by James Lowder
The other warriors took their fellow’s sacrifice as a signal to strike. Yet the Gond-forged armor turned aside the pikes as if they were blunted wooden toys. Gwydion whirled around, bringing the enchanted blade in a windmill arc through the skeletal soldiers. Bones cracked and skulls toppled from fleshless necks. The undead warriors retreated—those that could still run, anyway—and Gwydion paused to look out on the battlefield.
Gangs of shades roamed the square. Some carried blades or cudgels or barbed whips wrested from the denizens. Others had crafted weapons from the debris. Gwydion and his fellow knights had found that releasing the False from their tortures was a simple enough matter. Rallying the downtrodden souls had proved even easier. Cries of “Down with Cyric!” and “Long live Kelemvor!” rang through the streets, the latter slogan born of Gwydion’s speech that day on the banks of the River Slith. Even though the shades knew nothing of the long-lost hero, Kel was a bitter foe of their oppressor. Those were credentials enough to cast him in the unlikely role of savior.
The denizens, unorganized and prone to fighting amongst themselves, had yet to mount any serious counterstrike. Overwhelmed by the sheer number of False rebelling in the city, many of Cyric’s faithful had retreated to the diamond walls of Bone Castle. They were the lucky ones. The denizens caught outside the safety of the keep found themselves facing rough justice, indeed.
Even now, across the square from Gwydion, a group of renegade souls flushed a denizen from the detritus of a ruined building. The little creature tried to flap away on yellow bat’s wings, but two of the shades tackled him before he could flee. Like all the other battles between the newly freed False and their former jailors, this skirmish was bloody and brief.
Neither the damned souls nor the denizens possessed the magical might necessary to destroy one another. Because of this, their battles tended to follow a gruesome, vicious pattern. Once the scuffle ended, the victors chopped the vanquished into a dozen pieces or more, enough so it would take days for the fingers and legs and arms to come together again and regenerate. Such was the case now, as the shades scattered sun-yellow bits of denizen flesh across the square. The creature’s head was left atop a pole, shouting curses at the False as they abandoned the square in search of other quarry.
“We’ll feed the whole lot of you to the Night Serpent when this is over, slugs!” the head cried. “We’ll sink you all to the bottom of the Slith!”
Gwydion recognized the thick, hissing voice. He hurried down from the heap of bones. Sure enough, the bruised and battered head gazed back at him with familiar contempt. “Well,” the denizen muttered, “what are you looking at?”
“You’re better off than Af was, Perdix. When this is over, you’ll still be here to serve the realm’s new lord.”
The little creature narrowed his eye, darted his forked tongue over gory, split lips. “Cyric’s black heart! You’ve come back!”
Gwydion slipped his helmet from his head. The shadows from the dozens of small fires burning in the rubble nearby made him look distinctly ominous as he smiled and said, “You said an uprising would never succeed here.” He wiped the sweaty hair from his eyes. “You were wrong.”
“Look, slug,” Perdix hissed, “you think you’re winning now, but wait until Cyric’s elite troops arrive.”
A subtle shift of the denizen’s watery eye made Gwydion turn, suddenly alert to the danger that loomed behind him. A gigantic panther, dark as midnight, fell silently from the sky on wings of black light. It struck Gwydion with one massive paw, sending him to his knees. The knight’s helmet clattered away, and Titanslayer slipped from his grasp.
The cat pounced on Gwydion with preternatural speed, pinning him to the ground. Like a house cat toying with a captured mouse, it batted at his exposed face. Claws as large as daggers drew bloody lines across the knight’s cheek, threatened to gouge out an eye.
“Hee hee!” Perdix hooted. “Speak of the devils! You’ve captured one of the important ones, you have!”
The panther spared the denizen’s head the slightest glance, clearly offended by Perdix’s statement of the obvious, then turned its yellow eyes on Gwydion. The slitted orbs narrowed, as if the cat were pleased with its prize. The beast opened its mouth wide.
Titanslayer lay well out of reach, so Gwydion pummeled the cat’s legs and head with his fists. The creature’s thick fur seemed as tough as his own plate mail, though, and the blows did little damage. Still, the struggle bought the knight just enough time to pull the candle from his sword belt. With a grunt, Gwydion twisted sideways and tossed the stick of tallow into one of the dozens of small fires burning nearby.
