Dark Vengeance

by Ed Greenwood

  The Talonar crones stood frozen on their balcony, hardly daring to hope—and then moaned in despairing unison, as the stranger came striding into view out of the dust, evidently unharmed. He was smiling, and the flickering glows of great destroying magics swirled around both of his bare and empty hands.

  A relative quiet had fallen over Glowstone. The prowling beasts of the Wild Dark who’d been arriving in great numbers to see what wounded and carrion could be easily had were all dead now, or had been taught prudence by ready Nifl blades and had slunk back out into the darkness, to lurk and await better opportunities.

  Yet the most respected Niflghar in Glowstone suddenly stiffened, causing Lord Erlingar Evendoom to frown in alarm and stride toward him.

  Before he could reach Faunhorn, his brother turned to face Erlingar and announced grimly, “Something is happening in Talonnorn.”

  “What?”

  Faunhorn shook his head. “I know not. But it is very bad.”

  Erlingar turned to face in the direction of distant Talonnorn, then threw up his hands. “There is nothing I can do, beyond trudge there and see the aftermath. Nothing.”

  He turned away, striding aimlessly across the cavern, and then came to a halt, and shrugged. “I am no longer of Talonnorn.”

  Faunhorn silently walked to his side, and put an arm around his shoulders.

  “I should have stayed and died,” Erlingar whispered, after a time.

  “No,” Faunhorn replied firmly. “That would have been the easy way. And Lords of Evendoom do not take the easy way.”

  The place where Jalandral had imprisoned Klaerra Evendoom “for her own safety” was a chamber deep in the cellars of the Eventowers.

  Jalandral led the way to it in silence, grimly satisfied to hear all converse among the merchants of the Araed and the priestesses following him slowly die away in awe as the descent went on, and on . . . and on. Stairs after stairs, halls after passages. None of them had ever seen such extensive underways before, nor such wealth; the Eventowers went down a long way.

  At least a dozen times during their journey, the stone rocked and rumbled all around them, shaken by great explosions or tremors from above. Once, one of the priestesses shrieked in the heart of those shakings, and more than once, as dust and small stones rained down around them, the merchants cursed.

  When Jalandral finally reached the door he was seeking, it stood open, causing him to frown and quicken his stride. Keeping pace beside him, the merchant Ondrar muttered something under his breath, and a faintly glowing aura suddenly swirled around the High Lord of Talonnorn, shielding him against . . .

  Nothing, as it happened.

  The chamber beyond the door was comfortably furnished, with a high oval bed whose rim was set with a fringe of fine silver manacles; they were the only suggestions of confinement or compulsion in the room. A scrying-whorl floated in the air beside the bed, and a barefoot crone in light chamber robes stood before it, gazing into it. She turned to regard the Nifl now crowding into the chamber with a polite smile and a nod of greeting, and held out her hands to Jalandral.

  Who stopped well short of stepping into them, and said, “Klaerra, I am here on matters of state—”

  “Dral,” she said gently, her soft voice causing sudden tense silence in the room, “be welcome. I know why you’ve come.” She aimed one finger at the whorl in explanation, and then stood silent, waiting.

  Silence deepened, as everyone stood staring. Jalandral stared down at his hands as if expecting to find something unusual had appeared in them, and then threw up his head almost briskly—only to say softly, “The door . . . it was open.”

  Klaerra shrugged. “The chamber pot became full, and as I wasn’t a prisoner . . .”

  Jalandral winced. “But the spells on that door . . .”

  The Evendoom crone smiled at him, her eyes unreadable. “Mere trifles, High Lord. You really should get someone competent to work magic for you. Me, for instance.”

  Several of the Araed merchants and all of the priestesses took those softly spoken words as a threat, and recoiled, expecting spells to lash out at them without warning.

  Klaerra’s face acquired a sad smile at their reaction, but nothing else happened.

  Jalandral stood his ground, kept his eyes on hers, and said quietly, “I have made several mistakes, Lady of Evendoom. Yet I do not believe any of them had anything to do with the current crisis besetting Talonnorn—a crisis that compels me to request your help.”

