Dark Vengeance

by Ed Greenwood

  Gasps and startled cries among the Talonar below warned Jalandral Evendoom then, even before the crones standing with him did.

  Those two Nifl-shes flung off their robes to reveal black leather garb hung about with battle-scepters that could blast more of Talonnorn, to make those work gangs ever more needful. Snatching those blasting wands into their hands, they hissed words that awakened the scepters to almost blindingly glowing power.

  Nifl murmured in alarm and sought to draw back from around the podium, recognizing that they might imminently face the full-risen might of Nifl magic, the wildest fury that consumed its source, and so was unleashed only in dire moments, when all must be sacrificed.

  Yet the crones weren’t looking down at the crowd.

  They were gazing high across the cavern, at the swift-approaching menace—a flying force that some in the crowd had seen bursting out of the spell-glow of a great translocation that had snatched it from afar.

  The Hunt of Talonnorn! Whipswords and longlances gleaming, their spell-armor glowing like gems of all hues caught by firelight, the surviving Nifl of the flying Hunt of Talonnorn swept across the cavern on their long-necked, many-clawed darkwings.

  Like fell dark arrows they came racing, right at the high podium. The crones standing with the Lord of House Evendoom hurled bright blasting-spells at them in swiftly hissing frenzy, but Jalandral Evendoom merely glanced at the Hunt once, smiled, and turned again to the Talonar crowded into his forecourt below him.

  “Citizens, have no fear! I will stand for Talonnorn against even this treachery! I will save Talonnorn, and I will rule Talonnorn!”

  The foremost darkwings loomed up over the podium, jaws parting eagerly—before a bright burst of fiery magic tore it apart.

  Writhing black scaled fragments hurtled wetly in all directions, spattering those on the podium and the pushing, shoving-to-flee Nifl below. With them tumbled all that was left of its rider: a severed hand clutching a whipsword crawling with dying lightnings.

  “People of Talonnorn, I am your Lord!” Jalandral Evendoom bellowed, his spell-augmented voice like the deep roar of the fabled Ghodal Below.

  “I shall prevail!”

  And he smiled a broad and crooked smile as the air behind him flared with a new spell-glow, so bright and terrible that it made even the great Eventowers seem no more than a few black, vainly reaching fingers.

  “Tears of Olone!” Clazlathor whispered. “Now what?”

  3

  A Vow of Vengeance

  Will you stand waiting

  When the nightskins come up?

  Is your sword sharp enough

  Dark blood to sup?

  Will you be ready

  To fight and to die?

  Or hide, run, or cower

  And when dawn comes, to cry?

  —Orlkettle firesong

  Something moved in the night, a darker shape amid the deep shadows—a shape as softly supple as any serpent.

  Grammoth’s eyes narrowed. Was it just Kellurt creeping over to tap on Naraya’s back door again? Or heading down to the back fences, to seek the shuttered window of the widow Tayevur right down the far end of Orlkettle?

  What any woman saw in the sour-faced jeweler was beyond Grammoth. Aye, Kellurt the Grand took them food and left them coins, but still . . .

  The shadow advanced with sudden purpose, and Grammoth smelled a faint whiff of something that prickled in his nose, something he’d never smelt before.

  Something . . .other.

  The swiftest lad in all Orlkettle rolled away, as far and as fast as he could, coming to his feet with a shout. He flung the little bell he’d been holding the clapper of as hard as he could one way, to clang and clatter along the street, even as he hurled himself in the other direction.

  Answering shouts arose, near at hand and then farther off, and lanterns flared as they were unhooded. By then Grammoth was running as fast as he’d ever run in his life, whimpering in fear with his dagger half-drawn and the lean, furious-faced dark thing right behind him and reaching for him with fingers that were long and taloned.

  It can run faster than I can!

  Desperately he ducked around the corner of a shed, slipped and stumbled his frantic way up and over a midden-heap, shrieked as he smelled that smell again and his pursuer’s long arm came down—and then gasped, breath snatched out of his lungs in terror, as a steel sword longer than he was sliced out of the night to hack that reaching arm away.

