02 - Sons of Ellyrion

by Graham McNeill

  He looked up, seeing a fire mage in billowing robes of crimson making his way across the cavern floor towards him. His steps were uneven, like those of a drunk, and Imrik knew Lamellan had not slept in weeks.

  “My friend,” said Imrik, “What news? Have any of your brothers had their songs answered?”

  Lamellan shook his head. “No, my lord,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. “The great drakes do not heed our calls. One of the younger sun dragons almost rose from its slumber, but slipped back into sleep before we could renew the song of awakening.”

  “We must keep at it, Lamellan,” pressed Imrik, rising smoothly to his feet. He had long ago discarded his armour as too clumsy and restricting to fully perform the dragonsongs, and was clad only in a long white robe tied at the waist with a golden belt. His features were sunken and pale, for dragonsong drew upon a warrior’s heart and soul for its power.

  “The dragons do not heed us,” said Lamellan. “My brother mages are beyond the limits of their endurance, and there is little more we can do. The dragons sleep on, and they will wake or sleep in their own time.”

  Imrik sighed, letting the frustration of the last few weeks pour from him.

  “I refuse to accept that,” he said. “The dragons will come! If we die, they die, and the dragons of Caledor will not be slain in their sleep by druchii invaders. I will not allow that, do you understand me?”

  “I do, my lord, but I do not know what else we can do,” said Lamellan. “We have sung all the songs we know, and they do not reach the dragons. Only the songs known by the dragons themselves will rouse them now, and none among the asur know them.”

  Imrik paced the cavern floor, the red light of countless braziers and the shimmering reflections of dragonscale casting stark reflections over his noble countenance.

  “That is not strictly true, my friend,” he said at last.

  “What do you mean, my lord?”

  “I know them,” said Imrik. “And you are right; the dragons will not wake with the old songs of the asur, so we need to sing the songs of the dragons themselves.”

  “How can you know these songs?” asked Lamellan. “Teach us how to sing them and we will fill these caverns with our voices. With such songs, even the most ancient dragons of Ulthuan will wake!”

  “I cannot teach you these songs,” said Imrik. “Minaithnir taught them to me, but had me swear that I would never sing them in the presence of any save dragonkind.”

  “Why?”

  “The songs of the dragons are powerful, and not meant for the minds of mortals, even ones as long lived as the asur, for it is said these songs are powerful enough to reach the minds of even the oldest star dragons. But they hold the true names of all the dragons of Ulthuan, and such secret knowledge should never be used lightly.”

  “Tell us!” demanded Lamellan, the glittering light of fire magic crackling in the hazel of his eyes. “Ulthuan is lost without the dragons.”

  Imrik placed a hand on the fire mage’s shoulder and shook his head, speaking with all the calm he could muster. “In all the years you have known me, have I ever broken an oath to a friend?”

  Lamellan sagged. “No, my lord. Never.”

  “And never shall I,” said Imrik with a weary smile. “Now gather your brothers and return to the surface. Seal the caverns behind you, and let none enter on pain of death. Ulthuan will have need of the fire mages, with or without the dragons.”

  “And you will sing the songs of the dragons alone?” asked Lamellan.

  “I will.”

  “Then you will die. If such songs are as powerful as you say, then there will be nothing left of you by their ending.”

  Imrik drew himself up to his full height, and his skin shimmered with vitality; the earlier fatigue that had threatened to overwhelm him vanished. Just the thought of singing the songs of the dragons filled him with energy, as though the song itself ached to be sung.

  “Have faith in me, old friend,” said Imrik. “I will rouse the dragons, and I will lead you all in battle as we fall from the skies upon the druchii!”

  Lamellan bowed and shook Imrik’s outstretched hand.

  “We will burn them from Ulthuan together,” said Lamellan.

  “Count on it,” replied Imrik.

