by William King
Look at him, thought Rik. He’s found a chance at glory, and he’s about to grab it with both hands, even if he has to get all of us killed to do it. Vosh was beside Sardec, looking very unhappy.
Master Severin produced a crystal from his pouch and muttered a spell. The runes along its sides flared brilliantly and then settled down to produce a steady even glow. The wizard took the crystal and placed it in a socket on a specially prepared wand. He walked forward softly. There was an aura of great weariness about him which did not reassure Rik at all. If tired men made mistakes, how much worse mistakes could be made by a tired Terrarch wizard?
Weasel was at the front, reluctantly studying the tracks for clues. The Barbarian was beside him, a pistol in one hand, his massive knife in the other. He moved warily, perfectly poised and controlled, and if Rik had not known of his terror of the supernatural and his fear of enclosed spaces, he would never have suspected them. The Barbarian was not too bright, but he was brave as a dragon.
Behind the leaders were Pigeon, and Leon, and then Rik himself, followed by the rest of the squad strung out in a straggling line. Every second man held a lit torch. The others held ready weapons. Behind Rik came Gunther, lanky Boot, Toadface, limping Hopper and Handsome Jan. Rik wished Gunther were not right behind him. The low monotone of the man’s constant prayers was getting on his nerves.
He had to admit that if ever there was a place that warranted prayer, this was it. The props overhead looked as if they had been recently placed by men who had not known a great deal about what they were doing, at least according to Hopper who, like the Sergeant, had been a miner in his time. Rik felt cramped by the low ceilings. He did not like the strange glyphs carved into the walls at odd intervals. They made his eyes hurt when he tried to follow their intricate web-like patterns. There was no surer sign that sorcery was at work.
He grasped his pistol tighter in one hand, and his bayonet in the other. There was no room to swing a rifle down here. Any fighting would be up close and personal. It was odd how hot it was when it was so cold outside. Already his shirt was clammy with sweat, and some of the men had loosened their tunics. He could see beads of sweat on Weasel’s bald pate. The poacher licked his lips, and Rik realised that his mouth must be dry too. There was dust in the air, he thought and something else. He was not sure what.
This would not be an attractive place to die, Rik thought. Not that there were any of those, unless, as the Barbarian claimed, it was in the arms of a Sorajan whore in the great Palace of a Thousand Pleasures in Sorrow, but this was a particularly unprepossessing one.
His thoughts drifted all too easily to demons and the Darkness in the shadowy gloom. Barely controlled fear churned in his stomach; fear of the dark, fear of the weight of the mountains pressing down, fear of demons, and wizards and whatever other unnatural things might lurk down here. Bad as the weather was up top, he suddenly wished he was there or back in the camp, or in the sooty alleys of Sorrow; anywhere but here.
Uran Ultar had numbered many demons among his servants, at least according to all the stories Rik had heard. Perhaps not all of them had been destroyed along with Achenar. He offered up a prayer and hoped that God was listening. It was strange. He had more or less rejected the concept of a good God the orphanage priests had beaten into him except when he was in danger. His old faith usually came back to him then or at least the hope that there was something behind it.
The corridors wound on downwards. At first he thought it was his imagination but then he began to notice that there was a faint glow emerging from the walls. He had thought that it was merely the reflected light of the lantern playing over crystal veins, but then he noticed as he looked back that there was an ever so faint glitter that never quite faded behind them. It was as if a layer of something overlaid the wall.
He looked back at Hopper. The former miner shook his head then rubbed his broken nose. The expression in his deep set eyes showed he had never seen anything like this before and more than a touch of fear. Rik was not reassured. He almost bumped into Leon before he noticed that they had stopped and were staring at another mystical sign carved into the wall. The Lieutenant studied it thoughtfully. Master Severin hunkered down beside it, nodding his head as if he had some clue as to what they were looking at. All Rik knew was that he did not like this one little bit.
“Protective rune of an odd sort,” Severin said.
“Why odd?” Sardec asked.
“Unusual. Not of any school I know. Could be a divinator or a ward but it has no halo.”
