Hinterland

by James Clemens

  He didn’t answer. Instead, he lowered his head and stepped toward the column. “We don’t have any more time.”

  Laurelle refused to follow him closer. “What are we supposed to do?”

  Orquell motioned to the column, to the room, and beyond. “Close your eyes, strip away the natural stone, until only the unnatural flowstone is left. Do you know what you find?”

  Laurelle tried to map in her mind’s eye a picture of the streaking veins through which the stair had cut, leading at last to here.

  “It would look like a great swirl of black flame, frozen to glassy stone. What are called Boils. I’ve seen smaller of them, but never one so large.” He stepped back. “But though this old flame is turned to stone, it still burns with the fires of the naether. And where there is flame…?” He glanced inquiringly at Laurelle.

  She remembered his earlier lesson. “There is also shadow.”

  He offered her a tired smile. The coldness that had crept into his manner warmed away. “Very good,” he said. “This flame does indeed still cast shadows, but not ordinary darkness.”

  “Gloom,” Laurelle mumbled.

  His smile deepened. “Exactly. You might do well to pay a pilgrimage to Takaminara. I believe you’d fare well with her.” He turned back to the twisted column.

  Laurelle could now almost imagine it as a frozen whirlwind of fire.

  “But you are right,” Orquell said. “It casts Gloom like a pure flame casts shadow. But worse for us now, this flame also smokes with power, drifting upward, fueling the witch with dire forces. That is what we must stop if we are to help Tashijan.”

  “How do we do that?”

  He returned his attention to the chair. “By stanching this fire. Her power flows from the naether, along this column, and smokes high.”

  “But how do you stanch a fire that is set in stone?” Kytt asked.

  Laurelle remembered the master’s example on the stair. “You must purify it…with fire.”

  Orquell glanced back at her, his milky eyes appraising her anew. “You continue to surprise me, Mistress Hothbrin.” He returned his attention to the black stone. “The heart of this Boil must be purified. Burnt out to kill the poison. Setting fire against fire.”

  He shifted closer to the niche.

  Laurelle felt a stab of fear. She didn’t like the master to be so near to that black flame. But he stopped and turned back. He slipped out a bag of powder. She recognized it as the same bag where he had stored the remaining powder that fueled his torch. Orquell opened the bag and sprinkled the powder over his head, shoulders, and across chest and back.

  “What are you…?” she began.

  “It will take more than just fire to purify this,” Orquell said. “Someone has to enter this pyre, direct the flame. It is the only way to stop the witch. But there is great power flowing through here. One touch and your will and mind will be burnt away, lost to whatever hides below in the naether.” He faced the niche one last time. “Perhaps that is what happened to Mirra. Perhaps she discovered this place or was maliciously directed down here. Either way, once she sat on this throne, she would’ve been lost forever. Yet if someone who was purified sat here…”

  Laurelle again proved her understanding of the intent behind his words. “No.”

  “I must. It is the only way.” Orquell held out his torch toward her. “Once I sit down, you have to set me on fire.”

  Kathryn yelled to be heard above the bleat of a horn. “More flames! Get more torches! Where’s that barrel of oil?”

  She manned the line on the sixth floor. The lower five were gone. All of Tashijan, those still living, were crammed into a mere ten levels.

  Gerrod climbed up from below, his armor reflecting the firelight that shone down the stairs. He led another handful of knights. All their cloaks were charred at the edges. The witch’s attack had proven especially difficult to thwart. The same fires that shunned her black ghawls shed the speed and force of shadows from the knights, weakening them when they needed to be strongest.

  Also the wraiths still harried the line at top, dividing their full force.

  Gerrod and the other knights cleared the picket here. “That’s the last,” he said, joining her.

  The other knights climbed past. One of the knights carried one of his brothers over a shoulder. The body smoked. She caught a glimpse of a blackened arm hanging from beneath a cloak.

  “Coming through!” a shout erupted behind them.

  Two men rolled a barrel of oil down the steps. Others helped slow its descent with hands as they passed, lest it roll out of control.