  Powerful aromas of flesh on the fire and incense created from rendered bones filled the silken pavilion, together with the reek of human sweat. Morathi luxuriated in the delicious scents filling her senses, letting each one linger on the tongue before savouring the next. The air had a sluggish, greasy texture in the aftermath of powerful sorcery, and she could still feel the phantom caresses of her daemon lover.

  Sated bodies lay strewn around her, marbled flesh quivering and beaded with sweat and oil. Coiling wisps of smoke streamed from candles and the flames from hanging censers danced on the walls. Her flesh was newly restored; iron-hard and unblemished after the blood of a dozen captives had been drained to make it so.

  She ran her fingers across her flat stomach and down her thighs, relishing the cold smoothness of her skin. Rolling onto her side, she found a ewer of spiced wine that had somehow avoided being spilled during the carnal revelry, and poured it into a goblet of ice she formed in her other hand. Fingers from beneath a wolfskin rug pawed her, but she ignored them, sliding into an upright position and taking a long draught of the wine.

  It was bitter, the creature she had summoned to pleasure her having soured it, but she drank it down nonetheless. Morathi knew enough of creatures from beyond to know that it was never wise to decline their gifts, intended or otherwise. The wine tasted of blood, but that was of no consequence to her. She had tasted far worse in her thousands of years of life.

  Many of her lovers tonight would not live to the dawn, their throats and bellies opened in the frenzy of coupling that had brought forth the daemon. Such was the price of approaching the flame too closely. Slaves, captives or willing participants, it made no difference to Morathi, each was a pleasure to be taken by force or by seduction.

  A chill wind blew through the pavilion, snuffing out several of the candles, and she felt a wistful pang for her homeland across the sea. Immediately she corrected herself. This was her home, and had been for many years before she and Malekith had been cast from their rightful place as rulers of Ulthuan. The thought angered her, and she wondered if it was being back on this island that made her moods so unpredictable.

  Morathi pulled a thin robe from the floor, and wrapped it around her youthful body. Lustrous dark hair spilled around her shoulders, thick and glossy and black as night. She had the body of a maiden, but the eyes of a crone. Suffering the likes of which mortals could not imagine had paraded before those eyes, and no matter how much blood she spilled to preserve her youth, nothing could wash away the weight of ages in her gaze.

  She poured more wine into the crackling goblet of ice and moved to the entrance of her pavilion. Lithe elves in armour of banded leather that barely covered their flesh lounged upon velvet blankets, seemingly in repose, but poised and ready to react to danger in the blink of an eye. Servants of the witch cults, they looked up languidly before returning their gaze to the fortress wall in the east.

  The Eagle Gate still barred the way to the summerlands beyond. The white of its walls was stained with blood and fire, and the eagle carved into its ramparts was barely recognisable. Its towers were ruined, and only what the defenders built up during the night served as battlements now. Torchlight and the soft hue of magical light shimmered beyond the walls, like a frozen moment of time just before the dawn. Moonlight glittered from spear points and helmets.

  Wards beaten into the stone of the fortress prevented her from casting her spirit gaze beyond its walls, but she knew well enough what it protected. Lands of eternally golden summer, fecund soil and pure waters like the clearest crystal. In days past she had ridden those lands without a care, confident in the path her future would take, but those days were gone, and only bitterness remained in her heart. What
Morathi could not have she would destroy.

  Or if not her, then another…

  Morathi remembered the last time she had seen Caledor, and the threat he had made. She wondered if he even remembered it. The magic of the vortex had all but driven him mad, and Caledor would sooner destroy this land than allow her or Malekith to claim it.

  She wondered if the asur knew that.

  Once she could not have allowed her thoughts to stray to Caledor and the magical vortex at the heart of Ulthuan, for fear that he would become aware of her presence. But many centuries had passed since their last meeting, and her knowledge of the arcane arts had grown immeasurably—enough that she could weave spells to hide her from the archmages’ sight. Morathi was not deluded enough to believe that she was the equal of Caledor Dragontamer, but she had one advantage over the trapped mage lord.

  She wasn’t utterly insane.

