by Jack Conner
“Father, I can explain.”
“You have an explanation for everything, don’t you?” Albrech grimaced in distaste. “Just the same, it was I that sent you to him. I suppose I’m to blame, too.”
Baleron hung his head. Steady, Bal, he thought. Stay on course.
Slowly, he lifted the stump of his left arm. It was a blackened ruin. Where it wasn’t black, the skin looked as though it had melted, and the whole thing was an inflamed, reddened mass of tortured tissue. The king actually started upon seeing it.
“Rauglir is gone,” Baleron told him steadily. “The demon is gone. It did kill Logran . . . but it cannot harm anyone else.”
Thunder cracked again, and rain began to fall from the dark clouds Gilgaroth had thrown over the city. A chill breeze gusted through the tunnel.
Albrech eyed Baleron skeptically. “This is the same demon that pretended to be Rolenya?” the king said.
“The very one.”
A beat passed. Albrech reached his decision. “We need all the men we can muster, I suppose. General Kavradnum is dead. I don’t think the Enemy knows I’m here, otherwise they would have overrun us already. But we need every able-bodied man and woman to take up arms. I don’t know if I can consider you able-bodied, but . . . you do have a sword.” He studied the Fanged Blade. “Is that . . . your old sword? The cursed one?”
“Rondthril, yes. The last thing Logran said was that I should keep it.”
Albrech nodded slowly. “Yes, you did wield it well, if I remember. When it wasn’t betraying you. And me. Just the same, perhaps with it you could still prove of help to us—if you can resist the urge to murder any more of your fellow countrymen.”
Baleron hadn’t thought the jest humorous when Logran told it, and it hadn’t improved since. “Father, staying here is suicide. No matter how long you hold out, they’ll come for you eventually.” He paused significantly, then said, “Glorifel has fallen.”
The king glared at him. “You weakling. Coward. How dare you say that!”
“It’s true, Father. I’ve been out there. I’ve seen it. Our only hope—Havensrike’s only hope—is for you to live and somehow marshal a resistance in the north.”
“I won’t abandon my people!”
“You said yourself the city was doomed. If you don’t leave now . . . right now . . . you will die. Then you truly will abandon them.”
“I will not stand here and listen to your bile. Either take up your sword and fight the Borchstogs, or be damned! I’ll put an end to you myself!”
Baleron gritted his teeth. Patience, Bal. “Very well, Father. Borchstogs it is.”
Turning to one of the men, Albrech said, “Put him on the north barricade. And keep an eye on him.”
“I can’t keep eyes on him and the Borchstogs both,” said the captain of the assigned barricade. “I need men I can trust.”
“That’s ill for you,” spat the king. “You’ve got him instead.”
He stalked off, leaving Baleron with the captain.
“Where do you want me?” Baleron said.
The captain placed him at a spot on the barricade, and Baleron settled in with the others to watch the rain-thrashed city succumb to the horrors of Oslog. Gloom began to dig its way into him. The eyes of the other soldiers were glazed and dull and hopeless, and he knew if he stayed here long enough his would be the same. The terrible part was that the soldiers were right to think as they did; they were doomed.
Baleron tried to talk sense into the captain, whose name was Marz Sider, a colonel under General Kavradnum: “My father will die if he stays here. You must help me get him to safety. I know a way. It’s the only chance for Havensrike.”
Marz Sider shook his head—“You are craven”—and marched away. Baleron decided to bide his time until the moment was right, then steal the king away himself, somehow or other.
As things happened, that didn’t prove necessary. About an hour after Baleron’s arrival, a wave of Borchstogs swarmed across the bridge and broke against the barricade, howling and calling for blood. The men fought back with everything they had, women and children picking up arms beside them. Many died, but ultimately they drove the Borchstogs back—at least temporarily. The enemy would return.