  “If we cast much more fire below,” Gerrod warned, “we may burn Stormwatch out from under us.”

  Kathryn remembered the blackened arm. “Rather a clean fire than the corruption wielded by Mirra.”

  A piercing scream echoed up to them, full of pain.

  It wasn’t human—nor was it daemon.

  Horse.

  Kathryn had emptied the stables into the lower level of Stormwatch as the wraiths attacked. The thatching of the old structure had offered no protection against Ulf’s winged legion. So she had led the entire stable inside, horse and horsemen.

  “We couldn’t clear them,” Gerrod said. “There was no space up here for the horses. Climbing stairs, all the fires…Horsemaster Poll even tried blinding them with blankets. They were too panicked.”

  She remembered the stablemen’s refusal to abandon their charges, hiding with their horses in the cold barns.

  “What about the barnstaff?”

  Gerrod shook his head. “I don’t know. They were ordered to clear, but…” He shook his head.

  It had been chaos for the past half bell.

  “I have to go down there,” Kathryn said.

  “Are you mad?” Gerrod said, almost sputtering in his helmet.

  “She is slaying the horses on purpose. Most cruelly. She knows my love for those horses. And if there are any of the barnstaff still down there—”

  “They’re not worth the risk,” Gerrod said too quickly. He raised a hand to his forehead. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like that.”

  She touched his arm. “I know. But they’re all good folk who man our stables, every one of them. I will take a few knights, ripe with power, and strike a fast assault. Just to see if any of the barnstaff are down there.”

  But in her heart Kathryn knew they were down there.

  Gerrod stared a long time at her, unmoving, a statue in bronze. “Go,” he whispered, but she knew it took all his reserve to utter that one word.

  Kathryn had never loved him more. She didn’t need his approval, but his concession fueled her when she needed it most. She turned to two knights. “Bastian and Tyllus. You’re with me.”

  They came quickly, without question.

  They both bore the Fiery Cross, but she knew they were stout of heart and had proven themselves countless times this day. She told them what she proposed. They nodded and gathered what was necessary.

  “Let’s go.” Kathryn crossed the picket and headed down. “Send word to Argent at the top line,” she called back to Gerrod.

  He lifted a bronze arm in acknowledgment, then vanished from sight as she fled around a turn in the stair. Fires still blazed here, but after another two turns, all the torches were guttered. Darkness filled the lower stairs.

  Kathryn pulled up hood and masklin. Despite knowing what lurked in the depths of that darkness, she still sank gratefully into the shadows, wicking their power along all the threads of her cloak. She whisked away from sight, flanked by her knights.

  As they passed the next levels, a few fires were noted burning off down various passages, but the stairs remained dark. She descended the last level with more care. The screaming horse had gone silent.

  As she made the final turn below, she noted a glow rising from below, but it was not firelight. The cast was sickly, a sheen of emerald. She signaled her other knights with the barest reveal of her sword. She would take
the inside wall of the stairs, the others would take the outside.

  She went down first, one step at a time. With her eyes so attuned to shadow, she could discern enough in the darkness to tell daemon from shadow. But only when very close.

  Where were they all?

  She had expected a few sentries on the stairs.

  She reached low enough to see below. Between her Graced eyes and the greenish light, it was easy to see the horse sprawled across the stone floor. It lay in a pool of blood, its throat cut.

  Beyond its bulk stood the source of the light.

  Mirra.

  She leaned on a staff that glowed with the fetid luminance. She looked a monster. Her hair was burnt to her scalp. One side of her face was a blistered ruin. The handiwork of Orquell.

  “Hurry, boy!” she yelled with a wave of her staff.

  Movement to the right drew Kathryn’s eye. She shifted more to the stair’s center for a clearer view. She saw a small form walking a horse down from where they were corraled by the main gate.

  She recognized them both.

  The horse was a piebald, black on white.

  Stoneheart.

  The stallion’s legs shook and his flanks trembled. He smelled the blood, certainly heard the earlier scream. But he minded the boy on the lead. Someone he trusted.

