The Ancient sotfk-2

by R. A. Salvatore

  That one waved its arm to deflect the missile, but misjudged and whipped his hand past too quickly. The red-bearded dwarf did block the throw, however-with his face, or more specifically his nose-and his head snapped back.

  “Yach, ye mutt,” the powrie growled, reaching up to grab its busted proboscis, and taking away a palmful of blood. The dwarf sneered and growled louder and started for Cormack with more purpose.

  But he stopped suddenly, looking confused, and staggered down to one knee.

  Cormack had the time neither to acknowledge his luck nor to pat himself on the back for a perfect throw, for powries were made of tough stuff and such a strike wouldn’t normally bring one down, temporarily though it might prove. As soon as he had let fly the missile, he retracted his throwing arm and drove it down to the side, slugging the initial target in the head.

  The dwarf wrapped his strong arms about Cormack’s waist and drove him to the side, intent upon bearing him to the ground. The monk worked his legs frantically, trying to stay upright, and repeatedly hit the creature with his pumping right hand. Blood flew, but from his knuckles and not the dwarf, for surely Cormack felt as if he was punching stone instead of flesh!

  The monk didn’t relent, though, nor did the powrie, taking him far from Brother Giavno and the other two monks and the group of a half-dozen powries bearing down on them. Another lightning bolt shook the ground, and the lead powrie began to dance wildly, arms and lips flapping, his thick red hair and beard straightening to full length and shivering in the air. He danced and hopped, managing another step forward, but then fell over.

  The other five rumbled past, ignoring the rock missiles, and the club-fight began in earnest.

  Cormack continued to work his legs frantically, continued to punch at the dwarf, but on one slug, the stubborn little creature turned about, purposely putting his face in line with the man’s flying fist. Cormack scored a solid, stunning hit, but square dwarf teeth clamped upon the side of his hand and bit down hard.

  Cormack thrashed and tore free his hand, breaking out of the dwarf’s vise grip in the process. Even as he jumped backward, with the powrie coming in immediate pursuit, the monk launched a heavy left hook that snapped the dwarf’s head to the side.

  A right cross staggered the powrie even more, and gave Cormack the opportunity to square up against the dwarf.

  “Yach, but I’m to scrape the skin from yer pretty face!” the stubborn powrie promised, and came on.

  A trio of stinging left jabs put the dwarf back on his heels.

  Cormack retreated a bit more; his reach was his advantage, he knew, and when he looked at his opponent, who seemed like a walking block of rock, he figured it might be his only advantage.

  Giavno swung hard with his makeshift wooden mace. He scored a solid hit, but the powrie pressed him relentlessly. How the monk wished that he still had the mace he had carried when he had left Chapel Pellinor, a spiked weapon of wonderful balance and weight. But alas, that mace and all of their other metallic items were lost to them, corroded by the constant steam that floated about the islands of this hot lake.

  Giavno hit the powrie again, cracking the block head of the weapon against the back of the turning dwarf’s shoulder. The monk rolled his shoulders, thrusting forth his free hand in time to deflect the dwarf’s smashing response. And as that powrie staff slipped by, the monk wrapped his arm over the dwarf’s hands and bore in hard against his enemy.

  Big mistake, Giavno realized as soon as he slammed against the dwarf, who didn’t budge an inch. For now his advantage, the length of his arms, was lost, and the powrie fast squirmed and twisted free its hands, clamping them about Giavno’s waist and tugging him along as it fell into a roll.

  Another powrie closed on the wrestling pair, whacking away at Giavno with a weighted stick, raising welts under the monk’s heavy brown robes.

  Giavno grimaced through the pain and managed to turn about to see the two companions nearest him, both fighting valiantly and fiercely against a trio of dwarves, trading punch for swat. At one point in the roll, the dwarf loosened its grip, and Giavno quickly set his feet and thrust forward, scrambling toward his friends. As he had hoped, one of the powries broke away to intercept, launching a flying tackle at the monk and bearing him back to the two pursuing dwarves.