Bleeding from a cut on his arm, Marz Sider drew Baleron aside. The captain looked haggard and frightened, but Baleron knew it wasn’t for himself; the king had been forced to draw his sword during the fighting, and he’d been wounded—only a shallow cut along one cheek, but it had evidently been enough to convince Sider of something.
“You were right, Baleron,” he said without preamble. “The King will die if he stays here.”
Baleron waited.
“You seemed to think there was a way to get him safely out of the city,” Sider went on. “Is there?”
“Yes. It’s an old family secret, but I guess it doesn’t matter now. Beneath the ruins of Castle Grothgar there’s a tunnel. It will take us beyond the city, assuming we can find it under the rubble.”
“An old escape tunnel for the king,” mused Sider. “You’ll need men.”
“How many can you provide?”
Sider thought it over. “Maybe nine or ten.”
“It’s not quite my old five hundred, but it will have to do. Get them ready immediately. We’ll need help to kidnap the king.”
For as long as he could remember, Baleron had wanted one thing above all else—his father’s love and respect—but he knew that if he did this thing, if he took the king away from the fight here at what Albrech must think of as the bitter end, his father would not thank him, would in fact never forgive him, and Baleron would lose any chance he ever had of making up with him. To save the man, Baleron must give up his dream. If nothing else, the prince could not have asked for a better partner. Marz Sider was well respected and an able fighter.
To accomplish the plan they’d need to go up Kings’ Road yet again, and it was in worse shape now than before; at least one bridge was out that Baleron knew of, and the Omkar knew how many creatures lurked in the dark, not to mention the hordes of Borchstogs that had brought them . . . and, of course, the dragons and glarumri.
Baleron watched himself closely. He waited to feel a stab of ice in his breast, or a swell of shadow, or some other sign of his Doom. Nothing. Still, he remained wary.
At length, Sider returned to him. “The men are ready, sir.”
The king was giving a speech to a group of perhaps fifty soldiers and civilians, trying to rally their spirits. All looked grim and weary, most especially Lord Grothgar. “We will fight and we will die,” Albrech was saying, “but, Illiana help us, we’ll take as many of them down with us as we can. We’ll weaken them so much that our allies will be able to wipe them from the earth. Our sacrifice will save the world!”
The troops cheered raggedly, though Baleron doubted many believed the bold words. Baleron just felt sick. He was the reason for their deaths, and he didn’t forget that for a moment.
As the gathering broke up, he approached his father, who appraised him coldly and said, “Yes?”
“I’ve something to talk to you about . . . privately.”
“Oh?” Albrech did not budge.
“It’s about Rolenya.”
The king arched an eyebrow. “What about her?”
“It’s something I don’t feel comfortable talking about here. Come.”
Reluctantly, Albrech followed him into the shadows in the center of the tunnel, the farthest place from the torches, right next to the coach Baleron had stolen from the palace. It had been drawn up by one of Sider’s men, and father and son huddled next to it conspiratorially.
“What is it?” asked the king.
“She lives,” said the prince.
It was the signal.
All at once three soldiers rushed around from the other side of the coach, one shoving a gag over the king’s mouth. The largest wrapped his muscular arms about his lord and held him while the third slugged the king in the face to
subdue him; the man looked frightened even as his fist landed, but it worked, and some of the fight went out of Albrech, though by no means all.
Colonel Marz Sider jumped into the driver’s bench and another, bearing a longbow and a full quiver, joined him.
Baleron opened the door and they prepared to fling the king inside.
The prince had forgotten about the unconscious driver.
The man still lay in the cab, even more still than before. Blood coated his throat and chest and face. Flies buzzed all about, and a stench of decay and death filled the tight space. All those gathered before it gasped and recoiled at the sight.
A long, dark form rose from the dead man’s chest—where it had been coiled inside one of the wounds, within the man’s very body—and reared its scaly head at kidnappers and king.
Its hood flared.
Albrech screamed into his gag, his eyes bulging. Baleron reached for Rondthril. Chose the dagger instead.
