The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection

by D. W. Hawkins

  “I suppose things didn’t work out in Ishamael,” Maarkov said. “Not that he’d go down there himself—you can tell him I said that, too.”

  “You know I will not.”

  “I know,” he sighed. “You may as well get out of my fucking sight, and go meet your doom. He already knows you’re here—you know that.” Maarkov tried to keep his distance from his brother’s apprentices. They had a nasty habit of dying when they’d outlived their usefulness. Maarkov didn’t want to see Inera go, though. Not that he liked her—he didn’t think he was capable of that—but her company was the only pleasant thing about his existence, and she was easy on the eyes. He wanted to bed her, but the woman eluded his every advance. He had long ago stopped trying.

  Another odd thing his body did—lusting.

  “I do, in fact, already know,” Maaz hissed, coming out of the darkness. Maarkov almost jumped out of his skin. He wanted to throw something at him, but the only thing in his hand was his tobacco pipe, and he didn’t want to part with it.

  Inera bowed her head, keeping her eyes on the grass at Maaz’s feet. Maarkov always watched these little exchanges with a wry sense of humor. He could remember when his brother had been a pleading little shit, and now he made all those who served him cower at his very gaze. It all seemed so useless and petty to Maarkov, but what did his opinion matter?

  “Master,” she said. “I have failed.”

  “A fact that I have deduced, given that you have neither the girl, nor the artifact in your possession, as I instructed you. What shattering explosion of idiocy resulted in your failure, Inera?” he asked. The space between master and apprentice was loaded with tension.

  “Dormael’s cousin proved to be more resourceful than I’d expected,” she said. “He found my hiding place before the Taker could do its work. Somehow Dormael was able to break the Circle I had constructed—it makes no sense. It held him in check right up until the end. He shouldn’t have been able to break it.”

  Maarkov could tell that the girl was struggling not to cower. He could respect her resolve.

  “If your former lover was able to break your Circle, then you must have constructed it incorrectly,” Maaz said. “And if his cousin found your hiding place, it was your own stupidity that led him to you. You failed, and failed yet again. Why am I not surprised, Inera?”

  “Because I’m a failure, Master.”

  Maarkov wanted to puke.

  “Because you’re a failure,” Maaz said. He reached out his hand, fingers curling into a claw. Inera collapsed to her knees, making only the smallest noise at the pain. Maaz left the pressure on her, until Inera could be heard whimpering just under her breath.

  Maarkov reached to his side, looking for the dagger he kept at his belt.

  “Explain to me why I should not just kill you now,” Maaz said. “If all that lies between us in the future is failure, Inera, you would better serve as a corpse.”

  Inera made a coughing noise, and reached a hand to her side. She cried out in pain as the movement nearly doubled her over, but then raised her hand into the air. Clutched in her fist was a piece of cloth.

  Maaz let the pressure recede, and she gasped in relief. He walked forward and snatched the piece of cloth from her, then ran it under his nose, sniffing at it like a lady’s undergarments.

  Maarkov gagged.

  “At least you have finally done something of value, Inera. You have earned your life tonight,” Maaz said. He turned his gaze on Maarkov. “Perhaps others could learn from your example.”

  “I’ve no interest in pleasing you, brother,” Maarkov sighed. “Fuck yourself.”

  Maaz just turned from him, walking a short distance away to clear a space on the ground. Inera gave Maarkov a guarded look, then turned to follow her master. Maarkov leaned back against the tree again and puffed on his pipe. He watched his brother simply because there was nothing else to look at.

  Maaz gestured to the space he’d cleared, and flames burst to life. They rushed across the grass in a circle, burning shapes and sinuous lines into the ground. Maaz directed the flames, drawing his spell on the ground like a man with a paintbrush.

  Maaz then turned toward the camp, and hissed something into the darkness. Two of the strega came out of the shadows, silent figures wrapped in ratty scarves and deep Sevenlander cloaks. Maarkov wondered why his brother even bothered making them shroud themselves so—it did nothing for the stink.