  As if it had been listening for a cue, the room rocked, rock dust falling in a light shower, and the stone walls boomed and echoed.

  “Klaerra,” Jalandral said unnecessarily, “Talonnorn is under attack.”

  The response was a nod. “From Klarandarr of Ouvahlor within our walls, and several small fighting bands approaching out of the Dark.”

  “So, Lady,” Jalandral said gravely, “you know our need.”

  “Yes,” Klaerra Evendoom replied, her eyes steady on his. “Yes, I do.” She smiled. “Done to death by dung-worms. How . . . prosaic. All the might of Talonnorn—warblades and crones, sorcerous items and spellrobes galore, Consecrated of Olone and holy magic—and we fight for Talonnorn with dung-worms.”

  Jalandral sighed. “I . . . fear so.”

  “Are you in too much haste for a last farewell between us?” Klaerra asked, flicking one finger in the direction of the bed so subtly that only he saw it.

  Jalandral’s eyes fell. “I fear so.”

  “Then we should proceed without delay. There is, I should point out, one small impediment.”

  “Yes?” Jalandral asked reluctantly, into a silence that had sharpened into sudden tension again.

  Klaerra waved a hand at the Araed merchants who stood glaring at her, their hands on all manner of weapons. “Unless these rampants are crones cloaked in spell-guise, you’re going to need a lot more crones. I suggest you send a trader or two back up into the Eventowers, to summon all you can find down here, in your name.” She smiled wanly. “I should not like my death to be wasted.”

  “There is a chance that you will live—” Jalandral insisted, taking a step closer to her, but she shook her head and waved him away.

  “I shall be sacrificing myself, and you know it. To serve as focus for even three skilled Consecrated—and forgive me, but these you have brought seem far from that—savages the focus. I can yet count, Dral. I will be savaged thrice over, and you will need many more than those here. To save Talonnorn, you must have a lot of crones and priestesses casting through me, each working to compel one dung-worm. That is Klarandarr of Ouvahlor toppling buildings above our heads, not a reckless young spellrobe with his first war-scepter.”

  Jalandral sighed heavily, and then turned, pointed at three of the younger merchants, and commanded, “Fetch all the crones you can, and lead them back here. Haste matters, as does not getting . . .” His voice trailed off.

  “Getting yourself killed,” Klaerra finished for him, her voice quiet and dignified. “Obey the High Lord of Talonnorn. Go.”

  The traders stared at her, then turned as one and rushed out of the room. One of the priestesses started to weep softly, and Jalandral shifted his feet, drew in a deep breath, and said, “Lady, I . . .” He ran out of words to say, threw up his hands helplessly, and tried again. “I—ah—”

  Klaerra held up an imperious hand, commanding his silence, and he gave it.

  “I do not do this for you, Jalandral,” she told him. “Not out of love, nor admiration, nor obedience—for your lordship is no more than a hollow thing of words. I do this for Talonnorn.”

  Jalandral stared at her, mouth open to snap something—and then closed it again, shrugged, waved at the priestesses to begin preparations for the spell, and strolled to the back of the chamber.

  The Ouvahlan rear guard rose up in front of them without warning, five Nifl who snarled defiance as their swords sang out.

  The forgefist never slowed. The blade in his left hand thrust deep into o
ne Ouvahlan face, and the one in his right struck aside a thrusting sword with such force that its wielder stumbled sideways into the Ouvahlan beside him.

  Orivon swung around to face them, opening both their throats even before they could regain their balances. They started to fall—leaving him room enough to reach over them and put the tip of his sword into an eye belonging to the Ouvahlan who’d just ducked behind them.

  That left only one Ouvahlan for any Nifl to deal with, and it took the Dounlar brothers barely a breath to bury their three swords in him.

  Garlane Dounlar regarded Orivon with an unlovely smile. “I had no idea Hairy Ones could fight!”

