by Jack Conner
Close by, a wolf howled, and Baleron hung his head.
The next day the gaurocks carried the host and their prisoners into Oksilith. Here the mountains known as the Aragst hesitated before a wasteland dominated by the towering volcano Oksil, whose roots stretched far and wide. On the other side of the Waste, the Aragst resumed, a solid line running roughly east-west.
Oksilith assaulted Baleron’s eyes and mind. Blackened and cracked, a poisoned land, he knew this was only a hint of what Oslog would be like. The black spire of Oksil loomed ever closer, smoke rising from its blasted top. The volcano’s creeping roots stood higher than most mountains.
Baleron had learned that it was through the Oksil Gap that Gilgaroth in ages past had sent his armies, and he had fashioned the Gap into a terrible wasteland populated by his creatures so that no army of the Crescent could pass through unmolested. Legend said that he had appointed Ungier, one of his favored sons, to watch over Oksilith for him. The elvish kingdom of Larenthi, once the jewel of the Crescent Union, bordered Oksilith to the north. For thousands of years Borchstogs and other beasts under the Dark One’s control had come through the Waste to assault Larenthi. It was thought that the hosts issued from some secret stronghold, and though its location was never discovered the Borchstogs called their fortress Gulrothrog and claimed their master was Lord Ungier, father of all other rithlags.
Here and there sentry towers stuck up from the wastes, and Baleron received the impression that these were just the tips of larger underground structures.
The convoy crossed a huge stone bridge that spanned a great chasm a mile wide and many miles deep. A river of flame flowed far below. Towers guarded every corner of the bridge. On the side of the chasm, clinging to the cliff, he saw a cluster of spires and terraces and walls—a castle embedded in the gorge’s side—but it was too far away for him to get a better look at. It seemed to be made of black crystal, and he wondered if it looked anything like Ghrastigor, the stronghold of Gilgaroth deep in the black heart of Oslog far to the south.
They entered Oksil’s Roots. Towers dotted the ridges and peaks. Surprisingly, Baleron saw no other Borchstog bands. Other than the endless towers, this Waste seemed utterly deserted. But of course that could not be true; hundreds of underground outposts, or at least a few massive ones, must lie beneath these charred grounds. He could almost feel the loathsome ranks of Borchstogs watching him from their towers. This made it all the more unnerving that he did not see any save those of the convoy.
Qubracrod led upwards. On their gaurocks, the company spiraled around the main bulk of Mount Oksil along a wide road, a road built for an army. Smoke belched from the volcano’s maw far above, pouring into the layer of black clouds just above it, blocking out the stars. Sulfur and ash filled the gritty air and Baleron found it difficult to breathe. Worse, the atmosphere thinned as they rose. Hot, weary hours passed. A dozen different peaks jutted from the great mass of Oksil like points of a black crown, red lights blazing from their windows, and the path of the convoy led to the base of one of the largest. There, set into the mountain wall, stood a huge black iron gate. Above and to the sides of the doors were cut countless arrow slits. Though Baleron saw no guards, he knew they were being watched; even now a hundred arrows pointed at his breast.
Looking up at the great peak above him and imagining the terrible fortress within, despair filled him at last. He could not meet Rolenya’s eyes.
Qubracrod appeared above him, framed against the iron gates. “Welcome to Gulrothrog,” he said.
* * *
Gears roared and the portcullis vanished upwards. The black doors swung outwards and the interior of Gulrothrog stood revealed. The Borchstogs ushered Baleron and Rolenya into a huge dark hall, while the gaurocks remained outside with the wolves. The vampires flew upwards along the mountainside to find a place to roost. Baleron would not miss them.
He found the air inside cool and dry. Great bonfires lit the vast chamber, which was carved from black stone. Altars of the same material rose from the floor, one representing Gilgaroth, one Mogra, one Lorg-jilaad. Each of these three main altars stood apart from the other. Blood, bones and body parts littered the bases of each one, and Baleron wondered if perhaps different tribes worshipped a different patron deity. As they neared the end of the hall, he saw something that gave him a hint as to the character of his new host: the fourth altar, and over it a great statue. Carved from the same black stone, it represented a batwinged form upon a throne, shadowed head lifted high and bearing a sharp-toothed crown. The number of sacrifices at this altar’s base outnumbered all the others combined. And the Borchstogs here speak a different language, Baleron remembered. Interesting.
