent at this reminder that Balthazar too was a Sunlander. It curbed their enthusiasm somewhat, as no doubt, it was intended to.
“No kin of mine.”
“Not blood kin,” said Coiled Serpent. “But they are of your people.”
“Among those who serve Xothak, there is only one people,” Balthazar said. “We are all brothers in his service.”
He kept his voice level, and there was no rebuke audible in it. Rebuke it was, nonetheless.
“Who am I to contradict one who has spoken directly with Xothak?” said Coiled Serpent.
“You are a chief among your people, and your service is valued by Xothak and by me,” Balthazar replied.
Coiled Serpent could not fail to notice the hierarchy implicit in that statement. His smile widened a fraction. His knuckles went white where they gripped the spear.
“There is one among these interlopers who is particularly dangerous,” said Balthazar. “A Guardian of the Dawn by the name of Kormak. He has thwarted our masters
in many times and many places. The reward for the one who brings me his head will be great.”
“Where can we find him?” asked Red Talon, ignoring his father’s withering stare.
“He travels along the Old Road towards the pass at Helgate. He is accompanied by packs of Sunlander soldiers who will provide you with many hearts to offer up on your altars.”
“We shall fill the Well of Blood and this time the Gods shall answer our call . . . my father’s call.” Red Talon managed to correct himself at the end. His father gave him a sour smile and looked back at Balthazar. “You wish this company wiped out. You and Xothak I mean.”
“That is exactly what we wish.”
A man raced into the square of the village. He shouted, “Sunlander warriors on the road! A hundred or more.”
Balthazar smiled. He could not have timed it better.
As the sunset shadows lengthened, the marines made camp once more. Wagons were drawn across the road blocking it, and sentries were set along the barriers on the roadside. The road was transformed into a fortified camp.
Kormak looked around. He was not entirely satisfied with the arrangement. Climbers could move along the branches of the huge trees above them and drop down into the camp or throw spears or fire poison darts. There was no real way of preventing this other than to put some men up there. However, he knew nobody would be willing to climb in this darkness.
The cooks fed sticks in their fires. Pots of water drawn from a nearby stream were being boiled even as Kormak watched.
He sniffed the air. Rhiana watched him and wrinkled her nose. “There’s a swamp out there. I can smell it.”
“A swamp tainted with blight,” Kormak said.
“That would not surprise me.” She turned and pointed off towards the north. “I sense something in that direction. There is a power out there.”
“A monster, an Old One, what?” Kormak asked.
“I don’t think it’s any of them,” Rhiana replied. “I’ve never quite felt anything like this before, such a concentration of power, flowing and shifting. I don’t think it’s sentient at all. I think it just is.”
“It might be a locus of power,” Kormak said.
“You mean like a doorway or a portal?”
He nodded. “Sometimes the blight concentrates around them. You find such gateways sometimes at the core of the biggest blights.”
“Shadow heart,” Terves said. “That’s not a pleasant thought.”
“What’s even less pleasant is that there are tribes living in that swamp. We’ve been seeing the signs all day.”
Rhiana shuddered. “You mean those skeletons whose heads you keep smashing.”
“Yes. According to Anders they are territorial markers.”
“What sort of people use markers tainted with shadow to warn people from their borders?”
“You’d be surprised how many people do it.”
“Not when you’re the person doing the telling,” Rhiana said. “You always seem to encounter such things.”
Kormak produced his wraithstone amulet from within his tunic. Tendrils of inky darkness ran through the heart of the white stone.
“You going to tell me that there is definitely blight in this area, aren’t you?” Rhiana said.
“We both knew that before I looked.”
As darkness fell, a faint glow became visible in the woods around them.
Small strange lights floated through the trees. They illuminated the darkness. They sparkled a little. The colours were odd, strange metallic red, glittering green. Kormak reached out with his hand and caught one of them. He sniffed at it. “Spores,” he said.
Seeing him doing it, some of the soldiers started to do the same. They pulled the floating lights from the air and held them fast. One man held his hand up to his mouth. Kormak slapped it away.
“Nobody eat any of this stuff. Cover the pots and water, make sure none of the spores get into it. Blight taints them.”
“You heard the man,” Sergeant Terves said. “Do as he says.”
Nobody grumbled. No one wanted to eat anything that had been so tainted. Most of them probably thought it was poisonous. And it was, just not in the way they thought.
Long-term exposure to blight twisted living things. Eating anything contaminated by it could have the same effect. Kormak had seen madness and mutation overcome those that had done such a thing. He did not want it happening to any of the soldiers.
“It’s oddly beautiful,” said Rhiana, looking at the glittering lights.