  “Garlane, behave,” his brother Barrandar snapped. “Such lack of honor!”

  “Honor? When trading with a human?”

  “Your brother means that you demean yourself by baiting anyone so,” Orivon said quietly. “Lose your fury, rampant of Dounlar. We humans are just as bad as Niflghar. And just as good, of course.”

  As the chant rolled over him and swept him up in its rising yearning, even old Ondrar was awed. Some of the younger Araed merchants, standing back against the walls of the chamber shaking in the thrall of the rising chant, were in tears, their arms dragged involuntarily aloft, their faces working.

  In the center of the room, the crones and the handful of Consecrated the merchants had brought here were standing in a ring around the one who’d agreed to sacrifice herself. They were chanting ever-faster, arms rising and falling in a dance of mounting urgency and—and power.

  Power.

  Yes, and how was the one who’d sought so much power, and been so changed, so swiftly, by what he’d managed to grasp?

  Curiously Ondrar glanced over at Jalandral, the self-proclaimed High Lord of Talonnorn.

  Jalandral wasn’t there.

  Blinking in astonishment, the old merchant struggled to look all around the chamber. Seeing no sign of Lord Evendoom, Ondrar thrust himself away from the wall and turned to look all around, despite the tugging might of the ongoing chant.

  Aye, he’d not been mistaken. Jalandral Evendoom was gone.

  Ondrar thrust out a hand and slapped the merchant next to him—who blinked, struggled as if needing to fight to regain control of his body, and then turned frowningly to Ondrar—and hissed, “Jalandral’s gone! Gone!”

  At that moment, the chant rose to a high, trilling note that smote all ears painfully—and at the heart of the ring, Klaerra Evendoom rose slowly into the air. Arms spread, bare feet together, her light robe rippling around her legs as if she were caught in a gale, she threw back her head and crowned the chant with a high, climbing scream.

  A moment later, both of her eyes burst into flames, that roared up to lick and then scorch the ceiling.

  Half a city away, Klarandarr stopped in midstride, and turned toward a sudden sound. High and bell-like, it was the thin, clear call of a lone Nifl-she’s scream.

  A scream carried to him by magic, and laced around with magic.

  A scream he should not have been able to hear, through the rolling crash of the building he’d just felled.

  A frown came across the spellrobe’s calm face. A frown that deepened into sharp-staring alarm as the sound continued, growing louder.

  A moment later, he started muttering out spells just as fast as his lips could move, leveling his arms like lances at the nearest tower.

  Even before it started to topple, he was blasting down the next one.

  He needed to smash down every last building between him and the source of that scream—and he needed to do it fast.

  In dark caverns and tumble-rock passages all across the Wild Dark, dung-worms stopped gliding, and stiffened.

  Where open spaces above them permitted, they reared up, to rock back and forth, listening.

  Then they started to tremble, great flanks rippling, heads quivering.

  And then they started to move, turning if they needed to, starting to slither through the long stone passages, faster and ponderously faster.

  All of them, every one, they came. Converging on Talonnorn.

  Orivon Firefist was really sprinting now, even as some of the Nifl running behind him faltered and stared up at the cracking, falling buildings ahead.

  Beside him, Taerune Evendoom was running just as fast, speeding along like the wind, matching him stride for stride.

  As always, the Talonnorn before them was a walled city without walls. Breach after breach had been made in its walls, as the city spilled out farther and farther across its vast cavern, until there were no real barriers left, but only a scattered confusion of new towers being hurled up here, there, and everywhere.

  Until now. When someone was busily hurling them back down.

  With the House Dounlar warblades right behind them, Orivon and Taerune rushed into the first street they came to, a way flanked by buildings that were leaning and shedding falls of stone all around them as they ran.

  At the first street-moot, Talonar in armor with swords in their hands came out of the side streets to block their way.

  And were promptly sworded down.

  Warning horns rang out from nearby windows, and more Talonar appeared.

  “You!” one of those new warblades cried, charging at Taerune with his sword raised to his shoulder to slice down and cleave her.

