by Ed Greenwood
Rod shrugged and looked away. I AM an idiot of an outlander lost here and just blundering his way along. I wonder when everyone will realize that, and pounce?
A LARGE, PAINSTAKINGLY-DETAILED map of Ironthorn sprawled across the circular table that filled the center of the room. More maps hung from the low rafters in cloth dust-gowns, each sewn to fit the map it guarded.
Among these dusty hangings, the warcaptains of Hammerhold stood silently waiting in the still air, their thoughts hidden behind guarded faces, just as they had stood in this map chamber many times before. Along one side of the table they stood: Syregorn, balding, scarred, and senior; swift, capable Darlok; and darkly handsome, stolid Tarlkond. Three patient statues.
A door opened and Lord Hammerhand shouldered in, his daughter and the priest of the Forestmother silent shadows in his wake.
Amteira Hammerhand stopped at the door, setting her shoulders against it, but her father and the Lord Leaf strode forward, trading brief, silent glances ere they stopped across the map table from the warcaptains.
Then Lord Hammerhand looked at Syregorn. "Take a few trusted knights, and get this Lord Archwizard into Lyraunt Castle. He seeks his Aumrarr and the fell wizard Malraun, who may well be lurking there. Once inside, concern yourself before all else with slaying those of the blood Lyrose. Killing wizards is work for other wizards."
The priest drew forth some small, slender metal vials from his belt and proffered them to Syregorn. "Leaf powders. Introduce them covertly into the Dark Lord's food—and only his food. They will keep him drowsy and biddable."
"When," Syregorn asked carefully, "will we have time for stopping and eating?"
The Lord Leaf looked for a moment as if he was going to fly into one of his rages, then relaxed and snapped, "Before heading to Lyraunt Castle, get well away from the Vale, back into the forest—say, to the old fire clearing—and there stop and feed this Archwizard. He looked hungry enough, but make sure he eats something. Tell him eating before battle is our tradition, and we need to keep the favor of the Forestmother."
He looked to Lord Hammerhand, who nodded again.
The priest smiled the briefest of tight smiles, went to the wall, and undid a loop of chain, lowering the five-candle lantern over the table.
Each of those candles burned in its own wax-filled bowl, all of the bowls thrusting forth on their own metal arms to flank a larger central bowl that served to reflect and magnify the light of their flames. Jaklar reached into the central bowl, supposedly empty of all but dust, and drew forth a small wooden coffer. Opening it, he lifted out a fistful of matching sheathed daggers, and handed three of them to Syregorn.
"Poisoned," he announced curtly. "Wear one, and give the others to men you trust."
"With them," Lord Hammerhand added grimly, "you are to kill whichever of the two wizards survives their battle with the other. A Falconfar with two fewer Dooms in it is a much safer Falconfar for us all."
THE FOUR AUMRARR shivered from time to time; no matter what height they chose to fly at, the air was chill and damp. Ironthorn seemed somehow farther away than last time... but then, as they all separately and silently remembered, it always did.
There came a time when Juskra looked up from her constant peering at the land below to ask, "Time for Orthaunt's skull?"
"More than time," Ambrelle said severely. "We must get the mindtrap gem from Stormcrag first, though. Malraun is probably watching us, and I can cloak his spying only for a very short time; I know a few spells, but he's a Doom of Falconfar!"
"And we all tremble accordingly," Lorlarra commented.
A bare moment later, she was tucking in her wings and banking sharply aside from something blossoming in the air right in front of them.
Something large, dark, and flickering, born out of nothing and growing with astonishing speed.
A rift in the air, its ragged edges as dark as a stormcloud, its heart a brightness out of which flying shapes—lorn!—were streaming.
Magic, of course... and of a size and power that only a Doom could wield. Oh, many a wizard could open a small rift for a moment or two, to thrust through a message, a burning brand, or perhaps something as large as a newborn babe or a sword... but this, in the midst of empty air, a tear in the sky as tall as many a keep...
All four Aumrarr were cursing, and all four had swords out and were swooping and darting their own racing ways through the air, seeking to get past their foes before the lorn—there were two dozen or more, easily, all of them waving swords or spears as they came—could reach them.
"Together!" Ambrelle shrieked, as Dauntra dodged one way and Juskra went another. "Sisters, stay together!"
Dauntra was already past the foremost lorn seeking to intercept her, and Juskra was growing a savage grin as she ducked aside from a spear-thrust and slashed with her sword across one of the lorn arms wielding that spear. Blood sprayed, and another lorn was blindly trying to thrust a spear through that gore when—
A second rift opened in the air, angled to half-face the first one, with the Aumrarr caught between.
This rift was spewing forth its own rushing horde of armed, Aumrarr-seeking lorn, too. Scores of the cruel winged beasts.
The four sisters cursed in disbelief, for all of three breaths.
Then the sky all around them was crowded with jostling, snarling lorn, and they were too busy frantically hacking just to try to stay alive, to have any breath to spare for curses.
AMTEIRA HAMMERHAND WATCHED the last of the three warcaptains stalk away down the darkened hall, firmly closed the door, and whirled around.
"Father, this is madness!"
Lord Burrim Hammerhand looked up from the part of the map of Ironthorn he most liked to stare at—the Lyrose lands, that he'd vowed so often would be his, every tuft of grass and fresh-plowed furrow of them—and asked with just a trace of weariness in his voice, "How so, dearest?"