  Behind Grammoth, the nightskin sobbed in astonished pain. Through his sweating, shivering fear the scrambling youth saw teeth just above that sword; teeth that flashed in a smile that wasn’t at all nice.

  The sword came slicing again. As he swung it, Orivon Firefist stopped smiling long enough to hiss something sharp and triumphantly challenging in a fluid, bubbling tongue that Grammoth didn’t understand—as the nightskin screamed, loud and agonized, right beside Grammoth . . .a horrible scream that turned into a wet choking and then a weaker bubbling.

  The forge-giant’s sword bit into jet-hued flesh again.

  The long-limbed dark elf reeled, whimpering, and fell.

  Orivon’s blade thrust down ruthlessly, and the nightskin stopped making noises.

  The forge-giant reached out a long arm, dug fingers bruisingly into Grammoth’s shoulder, hauled the frightened lad to his feet, and growled, “Stay by my side. There’ll be all too many others!”

  Grammoth was only too happy to obey. Shouts and screams rang all around them, now, and torches were flaring, spitting brightness into a night that seemed full of running men with axes and hay-forks—and swift-darting shadows.

  Orivon Firefist hadn’t waited for Grammoth’s reply. He was racing back out into the street, that fearsome sword gleaming as he swung it. Another nightskin shrieked, staggered, and fell. The sword thrust down brutally again, a black body spasmed—and Grammoth’s gut heaved.

  As he spewed his supper into the dirt, another two shadows ran past, moving like a storm wind yet making no more sound than a night breeze. Firefist heard them, though, and turned with that hard, nasty smile on his face, sword sweeping up.

  The dark elves promptly veered apart, waving swords that looked like black fingers of darkness, and then ran toward each other again, trapping the forgefist between them. They meant to . . .

  Grammoth threw his dagger desperately, right at one nightskin face.

  The dark elf calmly turned his head aside and tilted his head away, to let the hurled knife whirl harmlessly past—but Firefist had already spun to face the other nightskin, smashed that dark sword aside, buried his own blade in the dark elf’s other forearm, and sat himself down, jerking at his sword as he did so.

  Helplessly, the spitted elf was hurled over him and forward, keening in pain, to crash headfirst into the nightskin Grammoth had distracted. The two raiders stumbled together, entangled, and the forge-giant sprang up to hew at the backs of their knees. They fell heavily, and suddenly men of Orlkettle were all around them, shouting in fear and rage, and stabbing down with hay-forks like madmen.

  The heads of those two dark elves started to vanish messily under all the thrusting Orl steel, and Firefist turned away to seek more nightskins. Still retching, Grammoth staggered after him.

  A cottage thatch was burning, and by its leaping flames the lad saw the glint of his dagger, lying where it had fallen in the street. Plucking it up, he looked down the row of houses and saw distant bobbing lanterns—and, nearer at hand, bodies sprawled in the street. There were a few huddled, motionless heaps of village homespun, but more than a few black, long-limbed, somehow sleek bodies, too.

  Nightskins!

  Amid a sudden jangling of chimes, something pitched abruptly out of the darkness between two porches, and Orl-folk on one of those porches raced to it and started hacking and stabbing with their forks at the nightskin who’d tripped and was struggling to rise.

  The chime-strings!

  They worked!

  Orivon Firefist ha
d found another pair of nightskins, and his sword was ringing and clanging as they tangled with him, blade to blade. Orl-folk were throwing stools, churns, and even hoes at the two dark elves from behind, seemingly without effect—and beyond it all, Grammoth saw a lantern crash and fall with the village man who was clutching it. The dark shadow who’d killed him stooped, snatched up the still-burning lantern, and hurled it up onto another roof.

  Even as Grammoth shouted and pointed, the thatch smoked and then flared up, the nightskin darting away into the darkness.

  Behind Grammoth, someone screamed loudly, and he spun around in time to see four nightskins gathering, hissing things at each other and pointing with their swords—at Grammoth, amid other things.

  Another scream, right behind Grammoth, drove him to whirl frantically around again. He was in time to see a nightskin topple toward him, spewing a great froth of blood from its mouth, its head at an odd angle.