  They each stepped over the circle of low flame, and laid side-by-side in the center, their dead eyes staring at the sky. One of them was the boy they’d captured days ago, the one who had watched Maarkov eat a piece of his mother. Maarkov couldn’t keep the shudder out of his body as he looked at the thing. Maaz slashed his arm open with a knife, and slung his blood around the circle, whispering in that strange, guttural language.

  Each spatter of blood became a cloud of mist as it touched the spell, and each cloud of mist began to crawl through the air, congealing in smoky tendrils. Maaz continued chanting, and tossed more of his black, putrid blood into the circle. Two forms began to coalesce out of the crackling mist.

  Their bodies were translucent, like shadows pierced by moonlight. It was hard to make out much about them, but Maarkov thought their features were distended, like a strange mockery of the human body. Their arms were too long, fingers too thin, and legs too short. They had a hunched stance, and looked around the circle in quick, jerky movements. The only thing Maarkov could see clearly about them were their eyes, which were glowing motes of red light.

  Something about the look those things turned on him chilled Maarkov to the bone.

  Maaz hissed something to them in that same language, and the things gazed down at the two strega beneath them. One of them looked up and made a sweeping gesture with one of its ghostly arms. Maaz hissed something angry at them, and raised a fist toward the one that had replied to him. Darkness gathered around it, and it cringed in what appeared to be pain, though Maarkov could hear no sound. It went on for a few seconds before the thing flashed its eyes at Maaz in surrender.

  These things are intelligent, Maarkov realized. They’re communicating with him.

  The two shadows looked once again to the strega, and one of them reached its misty arm down into the mouth of one of the corpses. It crawled down into the strega, twisting the corpse’s shape as it wriggled down its throat. The second shadow crawled into the boy’s body, and Maarkov turned his eyes away. The sound of the flesh stretching and spasming was enough to disgust him even without the sight of it.

  Maarkov turned back as the sound abated, and watched the things rise from the ground. Though their skin was still the pallid gray of a corpse, there was something charged about it, something hard. The bodies no longer resembled anything close to human. The legs were shorter, hips somehow shifted to give the thing a more predatory stance. The arms were longer, and claws now decorated fingers at the ends of distended hands. The eyes burned with a red, fell light.

  They rose from the ground and adjusted their clothing, wrapping scarves around their faces until nothing showed through but the light from their eyes. The cloaks hugged their bodies in odd ways, but if they crouched, Maarkov supposed they might be able to pass for a man. He shivered at the thought. The things moved with a canine grace.

  Maaz took the blood-covered cloth that Inera had given him, and ripped it in two. He said a few words to the things, then tossed each one a piece of the cloth. Maarkov gagged a second time as the things swallowed the pieces, gulping them down like a pair of snakes.

  As one, their heads turned toward the city of Ishamael. They spared one last look for Maaz, then bounded into the night, loping away like a pair of ghostly wolves. A howl rose up in their wake, echoing into the night.

  They’re hunters, he realized. Like gods-damned bloodhounds.

  Like bloodhounds that could squeeze your head off, perhaps.

  Strega tore after them, running through the night at full speed in complete silence. Maarkov tr
ied to count them before they disappeared into the shadows, but the bastards were too quick. Maaz had made many new servants from the caravan in the mountains, and only a few remained in camp. They stood motionless, milky eyes looking at nothing. Maaz liked to keep a few of the rotten things around for menial labor.

  “Perhaps now we shall see some results,” Maaz said, brushing his hands off. “By morning the artifact and the girl will be in my possession. We’ll move tomorrow.”

  “What is my next task, Master?” Inera asked.

  “Travel to Thardin, inflict yourself upon the emperor. Ensure everything is going according to my plan. Prepare the way for our culling,” Maaz said. “And Inera—I shouldn’t have to tell you that this is your last chance. Fail me again, and you will end on my table.”

  With that, Maaz turned and slithered away into the night.

  Maarkov let out a long breath, and took another pull from his pipe. Inera gave him a long, opaque glance. For a moment, Maarkov thought she might open up to him, speak to him with honesty. There was so little honesty in their little band of murderers, and Maarkov’s heart momentarily ached for it. He thought he saw something in her eyes.

  Maarkov offered her a weak smile.

