Shadow Born

by Martin Frowd

  “Muar’na’graat,” Glaraz intoned next, hoping that transformative magics might avail him where the direct attacks of shadow and bone curses had not. The Druid raised a hand again to ward off this latest magical attack, but stiffened, standing still and rigid. Illuminated by the flashing lightning, Glaraz saw his foe’s rain-soaked, blood and mud beslimed brown robes turn to grey and take on the hardness of stone. Where the Druid’s hands and feet emerged from his raiment, they too faded to grey as they succumbed to the necromancer’s petrifying magic. In seconds, a statue stood in place of the living Druid, hooded face frozen into a soundless scream, eyes staring forward.

  Glaraz permitted himself a moment to catch his breath, leaning on the spear he had appropriated to help keep his balance on the now marshy slope, as the last two of his skeletal minions closed in on the statue. Their bladed arms rose high as they approached, slogging through the mud and the still-torrential rain, one skeleton from either side, closing in on the petrified Druid. The downpour had not abated with the Druid’s transformation from flesh to stone, and Glaraz could barely see through the curtain of falling water. Thunder boomed above. Lightning flashed, splitting the sky and illuminating the statue, the necromancer and the pair of skeletons.

  Golden-brown fur sprouted along stony arms and legs. Rigid stone robes became thick pelt, stone hood transformed into furred mane, and stone face gave way to slavering leonine muzzle. In an instant, the stone man was replaced by a very much alive, mobile and furious lion.

  Bone blades, already poised, swung down at the beast from either side, biting deep. Razor sharp ridges of bone slashed at the lion’s flanks, sending twin sprays of blood up into the rain. The beast roared with fresh pain and rage as it shook its bloodied pelt but lashed out regardless with huge paws. The force of its counterattack sent the two skeletons sprawling in opposite directions. As the undead minions struggled to recover their footing, fighting the mud that sought to swallow them, the lion growled and leapt at Glaraz.

  Several hundred pounds of wet, bleeding and angry beast slammed into the necromancer, knocking him over on his back. Glaraz tried to bring up the spear that he had been using as a walking staff to hold off his foe, but it merely scored another bloody line along the lion’s flank before being torn from his grasp by the force of the lion’s impact. The spear fell and disappeared into the mud as the lion landed on top of him. The air left his lungs with alacrity and he gasped, choking. His blood ran cold as hot, fetid breath blasted his face, and powerful jaws closed on his neck. Though his earthbone ward prevented the lion’s sharp teeth from breaking his skin, Glaraz knew it would not prevent the lion-Druid from snapping his neck with a powerful shake of its head.

  Twin blades scythed into the lion’s flanks. The prone necromancer felt the impacts as a dull thud above him, causing the beast to convulse atop him, as more hot blood spurted from the wounds and ran over his sodden robes. The lion roared in agonised fury, in the process releasing its hold on Glaraz’s neck, and scrabbled around in the mud to lash out at the skeletons who had resumed their assault. Glaraz had the presence of mind to roll to the side as soon as the vast weight was no longer pinning him, floundering through the mud as the beast battled his minions.

  As the necromancer scrambled to his feet again, sliding and slipping in stiff, soaked robes whose weight seemed to have tripled, coughing and gasping for air as he righted himself, squinting to see through the downpour, he saw that one of his skeletons stood facing the lion, slashing and hacking at its forepaws, using its sharpened arm ridges to fend off the lion’s retaliatory swats. The other skeleton had managed to clamber onto the huge beast’s back and was clinging onto its bedraggled mane with one bony hand while using the razor-sharp ridge along its other arm to saw at the side of the lion’s neck, like a demented combination of cavalryman and violinist. Blood gushed freely from the beast’s various wounds as it thrashed around, slapping at one skeleton while trying to dislodge the other, while the rain continued to fall relentlessly.