  As it fell, Orivon Firefist’s fearsome sword came free of its neck and was left waving bloodily in the air as the forge-giant stared past Grammoth at the four nightskins. He barked a bubbling string of words at them that sounded very much like orders, in that strange, flowing, wet-sounding language.

  The tongue of the nightskins sounded . . .exciting.

  The nightskins were hesitating, peering around as if seeking another of their kind. Evidently they couldn’t quite believe anyone of Orlkettle could speak their tongue.

  Orivon Firefist didn’t wait for them to think such matters over.

  He sprang right over Grammoth and charged the four, blood-wet sword shining in the firelight. At least three houses were afire now, and all Orlkettle was awake and shouting, rushing about on every side. Grammoth saw the four nightskins draw back, shifting to all face outward with their swords at the ready, as a fifth dark elf darted out of the night to join them.

  Which was when the forge-giant who’d been a nightskin slave reached them and gave a great bellow, his sword sweeping through the night air like the largest scythe in the world.

  At their faces Orivon hewed, and when they reared back and brought their blades up against his, he ducked and brought his slicing steel down in the air to reap their ankles, spilling and tumbling them in all directions as his rush carried him on into the backs of the two facing away from him. Those he trampled down, and broke the neck of one with his hand as he turned and hacked open the face of the other. Then he was bounding among the three that were left like a child pouncing on prized fruit, hacking and slashing and kicking in a frenzy that made Grammoth shiver all over again, even though it was nightskins who were dying messily in front of his eyes. The hated dark elves moaned and thrashed in pain and sprayed blood from slit throats just like slaughtered boar . . . or humans.

  And then a war-horn sounded, a horn that hissed more than any human horn—and suddenly the dark shadows of nightskins were racing away. All over Orlkettle, they streamed past the bright blazes of the burning homes in swift, eerie silence, vanishing back into the night.

  And Orivon Firefist was running with them, faster than Grammoth could have run, his sword reaching and reaping. Biting into this dark elf and that, sending them staggering and crying out, or arching in wild thrashings of agony.

  Grammoth ran after him as far as he dared, to where the leaping light of the burning homes faded into deeper night-gloom, and stood staring. Something moved, and he drew back in fear . . . only to swallow, whisper “But the Firefist ran after them all,” and dare to go forward far enough to see that a blood-drenched nightskin was trying to feebly crawl away from Orlkettle. Grammoth swallowed again, raised his dagger in hands he knew were trembling—and then rushed forward, snarling in silent distaste, and plunged it into a nightskin neck, leaping away again wildly when the stricken dark elf jerked around to face him, blood bursting forth from its mouth in a horrible, helpless choking flood. Then it fell forward into its own spew, clawing the ground feebly, and died.

  Grammoth backed away, suddenly cold and afraid, and found himself peering fearfully into the night with every swift step back toward the leaping flames.

  “There’s one!” old Mrickon snapped as Grammoth came up into the baker’s garden. Men of Orlkettle trotted forward, hefting clubs and axes, and seemed almost disappointed when Grammoth blurted out his name and insisted loudly that he was no nightskin.

  “More than that,” the deep voice of Orivon Firefist came out of the night behind him, seeming to hold a grim smile in its tones. “Grammoth Gheskryn is a slayer-of-nightskins. I saw him kill one, and he helped me down another. Fine knife-work.”

  Grammoth flushed and stood taller as he saw Orl-folk peering at him, as they came hurrying with lanterns and torches in their hands.

  He wasn’t as tall as Firefist, though; the forge-giant strode past just then, a head above everyone else in Orlkettle. Orivon Firefist was dark and sticky with blood that was not his own, but smiled fiercely as he came out into the full firelight—and the people of Orlkettle raised a ragged cheer.

  “Good folk!” he called as he came. “How many of us died, this night?”

  “One, at least,” someone called. “Harglin.”

  “I saw Toskur the Elder,” someone else said. “He’s lying in the street back there. There’s not much left of his head.”

  “Dorl, and his brother Thammon, too,” another man put in.