  Still clutching his graphite stone, Giavno fell into its depths. He got smacked with a staff and punched on the side of his head. The dwarf who had tackled him twisted him about as if to break him apart. But Giavno held his concentration and sent his energy into the stone and through the stone, and jolting sparks of electricity fired out in all directions around him.

  The powries fell back, were thrown back, and Giavno sprinted for his companions. He glanced over at Cormack with sincere, almost fatherly, concern, but reminded himself that Cormack had secured his position on this mission to Alpinador precisely because he had shown himself to be the finest young fighter at Chapel Pellinor.

  Cormack would get back to the three brothers, Giavno told himself, and prayed.

  Ah, ye’re that one,” the dwarf said, nodding and smiling, and spitting a line of blood at Cormack’s feet. “Yer blood’ll make me beret shine all the brighter, then.”

  He howled and brought his staff up above his head, leaping forward.

  But Cormack had anticipated the move and was moving as well, diving down to the side and lashing out with his top leg. He didn’t hit the dwarf, but slid the kicking foot past him, then bent his knee and brought the leg back in at the back of the dwarf’s knees. The powrie halted his swing and overbalanced backward for a second, as Cormack’s calf drove in hard against the back of his knees.

  That was naught but a ruse, though, as the unfortunate dwarf soon learned. For Cormack rolled out farther to the side, then reversed his flow, throwing his hips over and locking his scissors’ grip on the dwarf. The powrie tried to fight the inevitable pull, but had no leverage against the prostrate and rolling man, and Cormack’s trailing leg drove the dwarf forward and to the ground. The staff went flying and the powrie hit hard, just getting his hand under him in time to stop his face from smashing against the stones.

  Cormack continued the roll to his back, extracting his legs on the last turn. He arched, put his feet under him, and snapped his muscles, lifting him to a standing position over the prone dwarf. He moved fast into position, where he could stomp the powrie’s face into the stone, and even lifted his foot over the back of the still-stunned dwarf’s head.

  He hesitated.

  He heard the splashing and turned in time to see the charge of the first dwarf he had decked, out in the water. It came out with fury-no, not fury, Cormack realized, but with terror.

  For behind it emerged another creature, its smooth, bluish, almost translucent skin gleaming in the dull and hazy light, its black eyes peering at its prey intently under a protruding brow. A glacial troll, Cormack realized at once, and so too had the powrie, judging from the look of terror on his face!

  No taller than the dwarves and far lighter, the glacial trolls were nevertheless the bane of all the island societies. Their thin limbs were deceptively strong, and their teeth pointed like little knives. And where came one troll, inevitably, came many, and Cormack saw that clearly now, the long waggling ears of the ugly goblinoid creatures poking from the surf all about the rocky beach.

  The dwarf at Cormack’s feet grabbed him by the ankle and tugged hard, and he didn’t resist, but let himself fall backward into a roll, one that took him right over and back to his feet.

  “Trolls! Trolls!” he cried, and he started toward the beach, yelling at the dwarf, “Faster!”

  The dwarf threw his head back as he broke free of the surf and seemed to come on more quickly. Momentarily, though, for when the powrie jerked again, Cormack saw the truth of it.

  The dwarf staggered forward, slowing, then slumped down to his knees and gave a great exhale.

  “Yach!” cried the powrie on the ground before Cormack, and that one leaped to
his feet. “Bikelbrin, me friend!”

  That call had all the powries pausing and turning, as the truth of their predicament fell fully on man and dwarf alike. Ten of them stood against more than a dozen of the trolls, who were armed with spears tipped with sharpened, barbed shells and not the relatively benign sticks that the island inhabitants generally used to batter each other about the skulls.

  The trolls closed on the kneeling Bikelbrin but so did Cormack, leaping down across the stones in full charge. He heard Brother Giavno shout, “To the abbey!” and understood that his three brethren would take that route, but he could not ignore the wounded powrie.

