by Jack Conner
Ungier leapt out, off the platform. He stretched his batwings over the bright abyss, and flew high above the flames to get the best view, wheeling now and then over the platform to direct events. At his call, the Borchstogs bore Eleneth on her litter out onto the wide and sturdy gangplank as the drums reached a fever pitch.
Eleneth looked down into Grudremorq’s hungry fires. Her face screwed up in fear. The flames reflected from her leaf-green eyes and bathed her in red light.
Baleron wanted to close his eyes but could not.
“NOW!” shouted Ungier when the drums had reached a certain pitch, and the beautiful young elf was thrown, litter and all, into the hungry fires of the mountain. She fell and fell, vanishing against the glow of the flames.
Afterward, a long silence passed. The wind sighed.
The girl was dead.
Then Salthrick said something surprising, something that changed everything:
“We’re going to escape.”
Chapter 8
In shock, Baleron was half-inclined to laugh at the captain. This is all a play, he told himself. So. What’s my next line?
“What?” he asked. The wind still sounded too loudly for him to fear being overheard.
Salthrick smiled. “We are going to escape. After what just happened, do you want to linger here?”
“I ... of course not. But ... escape?” Baleron shook his head. Part of him thought, So this is how it will be. Then, bitterly: Three years!
Rolenya looked over at them. “How?” she asked. She was always one to get to the point. He admired her for that.
“The glarums,” Salthrick answered simply. “Instead of flying back to your terrace, let’s fly the Seven Hells out of here! I don’t know why Ungier allows you to fly unescorted. He must think you’re tamed by now. Let’s prove him wrong.”
“You’re mad,” Rolenya said. “The vampires would chase us down.”
“The glarums could outfly ‘em,” insisted the captain. “Trust me.”
“You?” she scoffed. “You, who’ve only ridden one once?”
“Come now. What’ve we got to lose?”
“They’ll send out glarumri,” she said. “Lightning, earthquakes. Ungier is a god.” She shook her head in exasperation. “It’s impossible.”
Doggedly, he went on, “A third-generation god, born after the Making of the World.”
“He’s right,” Baleron said suddenly. Salthrick had just dangled the key before his eyes. It didn’t matter if it was the right key or not, the honest key or not; it was the only key, and at the moment that was all that mattered. Also, he was surprised that Rolenya seemed not to realize what was really going on—at least what he suspected. The way he saw it, the Enemy had decided it was time for them to leave, and so it had arranged for their departure. But they were not supposed to realize it. Why that was remained a mystery.
The point was that if they didn’t leave right now, they might not get another chance, not for some time. It would be too coincidental for them to discover another opportunity for escape so soon after this one. And the powers at work had, literally, all the time in the world.
Baleron’s sanity did not.
“Come on, Rol,” he said. “Let us go. Let us be gone from this place. At least let us try. If we die in the attempt ... well, as long as we’re far enough away when it happens, our souls will be free, and the next world has got to be better than this!”
She set her jaw firmly. “No. You’re mad, Bal. You’re both mad. You’ll get yourselves killed. Just wait,” she urged. “Sooner or later, we’ll get a real chance.”
“Easy for you to say. You don’t have to work in the mines all day. You’ve never been to the torture pits, have you?” Against his will, he felt his anger rise.
“Easy now,” Salthrick cautioned. “We’re all friends here.”
Rolenya ignored him. “You don’t know what it’s like to sell your body, Bal. You may get whipped and beaten and starved, but to have someone use you, in the most intimate ways ... to violate you ... make you do things ...” Tears welled in her eyes. “Don’t say I don’t know what torture’s like, Bal. I do. But I’m not going to throw my life away on something as foolish as this, and neither should you!”
“But Rolly—”
“Don’t Rolly me! Not if you’re going to kill yourself.” She tried to control herself by taking deep breaths. “It’s the wine talking, Baleron. It’s the anger. The sacrifice.” She gripped his hands tightly and looked beseechingly into his eyes. “Don’t do this.”
He drew his hands away. “I must.”
She lowered her eyes. “Then this is good-bye.” She sounded as though she couldn’t bear to say it.