“So are some spiders,” Kormak said. But he agreed with her. Watching the lights stream through the trees was relaxing.
He tore his gaze away. “Set the sentries in pairs,” he told Terves. “Have them watch the trees above us as well.”
“As you say,” said Terves. He looked like a man who was not going to get much sleep anyway.
Kormak’s arm was numb with Rhiana’s weight when he woke. He pulled it gently free. This was not good. If a foe attacked in the night, he would be slowed.
Rhiana rolled to one side and smiled at him. “Why so grim?”
He smiled back. “Just thinking about survival.”
“Nothing new then.”
“No, nothing new.”
All around them the camp was coming to life. Night-watching sentries stretched and yawned as their replacements took over. Horses neighed. Cooks lit fires and began to mix the slop for breakfast. Men scratched at mosquito bites. As ever Rhiana’s skin was unblemished.
“You are lucky,” Kormak said. “The bloodsuckers never go for you.”
“Something in the blood,” she said. “It’s different from normal humans’. The Old Ones saw to that.”
Was there a note of bitterness or defiance in her voice? It was hard to tell.
“Must be,” he said.
“I never seem to go down with any of the fevers you landlubbers get either.”
Kormak shrugged. “I wonder why that is.”
“Not the most romantic of conversations at this time of the morning.”
“It’s not the most romantic of settings. I never figured you for the most romantic of women.”
She smiled and looked away. “I am not.”
“Why are you here?” Kormak asked.
“You really don’t know?”
Kormak knew all right, but he neither wanted to admit to it or deal with it at this moment. Perhaps ever. The attraction between them distracted him when he ought to be concentrating. It could get them both killed. He rubbed his numb arm, changed the gesture, so it looked like he was scratching a mosquito bite, then offered her a hand to get up.
She rolled lithely to her feet without aid. Kormak saw several of the soldiers looking jealously in his direction. Some of them looked at her lustfully. There was a potential problem there. Soldiers on the march could be violent in their desires.
He glared at the soldiers until they looked away. He had not needed to do that. Part of him was tempted to slide a proprietorial arm around her. He fought down that urge. Rhiana knew how to take care of herself.
The heat was already rising. Mist crept through the lower branches of the trees and the underbrush. The sky overhead was grey with the threat of rain. Kormak stretched and glanced around, inventorying his surroundings as he always did. One or two of the Governor’s guard lay nearby, wrapped in their bedrolls. A thin cloth was all they needed. If it rained they would use the oilcloth wraps in their packs. A few empty lean-tos lay near at hand.
Marines sat cross-legged on the ground, oiling their crossbows as they waited for their breakfast to cook. Terves stamped around the perimeter of the camp, letting everyone know he was coming and that soon it would be time to move. Zamara emerged from his pavilion, looking neat as if he had just come from a palace in his second uniform. Only the sweat rings beneath his arms gave away the fact that he too was in the jungle.
Kormak looked along the road. He did not expect to see anyone marching there. He just wanted t
o study the ancient stonework. There was moss between the stones. The inlaid runes had not been worn away by the passage of countless feet and wheels and the road itself seemed permanent as the mountains. He could feel the subtle ancient spells woven into it. The ancients had been giants. So much had been lost since they walked the world.
Rhiana walked up beside him. Her boots clattered on the stonework. She put a hand on his shoulder, leaned forward and kissed his neck. He reached out and squeezed her hand then noticed a frown upon her face.
“What is it?” he asked.
“There’s something out there, nearby, a presence of some sort, I can sense it.”
Kormak’s hand went to his amulet. It felt warm, but that might just be from body heat and sweat. It certainly did not have the level of heat he associated with magic.
“I don’t feel anything.”
“It might be nothing. Sometimes I just feel things.” She did not look as if she thought it was nothing, though. She stared thoughtfully out into the forest.
On the branches of one of the huge trees, a big cat, spotted and yellow-eyed, watched them back. Kormak could not help but think of the tales that Anders had told of the tribesmen’s bestial allies.
Chapter Ten
Coiled Serpent looked out through the eyes of the jaguar. It was like looking at a scene at night. The jungle and the road were leeched of all colour, although he saw shapes with a sharpness his own aged eyes could no longer match. He counted the number of Sunlander soldiers from this side of the road. Another twenty. That made almost a hundred in total. The jaguar had circled the camp earlier, and he had counted from the other side.
He breathed in through the big cat’s nostrils and caught the man-stink. It was different from the smell of his own people’s camps. These soldiers reeked of metal and strange foods and the incense from their temples. He could smell the latrines they had dug to one side of their camp, and the oil they used for maintaining their death engines.