  The glacial trolls neared, reaching for their embedded spears. Cormack put on a burst of speed, closing ground, and leaped, turning himself sidelong in midair as he cleared the dwarf. He was over the spears before the trolls could fully retract them. One let go of the shaft and threw its hands up to block, while the other stubbornly, and with a sickening wet sound, drew free its spear. That one took the brunt of the flying body-block as Cormack bowled both of the trolls over.

  He landed atop them hard, smacking his hand painfully against a stone, and his forehead painfully against the back of that hand. A wave of dizziness washed over him, but he knew better than to succumb to it in the midst of vicious trolls! He rolled sidelong, right off the two, who scrambled and bit at him, one catching a tooth on his bare forearm.

  Cormack tugged that arm free immediately and managed to slam it down hard on the troll’s face for good measure as he regained his balance.

  No faster than the other troll, however, which lowered its spear for Cormack’s belly and thrust it forward.

  The trained monk dodged aside and slapped the spear out wider with the flat of his hand. He started for the opening to strike at the creature, but instinct stopped him and turned him about.

  Just in time to deflect the thrown spear of another troll.

  Cormack jumped back, three on him now and a fourth coming in. To his left came a sharp retort, and one of the trolls he had bowled over stumbled forward and to the ground. Behind it came the furious powrie, running headlong and empty-handed, for he had thrown his staff, spearlike, into the back of the fallen troll’s head. He called for Bikelbrin, but ran right past his wounded friend, leaping onto the second of the trolls Cormack had tackled, bearing it down under his thrashing and kicking form.

  Cormack stomped hard on the back of the neck of the first fallen troll, ending its squirming. No mercy for glacial trolls, for everyone on that beach, human and powrie alike, knew that the trolls would show none. Up on the ridge, all of the powries had disengaged from Cormack’s Abellican brethren and were charging down, and to the monk’s relief, he saw Brother Giavno extending his clenched fist.

  “To the abbey!” Giavno yelled again, and Cormack understood that it was for his benefit alone, a warning to him that his three friends would desert him here. A lightning bolt followed that warning, off to the side where it sent a trio of trolls hopping wildly and weirdly, the residual jolts waggling their spindly limbs in a frenetic dance.

  A troll leaped at Cormack, and another went for the powrie and its wrestling companion. The young monk dodged a spear thrust, then a second. He turned sidelong, bent back and down as the third thrust angled high, past his head. Cormack’s left hand, his inside hand, grabbed the shaft and he wrapped his right arm over it, just below the seashell tip, as he brought it down. He turned to face the troll and thrust his right forearm, now under the shaft, upward at the same time he drove his left hand down. The sudden movement and Cormack’s redistribution of his weight snapped the spear at midshaft, and as soon as he heard the break, Cormack tugged the remaining troll weapon aside and crashed against the troll, grabbing a firm hold on the broken piece of the spear as he went. He felt that sharp piece drive into the troll’s torso, and he wrapped his left hand about the creature, boring in harder.

  The troll went into a frenzy and tried to bite at him, but Cormack stayed too low for that. The frantic creature wasn’t done, though, and it used yet another of its many weapons, its long and pointed chin, and repeatedly drove the bony feature hard against the side of Cormack’s head.

  Both fell to the ground, Cormack on top, and he shoved up immediately to his knees, his movement pulling free the spear shaft. He flipped it in his hands as he went, and came right back at the troll, this time with the seashell head leading.

  The troll scrambled and thrashed, slapped and squirmed, but to no avail, and Cormack fell atop it again, pushing the spear right through its chest. He tugged left and right, ensuring that the wound would be mortal, and finally he fell aside-to see the other troll, the one hit in the back of the head by the thrown powrie staff, standing over him, a rock in hand.

  An explosion of bright white light filled Cormack’s head as that troll struck. He covered and rolled and somehow even managed to get back to his feet without being hit again too badly.

  But the troll was there, punching and biting at him, and all the world was spinning.

  Cormack found his sensibilities just enough to punch out, a stunning right cross that through good fortune alone connected solidly on the troll’s jaw, snapping its head aside and sending it back and to the ground.

  Cormack tried to straighten, staggering left and right. He saw the powries and the trolls, one big pile of confusion and fury.