Various tunnels led off from this main hall, but the Borchstog host led onwards. The hall became a huge stairway that wound upwards, disappearing from sight around the first bend. The stairs each stood a foot high and were very wide.
Baleron was struck again by how empty it all seemed. Legions of the enemy must wait just out of sight, but he neither saw nor heard them, and somehow their unseen presence was oppressive. Sometimes shadows darted at the corner of his vision, but when he turned to look—nothing.
They marched upwards. Weariness overtook him. Sweat covered him and dried on his skin. When at last the stairs ended, the tunnel stretched on for a good ways more to terminate at a great set of doors, ornate and forbidding, with obscene engravings.
They stood open.
Qubracrod led the way in, and Baleron saw that the chamber was one huge cavern, a part of the mountain. Stalagmites reared, glistening with moisture. Many were taller than he was. Stalactites hung from the ceiling far, far above, dripping down like jagged teeth past a layer of mist that wreathed the cavern’s upper reaches. Strange shapes shifted and swayed in that mist, and Baleron, squinting, realized he was looking at hundreds of rithlags hanging by their clawed feet from the ceiling, half hidden by the mist.
A gorge ran to the far right and left, perhaps connecting in a U shape somewhere lost to sight ahead. A reek rose up from the gorge, the reek of rotting meat and bat offal, and it took little imagination to realize that here is where the vampires disposed of their victims. Baleron pictured mounds of putrefying bodies, slowly becoming one with the muck that surely filled that gorge. Likely snakes and other vermin populated it. His skin crawled.
The reason he could not see the gorge connect ahead owed to the fact that a massive staircase beginning a hundred feet beyond the cavern’s entrance blocked his vision. Carved out of the mountain, the staircase led upward at an angle so steep that a visitor had to crane his neck to see the top, where stood a large dais … and upon this the throne. In this grim and debauched affair sprawled a nightmarish figure—long, lean, leathery, and bat-winged. A jagged crown stuck up from his brow. Just like the statue, Baleron thought, though the statue had depicted its subject as greater than both Gilgaroth and Lorg-jilaad. In real, life Ungier was not much larger than a man.
Rolenya blinked. Baleron forced himself to give her a reassuring nod, then met the gaze, unseen but felt, of the Lord of Gulrothrog whose perch was so far above that Baleron could not even see his eyes. This, of course, was the intent of the room, to make the lord seem godly and awe-inspiring. As far as Baleron was concerned, it worked. From the vampire’s aerie, the prince and princess must look like ants.
To either side of the King of Oksilith’s throne moved slim white figures. Gold collars and chains bound several women, girls really, to the vampire’s throne. Wearing only a silken shift or perhaps the occasional bit of glittering jewelry, they amused themselves at their lord’s clawed feet.
Suddenly the rithlag rose and leapt into the air, throwing wide his leathery wings. He swept down on Borchstogs and prisoners like a hawk on prey, and Baleron fought the urge to flinch back. He finally saw Ungier’s eyes, large and intense, completely black, staring out of a long, aristocratic, bat-like face.
Ungier alighted before them. Qubracrod sank to his knees, as did the o
thers in the Borchstog host. Only Baleron and Rolenya remained standing, though Baleron’s knees shook.
“My Lord,” muttered Qubracrod, his eyes on his master’s feet. “We bring you the Master’s prizes, Prince Baleron and Princess Rolenya of Havensrike, as instructed.”
Prizes, Baleron thought.
Not even bothering to glance at the Borchstog captain, Ungier bored his eyes into Baleron, then Rolenya. When he looked at her, his amusement fled. She matched his gaze with a withering look, but he was not set back.
“My,” he said, and his voice was cultured and intelligent, if raspy. He spoke in Havensril. “What a beautiful mortal. I did not think humans could possess such ... radiance.”