With a hiss like a dragon gasping in pain, the wax spit forth a burst of smoke. The wavering cloud swiftly took a more definite form—a mastiff, as large as a draft horse and covered by a coat of writhing maggots.
“Free!” Kezef howled.
The rush of fetid air from the Chaos Hound’s lips extinguished all the fires in the square. The spittle from his lolling, tattered tongue ate holes into the cobbles at his feet. Kezef crouched when he saw the panther, then leaped forward. The impact drove both beasts a giant’s height away from Gwydion.
The Chaos Hound closed slavering jaws on the cat and tore the death yowl stillborn from the beast’s throat. The panther tried to fight back. It battered Kezef with its black wings and ripped at his guts with powerful rear claws. Yet the mass of corruption that was Kezef’s skin shifted with each blow, as yielding as water.
When the cat fell, the maggots swarmed away from Kezef’s jet-boned skeleton to cover the corpse. They devoured the minion’s flesh, then slid back onto the Hound. The gorged slugs made Kezef look bloated as they milled, sated, all across his corrupted body.
The Chaos Hound arched his back at the pleasant taste of flesh after so many eons of starvation. “Where am I?” he rumbled. “Where’s that treacherous bastard Mask?”
In the brief time it had taken the Chaos Hound to kill and devour the panther, Gwydion had managed to retrieve his sword, but not his helmet. The knight held the blade before him defensively as he faced the mastiff. “In the City of Strife. Mask gave me the candle and told me to free you here. He said you’d help us against Cyric’s minions.”
The Chaos Hound sniffed once, then wrinkled his nose at the shade. “Stop trembling. I eat the marrow of the Faithful,” Kezef muttered. “You’re not quite ripe yet, little soul, and I’d only make myself sick.” He motioned toward Perdix with his dripping snout “Where’s the rest of him?”
“Th-This is all of me,” the denizen stammered. “Just a head. Not enough to sharpen your teeth on.”
“In pieces. Scattered around the square,” Gwydion said. He backed toward his helmet and lifted it from the ground by one horn. “There are plenty of denizens swarming around Bone Castle, if you’re still hungry.”
“So that’s Mask’s game, eh?” Kezef barked a wheezing laugh. “Capture me and let me loose in his neighbor’s courtyard—all so he can rob the place through the back door, no doubt.” He turned away. “I’ll take my fill here, little soul, but I won’t be the Shadowlord’s pawn.” The Chaos Hound loped away, his paw prints spreading into pools of burning ichor in his wake.
“ ‘Scattered across the square!’ ” Perdix snapped. “You might as well have shoved me into his mouth.” The denizen snorted in contempt. “At least I’ve got the satisfaction of knowing you’ve lost the war, slug. Your secret weapon’s scampered off.”
Gwydion buckled his helmet back into place. “That creature was Mask’s idea,” the knight said, his voice echoing hollowly. He rested Titanslayer on his shoulder and started off toward the rubble-strewn fields that lay in the shadow of Bone Castle itself. “I’ve got other nightmares to unleash.”
* * * * *
In the Keep’s sheltered harbor, boats lurched drunkenly away from the docks, piloted by men desperate enough to brave the ice floes and the two dragons that had taken up patrol over the river. Past the Tesh Bridge to the east
and the Force Bridge to the west, ruined hulks of carracks and cogs wallowed, half-submerged. Some had hulls shattered by the ice, others fractured masts and crippled rigging from the white wyrms’ frosty breath.
The floating, ice-rimed graves did little to deter the refugees from setting sail. The soldiers assigned to guard the port had also failed to turn back the mobs. Most of the Zhentilar had abandoned their posts at the first rush of panicked citizens. Those who’d tried to hold their ground now floated facedown in the Tesh, blood from their slit throats staining the water around them.
“The one w’the blue sail. She’ll make it out.” The orc spit in the general direction of his chosen boat, then leaned his knobby elbows on the low stone rail that ran the length of the Force Bridge.
“Nah,” his equally uncouth comrade grunted. “They’ll all end up driftwood—or toothpicks fer the dragons.”