  The stableboy Mychall.

  The boy walked on legs just as trembling as the horse’s.

  “Is that her favorite horse?” Mirra asked.

  “Y-yes, mum. Please don’t hurt my da.”

  Mirra swung her staff to point toward the opposite wall. Kathryn had to slip two steps lower to see the remaining horror here. Pinned against the far wall, bolted through both hands into the stone, hung Horsemaster Poll, Mychall’s father. At the man’s toes, the darkness shifted with denser shadows; a clot of ghawls guarded him.

  “Boy!” he called to his son. “Why did you stay when I told you to go?”

  “Da…let my da down…”

  Kathryn could surmise what had happened. The horsemaster had refused to abandon his charges, but he’d had enough force of will to drive the other stablemen and-women up higher. Not his son, though. Mychall must have snuck back or hidden close. Either way, they’d both been discovered and their love used against them.

  “When we’re through here, I’ll let your father go,” Mirra said with feigned warmth. “Walk that pretty stallion over here.”

  Mirra lifted a long sickle in her other hand.

  Mychall approached, his shoulders shaking in silent sobs, face wet with tears.

  Kathryn shifted and motioned to the others. She lifted her hand and dropped her shadows enough for the two knights to see. She pointed where she wanted them to strike. She didn’t need to see their acknowledgments.

  She raised her hand, fingers out. She counted down. When she formed a fist, small flashes of fiery Grace ignited the wicks of two small barrels, one held by each knight. They were lobbed down into the lower floor, landing precisely where she wanted.

  The first struck the dead horse, bursting up with fire, separating witch from boy. The second flew and struck the clot of ghawls by the pinned horsemaster.

  The three knights followed the flight of the flaming barrels, hitting the floor about the same time the fires burst. Stoked with shadows, Bastian and Tyllus dashed toward the horsemaster. They had an oiled brand in each hand, dipping them into the fresh fire as they passed, igniting the torches.

  Kathryn did the same with a single brand, but she also whistled sharply.

  Stoneheart had reared when the barrels blew, yanking Mychall off his feet. But he responded to Kathryn’s whistle, desperate for the familiar. He swung toward her. She still had enough shadows, despite the fires, to leap onto his bare back. She guided him with her legs, turning toward Mirra, her sword in her other hand.

  But Mirra was not one surprised into inaction.

  She had shifted and grabbed Mychall by the hair, and now had the sickle at his throat.

  “No!” Poll moaned.

  Below his toes, the two knights fought the ghawls among the fires, armed with their two brands. But they could not hold off the daemons long enough to free the father.

  Atop the horse, Kathryn watched more daemon knights boil out from the far passages. Cloaks rustled behind her. The stairs they had come down flowed with a river of darkness.

  A trap.

  She gaped at the sight. She had never imagined the witch’s legion numbered so many. Tashijan would be overrun.

  Mirra must have sensed her despair. “You surprised me, Kathryn.” Her voice sounded so familiar. “I thought I’d have to kill more than one horse—or at least the boy—to draw you down here.”

  “Why?” she finally choked out, the one word encompassing so much.

  The answer, though, was quite small. Mirra nodded her chin toward Kathryn. “I want my diadem back.”

  Kathryn stared into the face of madness.

  “And to make you suffer—all of you suffer—for the pain you’ve caused me—that oily-tongued rub-aki.” She spat on the stone. “I was going to simply send my legion through you like a fire through chaff, but after this cruel burning, I want you all to end your lives screaming.”

  She met Kathryn’s eye squarely.

  “We’ll start first with this boy.”

  Laurelle shook her head. “I can’t light you on fire.”

  Orquell turned to Kytt, holding out the torch. The boy backed several steps, almost knocking himself flat on the altar before catching his legs. The master turned again to Laurelle.

  “You must, Mistress Hothbrin.”

  Laurelle kept her hands clasped together between her breasts.

  Orquell lowered the torch and stepped closer. “Look at me, Laurelle.”

  She reluctantly met those milky eyes.

