Forging the Runes

by Josepha Sherman

  Now? With the city and land so prosperous? Oh, good thinking. Hurt the merchants, hurt the economy, and you hurt your people's trust in you. Hurt, that trust and you're just asking for treason to spring up at home while you're off in the field.

  God. Here they went again. Two other ealdormen had started arguing as hotly as two small boys. Egbert recognized them after a moment: Cerdric and Aethelred. Members of rival families, families that had been at each others' throats for far longer than either ealdorman had been alive.

  Fortunate that I don't allow weapons in here. Though it might stop this farce if one of them took the other's head off.

  Aethelred was shouting something about King Cenwulf of Mercia, and Cerdric was shouting right back: He's weak! He's strong! He's not as strong as Offa! He's invaded Kent!

  And why, they're both saying without words, haven't I done anything about that last? Kent is, if you reinterpret the law just a convenient bit, part of my territory.

  Bah, didn't they see? The invasion of Kent had pretty much decimated Cenwulf's forces, and the man's less than successful forays into stubborn, savage Cymru in imitation of the late Offa weren't helping. The more the Mercian king fought, the more he weakened himself and his land.

  And the more time he gives us to prepare.

  That was what he should be saying. He should be silencing these idiots. Making himself perfectly, regally clear. Egbert rubbed a hand across a sweaty forehead. If only it wasn't so cursedly warm in here, so warm and—and vague. He could think the words clearly enough, but he just couldn't say them . . . the words just wouldn't leave his mind. . . .

  All he could do, Egbert realized, was wait and wait and wait for this seemingly endless ordeal to be done.

  He should have expected this, Osmod thought in the few brief moments when he dared take his concentration from the king, from the Witan. Here was the meeting that would finally push his plans forward into action—

  Ha, yes. If only. If only. The Witan was hardly one united organism with one mind to be controlled. Osmod watched, half amused, half wildly frustrated, as the debate there in the Great Hall grew more and more frenzied without any result. Too many different folk, too many personal grudges and ambitions, curse them all. They'd been going at it all day now under the lash of his will with barely a break yet, with not a thing resolved. Bah, listen to that storm of eager, angry voices, look at all those fierce, florid faces.

  Like a gang of squabbling small boys, the lot of them.

  And when oh when was it going to dawn on the idiots, despite his careful proddings, that they were arguing over petty details?

  That they were all basically on the same side?

  The side of war.

  It had dawned on their king some time ago. He was sitting slouched, fingers steepled and a sardonic glint in his eyes, evidently rather enjoying watching the others make fools of themselves. For the moment. Egbert was a patient man—in the way, Osmod mused, that a predator is patient—but there was a limit to even regal forbearance. A fortunate thing, then, that Egbert had not the faintest hint that his will was not quite his own.

  As long as I don't push too hard, make myself too obvious. After all, he does, deep within, want this war-as-excuse-for-expansion as much as any other. Of course, such "this is mine just because I want it" inner desires rarely reached the surface; civilized men rarely yielded to those primitive, deeply rooted impulses. But with my . . . help, Egbert has no choice, now, does he? Primitive desire for conquest and sophisticated wish for glory—we may be here all night, but by all the powers of Darkness, we'll leave here with an attack on Mercia all planned and ready.

  All night.

  No, he mustn't let his thoughts wander like this! Osmod fought to keep the properly concerned, ever-so-worried expression on his face, fought as well to hide his real emotions—

  The primary one of which was rapidly growing into full-blown worry. He had depleted so much of his Power in getting this far, in swaying so many minds, and what was left was definitely starting to slide away, bit by tormenting bit. Well and good to interject soothing or sarcastic comments where he thought they'd be most effective, but without the reinforcement of magic behind them, they would quickly become nothing more than suggestions. He must, Osmod knew, take another victim, and soon.

  And yes, the Darkness burned that in his mind as clearly as a shout, blood and Power, yes, giving him a sudden jarring awareness of Prince Ardagh, of Prince Ardagh here, at the gate, Prince Ardagh—

  Osmod nearly snarled. Just what do You want me to do about it? I can't take my attention from here— You want the war, don't You? I can't deal with this and the prince both!