“No,” he said. “It’s never good-bye. I’ll come back for you. I promise.” He meant it with every fiber of his being.
“Me too,” said Salthrick.
Baleron could not believe what had just occurred: he had agreed to leave her here. How could he abandon his sister? Was it really the wine talking, or the desperation? No, he told himself, Rolenya was the one making a mistake. She simply didn’t realize. Couldn’t let herself realize. Nevertheless, the enormity of what he was about to attempt staggered him—not just the escape but the severing of the bond that connected him to Rolenya. He was just about to plead with her again when he was interrupted.
The others on the platform were talking amongst themselves, some shouting to be heard over the wind. Suddenly, Lord Ungier set down amongst them.
“I have an announcement to make!”
They turned to him. Ungier looked very smug, even more so than usual.
“I have splendid news!” he said. “I’m taking a new wife a month hence, on the next moonless eve, when our union will be beyond the ken of the Light.”
A hushed murmur swept the crowd. Baleron felt a vague foreboding. He looked to Rolenya. Her face was ashen. Please, no ...
“Some of you know her,” Ungier continued. “She’s been with me for only a few years, and never did I think to win her heart, but I’ve recently made a deal to claim her, to make her mine—beyond the limits of a concubine—beyond a mere lover. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present my bride-to-be, Her Highness Rolenya Grothgar!”
He gestured toward the princess and the crowd applauded.
Baleron gasped. “No ...”
Rolenya bore it all stoically. Out of the corner of her mouth, she said, “It’s not what you think, Bal.”
Suddenly it came to him. “Salthrick. So that’s how you got him here. You made a deal ... you for him.”
She held his widening gaze.
Her act of love staggered him. She had ensnared herself even tighter in Ungier’s web just to make his lot in life a little brighter.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
“Don’t be,” she told him. “Just know that I love you and always will, no matter what happens.”
“I know you do, Rol. And I, you.”
Ungier went on: “Therefore, a month hence, on the eve of our wedding, I’ll bring Rolenya into the embrace of the night.”
This time, it was Rolenya’s turn to gasp. She clapped a hand over her mouth and her knees nearly buckled. Baleron gave her an arm and she took it, trembling. Her face was whiter than the stars above.
“You didn’t know?” he said.
“No ... no ...” Her voice was very small.
“The rotten luck,” said Salthrick.
Baleron shot him a dark look.
Ungier beckoned to her, smiling. His fangs shone like aged ivory under the moonlight. As though she had no will of her own—and perhaps, Baleron reflected, remembering Ungier’s powers, she hadn’t—she left her brother and Salthrick behind and cut her way through the crowd to stand at the side of her lord and master. She bowed to him and he took her hand.
How was this possible? Baleron felt sick. Rolenya corrupted with Ungier’s filth! He imagined her turned into a creature like Ungier and felt like doing something rash. He just barely held hims
elf back.
Now, surely, he could persuade her to escape, or at least to make the attempt with him and Salthrick tonight.
He never got the chance.
Without warning, Lord Ungier wrapped her in his arms and rose up into the night, batwings flapping. Still white with shock, Rolenya disappeared with him into the darkness above.
* * *
Baleron snatched a glass of wine off a servant’s tray and drank one glass, then another. It was Borchstog wine, bitter and earthy, yet strangely sweet. His throat burned, and his mind reeled, but the anger did not leave. He felt hot, feverish. “I’ll get him,” he said, again and again. “I’ll get that bastard if it’s the last thing I do.”
“I’m sure you will,” Salthrick said.
Baleron could have punched him.
A familiar figure skulked over and performed a mock bow, which the prince did not return. “Roschk ul Ravast! Or, as they say in these parts, Rivoust-roisk.” Asguilar, Lord of Wegredon, smiled. “I trust you’re enjoying this evening’s festivities.” The words had a way of slithering out of his mouth that jangled Baleron’s nerves. “Tell me, did you like the news? Aren’t weddings divine?”
Baleron was tempted to smash his wine glass over Asguilar’s battish face. “I’m surprised you can even say the word.”
