The Legend of Nightfall

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  Then, Volkmier’s commanding bass rose over the uproar. "Six to the royal chambers. Four to the North Tower. The rest of you wait here and guard the exits. No one goes in. lf we damage the kitchen right before the funeral banquet, it’ll be my hide and your heads.” A short hammer of footsteps followed. A moment later, the guards’ talk resumed at a lower tone. A few of the kitchen workers glanced at Nightfall, then returned to their jobs without comment.

  Momentarily reprieved, Nightfall reveled in the slowing of his heart back to its normal beat. But the comfort did not last. The pause in his mission sent the oath-bond off on another rending cycle of torment that drove him to action he could not immediately think to take. He followed the line of his previous consideration, eyes searching for some opening to the courtyard before his consciousness recognized the attempt. He discovered a bolted and locked square between the ovens that surely served as a pulley system for heavy products drawn into or lowered from Alyndar’s kitchen. That seemed his most likely possibility, but he doubted even the detached kitchen staff would allow him to jimmy the lock without some comment or warning to the guards. Optionless, he headed toward it, halted by the sight of an elderly woman dumping parings, rotted scraps, and entrails down a chute near a countertop buried in cutting boards and pestles.

  Not for the first time, Nightfall appreciated the smaller than average frame hardship had given him. He crossed the room, casually eyeing delicacies his stomach, queasy and twisted from pain, would not tolerate. He kept his movements relaxed, waiting only until the woman turned her back before diving through the narrow slot.

  Greased by the sludge, Nightfall slid at a speed that alarmed him. He choked on the rancid stench of discarded and ancient foodstuffs, a minor discomfort compared to the pain assailing him. He took some solace from the realization that, whatever threatened Edward must not yet have killed him. Although Nightfall already guessed the danger came from Gilleran, the dragging of time turned it into gross certainty. Only the sorcerer would dare play cat-and-mouse with Alyndar’s prince, probably waiting to murder until he had Prince Edward and King Rikard oblivious and together.

  A moment later, Nightfall spilled into a trough filled with a mixture of foul, unrecognizable offal that made him gag. Disoriented, he rolled free and to his feet, recognizing the grunt and squeal of pigs around him. He wiped fluid from his eyes. He stood in a stable surrounded by sows guarding half-grown piglets that huddled near the enclosing fence. Beyond them, other pens held sheep, goats, and steers. Suddenly, the sows charged him.

  Well-aware of the murderous frenzy of protective mother hogs, Nightfall pitched over the ring of sows, rolling to his feet amid a squealing mass of retreating piglets. He clambered over the pen wall, sow teeth ripping though his breeks to his shin, warm blood trickling into his boot. He flung himself out and over the pen, slamming down on a packed pathway strewn with wood chips. Breath jarred from his lungs in a gasp, and the fall stunned him momentarily. The spark of pain seemed to course through his body in slowed motion, as if through water; His every muscle felt torn by magic; his every bone felt broken.

  A shadow fell across Nightfall. Still gathering strength to stand, prodded by the oath-bond’s need, he rolled his eyes up to the source. Captain Volkmier stood over him, the point of a spear leveled at Nightfall’s throat. "Be still."

  Nightfall fixed a desperate gaze on the red-haired guardsman, digging for his own feelings amidst the drowning presence of the magic. A trickle of wisdom told him to bait the captain to a red rage beyond thought of consequence. Death in this fashion would rescue his soul from Gilleran. But Nightfall sensed something stronger, a need that he hoped came from within, as it seemed, not just an offshoot of the oath-bond. Bound or not, he had to rescue Edward, and Alyndar, from the sorcerer’s evil. He suspected Volkmier had presumed the means of his escape from the kitchen, purposefully misdirecting Nightfall with his instructions to the guards. Harboring no fear of a routine killing but driven to reckless urgency by magic, Nightfall doubted he could remain in position longer than a moment. "May I stand, sir?"

  Volkmier’s features opened with surprise at what was, apparently, an unexpected question. "You may sit," he said at length, the spear retreating slightly.

  Nightfall rose into a crouch, keeping his hands well in sight. "I’m unarmed.”

  The captain ignored the claim. Without taking his eyes from Nightfall, he back-stepped to a bag on the floor. He sorted the contents without looking at them, tossing a pair of opened shackles, then manacles, at Nightfall’s side. "Put them on. No tricks. I’ll check them when you’re done."