  Abruptly the lion folded in on itself and was replaced again by the Druid’s human form. The skeletons, unprepared for the change and overextended against an enemy who was no longer there, sprawled and slid in the bloody mud again as the robed Druid, wet and bedraggled but once again unharmed, stood and gestured with both hands. Twin gusts of directed wind, one from each hand, struck the skeletons and sent them hurtling through the air and rolling down the caved-in side of the burial mound, to fall into its interior and vanish from sight. The Druid turned his attention to Glaraz, raising his hands to begin another mystical gesture, but the necromancer was quicker to react.

  “NeShish. Graa’na’graat.” Glaraz rattled off two more spells in rapid succession. Once again, the necromancer resorted to his transformative magics, but this time, having seen how easily the Druid had shrugged off the petrification spell by simply shifting back into his lion form, Glaraz did not target the Druid directly, but instead the ground beneath him. The mud beneath and around the Druid’s feet – bare, like all his Order – bubbled and churned for a moment as the moisture was abruptly removed from it, transforming it to packed earth. The next instant, before the Druid could react – or the heavy rains could wash the earth away again – the earth in turn was transformed into solid stone, trapping the Druid’s feet and lower legs in a firm hold, just as the Druid had earlier attempted to engulf the necromancer’s own legs in a wave of mud.

  Conscious of just how dangerous the Druid would be if given a moment to shift back into his lion form – particularly if the change gave him the strength to pull free from the stony grasp immobilising his human legs – Glaraz pushed himself forward, one hand yanking back the hood of the Druid’s sodden robe while the other slapped down on the crown of the man’s shaven head. As the Druid glared furiously, even as his arms came up to bat Glaraz away, the necromancer spoke the arcane words that actualised one of the most formidable spells in his repertoire, and yet one of the most limited, because it required specific physical contact with the target.

  “Sel’shul.”

  The Druid convulsed once and went limp in the necromancer’s grasp, as Glaraz’s spell drained the life from him. The spark of hate and rage in his eyes went out and his final breath rattled in his throat.

  Abruptly, the torrential rains ceased to fall, the thunder no longer pealed, and the lightning flashes stopped. The silvery moon emerged from behind a cloud as black as the necromancer’s own robes, and Glaraz surveyed the scene before him with greatly improved visibility. The necromancer released the dead Druid, who sagged but remained upright, the grip of transformed stone holding him from the knees down. A trickle of renewed strength flowed into Glaraz from his drained opponent, but he remained battered, bruised, weary, and soaked after the prolonged encounter. And he had yet to retrieve his young charge, the point of this whole wretched sojourn. Zarynn. I am coming for you, boy.

  Hoping that that retrieval – and potentially facing yet another Druid, and in a null zone to boot – would not tax him beyond his remaining capabilities, the necromancer began to descend the wrecked burial mound, urgency in his steps as he headed for the valley below.

  EIGHT: THE SILENT VALE

  Zarynn gaped as once again, a man became a living torch before him, shrouded in flames of an eerie deep grey hue. The hunter stumbled and thrashed from side to side, burning swiftly, yet radiating no heat, making no sound and filling the silent air with no stench. The man’s face was contorted into a silent scream as he blazed. In seconds, only a pile of smouldering ash remained.

  More hard-faced hunters closed in on Zarynn, spears levelled. One, face twisted into a soundless snarl, grabbed Zarynn’s hair in one hand and drew back his spear in the other, as if to plunge it into the bound and gagged boy’s throat. But the blow never came. Another hand landed on the hunter’s shoulder, pulling him back. The man half-whirled, raising his spear, but froze and dropped into a jerky, awkward bow as he saw who had interrupted him.

  From his position, Za
rynn’s line of sight was still limited, but he saw enough to know that the second man, who had interrupted his would-be killer, wore long hooded robes with bare feet like a Druid. But unlike the Druid who had caught him outside the cave, and the one who had orchestrated the murder of his parents – just a few days ago, but in some ways, it already seemed like so much longer – the glowing light globes over the hunters’ heads showed that this one’s robes were not brown, but jet black.

  Zarynn had never seen a Black Druid in the flesh before, but he recalled that Glaraz had said Druids came in both brown and black. Try as he might, he could not remember how they differed in their evil powers. Apart from the darker hue of his robes, this one looked just like the other Druids Zarynn had encountered: cruel, malicious and arrogant, entirely confident that he would be obeyed by all loyal folk of the People.