  Then he saw the ground, rushing up to swallow him. He thought of Milkeila, his secret lover, and was sad to know that he would not rendezvous with her that night at their special place on the sandbar to the north, as they had planned. He thought it silly that he thought of that at all, for he didn’t know why that image of the beautiful barbarian had flooded his thoughts at this critical time.

  He knew then the reason. The thoughts, the image, were a blessing, a moment of peace in a roiling storm. He tried to say her name, Milkeila, but he could not.

  The sounds receded, the light disappeared in a blink, taking her beautiful form with it, and Cormack drowned in a cold and empty darkness.

  FOUR

  The Crutch

  Bransen rolled off Cadayle and onto his back. He threw his arm up over his face and even miscalculated that action, thumping himself hard on the forehead. Tears of frustration welled in his eyes, and with much trembling and shaking, he managed to guide his arm down to cover them. Cadayle came up to her side on one elbow to look over him.

  Down below, Bransen’s foot twitched and shot out to the side, smacking against the front support of their tent, nearly caving in the entrance. In ultimate frustration, the man managed to clasp the soul stone which lay at his side.

  Cadayle gently stroked her husband’s bare chest and whispered soft assurances to him.

  Bransen didn’t move his arm, didn’t look at her.

  “I love you,” Cadayle said to him.

  Despite his stubborn pride, Bransen reached over and clasped the soul stone that he had placed at his side. “You would have to, to suffer my… my clumsiness.”

  Cadayle laughed, but bit the chuckle off short, realizing that it wasn’t being taken in the manner in which she was offering it. “We knew that it would take time,” she said.

  “It will take forever!” Bransen retorted. “And I do not improve! I dared believe that by now I would be free of the soul stone. I dared hope…”

  “It takes time,” Cadayle interrupted. “I remember the Stork, who could hardly walk. You can walk now without the stone tied to your head. You have improved.”

  “Old news,” Bransen replied, and he finally did lower his arm so that he could look at his wonderful and understanding wife. “My improvements were dramatic and I dared to hold hope. But they have stopped now. Without the stone I am a clumsy oaf!”

  “No!”

  “Without the stone I cannot even make love to my wife! I am no man!”

  Cadayle pulled away from him and sat up, shaking her head. As Bransen rambled on she began to laugh.

  “What?” he asked at length, growing v
ery irritated.

  “I am unused to the Highwayman so full of self-pity,” she said.

  Bransen stammered and could not even give voice to his anger.

  “You have brought down a laird and robbed the prince of Delaval-twice!” Cadayle said. “You are a hero of the folk-”

  “Who cannot make love to my wife!”

  Cadayle kissed him. “You make love to me all the time.”

  “With a gemstone bound to my forehead. Without it I am too clumsy.”

  “Then be glad that you have it!”

  Bransen looked at her blankly. “I want-”

  “And you will find it,” she cut him off. “In time. But if you do not, then so be it. Be glad that we have the soul stone. Indeed, I am.” She frowned. “But even if we didn’t have it, even if you could not make love to me with any grace, do you believe that it would affect the way I feel about you? Do you think it would diminish my love and adoration for you?”

  Bransen stared at her.

  “If I could not make love to you,” she challenged him, “would you throw me from your life to find a ‘whole’ woman?”

  Bransen’s stammer was powered by more than his physical infirmities.

  “Of course you would not,” Cadayle pronounced firmly. “If I believed you could, I would never have agreed to marry you.”

  Cadayle’s expression softened. “I love you, Bransen,” she said, her small hand stroking his chest. “The physical act of making love is sweet to me with or without the gemstone upon your head. There is no more to be said, and no more of your self-pity, if you please. I cannot suffer it from my beloved, who could kill a dragon protecting me. You have stepped yourself so far above the common man that self-pity from you is worse than irony. It is foolhardy and laughably ridiculous. You are the Highwayman. You are the best man I have ever known. A better does not exist. You are my husband, and every day I awaken and thank God and the Ancient Ones that Bransen Garibond found his way into my life.”