Rauglir, a serpent now, coated with blood, struck at Albrech, but the distance was too great and Baleron leapt in between them, dagger flashing. Rauglir retreated into the darkness of the cab.
All over the tunnel, people shouted and pointed towards the coach.
“Hells!” snapped Sider. “Hurry, boy!”
The first three kidnappers dragged the kicking, thrashing king back a few feet, while Baleron leapt into the coach, growling in desperation—the others in the tunnel would be upon them soon—and slashed at the snake, again and again, but Rauglir was too quick. Hissing, the serpent vanished into the shadows.
The shouts and screams and commotion drew closer. Louder. In seconds Baleron and the rest of the kidnappers would be caught and killed.
He heard a sound and flung the dagger at it. The blade quivered in the wood floor, catching nothing. Damn!
Rauglir flew at the prince’s face.
Baleron barely had time to reach up and grab the snake by the neck. Rauglir, slippery with blood, twisted in his grasp, but Baleron held firm. The snake tried to bite him, but Baleron avoided his fangs. Frustrated, Rauglir began changing forms—first to a scorpion, then a left hand, then a spider. Working quickly, Baleron evaded his mandibles and stinger and kept his grip, until finally, exhausted, Rauglir returned to his snake form.
Hearing the noise outside, Baleron knew he had to do something fast and bitterly lamented the loss of his left hand. He threw the black snake at the wall and pinned him there with his boot.
“Get comfortable,” he said.
He jerked his dagger out of the floor and ran Rauglir through, right to the hilt, impaling the demon to the cab wall; the blade passed right below the snake’s head; he did not want the snake dead, as that would just free Rauglir’s spirit to cause further mischief in a new form.
To the kidnappers, he shouted over his shoulder, “In! Now!”
The three leapt inside, dragging their captive with them, and with a crack of Sider’s whip the coach was off. The dead body of the coachman was flung unceremoniously outside.
Marz Sider had recruited several of the men along the barricade, and they shoved a coach out of the way so that the king’s vehicle would have an opening to break out of. They’d begun shoving the overturned vehicle out of alignment with the others the second their captain had jumped into the driver’s bench, and by the time Sider lashed the horses into action the way was open.
The coach shot out of the tunnel, and not a second too soon. In an instant an angry mob was swarming out after them, but fortunately none were mounted, and the king and his kidnappers were safely off.
Looking out the rear window, Baleron watched as the angry mob turned their venom on the men that had breached the barricade, and a swell of shame rose in him. Yet more deaths on his conscience.
“Go to the Lights of Sifril,” he whispered. “And thank you.”
Rain slashed down at the charging coach, and lightning struck the ground. The once-fair city was now a place of horrors. Ghouls and goblins and demons walked the streets. Darkworms, aided by glarumri, eliminated all organized resistance from above, while foul spirits possessed the living, and an evil army burned the town down around them.
Baleron and the kidnappers raced through the streets. Borchstoggish arrows riddled the vehicle and beasts gave chase. Once a Serpent bearing many Borchstog archers pursued them for a while, and Sider had to drive the horses through twisting dark alleys to elude the creature. Just the same, some of the archers managed to hit the coach with flaming arrows. The rain put out the blaze.
Three bridges had burned down between Sadram Tunnel and the ruins of Grothgar Castle, and Sider had to take them the long way around, finding alternate routes where he could.
All the while, Rauglir hissed and taunted those in the cab in a strangled, gurgling snake-voice. “Fools!” he hissed. “You will all be killed, if you’re lucky.”
The king’s gag had been removed and, once he’d stopped struggling, his bonds had also been taken away. At first he’d denounced them all as cowards and traitors, but he seemed to have resigned himself to his capture and possible survival. Baleron had told him of their destination, and he’d just grunted. Now, glaring at Rauglir, he said softly to Baleron, “So . . . that’s the thing that . . . possessed Rolenya . . . and you.”
“Yes.”
Albrech’s eyes hardened. “That’s the thing that killed my sons, my wife, my sorcerer . . . doomed my city . . .”