  She turned, form sliding back into the black bird, and fluttered away into the night.

  Maarkov watched her go, then took another pull from his pipe. At least this would be over by morning. They could head back to Shundov, and he could go back to ignoring his brother.

  A man needs something to look forward to, after all.

  ***

  “This,” the Mekai said, holding a scroll gingerly to the light, “is one of the oldest pieces in the archive. It’s four copies down, and in Old Vendon.”

  “What does that mean?” Shawna asked.

  “Whenever a document falls into disrepair, it is copied down into a new text,” Lacelle explained, shuffling through her research. “If it is in an old language, it is translated. This is the fourth copy of this text, and it is in a dead language—so it is very old, you see.”

  “I understand,” Shawna said, turning a reverent eye on the ancient scroll.

  “What is it?” D’Jenn asked.

  “It’s a history,” the Mekai said. “It’s in an old style, though—when the words were meant to be sung in verses. It’s a poem about the founding of the Sevenlands.”

  “A folktale, you mean,” D’Jenn said.

  “Don’t be so quick to judge,” the Mekai replied, turning a serious gaze on D’Jenn. “Just because something is old doesn’t mean you can dismiss it.”

  “What does this have to do with my mother’s armlet?” Shawna asked.

  “You’re about to see,” the Mekai said. He perused the document, muttering to himself as he did so. His spectacles floated up of their own accord, depositing themselves on his nose, and he cleared his throat. “Here we are—And Ishamael went to the holy place on the hill, where the gods listen. He said to them ‘Look upon my people, they are dying, they are enslaved. Look upon my people’. The gods replied to him ‘Ishamael, have you not fought the invader, have you not killed him, have you not driven him before you?’ ‘I have’ said he. ‘Then it is your lot to die, it is the lot of the Vendon to die, their bones ground to dust, their cities burned, their children wailing’ said the gods. ‘If Ishamael cannot beat the invader, then it is the lot of the Vendon to be shattered.’

  “Ishamael’s heart was firm, though, and he challenged the gods. ‘Why’ said he, ‘have you sent this horde upon us? You give them steel, and anger, and men as numerous as the stars, yet you make the Vendon fractious and mistrustful. Are the Vendon not your people, do they not cry out, do you cower from the wailing of their children?’ Ishamael shook his fists at the gods and decried their judgment. ‘Cower, then’ said he, ‘as this horde-from-nowhere shatters the Vendon, and kills the last of the Blessed of Eindor. Let the gods cower in fear’.”

  “I’ve never heard this version,” Dormael said. “In the one I’ve read, he prays to them and they bless him with victory, or some such. Where did this version come from?”

  “It is very old,” Lacelle said. “One of many such scrolls in the archive, all scattered pieces of something greater. You have no idea how much I wish we had the rest of it.”

  The Mekai cleared his throat, and everyone went silent.

  He continued, “So the gods looked down on Orm, the Place Where the Gods Listen, and they looked down on Ishamael, and they looked down on the Vendon. They weighed Ishamael as a man, and found the worth of him. Then the brothers—Evmir, whose Hammer forged the world from the Void, and Eindor, who gave the world magic—looked down on Ishamael and said ‘Do you wish to drive your enemies before you, to shatter their steel, to break their anger, to kill their men as numerous as the stars?’ ‘Yes’ said he, ‘I wish the children of the Vendon to live.’

  “Then the brothers looked down on Orm, the Place Where the Gods Listen, and said ‘Give us a sacrifice’. Ishamael had brought a sprig of new ivy, fresh with berries on the stem, and he gave that to the bowl, and said ‘It is life that I bring to you’. The gods answered him.”

  “Wait,” Dormael said. “Did you say a sprig of new ivy?”

  He recalled the armlet’s dream in a sudden rush of vivid color—the stone bowl, the ivy, the kneeling man, and the woman being stretched over the altar. Dormael’s blood went cold, and he tried to make sense of what he was hearing.

  “I believe that was what it said, yes,” the Mekai replied. “Why?”