  Ach, but he'd already taken his attention from Egbert for an instant too long—or, Osmod thought bitterly, had it torn away—and now the king was surging to his feet, on his face the look of a truly desperate man. "I'm all right," Egbert snapped in response to the sudden storm of worried voices. "Go on. Work this out among you. When you reach a conclusion, then, and only then, let me know."

  Damnation.

  But there was nothing Osmod could do but bow with the others and watch his king leave the hall. One did not find fault with the Lords of Darkness. And at least there was still the Witan on which to work.

  For as long as he could. For as long as his Power held out.

  Leofrun, royal mistress—though that title meant little to her (except that it meant she could cuddle with Egbert, yes, yes, be nice and warm and play those games that sent funny little fires racing all inside her), Leofrun stood before the Great Hall, stood stubborn as a wooden image to the dismay of her ladies. They were always trying to get her to do what they wanted. None of them knew what mattered, what really, really mattered.

  Leofrun whimpered, looking about at the fading day. This was what mattered. Soon the sun would be gone. "Night," she whispered. "Night."

  "Yes, dear," one of the women agreed. "That's right. Night follows day, you know that. And day follows night."

  Leofrun glared at her. They didn't understand; they never understood. Leofrun knew that she wasn't very clever, but at least she knew what the night meant:

  Dark things. Dark, dark, dark. She wasn't sure exactly what kind of things there were. The priests tried to tell her about devils. They told her that if she didn't act the right way, the devils would carry her off to . . . Leofrun frowned, trying to remember what they always said . . . to "eternal damnation." She wasn't sure what that meant, except that it wouldn't be happy at all. She wasn't sure exactly what acting the right way meant, but Leofrun practiced looking over her shoulder now just to be sure no devils were sneaking up on her.

  The devils that were going to carry off Osmod. They were, they were! They would carry him off and—and—

  Unless Osmod was a devil, too? Leofrun stared at the Great Hall in sudden new horror. Maybe he was a devil! Yes, oh yes, maybe he was! He was just as bad as the ones with horns even though he didn't have any horns, no, or—or cloven hoofs, either! Osmod was a devil, and no one knew, no one but she, and no one would listen to her. Leofrun shivered, and one of the women "tsked" and draped a cloak about her shoulders and pinned it fast.

  "Won't you come inside, dear? It's growing late."

  Leofrun glared at her just as she had at the others. "No!"

  Didn't they understand anything? She had to watch. Osmod was in that hall. She had to watch when he came out, because when he came out, he'd want to kill someone. No one else was going to help her because no one else believed her. They all thought she was stupid. Well, maybe she wasn't as smart as some, but that didn't mean she was that stupid! The women all thought themselves so smart, but she could get away from them any time she wanted.

  She stiffened with a wordless little cry. Egbert! Egbert was rushing out of the Great Hall, trailed by his guards. And he looked so very unhappy! Before the ladies could stop her, Leofrun raced to his side, trying to throw her arms around him. "Egbert!"

  He glanced sharply down at her as though sta
rtled to see her there. "Leofrun. You shouldn't—" He stopped, changed that to a glare at the ladies and an angry, "You shouldn't let her—"

  "No," Leofrun whimpered. "Not anger. Don't be angry."

  For a moment, his arm went about her, hugging her to him, for a moment Leofrun was happy and safe and warm. But then Egbert released her with a sigh. "I'm not angry at you. I'm just . . . tired, Leofrun. Just tired, that's all."

  Leofrun stared past him at the Great Hall, the hall that was still blazing with light and noise. "Osmod," she whispered. That was who had made Egbert tired. Osmod had hurt Egbert. "Osmod."

  This time Egbert's sigh did sound angry. "Don't start that nonsense again, Leofrun." His hand closed on her shoulder, not quite gently.

  But Leofrun squirmed free, still staring at the hall. Osmod had hurt Egbert. The devil had hurt Egbert. "No," she murmured, "no."

  Egbert must have thought she was agreeing with him. "Good," he said, absently ruffling her hair, and walked on.