  A pair of enormous shaggy black beasts flanked this Druid, larger than the hunting cats which had helped catch Zarynn, perhaps a trifle smaller than the lion. Their eyes glowed red like coals. These surely must be the doomwolves of whom both Glaraz and the dead man had spoken. They drew back their lips to snarl silently, exposing vicious fangs, and sniffed at the captive boy. Their breath stank of something unutterably foul, not simply hot and fetid like the lion’s but with an underlying wrongness. More long, black shapes slunk in the shadows, with the same glowing red eyes. From Zarynn’s limited perspective, he could not accurately gauge their numbers, nor tell the full count of armed men who also guarded this eerie, silent place.

  The black-robed Druid gestured to the hunters, and another one took the reins of the pony over which Zarynn was still draped and bound. More hunters pressed in on either side, glaring watchfully at Zarynn, knuckles almost white as they gripped their spears tightly. The procession set off again, heading deeper into this strange silent valley. From the corner of his eye, Zarynn spotted several of the doomwolves pacing the hunters, a swift and terrible presence in the shadows at the edge of his vision.

  A flare of lightning somewhere in the distance split the night sky. Zarynn tried to crane his neck around the side of the pony to see more clearly. Another bright flash followed. It certainly looked like lightning striking one of the big hills, or mounds, at the entrance to the valley, but Zarynn still could hear nothing. If there was thunder or rain with the lightning, this eldritch place blocked it out.

  One of the hunters pointed up at the distant lightning with his spear, and indicated the path behind the group, down which they had come into the valley. The Druid shook his head firmly. Zarynn thought the hunter looked mutinous for a moment, but then the man subsided, clearly unwilling to disobey the Druid. Zarynn recalled the secret teachings of his murdered parents, that Druids were evil and cruel like the Dark God whom they served, but few of the People would dare go against them. None could defy the Druids openly and survive.

  The memory of his parents, struck down before their time, brought tears to the bound and gagged boy’s eyes once again. He wept silently, fat teardrops running down his cheeks and into his gag, as the hunters escorted him, still draped across the pony’s back, deeper into the valley. Though no sound could be heard in this strange place, his tears did not escape the attention of the men who escorted him, and several pointed at him, jeering and sneering silently as they brandished their spears at him. For all that the lion-Druid had decreed his fate to be a return to the execution ground of his clan, and only there to die, he still flinched, as best he could in his bondage, as the spears moved closer to his face. His panic only served to goad the hunters further, and a sharp spear tip touched his cheek, just under his left eye. Another grazed his throat, and he froze instinctively, but his emotions were in turmoil, fear and despair beginning to overwhelm him. His eyes swam with tears, his throat felt hot and tight, and the buzzing began again in his head.

  This time, when the shimmering iron-grey shadowfire erupted, it did so in a wave that burst forth in all directions around him.

  The hunters collapsed, spears discarded as they immolated, swaying and blazing silently, mouths open wide in silent screams. Their ponies were not spared either this time, torched by the same intense burst of magic, thrashing and kicking the air as they burned in complete silence.

  The pony across whose back Zarynn was bound reared up, kicking and squirming in agony as the shadowy fires burned it to ash. Zarynn felt the steed collapse beneath him, felt the ropes give way, and suddenly he was falling. He managed to twist in mid-air and hit the ground on his side rather than his head, but the breath was knocked from his lungs for a moment and he saw stars.

  For a moment, he was on the orange rocky plain again, crouched beneath the eerie green sky. Massive blasts of dark green lightning ripped across it, reminding him of the lightning flashes he had seen striking the mound at the mouth of the valley in the waking world. But this time Zarynn retained, albeit barely, the presence of mind to realise that he had not been knocked out, nor was he asleep.