  The oath-bond struck him with a sharp pain as abrupt and frightening as lightning. It took most of his will to keep from skittering t0 his feet against the captain’s order. He waited for the pain to subside enough to allow speech, then fixed his gaze on Volkmier. "No."

  "No?"

  "No, sir.” Nightfall could not compromise. Though he could unlock the bonds once placed, the magic had become too insistent for more delays.

  Volkmier did not relent. "I didn’t ask a question, Sudian. Do as you’re told."

  "I’m trying to." Nightfall fixed the most earnest stare he could muster on Captain Volkmier, then quoted him nearly verbatim. "I was told to protect my master, and I’m bound to his service. I won’t leave him unguarded with men I don’t trust. I won’t leave him unprotected.”

  "Your charge is with his father. No danger there.”

  Nightfall tensed to rise, goaded to thoughtless action by the oath-bond.

  The spear reared back. "Don’t test my aim. I’ve slain zigzagging rabbits smaller than your head."

  "No choice." Time constraints made Nightfall’s sentences incomplete. “Kill me if must. Rather die than forsake master." Nightfall sprang to his feet and raced for the exit in a straight line Volkmier could not miss. Without so much as a backward glance, he charged into the courtyard, tensed for a stab through the back that never came. Nor did he hear a clatter to indicate the weapon had been misthrown. Nightfall knew a sudden camaraderie that both, it seemed, could understand. "Look to your own charge," he shouted as he ran. "The king may face the same danger."

  Apparently not fully trusting the man he had just released, Volkmier shouted to his men. "Prisoner in the courtyard. Those on duty, man the walls and gates. The rest, inside to the North Tower chapel!"

  Volkmier’s command was obviously intended to police Nightfall’s claims and keep him from escaping from the castle grounds. Since he had no intention of doing so, their position posed no threat. It would take time for the guardsmen to enter the door, head north, and clamber to the North Tower, a delay Nightfall dared not spare. He rushed north, praying to the Father the North Tower had been appropriately named. As Alyndar’s guard force rushed alternately to the periphery or the castle entry, Nightfall made a beeline for the northernmost tower.

  Daylight turned the stonework into a glaze that revealed no hand or toeholds aside from sundry windows on every level, the ones on the lowest three shuttered and barred. Nightfall vaulted for the first, landing lightly on its ledge. From there, he dropped his weight as low as the wind would allow, shinnying as quickly as a menaced spider, trusting momentum and his featherweight to serve where the craft of the artisans foiled him. Each upward glance brought sunlight glaring into his eyes, the aftermath a bland sequence of lines and spots on the stonework that made grips even harder to find.

  Glass paned the fourth and fifth floor windows, apparently to thwart insects. Nightfall doubted any man, himself included, could battle past the courtyard guards and scale the walls without noticeable equipment. Desperation goaded him up walls that had begun to seem glass-smooth and achingly hot from the sun. By the sixth floor, he realized he had lost a boot, and his fingers bled from the minuscule irregularities they groped to clasp repeatedly. Every leg or arm muscle ached, and the stone had abraded his cheek. His nose still throbbed from the fall, and his head pounded. Yet, these pains seemed a blessing. As he approached Princ
e Edward, the oath-bond had returned nearly to its nagging baseline. He drew some hope from the realization that the sixth floor windows sported no glass, shutters, or bars, just lacy curtains that flapped and spiraled in the wind. Heart pounding, Nightfall dropped his other boot and scooted upward.

  The purple curtains on the seventh floor windows matched those on the sixth. Using their fluttering pattern as cover, he peeked into a massive chamber that surely accounted for the entirety of the level. He perched high over a dais that supported a glass case of books, the gold-inlaid box that held Leyne’s body, three hammer-and-fist banners of Alyndar, and a colossal candelabra holding eight burning, purple candles. Prince Edward slumped on the steps leading to the dais, Chancellor Gilleran in front of him, animatedly waving his arms.

  I ’m too late. Nightfall’s heart seemed to stop, and pain fluttered through his chest. But the oath-bond remained at its lower level. Apparently, Edward lived. A moment later, a sigh shuddered through his body indicating consciousness as well. Both men wore tailored costumes, as richly dressed as nobility in court. Nightfall assessed the remainder of the room from habit. Wall sconces held lanterns, illuminating the central as well as the outer aisles between lengthy rows of pews. At the far end of the middle aisle, an iron-studded door stood closed.