Lightning split the skies and illuminated the war zone beyond the coach, which its inhabitants could see through the windows; their little black drapes were pulled to, but wind tore them aside. Rain and cold wind ravished the inside, and all were shivering and wet. At least we’re not as bad off as Sider and his archer, thought Baleron.
Lord Grothgar rose to his feet and put his face as close to Rauglir’s as he dared.
“A little clossser,” hissed the snake.
“Demon!”
“Yessss.”
The king was winding himself up into a fine fit of rage, Baleron saw. “Don’t kill Rauglir,” he warned. “Don’t free him from that body. That’s just what he wants.”
“Oh, I won’t kill it. I have better plans than that.”
Albrech tore the drapes off the largest window and jerked the string out. Acting quickly, he yanked the dagger out of the wall, Rauglir still wriggling on it like meat on a spit, shook the serpent loose and dumped it into the sack created by the drapes, tying the ends off with the string. Rauglir thrashed and struggled, but he couldn’t tear his way out of the sack, not right away. The cloth was thick and heavy.
“There you are,” Albrech said, holding up his prize. “Now I can take you anywhere.”
“That won’t hold him for long,” Baleron said. “Better to bind him and leave him.”
The king tossed Baleron the bloody dagger, then, with sudden violence, smashed the sack against a wall.
Rauglir hissed in pain. Hidden coils writhed furiously from within the sack. Albrech, a mad light in his eyes, smashed again, and again. And again. Sweat flew off his brow, and he swore and cursed viciously with every strike. Baleron, who hated Rauglir above all others, didn’t stop him. Part of him wished he was the one wielding the sack.
“This is what you get!” the king shouted. “This is what you get, you filthy demon, for all your wickedness and deceit!”
Rauglir hissed and squirmed, but his struggles were growing feebler.
“This!” shouted the king, striking again. “This!”
Baleron still had the dagger in his hand.
The king’s back was to him.
Suddenly a throb of ice exploded in his chest and a freezing tendril shot into his mind.
He was waiting.
All this time he’d been thinking of his blood smoking on the Spider’s corpse, thinking of the Flower of Itherin, trying to feel it inside him. Now he did. He called on it, clumsily, but it heeded his call. Strength surged through him, and he forced that icy limb down, down and away. Not this time, you b
astard.
Baleron didn’t know how long the Flower would stay in his system, but prayed it lasted long enough time to get his father to safety. To the horses, he thought, May the gods give you wings.
He sheathed the dagger.
When they finally reached the blackened ruins of the castle, Baleron was shocked to see just how large the mound of rubble was; the castle had been massive, certainly, but it was still massive, and the fact that it sat on a hill made the ruins look even more impressive, even ominous. Lightning backlit the jagged, blackened thrusts of the mound, and thunder shook the earth.
Baleron jumped down from the coach and the others followed him. One of the soldiers had taken Rauglir from the king, so Albrech’s hands were free, and, surprising Baleron, he clapped one on the prince’s shoulder.
“Our old home,” sighed Albrech, his eyes gazing up sadly at the dark ruins.
What is this? Baleron wondered. Has he forgiven me? Aloud, he said, “And our way out.”
He led the way into the desolation, and they began searching. His greatest fear was that the opening would be covered by debris too heavy to move. As it happened, most of the entrances into the lower levels of the castle—the dungeons, wine cellars and arcane libraries, all underground—were indeed blocked, but two were still accessible. Baleron picked one and they all congregated around it.
“We’ll need a torch,” he said. “Some light.”
They looked at each other blankly. None had brought anything.
The king shook his head wearily, grimly amused. “Rauglir was right: I’ve been kidnapped by fools.”
“Foolsss,” agreed Rauglir from the sack, now wet with his blood.
Just then, a great shadow blotted out the lightning-torn clouds above, and everyone looked up. Baleron’s jaw dropped open, but it immediately closed tightly, clenching. His eyes narrowed.