“Oh yeah? Well if yer so sure, Zadok, how ’bout we wager yer sheev on it?”
Zadok drew an ivory-handled knife from his belt and wiped the dirty blade across his black leather jerkin. “I dunno, Garm. I got this off the body of the first sharp I ever milled. He was a real fancy one, too—before I gave him a topper. Cracked his skull wide open, I did. One blow, right above his—”
“Oi, quiet,” Garm hissed. He grabbed Zadok’s arm and directed his gaze with one frostbitten finger. “Lookit what we got here!”
The orcs squinted down the bridge toward the northern bank, where flaming barricades had been set to stop anyone from fleeing the city. A lone figure hurried along, close to the railing.
“They let one through!” Garm snarled.
Zadok flipped his knife to a fighting grip and watched the figure slow from a run to a walk. “A woman from the looks of it. Human, I think.” He leered. “At least this’ll give us something to do.”
When she saw the blade in the orc’s grip, Rinda stopped and showed her empty hands. “No need for weapons. I’m here to see General Vrakk,” she said. “Let me pass.”
Garm took a menacing step forward. “Vrakk sent us t’help ya,” he lied. “He’s got right busy all of a sudden, so we’ll be taking care of ya.”
Slowly Rinda started away from the railing, trying to angle around the soldiers. Vrakk had said he’d leave orders with the orcs at the barricades to let her pass, but these two obviously knew nothing of that. “He gave me this as proof,” the scribe said. She slung her heavy pack off her shoulder and pulled a black armband from a pocket. Cyric’s holy symbol grinned from the tattered cloth.
“So what? You’ve got one of our old regimental bands,” Zadok said. “We threw them out months ago, missy. Anybody coulda dug a dozen out of the trash heaps.”
Rinda continued to move toward the center of the bridge, but it was clear now the orcs weren’t going to let her pass. The scribe glanced uneasily toward the twin towers that marked the southern end of the bridge. No sign of Vrakk on the battlements. She could only hope he’d seen her coming and was on his way.
“Give us the bundle. If it’s got anything good in it, we might let ya go back t’the city,” Garm offered, creeping closer.
When Rinda moved to reshoulder the pack, Garm leaped forward. He grabbed the bottom of the cloth sack and rolled, hoping to drag the woman off her feet. To his surprise, she let go of the straps. The orc tumbled forward on the rough stone pavement, cursing in a colorful mix of Zhentish and the guttural tongue of his race. The pack burst open beneath him, and its contents spilled across the bridge.
Garm didn’t have time to inventory Rinda’s belongings. As he pushed himself from the ground, the toe of her boot caught him just in front of the ear. With a loud crack, his jaw snapped out of joint. The orc went down again, this time howling in pain.
“That’ll cost you more’n you think, missy,” Zadok hissed. He shuffled forward, waving his grimy knife before him.
Rinda watched the orc move closer, watched his beady eyes for some sign he was going to strike. The sound of heavy footfalls had begun to echo from the southern end of the bridge, and shouting, too. If it was Vrakk, he was still too far away for the soldier to hear him. If it was more orcs coming to join the fun … Rinda grimaced. Better end this quickly, then.
The scribe edged sideways until she stood directly over the cloth-wrapped bulk of the Cyrinishad. She could hear the muttering of the tome’s guardian, muffled by the rags and the chain Oghma had strung across its mouth. “Last chance to save yourself some pain,” Rinda said.
Zadok slashed at the scribe. The strike was tentative, more a test of her reflexes than a serious attack, and the blade hissed through the air well in front of her. Nevertheless, Rinda acted as if the knife had come quite close. She leaped back a step, then dropped to the ground, sitting right behind the book. She gasped in mock terror, as if she’d stumbled, but her hands trembled not the least as she grabbed for the heavy tome.
The feigned blunder drew Zadok into a charge. He lunged, but the blade met the indestructible bindings of the Cyrinishad, not the woman’s throat. With a high, ringing sound, the knife snapped in two. The blade jangled musically as it clattered to the cobbles.
The orc continued forward, but Rinda rolled onto her back and caught the soldier in the stomach with her boot heels. A push from her legs sent Zadok sailing. He landed face-first on the bridge. He skinned his hands bloody and broke both the incisors that jutted up from his bottom lip.