  Morathi smiled as she wondered if that were true.

  Her sinuous guards uncoiled from their supine positions, long-bladed daggers appearing in each hand as a towering figure in armour like flayed skin appeared at the edge of the torchlight. Handsome to the point of ridiculousness, his body was as fine a specimen of mortal flesh as could be imagined.

  “Is it safe to approach?” he enquired with a wry grin. “Or must I again send you my best warriors to die under your knives?”

  “Approach, Issyk Kul,” said Morathi. “I am, for the moment, sated.”

  The warrior emerged fully into the light, and Morathi took a moment to appreciate the sheer dynamism of his body. So raw in its muscularity and power, so blunt in its threat. So different from the slender bodies of Naggaroth.

  “How goes the fighting?” she asked.

  “You would know if you fought instead of rutted,” said Kul, “though there’s pleasure to be taken in both. Perhaps we should swap roles.”

  Anger flared momentarily, but she quelled it, knowing the warrior of the Dark Prince was simply goading her. He relished her anger, and she was in no hurry to indulge him. Not yet.

  “Why should I fight when you and your tribesmen take such pleasure in it?” she said.

  “There’s truth in that,” agreed Kul. “The blood flows freely, and the asur fight well. It is a battle of blood, of pain and of exquisite wounds. The kiss of an ithilmar blade stings like no other.”

  “In any case, my battle is fought in subtler ways,” said Morathi.

  “I like subtle,” said Kul, and Morathi laughed.

  “So I see,” she said.

  Kul drew his many-bladed weapon from the sheath across his shoulder, and Morathi’s witch cultists were at her side in a heartbeat. Kul grinned, exposing his tapered fangs.

  “Tell your witches to beware,” he said. “I do not wish you dead until I have taken my fill of your flesh.”

  “When the war is won, you will have your prize,” said Morathi, letting her robe fall open to reveal a slice of her toned thigh. Kul’s gaze lingered on her body, following its contours from her hips to her breasts to her face. His grin was one of pure lust, and it never failed to amaze Morathi how much importance mortals placed on physicality. Copulation was the least of the ways in which a soul could be pleasured, the easiest, the most direct and the most human.

  Issyk Kul would never satisfy his base, animal needs with her.

  He would be dead before then.

  “Your son still lays siege to Lothern?” said Kul, picking up a discarded cup and holding it out to her as though she was some kind of servant girl. She bit back her anger and poured the soured wine into his cup.

  Kul drank it down in one gulp. “Pungent,” he said.

  She dropped the ewer, letting its contents ooze out onto the rock of the pass.

  “Malekith enjoys success at Lothern,” she said. “The Emerald Gate is his, as are the shoulder castles on the cliffs. Every day fresh warriors cross the bridge from the Glittering Lighthouse to the mainland. It is only a matter of time until Lothern is ours.”

  “From what I hear, getting to the next gate will be a fight of great magnitude.”

  “It will be bloody,” admitted Morathi.

  “Mayhap we will be in Lothern before your son,” suggested Kul playfully.

  “Not if this fortress continues to stand.”

  “It will fall soon,” promised Kul. “It is a certainty. And it will be soon.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “There is one among the elves who is touched by the Dark Gods.”

  “An asur?”

  “Aye. An archer, I think.”

  “They are all archers, Kul,” pointed out Morathi.

  Kul shrugged. “You elves all look the same to me,” he said. “Pale skin, strange eyes and pointed ears. I could have killed him, but I saw the touch upon him as clear as midnight. His soul is at war, and all it will take is a small push to make him ours.”

  “How small a push?” asked Morathi.

  “One you could easily provide,” said Kul.