  But Leofrun stood where she was, "No," she repeated softly. It would not happen again. The priests were full of stories about people who had done brave things, even died, for the sake of goodness. And she—no matter what she had to do, Leofrun knew that she was not going to let the devil Osmod hurt anyone ever again.

  Ardagh straightened in the saddle of this latest in the succession of "borrowed" horses. Over him towered Uintacaester's ancient walls. In the deepening twilight, they were an ominous grey, like some great crouching beast waiting for its prey.

  Ae, what poetic nonsense! Far more important than foolish fancies was the very real psychic fog he sensed swirling about the city. And Ardagh felt a chill settle over him. I wasn't imagining it, was I? I wasn't imagining that Darkness was watching every time I tried the runes. Foolish me. Here I thought I'd merely be fighting Osmod.

  Did the human know how he was being used? Did he care? From what Ardagh had seen of Osmod, total self-interest and a lack of what humans called morality seemed to be his prime attributes.

  But this didn't make sense! It was one thing for Darkness to settle about someone like Osmod, someone who could promise chaos and pain. Why, Ardagh wondered, should the Darkness be so suddenly aware of him? The Sidhe had never had any dealings with demonic forces!

  Ae, wait. Maybe-they hadn't. But he, Ardagh realized with a shock, most certainly had. Even if it hadn't been by his choosing, he had definitely had dealings with Arridu, the late Gervinus's demon ally.

  And so it is that the Darkness knows of me, and now the Darkness knows that I'm a threat to Osmod as well. Gervinus, Gervinus, curse your treacherous soul, I thought I was done with you. And wouldn't it please you to see this?

  But why hadn't the Darkness already struck? That was obvious enough; it couldn't. If he were reachable, Ardagh thought with sardonic humor, he'd already be dead. Regardless of human tales of demons, no aspect of Darkness could enter Reality without a gateway. And clearly—thank whatever Powers might be involved— those few drops of his blood that Arridu had stolen, the blood that might have formed such a gateway, had long ago lost their potency.

  But what of Osmod? He just might be fool enough to invite the Darkness in and never see the harm!

  At the prince's angry hiss, Cadwal turned sharply to him. "What? What?"

  "The Darkness is in him and about him, swirling over the city, waiting for a chance to enter."

  The mercenary didn't have to ask who that "he" might be. "You're not just being poetic, are you?" At Ardagh's impatient shake of the head, Cadwal continued, "And a fellow who can see in the night isn't going to be worried about nice, natural darkness. Iesu. You don't mean we're going to be doing battle against the Prince of Darkness himself?"

  "Don't joke."

  "Wasn't." Cadwal paused a heartbeat "You don't really mean—"

  "No. There will be no conventional demonic figures. But Osmod is playing with more, I think, than either I or he suspected."

  "And where is he? If he's got all that—that dark Power, why hasn't he already done something about our being here?"

  "I don't know. Something is very obviously distracting him."

  "And distracting the . . . uh . . . Darkness as well?"

  Ardagh shook his head. No use trying to explain what wouldn't fit the human tongue. He and Cadwal rode unchallenged into the city in the midst of a chattering group of late-arriving merchants. After a moment's hesitation, the prince turned his horse in the direction of the royal enclosure. But Cadwal moved his own horse to block Ardagh's path.

  "No insult meant, but what the hell are you doing? Marching right into enemy territory?"

  "In effect, yes."

  "But you—he—"

  "Cadwal, please. I cannot afford to wait meekly for him to leave his sanctuary. Trust me on this: I don't dare. In fact, I don't dare wait at all." Not with that fog of Darkness all around us and threatening to erupt into Reality.

  The mercenary opened his mouth, closed it, caught by the prince's inhumanly steady stare. At last Cadwal shrugged with the casual, resigned manner of one who has fought too many battles to be upset by one more, even one in which he might be badly outmatched. "I keep forgetting. You're not human. At least we have that on our side."

  "You still have a choice. You can still leave."

  "Hell, man, I've never yet turned my back on a comrade. Even if," Cadwal added with shaky humor, "this time Hell may really be involved. Come on, let's get going before I find some way to talk myself out of this."