  Nightfall lowered himself through the window, scrambling down the wall to the floor, briefly losing track of his charge in the moments it took to climb. Those few instants cost him surprise.

  Edward called out to him softly. "Nightfall."

  Nightfall whirled at the address, realizing his mistake as he did so. In his nearly three decades of terrorizing the continent, he had never once crossed personae. Now, he had allowed emotion to steal his composure. He had fallen prey to the oldest and easiest trick in the world.

  "Father take me, it’s true." Edward’s voice became an anguished sob, and he crumpled to the steps. "I believed in you. I dared to think someone believed in me. It was all a vicious lie."

  Standing over the despondent prince, Gilleran smiled his triumph.

  The rising prickles of the oath-bond were Nightfall’s first warning that his hatred had again intensified to thoughts of murder. Whether the news, so close on the heels of Leyne’s death, had overwhelmed Edward by itself or only with some magical assistance from the sorcerer, he did not know or care. He had only two options: win back the prince’s trust and turn him against the chancellor he had known since childhood or battle alone against an enemy he could not harm without destroying himself.

  Chancellor Gilleran made the choice for him. "Just in time for the finale." He recited harsh syllables with a gesture that had become familiar, attention on Edward.

  Edward lay, curled on the steps, weeping with the same world-oblivious grief he had displayed for his brother. It was a touching, heart-rending tribute, lost on its recipient who had eyes only for Gilleran.

  The ice spell. Desperation drove Nightfall into a wild charge, thoughts deliberately focused only on defense. He could not clear the distance to physically disrupt the magic in time. The Magebane’s stone. Nightfall fumbled it free as he ran, shouting to draw what little regard he could seize from Edward’s unreasoning anguish. "Look!" The stone glowed red in his fist, and he turned his concentration to the death spell Gilleran had wrested from Ritworth.

  Gilleran waved his hand toward Edward. An angry, blue light blazed from the stone, arching like lightning toward the magical energy. The forces met in silence, but a brilliant explosion of light slashed Nightfall’s vision, flinging sparks in a multicolored rain.

  Gilleran retreated with a startled gasp.

  Nightfall cleared the distance between then, speaking to Edward without bothering to see if the prince was watching. “See? I had the power to escape the bond at any time. I did believe in you. I chose to stay in your service!" It was a necessary lie. Until he roused Edward, he could accomplish nothing but delay.

  "Murdering liar! Demon!" Gilleran undermined whatever confidence Nightfall had reclaimed. His gaze fixed on the stone, now cold and lifeless in Nightfall’s fist; and the icy corpse’s grin returned. "You have no power at all, over it or over me." He lurched toward Nightfall.

  Hatred boiled within Nightfall, and he closed before he could think to do otherwise. The oath-bond caught him a blow he could not fend, an abrupt agony that shocked through his body. "No!" he screamed. ‘°Master, run. Save yourself." Before he could regain control of his limbs, Gilleran hammered a fist into his face that sprawled him. Rage and the need for vengeance struck as hard as the blow, bringing a whirlwind response from the oath-bond that spasmed every muscle in his body. Pain only fueled the venom, an ugly cycle he fought to escape. His body jerked into a wild seizure he felt helpless to override.

  A boot tip thudded into Nightfall’s chest, stealing what little breath his shuddering lungs managed to gather. Gilleran kicked him repeatedly, shouting epithets Nightfall could not decipher over the roar of the oath-bond’s threat. Dimly, he recognized a series of kicks and blows, heard something crack, and tasted blood. But the physical agony seemed secondary. His mind seemed to slip away, as it had in childhood, separating thought from emotion. The battering became a familiar lull on which to focus his consciousness, its source a nameless creature that bore no relation to anyone he knew. The drive for retribution and self-defense died, unfullfillable, and the oath-bond gave him enough reprieve to feel the stabbing, aching momentos of the beating. And also to realize the pounding had stopped.

  Nightfall staggered to his feet, forcing his pain-glazed eyes to focus. The cruelty had snapped Edward from trance to flying rage, and he charged the sorcerer with sword drawn. Gilleran calmly gestured, a spell different from any Nightfall had seen cast before. Logic jerked back to body in an instant. He recalled Kelryn’s description of the cutting magic that had dropped a tree branch on Ritworth. Then, Gilleran had only wanted to trap, not kill. What damage could a force that sharp do to a man? Nightfall sprang for Edward.