Vrakk and three other orcs staggered to a stop near their fallen comrades. At a gesture from the general, Garm and Zadok were roughly hauled away. “Pathetic,” Vrakk puffed.
The scribe winced. “Oh, I don’t know. I thought I did rather well.”
“Not you.” The general jerked a warty thumb over his shoulder. “Them. Two against one. They should’ve killed you.”
Rinda carefully replaced the Cyrinishad in her pack and stuffed the rest of her belongings in around it. “Seems to me you didn’t do much better, that first day at my place,” the scribe said coldly.
With one hand, the orc lifted Rinda from the ground. His beady eyes were narrowed in mirth. “You pretty good soldier,” he said and chuckled basely. It was the first time Rinda had ever heard an orc laugh; the sound reminded her of the sewers gurgling after the spring rains.
Vrakk led Rinda the rest of the way across the Force Bridge. More orcs gathered at the southern end, where a small, walled borough of the Keep crouched tensely upon the bank. There was little need for guards at this end of the span, since the wealthy Zhentish families who lived in the borough had either fled long ago or crossed to the better-protected confines of the north bank. From the fine cloaks, polished armor, and jewel-hilted swords the orcs wore, Rinda decided the nobles hadn’t left anyone to safeguard their homes from looters.
They climbed one of the twin towers that stood sentinel over the bridge’s terminus. When they reached the very top, Vrakk pointed across the Tesh. “Look what we done,” he said proudly.
In the city’s winding streets, crowds rushed away from the beleaguered western gate and the smoking ruin that was once the darkly glorious Temple of Cyric—though from Rinda’s vantage the mobs appeared as little more than groups of ants treading through a maze. The dragons circling the Keep reacted swiftly to the retreat. They focused their attacks on the northeastern gate. That left two avenues of escape for the Zhentish: the river or the twin bridges.
Most of the boats in the harbor had set sail, and all but a handful of them had been capsized or becalmed by the ice and the dragons. Finding the slips empty, a few foolish people tried to swim, but the bitter Tesh froze the life from them before they’d got fifty strokes from shore. With no other options, the mob turned to the bridges.
Patriarch Mirrormane had been certain the Lord of the Dead would answer the city’s pleas and strike down the besieging army—so certain, in fact, that he’d failed to consider the bridges a means of escape. So it was that Vrakk and his orcs had been assigned the unglamorous duty of guarding the spans while everyone was gathered in dawn
prayer groups. The brutish soldiers had immediately constructed barricades across both bridges, barricades that now kept the Zhentish from fleeing the giants and dragons.
Xeno’s lackeys were only now discovering that the orcish troops had no intention of tearing the barricades down—not at a priest’s order, anyway. And so, the ends of both bridges were crammed with frantic refugees. Rinda could see them, masses of humanity, pulsing forward to the bonfires and toppled carts. The crowds had gotten much worse since she’d shouldered her way through. Small groups had begun rushing the orcish lines, only to be driven back by a hail of crossbow bolts. Dozens of corpses lay sprawled in the no man’s land between the humans and the orcs.
“It’s time,” Vrakk said.
“Time for what?”
The general smiled—a horrible thing to see—and gestured for a flag to be raised. As soon as the young orc started the red banner up the pole, its twin began to rise over a tower at the southern end of the Tesh Bridge.
“We do lots of work on bridges,” Vrakk murmured, then turned back to watch the distant barricades. “Priests think it punishment for us.…”
Sparks rose into the morning air as the orcs scattered the bonfires. With the bridge sealed off, at least for a short time, the soldiers retreated at a run toward the south bank. They’d only gotten a quarter of the way across before the mob broke through the flaming wreckage. In the press, men and women were shoved into the fires. Their neighbors clambered over their backs as they burned.
Vrakk glanced at Rinda. “You not figure it out? Me think you smart.” He gestured to one of the dragons as it swooped low over the river to tear the sails from a coaster. “They not attack us. How come?”
The realization swept over Rinda then. “You’ve cut a deal with them, haven’t you?” she whispered. “You’re fighting for the giants.”
Vrakk nodded. “Priests say we’re monsters, so we fight on side of monsters. Giants happy to have us in army.”