  “What god do I bow down to?” he asked, teasing her eyes more firmly to him. “Fire is my comfort. Flame is my passion. What I do, I do willingly. I’ll not say gladly. I won’t lie to you. But often life asks much of you, and you either honor life by answering with all your heart, or you cower your way into your grave.”

  Laurelle took a shuddering breath.

  Orquell read her reluctant hesitation. “I know what I ask of you is horrible. But I am rub-aki. We are trained to withstand a fire’s burn and still hold our minds. Only I can do what must be done here.” He glanced up. “Lives already end above because we hesitate below.”

  She searched upwards with him, not so much looking for answers as asking for forgiveness. As Orquell lowered his eyes, he met her gaze. A smile formed as he read her decision.

  “Very good, Mistress Hothbrin.”

  Kathryn could do nothing to save the boy.

  She sat atop her horse amid a sea of black ghawls. Bastian and Tyllus were trapped in a corner. She suspected the pair lived only at the whim of the witch. More fodder for her cruel games.

  “Do not turn your face,” Mirra warned, “or I’ll make him suffer worse.”

  Kathryn would not have looked away. Mychall was frozen in terror. All she could do was offer her vigilance, her witness. She met his frightened gaze, his weeping eyes begging her to save him.

  First Penni, then the squires, now Mychall…

  “What? No tears for the boy?”

  Kathryn shifted her eyes to Mirra. “You taught me well,” she said. “Tears are for later. After you’ve killed your enemy, only then do you mourn your fallen.”

  Mirra cackled at her words. “Then I’ll give you much to cry about.” She lifted the sickle high.

  “No!” the horsemaster moaned.

  Kathryn merely stared into Mychall’s eyes, letting him see her love.

  It was such focus that alerted Kathryn to a shudder along Mirra’s raised arm. Kathryn felt something rush through the room like a gust of wind, but the air didn’t move. Still, the passage stoked the fires momentarily brighter, knocking back the ghawls.

  Kathryn responded. She kicked Stoneheart, but as usual
, he somehow read her intent, knowing her heart or sensing her hips tilting forward. Either way, he burst forward under her.

  He leaped the edge of flames that separated her from the witch.

  Mirra looked up, a cry on her lips. The sickle fell from her fingers.

  Surprised now, are you?

  Kathryn whipped her sword down in a savage swipe, but Mirra leaned back at the last moment. The tip of Kathryn’s sword sliced through the witch’s mouth, splitting her cheeks ear to ear as she screamed in rage. But it was not a fatal blow.

  Mirra tripped back, sporting a mouth as wide as her face, blood pouring in a river down her chin and jaw. She howled and revealed the full gape of her mouth.

  She lifted both arms, ready to unleash her legion upon Kathryn.

  It left her belly exposed.

  Mychall rose up from the floor, forgotten by the witch. He bore her sickle in hand. Using both arms, he hacked the blade through her gut.

  She screamed anew, stumbling back, spilling intestine.

  Kathryn had Stoneheart turned. She leaped back to the witch, but instead of attacking, she bent down and scooped Mychall one-armed up to her. He had been about to be skewered by one of the ghawls.

  Not this night.

  Mirra fell to her knees. She crawled to her staff, but the fire dimmed out of it. She grabbed it like a drowning man might a floating log. But the fires in it continued to die. And as the glow ebbed, the flames in the room brightened, as if a smothering smoke had lifted.

  The ghawls shifted about in confusion.

  Mirra rocked back, holding her staff, almost shaking it.

  One last cry, and she fell back in a pool of her own blood and entrails.

  Dead.

  Laurelle knelt on the stone. The torch lay nearby, forgotten, still burning. She held her hands over her face. Kytt crouched over her, an arm around her shoulders. He squeezed her tight. She leaned into him.

  “Come,” he said. “We must go.”

  Laurelle still could not stand. She could still picture Orquell smiling through the flames as he burnt, seated on the witch’s throne. The powder over his body had spread the flame quickly, wafting hay and sweetness. Laurelle suspected she would never again enter a barn without retching.