  Nightfall crashed into the prince just as Gilleran made the final, curt movement. Pain gashed Nightfall’s side, magic opening the flesh from hip bone to buttocks. Edward collapsed, head slamming against a pew with a sickening thud. He slumped to the aisle, and momentum sent Nightfall tumbling over the seat then skidding beneath the pews. He thumped into the dais steps hard enough to jar every wound in his body. Blood smeared the wooden floor. Dizziness assailed him like an enemy, the blanket of buzzing stars that could only come from blood loss.

  Nightfall’s eyelids felt heavy, but he forced himself to look. Edward lolled, unconscious, on the floor, his sword a hand’s breadth from his limp fingers. Near the door, the sorcerer started the ice spell again. This time, Nightfall knew he could not prevent it. He had lost, and his soul belonged to Gilleran. The urge to sink into coma, to pray to the Father that death took him first became an obsession. But survival instincts that had become more curse than friend nudged him to action. He staggered to his feet, already too late.

  The door jerked open with an echoing snap and squealing hinges. King Rikard of Alyndar stood in the doorway. "Edward, I—"

  Gilleran spun, redirecting his spell from surprise or desperation. White light bathed the king’s head. Rikard went still, mouth open, expression fixed. He pitched backward, head striking the floor and shattering. Shards skittered down the hallway, the sound eerily benign, nearly lost beneath the thud of his collapsing body.

  Nightfall’s agony seemed to drop a thousand notches in an instant. Still dizzied, it took him longer than it should have to divine the reason. The king is dead and the eldest prince. Edward is king of Alyndar. Edward is landed. Freed from the oath-bond, Nightfall launched himself at Gilleran.

  The stomp of footsteps funneled up the staircase, accompanied by the clatter of mail.

  Gilleran swore, the ever-present smile becoming a desperate grimace. He whirled, sprinting deeper into the room. An accident in the chapel room that took king and prince, he could have arranged. This, he could never explain
. His mad scrambling dash ran him headlong into Nightfall.

  Both men sprang at once, Gilleran rising to fly for the window, Nightfall attacking in blood-maddened frenzy. Nightfall tackled the sorcerer, hands scrabbling for the throat, Gilleran twisting and swearing. The magic proved stronger. Gilleran soared upward, Nightfall still clinging and clawing for a better hold. As the Alyndarian sentries reached their king, some elbowing past to find the culprit, Gilleran and Nightfall shot through the window.

  Once in free air, Gilleran fought back, planting his fingers on Nightfall’s face and raking his nails over flesh. Nightfall tossed his head, saving his eyes. The movement nearly cost him his grip. Gilleran spun, kicking and flailing to free himself from Nightfall’s encumbrance. The ground lay seven stories beneath them. Gilleran spiraled higher, ensuring Nightfall’s death when his grip finally failed.

  Nightfall hid fear behind desperation and will. His mind filled with swimming spots, and his vision gave him only whirling pictures of tree tops, guards leaning from the tower window, and the courtyard far below them. Gilleran’s struggles and blood loss stole his coordination and, soon, his hold on the sorcerer. If I fall, I die. If we both fall, we both die. The choice was easy. Eventually, Gilleran would have to touch down, but Nightfall dared not risk the chancellor’s escape. He could not bear the cost in friends’ lives. He closed his eyes, concentrating on a quick prayer. Seven Sisters, may my death, at least, not be in vain. He opened his eyes, feeling an inner peace that he tried to believe came from divinity, though the absence of the oath-bond after so many months seemed the more likely explanation. He locked holds on Gilleran’s arm and belt, driving his weight to its maximum. They plummeted.

  Gilleran screamed, writhing. He pounded on Nightfall’s wrists, then eeled his head and buried his teeth in the squire’s thumb.

  Nightfall jerked, saving his finger instinctively, but losing the arm grip. Tree limbs snapped like twigs beneath them. Nightfall dropped his weight as the ground rushed up to meet them. They spun like flotsam, Gilleran flopping to the bottom as he became the heavier of the two. Nightfall stiffened for the impact, trying one last, urgent act. He imagined himself weightless as he released his death grip on Gilleran’s belt and snatched a tree branch from the air.