  “And Kellurt Bane-of-Husbands!” Mrickon added gleefully, news that raised some chuckles.

  “Two–three more are hurt bad,” a younger man offered.

  “And how many children are taken?” Firefist asked.

  Silence fell as if he’d slain all noise with his sword, and in its heart could be heard a faint, distant weeping.

  “Larane the dyer’s little ones,” old Bryard said grimly, waving his hand toward the sounds of grief. “Brith and his sister Reldaera. She was the prettiest we had.”

  The forge-giant’s smile went away as he strode toward the weeping.

  In the village square, a little knot of women were hugging the sobbing Larane to themselves, their backs forming a wall around her to keep the world at bay.

  In silence Orivon Firefist bore down on them. All Orlkettle seemed to be following him, or have gathered in the square already. They gazed in silence as the forge-giant stopped at the nearest dark elf corpse, and rolled it over with his foot.

  “We never killed a nightskin before, though,” a man said triumphantly in the crowd. “And there’s seven or more, just here!”

  “And a lot more, where he went after them,” another man added, nodding at the forge-giant.

  Who looked around at them all, gathering their attention to him, and then pointed down at a badge on the throat-armor of the dead dark elf.

  “Towers rising from darkwings,” Orivon said. “Mark it well.”

  Some of the men—and Grammoth, too—dared to come close enough to peer.

  “These Niflghar came from the city of Talonnorn.”

  Firefist’s pointing finger moved to indicate a smaller symbol graven into the cuff above one limp Nifl hand. “The Talon of Oondaunt.”

  “What’s that?” Mrickon dared to ask.

  “A noble House of that city. A rich family.” The forge-giant took two steps toward the water-trough, to where the light of the hanging lanterns was strongest, and raised his voice to add, “I know where these raiders came from.”

  “And this consoles our Larane how?” one of the women—old beak-nosed Meljarra, wife to Osmur the carpenter—almost spat at him. “Her children are still taken!”

  Orivon Firefist took a step toward that angry goodwife, and the silence became an utter, hard-edged thing that seemed to sing with the tension of coming battle. (Even the weeping woman who’d lost her children fell silent, staring in frozen, white-faced stillness at the hulking man with the sword.)

  Who turned, took a step toward that bereft mother, and said to her gently, “Hear me, Larane. I will go after the nightskins, and try to get Brith and Reldaera back.”<
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  She stared at him, trembling, but found no words to say. As her mouth worked and fresh tears streamed down her face, the forge-giant looked around at the watching villagers, and raised his voice again.

  “More than that: I will go after the Dark Ones and kill as many as I can, to humble them. To make them fear Orlkettle forevermore, so that they dare not come again.”

  The villagers stared at him in disbelief, or awe, and fear stirred in their faces. Orivon saw it and said swiftly, “You have seen how easily nightskins can die, this night. You can defend yourselves right well, friends. For behold, they have fled—though more than a score of them will never run anywhere, ever again.”

  There were a few yells of agreement that might have become a feeble cheer if the villagers hadn’t looked so lost. “Only a few of us died, and they snatched only two to be slaves. I have heard Mrickon and old Aunjae and Thurtha talk of raids that carried off dozens, almost every child in the village. Folk of Orlkettle, you have fought the proudest Niflghar and won!”

  That did raise a ragged cheer.

  It didn’t last long, but Orivon didn’t need it to. Raising his hands as it died away, he roared, “Hunters, to me! Gather at the forge!”

  He turned a little, and shouted, “Mrickon! Grammoth! I need you to get everyone who can swing a weapon into a ring all around Orlkettle! Standing in threes, each trio with two lit lanterns and some weapons! Stand where you can see the next group on either side. Haste!”

  Even back-country villages like Orlkettle had heard royal proclamations a time or two; Orl-folk understood the imperious roar of command. Suddenly everyone was moving, rushing about and chattering excitedly, afire with their own victory.

  The forge-giant reached out a long arm through the bustling chaos, took Larane by the shoulders, and pulled her along as he strode toward the forge, the women who’d shielded her clucking all around him like so many disapproving hens.