  “I know you! You’re Evendoom, you are!”

  “And you,” Orivon said to him, striking that sword aside, against the Nifl warrior’s neck, “you’re in Talonnorn, you are!”

  “And in Talonnorn, no one lives forever!” Taerune snarled, grinning—as she buried her blade hilt-deep in the warblade’s throat.

  21

  The Spellrobe Gone Mad

  Priestesses cruel and ruthless

  I face time and time again

  The Dark holds monsters many

  No relief from their creepings

  Know we, nor expect any

  Yet there is a danger I fear

  More than these common perils

  One that makes high lords

  And masters-of-battle alike quake.

  Beware what they fear most:

  The spellrobe gone mad.

  —legendary Talonar saying,

  attributed to Sardron Oszrim

  “Follow me,” Taerune murmured in Orivon’s ear as they tugged their blades free of dead Nifl, bumping hip to hip in the bloody aftermath of hewing down the Talonar who’d attacked them. “I’ll take you to House Oondaunt’s yeldeth caverns. They’re clear across Talonnorn.”

  Orivon’s nod was the tiniest movement of his head he could manage; he knew Dounlar warblades were drawing closer around them, to listen.

  “When Ouvahlor attacked last time,” Taerune told him, raising her voice just a trifle so the Dounlar Nifl could overhear but it didn’t seem like she was intending them to, “they came swarming up out of a tunnel that rises into Talonnorn on the far side of the city, there.” She pointed across the many-towered city with her blade. “What has come out of the Dark just now is paltry enough that I believe it must be a diversion. The real attack will come through that tunnel again—and we must be there to meet it.”

  Without another word, she started running in the direction she’d pointed, and Orivon started trotting after her. A moment later, at a nod from their House heir, the Dounlar warblades all started to follow.

  The flames that had raged so freely across Talonnorn, dancing high in the air without blazing on the ground or seeming to need fuel, had scorched balconies everywhere, cooking high turrets and those in them, but were gone now.

  The rumblings of falling buildings, however, were still shaking the city—and they were running right toward those rumblings.

  Around them, as they ran, doors were closed and windows were shuttered. Aside from plentiful sprawled corpses, the few Talonar they saw out-of-doors were skulking grimly along in small groups, keeping close to walls, swords out and suspicion in their faces. War had come to the streets of Talonnorn.

/>   Orivon, Taerune, and the Dounlar warblades ran on. Off to their right, a strange shrill sound was rising; a high, warbling scream or shriek that went on and on without a break. It sounded as if a Nifl-she with powerful lungs and a commanding voice was trilling ceaselessly without ever needing to breathe, and it was growing ever higher and louder.

  Taerune hastened on across the city with Orivon and the Dounlar Nifl hot on her heels. They came to streets where dazed Talonar were hurrying toward them with terror on their faces, offering no violence to anyone but obviously seeking to get away from something just as fast as they could hasten.

  Then the streets of frightened Nifl gave way to an open area of heaped rubble and devastation that had once—a very short time ago—been most of the Araed. The crowded hovels and ramshackle warehouses the Talonar nobles had so utterly failed to eradicate in many, many attempts had been smashed down and swept aside in a seeming trice. Ahead, over heaps of broken stone, they could see the distant, riven walls of House Oondaunt. Its central towers were shattered and fallen, and amid the slumped stones small fires were raging.

  They gave that shocking destruction only a moment’s glance. Far off to their right, at the end of the trail of devastation, something else snatched at their attention.

  A lone Nifl rampant, a spellrobe, was standing with his back to them, arms raised as he hurled a spell that sent a seething, frothing emerald-green something at the walled stone mansions in front of him—mansions from which arrows and spears and a few spells of stabbing lightnings spat, in his direction.

  Those hurtling dooms faded away long before reaching the spellrobe, obviously encountering unseen shielding spells, but his emerald-hued magic melted through the outer walls and then the mansions inside those walls in an instant, causing the grand buildings to come crashing down.