“Your eyes take liberties,” she said, “yet you haven’t even introduced yourself.” She sounded very like a princess in that moment.
“I am Ungier, Lord of Gulrothrog and high servant of Oslog. I am the Shepherd of the Flame, Keeper of the God of Fire.”
“Pretty titles,” Baleron said.
“The Savior speaks!”
“Savior?”
Ungier laughed, showing sharp ivory-colored fangs. He had a smell, Baleron noted: sharp and musky, but not unpleasant. Just primal, exuding power. He stood more than a foot taller than Baleron, who was tall by human standards.
“Not yet, perhaps,” Ungier said. “Someday, maybe. Now you’re only a slave.”
“Never.”
“Never, my fair prince, is a long time indeed. A very, very long time. And I should know. I am nearly as old as the world. Gilgaroth himself begat me back before he Broke it, when raw power still drifted on the wind like pollen.” He sighed. “These days are dismal compared to those. Ah, back before the Breaking of the World!—when most power spilled out into the nether ...” He shook his head. “Yet we endure, and the deed was necessary. Elsewise the Omkarathons would have prevailed. Now they are stranded, exiled, and the world belongs to my lord-father. Or will. Times, he tells me, are soon to improve—due to your efforts, Baleron. I want you to know that I appreciate them.”
“How?” Baleron said. “What am I to you, and Rolenya? Why did you go through so much trouble ... kill so many innocent people ... just to bring us here? What did that thing in the mountains do to me?”
Ungier drew back a step and seemed to consider his next words carefully. “I know that which I need to know. I know that for the time being you and your sister are mine. To do with as I will.”
“What then shall you do with us?” Rolenya asked.
“As for you, my dear,” Ungier said, stepping close to her and running his leathery fingers through her hair, “I will give you a bath and fine clothes. You will want for nothing. I had heard of your beauty, though you surpass even the rumor I had thought an exaggeration. It’s why I asked you to be brought here: my payment for the role I will perform. It’s why I instructed my thralls not to violate you on your journey. I wanted you pure. And you are pure, yes? You did not even make it to your wedding night.”
She flinched at his touch but was too wise to jerk away.
“Get your hands off her,” Baleron said. When Ungier refused, Baleron felt anger well up in him, not just anger over seeing the monster touch her, but over everything, all the deaths and mystery and confusion. Unable to help himself, he leapt at Ungier.
The Lord of Gulrothrog merely glanced at him, and a heaviness came over his mind. His strength fled.
Ungier struck Baleron and the prince flew backward. Skidding across the rough floor, he only managed to stop himself at the drop-off to the gorge. He stared into its depths and wrenched his gaze away; all that he had imagined was true, and more. Even then several vampires were down there, amusing themselves and preying on bodies that still moved —this amid mountains and rivers of offal and decay. Baleron gagged on the smell, and he would have wept at the things he witnessed, but he had more immediate concerns.
Swaying, he climbed to his feet.
Ungier’s thin lips twitched at the corners. “Perhaps I should have a little fun with you.”
“Hurt my brother,” Rolenya said, “and I’ll kill myself. Surely that would displease you. Purity wears thin on a corpse.”
Ungier looked surprised, then proud, as if she were a favored pet that had just performed a trick it had not been taught.
“Oh, your brother shall certainly live,” he said. “He may not enjoy it, but he will live.” To Baleron, he said, “You must think you have nothing left to lose, lad. That’s what gives you courage. You are quite wrong.”
“Do whatever you want with me,” Baleron said, hearing the hollowness in his own voice. “If you leave Rolenya alone, I won’t fight it. I promise.”
“You still don’t understand, do you? You are mine to do with as I will. And there’s nothing you or your sister can do to thwart that will. So, young Baleron, there will be no bargaining, not unless I deem it prudent. I will add your sister to my harem and you to my work force. You’re a strapping lad. You’ll do well in the mines. I think you were born to be a slave.”
* * *
Once Baleron and Rolenya were ushered from the room, Qubracrod, captain of the company of Borchstogs, still on his knees, unwrapped an item from a soft cloth and proffered it to Ungier. With an intake of breath, Ungier accepted the object in both hands and held it up to the light. Its polished black surface reflected the firelight in loving ripples.