  Ardagh grinned in spite of himself and reached out to clasp the startled human's hand for a minute. "Comrade, indeed. I'll need someone quite literally to guard my back."

  "Uh, right. But," Cadwal added, gesturing with his chin towards the palisade about the royal hall, "getting in there is not going to be easy."

  "On the contrary." Even as he spoke, Ardagh was still searching with delicate magical care for Osmod, finding nothing but that unnerving psychic haze of Darkness. "On the contrary," he repeated after a moment, "I suspect that getting into the hall is going to be the easiest part of it all."

  A Loving Sacrifice

  Chapter 36

  Osmod fought down a shout of pure rage. No! He dare not let his emotions overcome him, not now. Grimly, he forced his mind back to self-control, back to total and fierce concentration.

  Or almost total concentration. What was going on in this hall was almost too much for even a Powerful mind to bear! Hour after hour, and yet these idiots kept at each other, voices more hoarse perhaps, gestures less frenetic, but with nothing accomplished, nothing!

  No. Calmness. Concentrate.

  Yes, but again and again he'd almost had them, almost had them all—then again and again had come those savage little surges of distraction shaking his concentration, wasting his already wasted Power, and:

  Lords of Darkness, what are You thinking? Osmod cried silently in sudden, irresistible rage. It's You distracting me, it's You causing the never-ending chaos in this hall. What do You want?

  No answer, of course. And he knew this was a perilous path to be tracing. But Osmod continued savagely, far too worn for caution:

  If You do want war, if You do wish Your share of blood and lives—end this! Let me win, let me win—end this stupid farce now and stop tormenting me with "He is here, the prince is here." I know the prince is here, but I am only mortal, like it or not! I can only deal with one war at a time!

  At least he could draw a token of Power from what was going on here, enough to keep him from collapsing completely, even if it was as tedious a process as gathering grains of sand to build a beach, and never as potent (or as satisfying, to him and the Darkness both) as the blood-sacrifice. All violent human emotions gave off tiny sparks of energy; the more intense and long-lasting the emotion, the brighter the spark, from the foolish quarrels going on here all the way up to outright war.

  War.

  Ach, yes, war.

  The sudden shock of understanding stabbed through Osmod, sharp as a
psychic blade, shaking his concentration yet again, making him quiver because: Of course the Lords of Darkness wanted war; that was why They were so willing to support him, their merely mortal tool, in his merely mortal plans of conquest. They would drink deeply of the blood spilled and the lives lost.

  What of it? You knew that.

  But would They be so easily sated? There was the heart of it. Osmod felt new shudders race through him despite all his fierce determination. Why hadn't he seen this before? (Had They, perhaps, not wanted him to see it? Had they blinded him to it?) Once the war with Mercia was begun, would They ever let it be stopped? Would the Lords of Darkness ride him as he rode the wills of others, forcing him to force the realm towards more and more terrible carnage—

  You idiot! he snapped at himself. Afraid of war—bah, you sound like a frightened little mouse of a priest!

  There always had been and always would be war; it was the normal state of human life. And most of those lives weren't worth the saving! Bah, yes, look at the lot here. Would the world care if any of them, if all of them, died this very moment? No, no, anyone who worried about the cost or that most absurdly uninterpretable concept, morality, was worthy only of being a victim.

  All right, then. Calmness. Calmness. Of course there would be another war, and probably another after it— how else could one conquer other realms? Another war—what of it? This time, Osmod thought, allowing himself a little prickle of pleasure, this time at least, there would also be genuine glory.

  Ardagh glanced fiercely about the night-dark royal enclosure, a small, predatory smile on his lips. There were none out here save for the occasional guards, and those were no more than the slightest of nuisances.

  "You were right." It was the softest of murmurs from Cadwal.

  The prince gave a silent laugh. Of course he'd been right. It hadn't been at all difficult to slip by the guards at the gates, even with the handicap of pulling the human Cadwal into his Sidhe "no one here" illusion; no Sidhe worthy of the name would ever have found it a problem to slide unseen past humans.