  Fledgling. Zarynn. As before, the disembodied, booming voice seemed to emanate from everywhere around him. Up, fledgling. Your enemies beset you, and you must run. Run now. He blinked, and reality came crashing back in around him. He scrambled to his feet, and no ropes constrained him, burned away by the magic he could not yet control. Silently snarling black wolves loped toward him from both sides of the path that ran through the middle of the valley, their red eyes glowing, jaws open and fangs slavering. He had lost sight of the Druid, but more hunters were closing in on him from out of the shadows, fury in their faces and spears in their grasp. Run now, the booming voice thundered in his head, even in his fully awake state. RUN!

  Zarynn complied with the command that echoed inside his head, breaking into a run with no thought as to direction or heading, only the need to get away from the approaching hunters and the terrifying doomwolves. The ground sloped downward slightly under his feet, taking him further away from the valley mouth and reunion with the necromancer Glaraz, but in his panic, he paid it no heed. He fled, picking up speed as he pelted down the valley with men and doomwolves loping after him in deadly pursuit.

  Zarynn was dimly aware of something gigantic swooping out of the sky. Black wings, far wider than those of any bird, spread to its sides. He had a brief, confused impression of scales the colour of midnight, and vast jaws opening wide, and the night sky seemed to rain shadowy grey fire on all sides of him, though it touched him not. He ran, squeezing his eyes shut to blot out the fearsome sight, desperate to get away.

  After a while, Zarynn realised he was no longer running on the loose, hard-edged gravel of the valley floor, but on something substantially smoother and more consistent. That realisation forced Zarynn to open his eyes and examine his surroundings. The ground beneath his feet was indeed smooth, polished stone, black as a doomwolf’s coat, with veins of gold snaking through it. Walls of the same shining black flanked him, like no cave he had ever seen, clearly shaped by the hand – and tools – of some crafter. A third such wall, a few more man-lengths in front of him, blocked his way further, and he realised if he had waited another few moments to open his eyes, he would have crashed headlong into it. The golden veins running through the walls and floor glowed with a soft radiance, giving him more than enough light by which to see.

  Zarynn turned around as his panic subsided and gave way to new worry at the sheer strangeness of his surroundings. No cave looked anything like this, nor did any yurt of the People! Looking back behind him, he saw that the smooth, shaped and polished black stone gave way after a while to rough, natural-looking black ebonstone, sloping slightly upward, turning around a bend to his left and looking just like a cave. Zarynn realised that he must have run into one of the caves that pockmarked the base of the valley, but he had certainly never expected to find such a sight within a cave.

  A soft humming began, and Zarynn realised it was coming from beneath the black stone floor. Then he realised that he could hear again at last – or at least that there was something to hear. For the first time sin
ce the hunters had led him into the strange, silent valley, Zarynn was able to give vent to a sigh of relief. The sigh quickly became a strangled gasp of surprise as a part of the floor appeared to slide away, and something rose out of the gap, between him and the way back out of the cave.

  Zarynn recognised the concept of a chair, for Chief Zovyth of his old clan had possessed one, a valued possession of cloth and wooden struts that was carefully folded up and carried through every migration and unpacked whenever they made camp in a new place. The old chief would sit in the chair, the only one the Duskwalker clan of the People owned, at meal times or when he dispensed wisdom or judgement. But this chair was nothing like that one. The chair that had risen out of the floor was a gleaming black, to match the walls, but appeared to be made of metal rather than stone, or the cloth and wood of Chief Zovyth’s chair. Zarynn gasped at the sight, having never seen so much metal in a single object before. Zarynn wondered, if this chair had been owned by his clan of the People, how many women it would have taken every day to keep it this clean. And then he wondered, had it been owned by his clan, if the smith would have insisted on breaking it up, and smelting it into other, more important things. He would have remade it into weapons, perhaps, or tools.

  Zarynn tentatively reached out a hand and touched one arm of the chair. It was cool to the touch, but not cold, and felt distinctly smoother than the best iron that the Duskwalker clan smith had ever forged. Zarynn cringed at the memory of the old smith, bringing back as it did a corresponding memory of the iron execution tree to which he had been bound, and on which, if Glaraz had not saved him, he would have died by stoning.