The rithlag chuckled. “I too am a prince, the Prince of Gulrothrog. We share that much, at least, you and I. Though I’m the firstborn, and you the last.”
“So you’re what a fourth-generation god looks like,” Salthrick said.
“You should know my face well, urignon. You were my prisoner long enough.”
Baleron grimaced; they were putting on a show for him. I hope this works. Pretending to go along with Salthrick was a dangerous game. Just how far could he take it?
Asguilar paused to contain his mock rage. “My lord-father asked me to escort you both back to the mines. Thanks to his benevolence, you two will work out of the same pen and alongside each other during work periods. Rolenya has asked that you be given a free day to catch up with each other, but I rather think you two could use a little softening up instead. Oh, I’ll let you get reacquainted, all right ... in the torture pits!”
“You should show more respect to ul Ravast,” Baleron said..
Asguilar sneered. “You’re nothing but a puppet. When the Master jerks your strings, you’ll dance—and what a beautiful performance it will be. You will usher in a new age, a golden age. The Age of Grandeur. Its advent began fifty years ago when the Moonstone was destroyed, weakening the bastions of light. Now, after our forces have replenished, the killing blow comes, and you will be that blade. A shame you cannot appreciate it. Now come.”
Baleron and Salthrick climbed astride their glarums while Asguilar watched. The other rithlags of his party were socializing with the guests that had stayed behind, most of whom made their way down the stairs, returning to Gulrothrog, eager to get indoors and out of this alternately hot and chilling wind. One minute Baleron shivered with the cold of high mountain winds everywhere, and the next a searing updraft from Oksil’s maw burned his skin.
Asguilar flapped his wings and sprang up into the folds of the night, where he waited for Baleron and Salthrick on their glarums to join him. Rolenya’s bird followed riderless behind.
Asguilar led the way through the night to the upper reaches of the rock spire that housed Gulrothrog. Its upper portion was dotted with terraces that flickered in the red glow of chambers within. Here and there stood guests of Ungier or guards. The guards mostly loitered on the lower balconies, though for security reasons even these were high. Asguilar alighted on one of the lower and larger balconies, and the Borchstogs there immediately bowed in deference.
Baleron’s and Salthrick’s glarums landed on the terrace next, along with Rolenya’s. Baleron wondered how the play was supposed to go. To hell with it. I’ll make my own. It was his only hope, really. If he let himself get swept along by events of the Shadow’s making, he’d end up fulfilling his Doom, whatever that was. He needed to pull his own strings.
He lowered himself from the graying glarum and took stock of the situation. Four Borchstog guards knelt before their lord’s son, whose attention was snared by their toadying words. The breeze blew hot.
Baleron would never have a better chance.
Salthrick met his gaze, seemed to see something there, and nodded. What did that mean? The captain, now dismounted, stood closer to the Prince of Gulrothrog than Baleron did.
Salthrick acted. Moving with lightning speed, he grabbed the hilt of Asguilar’s long, slim blade and wrenched it free of the scabbard.
The Borchstogs’ eyes widened in alarm. They leapt to their feet, unsheathing their own swords—large, heavy affairs.
Asguilar spun, his hand shooting to the empty place above his scabbard, only to find the grinning face of Salthrick pressed close to his own.
The captain brought the sword down heavily. The flat of the blade struck the Firstborn’s forehead with a vibrating wong sound. Asguilar’s clawed hand rose halfway to his darkening forehead before his knees buckled and he collapsed in a heap like so much kindling.
Baleron leapt on the nearest Borchstog. He wrestled the creature’s weapon away using muscles honed to stone over the last three years and sliced open his throat, hewing through arteries and flesh. Two others fell on him, howling, while Salthrick dealt with the fourth.
Baleron parried desperate thrusts from his two opponents, only fleetingly able to go on the offensive, and at last hacked through one’s hamstring. The Borchstog screamed and fell. While the other hesitated, Baleron speared him in the throat. Dark blood sprayed him. The glarums cawed nervously. Baleron slew the one on the ground, then, heart beating wildly, stepped over to the body of the downed prince and raised his weapon.