  “The armlet,” Dormael said. “It showed me a scene like that in a dream.” He explained the dream to everyone in the room, recalling as many details as he could. Lacelle and the Mekai listened to his tale, and then shared a guarded look with each other.

  “I believe that’s confirmation,” Lacelle said. “It is as we feared.”

  “What?” D’Jenn asked.

  “The armlet,” the Mekai said, handing the scroll over to Lacelle, who put it aside. “Tell me something about it—when it acts out, what universally appears?”

  “Fire,” Shawna said, and Dormael nodded in agreement.

  “Young Bethany refers to the thing as ‘fiega,’ which you all know is the Old Vendon word for ‘fire’. This is something that the armlet told her, not something she named it on her own,” the Mekai said. “You see, in the story, the gods answer Ishamael, and gifted a weapon to him. If I recall correctly—‘And so she shall serve you, and grant you seven signs of power over the world. Take her and hammer their bones to dust, kill their men as numerous as the stars, shatter them, and leave their children wailing. Take this hammer and drive them before you’ said the gods. And Ishamael took it.”

  “So you believe my mother’s armlet is this weapon?” Shawna asked. She sounded skeptical, and Dormael couldn’t blame her. He was as religious as the next man, but even with the dream, this sounded hard to believe.

  “Only a piece of it,” Lacelle said. “I know it sounds a bit rich, but hear us out. This weapon, this Nar’doroc, was used to drive the hordes back to the east. There are many old stories amongst the steppe tribes in Dannon, songs as old as this one that tell of their people being killed by a god-man who had a weapon they called ‘hirminusloch’. Many historians believe it’s the source of the hatred they hold for westerners.”

  “By the time he had driven the horde from the lands of the Vendon, Ishamael had united the nine tribes into one,” the Mekai said. “Two of them wanted him to share the power of the Nar’doroc, though, and Ishamael refused. So, seven tribes fought two, and only seven remained. He used the power of the Nar’doroc to twist the rebels, and drive them into the mountains. In his shame, he sundered the Nar’doroc into seven pieces, and gave the chief of each tribe a single piece of the whole. According to the story, though, the Nar’doroc stopped working when it was sundered.”

  “What do you mean he twisted them and drove them into the mountains?” Allen asked, joining the conversation. “You mean the Gathan Mountains? Do
you mean that Ishamael created the Garthorin with this…this thing?”

  “This is just one story,” Lacelle said. “You have to realize that we’re drawing on different sources, here, and each one can be difficult to properly translate given many different things—the assumed diction of the time, the dialect in use, the location where it was recorded, and many other things you don’t care to hear about. In other words—there’s no way to be certain about any of this. Don’t take it for the gospel of the gods. Remember—these poems were meant to be performed for an audience. There is some embellishment.”

  “I see,” Allen said. “But still—according to this story, Ishamael used Shawna’s armlet to create the Garthorin. The bloody Garthorin.” His eyes went to the silver box on the table, and he smiled. “I’ve been waiting for a chance to hunt the Garthrorin. That’s a real test for a man.”

  Lacelle gave Allen a bewildered look, but he didn’t notice.

  “The thing Ishamael would have used to ‘create’ the Garthorin—as you put it—would have been completely different,” Lacelle said. “The Baroness Llewan’s armlet would have been only a single piece of a greater whole.”

  “Wait,” Dormael said, coming to a realization. “If Shawna’s armlet is only one of seven pieces of this thing, then where in the Six Hells are the rest of them?”

  “You’ve stumbled right onto the problem,” the Mekai said. “Where, indeed? We’ve already spoken of the players in this game—the Galanian Emperor, this mysterious vilth—but now we better understand the stakes.”

  “What does Victus know of this?” D’Jenn asked.

  “Some of what we do,” Lacelle said with a grimace. “But we can take some small solace in the fact that his knowledge doesn’t run very deep. He knows the armlet is powerful, but the research the Mekai and I have been gathering is unknown to him.”

  “What have you been gathering, Deacon?” Dormael asked.

  “Anything we could find that mentioned the thing, or something like it,” Lacelle replied. “Most of it is scattered information, but there are a few pieces in there that point to possible locations for the other pieces of the Nar’doroc.”