“You mean you did not sense it till you saw it?”
“Correct.”
“I think it’s safe to say our dark wizard knows we’re on his trail,” Sardec said. There were a few half-hearted chuckles but the atmosphere of fear only deepened.
They pushed on down.
“I wonder how deep this mine goes, Rik?” asked Leon.
“Perhaps all the way down to Hell,” said Gunther. Rik wished he would shut up. This was not the sort of talk he needed to hear.
“But the Light will shield the righteous,” Gunther added. “Are you righteous?”
“You’ll get my righteous boot up your arse, if you don’t shut up,” said the Barbarian from up front. It was a measure of the Lieutenant’s involvement in his own thoughts that he did not intervene.
The strange scent increased. It smelled vaguely of spices, of cinnamon as well as rotten meat. The Barbarian noted that there were odd scrape marks on the floors and then they entered a large chamber-like cave and stopped short.
“Why would a wizard come here?” Leon asked Rik in a tone that suggested he genuinely expected an answer. His voice echoed somewhat under the high domed ceiling. “Why did he brave the demons?”
“Perhaps you are asking the wrong question,” said Rik. “Perhaps he came here because there are demons.”
It made an awful sort of sense. It was the thing wizards were always supposed to be doing, communing with demons of the Pits in pursuit of forbidden wisdom. It reminded him of some of the things the Old Witch used to say back in Sorrow, about the Ancient Ones having knowledge that men would sell their souls for. Of course there were other things demons would barter for as well as souls. He thought of the missing people. Maybe the wizard they were after was making some sort of deal.
The Foragers all looked at each other uneasily and then at the Lieutenant and the wizard for guidance. Rik could tell they were all thinking of turning tail and running. He did not blame them. He was considering it himself. Fighting demons in this deep, dark and lonely place was not his idea of soldiering. The Lieutenant looked at them and smiled sardonically. He brandished his truesilver blade, making a couple of quick cuts in the air. He looked as if he would chop down the first man to run but he said; “There is no demon this won’t cut.”
“It is the blade of the righteous,” said Gunther, a look of grim satisfaction on his face. Well, there’s one man who won’t run, thought Rik, deciding that he would not run himself. Anywhere the Lieutenant could stay he could stay too.
“I am not afraid to fight demons,” said the Barbarian. His voice sounded a little shaky but he added. “What demon of this miserable wee land can compare to the Aer of my home?”
Suddenly the Lieutenant held up his hand for quiet. Rik did not need to be told why. He could hear it too. From somewhere up ahead came the sound of soft scuttling.
It looked like something had found them.
Chapter Seven
The Foragers looked at one another. The noise ceased, to be replaced by conversation between a human voice and one that belonged to something eerily other. It was high-pitched, gibbering and insane, possessed of a timbre that was not the product of any human throat. Rik could not make out the words, and he doubted he could understand them anyway. They had the strange, cracked quality of one of the ancient demon tongues used by sorcerers in Sorrow.
“Form up men,” said the Lieutenant. “Stand ready. We are discovered.”
&nbs
p; “What makes you say that?” muttered Weasel, edging away from the direction the sound was coming from and putting his back to the wall. Rik looked around. Most of the men had drawn pistols or knives even those who held torches. Sardec gestured for them to fall back. Space was confined and he needed room to wield his blade. The Barbarian stood beside him, a look of determination on his face.
“Don’t shoot until I give the order. Don’t want to hit our own accidentally or have a ricochet get us. This is blade work, men, unless you get a clear and certain shot.” Only the slightest trace of strain showed in Sardec’s voice.
Rik’s fingers tightened on his own weapons. Something was coming towards them, something large and heavy, something that made a strange slithering sound mixed with scuttling as it moved. His imagination conjured up the vision of a massive serpent coming to devour them or a huge spider, its slimy sides scuffing the stonework of the walls. Severin raised his arms and began to chant.
The demon came into view, and it was worse by far than anything Rik had expected. In the gloom it was not possible to make out all the details and for that he was glad. What he could see was quite bad enough to live in his nightmares for the rest of his life.