“No!” said Salthrick. “Don’t.”
Not surprised, Baleron asked, “Why?”
Wearing a strange look, Salthrick said, “Because ... if they capture us, and we’ve killed Ungier’s firstborn ... his heir ... well, they’ll never let us out of the torture pits, my friend.”
It sounded reasonable, but Baleron was not in a reasonable mood.
“No,” he said, raising the heavy Borchstoggish sword. “We let him live and he’ll just raise the alarm when he comes to.”
He cleaved in Asguilar’s skull. Blood and brains sprayed everywhere.
Was the rithlag dead? Could a mundane weapon destroy him? Looking closer, Baleron noticed there was a black gem set in the pommel of the Borchstog sword. Perhaps not so mundane, after all.
The body didn’t stir. Just to be sure, Baleron hacked into it again and again, severing the head and limbs and cleaving the heart and skull in two. When he was done, panting with exertion, he stared down at the body and felt a surge of triumph. Asguilar’s blood had spattered his face, and he tasted it on his tongue, acrid and foul, yet the sweetest thing he’d ever tasted.
Salthrick glanced from Baleron to the butchered body of Asguilar. He shook his head as if to dismiss an ominous thought, then clutched Baleron’s shoulder. “Let’s go while there’s still time.”
Baleron ached to take the Borchstog’s weapon with him but wanted no weapon on him. Salthrick would not be on guard.
The captain, for his part, not being so cautious and perhaps wanting a weapon for his own purposes, did spare the time to remove Asguilar’s scabbard and fasten it about himself. In went the slim and beautiful sword of the fallen nobleman.
Salthrick jumped on his mount. Baleron prepared to do the same, but found Lunir hovering above the body of a Borchstog. The glarum sniffed at it, took an experimental bite. Evidently the flesh was too fresh, for he didn’t take another.
Baleron slipped astride the glarum and tied himself on. “Ra!”
He and Salthrick winged away. Wind moaned in Baleron’s ears and drowned out everything else, even the cawing of the glarums and Salthrick’s reassuring words. The wind ruffled Baleron’s hair, brought tears to his ey
es and chapped his skin. The bird’s soft feathers pressed his thighs and he tried to concentrate on that touch rather than the unreeling scenery below him. The Waste tilted and heaved, stretching darkly in all directions.
I wish I knew where Ungier had taken Rolenya.
By the light of the stars, he angled Lunir toward the eastern branch of the Aragst Mountains. There it would be more difficult for Ungier’s agents to find them.
On one point, he reflected, Salthrick had been right. The Lord of Oksilith would not be happy with his son’s murder, and he would demand righteous vengeance. He would hunt hard and instill the fear of his wrath into his hunters. Perhaps, Baleron began to think, he should have left Asguilar alive. But Asguilar had led the raid on the wedding caravan and all those slain that night had demanded vengeance. Baleron hoped they were satisfied now. May you rest easier.
Suddenly, Salthrick shouted. Baleron turned. Salthrick was gesturing at something back in the direction of the fortress. Baleron strained his eyes.
Nothing. Then, dimly ... a dark blot against the clouds. Growing nearer and nearer. A rithlag? A glarum? No, too large ...
The shadow drew closer. Salthrick cried out frantically and began kicking his steed in the flanks to hurry it.
A burst of fire shot from the maw of the shadow. Baleron’s blood ran cold.
“Omkar be damned,” he breathed. “The Leviathan ...”
Ul Mrungona. It had to be.
The being closed the distance rapidly. Huge and dark, the Great Worm snaked its way through the sky, slithering in and out of the brooding thunderheads. Fire licked at its lips. The night was so dark all Baleron could see was that it was huge, a great shadow with wide dark wings propelling it onwards, terrible and inexorable.
A chill shuddered up Baleron’s spine. Asguilar must have truly died then, and his murder discovered all too quickly. Baleron had thought it would take longer to find the corpses. He had counted on pursuit by rithlags or glarumri; those he and Salthrick might be able to outwit if not outrun. But how could they possibly escape ul Mrungona in its natural element?