  Alathenar took a seat on the carved bench at the foot of the walls, and let out a relieved breath. He rested his bow against the wall and placed the plate of bread and cheese beside him. He was too tired to eat, but knew it was the only chance he was likely to get to satisfy his hunger. His muscles ached abominably and the sword cut on his hip had reopened. Blood stained his leggings, and he had loaned his needle and thread to one of the healers whose magic was exhausted. He tried to remain still, knowing that the wound would seal eventually, and grateful for this chance to rest. The walk from the mess hall had all but drained him, and he knew that he could not survive much longer without rest. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, but sleep would not come. Too many images of hacked open bodies and friends screaming in pain paraded before him to allow him to sleep.

  He wondered if he would ever sleep again.

  The defenders of the Eagle Gate were in a sorry state. Barely eight hundred of them remained alive, and only two-thirds of those were fit to fight. Rumours kept circulating that reinforcements were being gathered, but they had yet to see any sign of them. Stories of far off battles filled the fortress; bleak tales of war being waged at Lothern, human fleets ravaging the coasts of Cothique and Yvresse, and assassins striking at the leaders of the asur.

  No one knew what to believe anymore.

  Warriors gathered in small groups, talking in low voices, and he wondered if they gave voice to the same thoughts as slithered around his skull. Healers moved from group to group, using what little magic remained to them, and victual bearers brought water to parched throats.

  “We are battered, but resolute,” he said. “But for how much longer?”

  “Not much longer if Glorien keeps wasting lives,” said Alanrias, walking over from the direction of the mess hall. The warrior of Nagarythe carried something beneath his cloak, but Alathenar could not tell what it was. Eloien Redcloak came with the Shadow Warrior, and though the he still bore his scarlet cloak, it was torn and burned in so many places that it seemed foolish to retain it. His features, already hardened from a life in the saddle, had been hardened further by his time at the Eagle Gate.

  “I was about to eat,” said Alathenar, ignoring the Shadow Warrior’s obvious barb.

  “A delightful feast indeed,” agreed Eloien, taking a slice of bread from Alathenar’s plate. He bit into the bread and grimaced before spitting it out. The Ellyrian wiped his lips with the back of his hand.

  “You don’t like the bread?” asked Alathenar.

  “It is stale.”

  “Stale? Elven bread does not go stale.”

  “Then you had better tell the bakers,” said Eloien. “Either this bread has been in the stores since the time of Bel Shanaar or the sorceries of the druchii have found new ways to make us miserable.”

  Alathenar took a mouthful of bread and was forced to agree with Eloien. Elven bread could last for years without going hard and tasteless, but this was like stone or the bread the dwarfs were said to f
avour.

  “It seems you are right,” he said taking the half-chewed lump from his mouth.

  “Enough prattle about bread,” hissed Alanrias. “I saw you on the wall, we made a compact. I saw it in your eyes. Let us be about our business.”

  Alathenar sighed and looked toward the Aquila Spire. Soft light emanated from the windows, where Glorien Truecrown rested in comfort.

  “Yes,” he said. “We did, but that does not mean I take pleasure in what we must do.”

  “I don’t care whether you take pleasure in it or not,” hissed Alanrias. “Only that you do it.”

  “Be at peace, brother,” soothed Eloien. “Alathenar knows what must be done. It does him credit that he takes no joy in its necessity.”

  The Shadow Warrior sat back and shook his head. “We are on the brink of ruin and you dance around the issue like children. On the walls tomorrow. That is when it must be done.”

  Anger flared in Alathenar’s heart and he rounded on the Shadow Warrior. “If you are so ready to spill Glorien’s blood, then why not do it yourself?”

  “You are the best archer in the garrison,” said Eloien. “You are the only one who is certain not to miss.”

  “You think you can move me to murder with flattery?” hissed Alathenar.

  “If need be,” said Alanrias. “You saw how many died protecting him today. How many will die tomorrow? How much longer can we bear his incompetence? Until the fortress falls and we are all dead?”

  Alathenar started to reply, but before he could form the words to respond to Alanrias, he tasted a bitter metallic flavour in his mouth and a bilious wave of resentment washed over him. He wanted to tell Alanrias that he would not kill one of his own kind—murder was beneath him—but all those noble sentiments were swamped by images of the dead and maimed.