The thing was perhaps the size of a small bull, with a body that at first suggested that of a great spider till he noticed that it was armoured and segmented like a centipede’s. It moved along on six columnar legs, jointed several times. In the centre and front of its torso, where the eyes of a spider would have been, was a head that resembled the body of a squid. It had eight stalks and at the end of each stalk was an eye. In the centre was the mouth. What looked like two long stabbing prongs constantly retracted and extruded on either side of it. Worst of all were the huge blades that emerged from the front of the torso. Once they might have been legs, but they had changed and adapted till now they were massive scythes, poised to strike. They were an odd venomous green, and Rik felt sure that their touch would mean poisonous death.
The air was filled with the smell of rot and spice and something musty. The demon gibbered crazily.
“An Ultari,” said Sardec. Rik gasped. It was a name he had heard whispered in fear in the Street of Sorcerers in Sorrow. It was one of the old demon races, famed for their cruelty and insanity, the spawn of the Spider God, Uran Ultar, long thought gone from the surface of Gaeia.
It was massive. Its skin was oddly blotched and albino white. How long had it been down here, Rik wondered? How had it survived? Was it the last of its race, lurking in the shadowy depths far from the eyes of its successors? What strange tales could it tell and what strange lore did it possess?
He realised he was gibbering himself. His thoughts were a constant fear-filled babble as the thing reared over the Lieutenant and the Barbarian, moving with an awful speed despite its bulk, dwarfing the wizard, the officer and the man. It lashed out with its claws. Its first blow sliced open the wizard’s chest and sent him tumbling to the ground. The strike had cut him almost in two. Apparently not even being a master wizard made you immune to the claws of a demon.
The Lieutenant’s blade bit into the Ultari’s chitinous flesh just as one of the glistening blades lashed out at him. It caught him a glancing blow on the forehead that toppled him.
Quick as cat, the Barbarian leapt backwards, parrying a scythe with his heavy knife. An eerie screeching noise filled the air as the two met. Rik half-expected the Ultari’s claw-weapon to break but it did not. It launched another blow at the Barbarian, aiming both blades at him.
“Don’t help me you idle bastards!” shouted the Barbarian, panic and berserker rage warring in his voice. “I can take this thing all by myself! Easy!”
Rik heard feet racing away up the tunnels but did not glance around to see who fled. Instead he raised his pistol, took careful aim at the space among all those writhing stalk eyes.
As his finger squeezed the trigger, the thing flowed towards him in swift serpentine movement, its long segmented lower body rippling upwards, even as its forward torso flowed downwards. A spear-like stinger emerged from the tail, dripping some foul poisonous slime. The shot was deafening in the confined space. The smell of powder warred with the smell of spice. The creature screamed as the bullet found a resting place but Rik knew he had not killed it.
There was no time to reload. Instead Rik threw himself forward over the body of the Lieutenant, slashing with his bayonet at the creature’s leg, catching something with it, feeling cold clammy blood spurt out over his hand.
A human form flung itself forward out of the tunnel mouth, wielding blade in one hand and torch in the other. It was Gunther, filled with righteous rage and ranting about the vengeance of God. The torch flames drove the thing backwards. From somewhere in the chamber, Rik heard the Barbarian shouting; “Eat this you scaly wanker.”
The sound of a heavy blade biting home followed every word.
From out of the powder-smoke a scythe-like claw hurtled straight at Rik. Seeing what it had done to the Lieutenant, he had no desire to let it touch his flesh. He threw himself backward, tripping over Sardec as he did so, and the Ultari’s body passed over his head. He caught sight of its segmented underside, felt what seemed like hundreds of little worm-like streamers tickle his forehead. Moist slime smeared his face. He retched as he rolled out from under it.
A new note entered the demon’s gibbering. It might have been fear or pain or some alien emotion. From behind it, the human voice answered in kind. Was the mage controlling it, Rik wondered? Had he somehow bound it to his service? If so, perhaps the best way to deal with the thing was to kill the wizard.