“A seeing stone,” he said.
“An Elvish device,” Qubracrod said. “Purified by the One. It was retrieved from the caravan by Rauglir before its destruction.”
“Interesting.”
“It’s a gift from the Master. Not the stone, I was told to say, but the opportunity it affords.”
“And what is this ... opportunity?” Ungier’s dark eyes met and held the Borchstog’s red ones critically.
Qubracrod’s answer was simple: “To return to the Master’s good graces.”
Normally Ungier would torture and kill a thrall for such insolence, but he knew the words came not from Qubracrod but from the Great One. Ungier’s relationship with Gilgaroth was strained, and the prospect of a change in it gave him pause.
“How?” he said.
Qubracrod’s eyes flashed. “Murder.”
* * *
Baleron’s mind spun as the dungeon master and his crew led them down into the dark bowels of the fortress. The Borchstog led them past its torture chambers and dungeons and even further down, deep into the mountain itself where the walls dripped with moisture and strange noises echoed from fissures barely illuminated by the dungeon master’s torch—sounds of huge lungs laboring and clawed feet scraping the ground. The flickering flame showed brief glimpses of large rooms with many side-tunnels and caged cells where hidden terrors dwelt. Finally the Borchstogs shoved Baleron and Rolenya into a domed chamber into which debouched several corridors. In the center of the chamber a large hole gaped, perhaps ten feet wide, so deep the torch could not show its bottom.
An aged metal mechanism hovered above the well of darkness, a cage suspended by chains and gears. The rusted cage rocked slowly back and forth with a creak that made the hairs on the back of Baleron’s neck stir. The Borchstogs forced prince and princess into the cage and lowered them into the pit.
“I hope you enjoy the dark,” the dungeon master said. “It will enjoy you.”
As the cage plunged down, scrabbling noises and a foul reek rose up to greet its occupants. The light receded above. Baleron and Rolenya seemed to descend forever, the torchlight growing ever dimmer overhead, shrinking into a small, red pool of flickering light. Now all he could see of Rolenya were the gleam off her eyes and the faint sheen of her hair. All he could hear was the grinding of rusty gears and the straining of ancient chains. He smelled oil and grease, filth and decay.
At last the cage slammed into the ground, driving its charges to the floor. Baleron cut his cheek on a rock sticking through the bars. The door, which had been left unlocked, bounced open and banged against the side,
startling him.
He wiped his bloody cheek against his shoulder.
The dungeon master shouted from above. “Out, or I’ll send something down to get you out!”
Though a bit unsteady, Baleron rose to his feet. Using his toes to grope in the blackness, he found Rolenya and helped her up, and together they left the cage. She moaned under her breath.
“Did you hurt yourself?” he asked.
“I’m fine.”
He wrinkled his nose at the stench and tried not to imagine what had caused it. How many prisoners had rotted away down here, year after year? How many had died down here?
How many had remained?
“Well,” she said, “at least we’re alone at last.”
Squinting, his eyes picked up just enough light to see that the bottom of the pit was lined in stones and covered in heaps of decaying hay.
The cage rose slowly back up the well, occasionally swinging from side to side and crashing against the wall. Once it dislodged a group of stones and they tumbled down, one smashing into the ground near Baleron. If he’d been standing just a few feet over, he’d be dead. The cage finished its upward flight and was set in place once more, though Baleron could hear it creaking and groaning as it continued to sway back and forth. He thought of how heavy it must be and just how precariously it must be hung. It could fall on them at any time.
“Ruvust-roisk!” the dungeon master said, speaking in dialect, his voice holding an odd melding of mockery and reverence, and the other Borchstogs echoed the words.
With that, they withdrew, as did their torchlight. Baleron had hardly even been aware of the light until it disappeared and he and Rolenya were sealed into absolute blackness—this in a deep cold pit in the center of a fell mountain, directly below a dungeon full of horrors and a castle host to worse. He knew Rolenya must be terrified and pushed his own fear aside enough to promise, “We’ll find a way out of this.”