Gunther went down, screaming in pain. The stinger tail descended towards him but missed. Rik fumbled around. His hand connected with the hilt of a weapon. It was a blade, amazingly light and well made. It seemed to fit into his hand like a glove. He realised the sword in his hand was Sardec’s truesilver blade.
He forced himself upright and lashed out at the beast’s belly where the massive leg entered the armoured torso. The blade slid home with ease, despite the way the thing’s flesh had resisted the Barbarian’s heavier weapon. Cold, greenish blood flowed forth. He struck again, and the creature screamed in real pain. The stinger spasmed and missed Gunther again.
“I knew you could not take this for long,” shouted the Barbarian. “Die, thing of evil! Taste Northlander steel!”
The demon backed up. The scythes flickered back towards Rik but they wavered now, as if the thing was weaker. The blades slashed air near him, striking almost at random. Fortunate it was for him that he was still in a half-crouch or he would have been carved into pieces. He rolled sideways, intending to get past the Ultari and find the sorcerer. As he did so, he realised he had inadvertently put himself out of the demon’s area of attack. He lashed out with the blade once more driving it deep into the beast’s right side.
It let out an ear-splitting scream, and its body flailed like a great whip. The huge rope of muscle struck Rik a glancing blow, and even its reduced force was enough to send him flying across the room and smacking into a wall. Darkness obscured his field of vision for a moment, filled with strange stars. He felt an odd sense of disorientation, and then noticed that the Ultari was retreating from the chamber, slowly and seemingly in great pain, with the Barbarian in ferocious pursuit, screaming challenges and daring the great beast to come back and fight.
Suddenly the Barbarian’s shouts were cut off at a stroke. There was no sound of a blow. Rik wondered if the creature had got him or if it were the wizard. He was almost afraid to find out. He forced his rubbery limbs to move, reeling towards the entrance to the tunnel down which both the beast and his comrade had disappeared. Through the powder smoke and gloom he thought he caught sight of Weasel and gestured for him to follow.
The Barbarian stood frozen, great muscles writhing in his neck, veins bulging in his forehead. Far off down the tunnel, Rik could just see the massive form of the wounded Ultari scuttling away. Rik had a brief vivid impression of more tunnels leading
off from this one, the entrance to an endless maze. In front of the Barbarian stood a tall, slim figure robed in purple, a silver mask reflecting the light from beneath a cowl. One claw-like hand clutched a staff; the other was stretched out in an odd gesture. As that hand moved, the Barbarian began to bend forward. Rik was shocked to see that despite his apparent attempts to resist, the Northman was about to fall on his own sword. The elder sign at his throat blazed but was not potent enough to resist the mage’s power.
Rik leapt forward, the truesilver blade light in his hand. The magician sprang backwards with unnatural agility. Laughing, the mage raised his hand and made a curious gesture, speaking words in one of the old tongues. Rik felt nothing although the runes on the blade of the sword suddenly blazed to life, and he felt a slight warmth, even through the hilt. He guessed that at least one of the things they said about truesilver was correct then. It did provide protection against evil magic.
He saw the mage’s eyes go wide, and leaned forward into a long thrust that drove the blade right through his opponent’s body. The mage screamed. His staff clattered from his hands. Rik found himself almost breast to breast with the wizard as he tumbled forward. He twisted the blade as he pulled it free. The mage whimpered as he clutched at the ropes of steaming, streaming intestine that tumbled forth.
Rik struck a blow to his head with the sword’s pommel. He felt the skull crack beneath the blow, and saw shards of blood-drenched bone fly forth, but still the wizard would not die. He was merely forced to his knees. Cursing, Rik hewed his head off with the blade.
The Barbarian came up beside Rik and began to hack the body to bits with his sword. “Bastard thought he had me there, Halfbreed, but I was just lulling him into my trap.”
“Whatever you say,” said Rik looking off into the distance where the Ultari had vanished. He supposed that they could follow it by the trail of slimy blood it had left behind, but he had no intention of doing so unless forced. Footsteps behind him made him turn and he saw Weasel approach holding a torch. He immediately gestured for the Barbarian to stop chopping and bent over the wizard. Rik put his hand on the poacher’s shoulder.