Amteira had intended to be no more than sternly sorrowful, but she found herself striding forward in as loud a bluster as her father ever trumpeted, anger rising like a warm red tide to choke her, before she could stop herself.
"Poisoned weapons! Lies about the gods! Risking Syregorn on a sneak-thief raid on a castle all our warriors have failed to take, dozens of times! Are not all of these things foolish, dangerous, and dishonorable?"
Her father's face turned stony. "Daughter mine," he said curtly, "hear this, and know it well: to preserve Ironthorn, and free Falconfar of wizards, nothing is dishonorable, or too foolish, or too dangerous. Nothing."
The Lord Leaf smirked at Amteira. "Best you should find calm, Lady Hammerhand, and keep silent, and learn. The Forestmother—"
Fury flared. Amteira fought it down enough to keep from snarling or screaming, so her voice came out as something very close to her father's curt snap.
" You be silent. You are no Hammerhand, priest. Concern yourself with what the Forestmother charges you to watch over: warding off wolves and worse forest beasts, guiding those lost in deep woods safely home, and looking after woodcutters. Who rules in a Great Forest hold and how they rule is not your affair."
Cauldreth Jaklar stiffened, his eyes blazed up like fresh-kindled torches, and he strode toward her, snarling, "Do you dare to tell me what the Forestmother does or does not say or do? Am I actually hearing such blasphemy from your fair lips, young—and thus far spared all holy wrath—lady heir of the Hammerhands? You dare to speak so?"
"Priest," she replied, striding forward to meet him, until they almost crashed together chest to chest, "spare us your staged tantrums. Quite obviously, I do so dare. Nor is it blasphemy or presumption on my part. The Forestmother's teachings have never been about what befalls in castle, town, or market-moot, but rather out in the—"
The priest interrupted her in a tight whisper that managed to stop just short of a shout. " You hear only what I tell you of what She says to me, child. To spare your very sanity, I keep from you—from all faithful Ironthar—much of the dread secrets she revea
ls! The truth is that She has whispered to me of cleansing Ironthorn enough to hold a Holy Moot here, that all Ironthar personally know Her love and blessing, and—"
"What will that mean?" Amteira snapped, interrupting Jaklar in turn, emboldened by the cold look of disgust in her father's eyes, as he stood with arms folded glaring at the priest's back. "We Hammerhands sacrificed on altars, you sitting on my father's throne, and wolves and bears roaming the farms and every last alley of Irontarl, devouring Ironthar at will?"
"Pah! Such wild fancies are always flung by those who—"
The door behind Amteira opened, bringing instant silence. The Lord Leaf glared murderously over her shoulder at the intruder, but that warrior was unabashed.
Panting a little, he looked at Lord Hammerhand and blurted, "News, lord! The wizard Narmarkoun has vanished! His tower of Helnkrist stands empty, and no one knows what has become of the greatfangs he breeds there!"
"Well, they're a little large to have slipped away unnoticed, what with all Helnadar cowering down whenever they flap overhead," Lord Burrim said flatly. "No other news? My thanks, Bramlar."
He inclined his head in a clear dismissal, and the warrior bowed and withdrew, pulling the door firmly shut again. He clinked his scabbard against the wall as he walked away, again and again, to let the three in the map chamber know he wasn't tarrying to eavesdrop.
"One less wizard for us all to worry about," Jaklar said triumphantly as those clinkings died away, turning to give Lord Hammerhand a grin.
It died away along with his voice, as he caught sight of the bleak look on Burrim Hammerhand's face.
"Think, priest," the lord said bluntly. "Is this Doom dead? Fled? Captured by one of the other Dooms? Or staging some ruse we can only guess at? Was the 'Dark Lord' we just met with Narmarkoun in magical guise, trying to learn all he could of Ironthorn's strength? Or hiding from a greater pursuing foe?"
Silence fell, as the two Hammerhands and the Lord Leaf stared at each other, truly aghast this time.
THEIR AGILITY AND the fact that they were only four, and so few enough to pass between jabbing spears, twist around the shafts of those weapons, and fling one lorn into another—or onto the sharp edges and points of countless gleaming lorn weapons—was all that was keeping the Aumrarr alive.
Juskra loved to fight, and was hewing and stabbing in glee, lost in the red and bloody moment. Lorlarra fought with nostrils flaring and lips tight in distaste, as usual, grimly doing what she must.
The minds of Ambrelle and Dauntra lay between those extremes. They were fighting for their lives, but had time enough—in the panting instants when lorn stiffened and spewed in death against them, and they were tearing free their swords, or fighting to win free of the dying—to mark one grim realization: only a Doom of Falconfar would have power enough to craft two rifts in succession. There were legends of Archwizard Lorontar doing so twice or thrice, of old, sending armies into the castles of their foes, to smite those who'd thought themselves safe behind walls...
Not that this being the work of a Doom was all that much of a surprise. Or that it really mattered much who had caused these rifts, if they died here in this sky full of endless lorn.
Lorn who seemed confused and hesitant, thanks to the only useful spell Ambrelle could call to mind. A magic that made the four Aumrarr look like lorn, except to each other.
It was not a magic that made mere looks slow sharp steel. Lorlarra moaned in pain as a spear-blade laid open her side, racing along ribs that had lost all protection to earlier slashes and thrusts. She twisted around to thrust her free hand into her own gore, holding her side as if her fingers could quell pain.
Her wings faltered, she fell below a drift of swarming lorn—and Juskra, dropping beside Lorlarra to protect her, wrested a spear from dying lorn hands and shouted in glee as she found a dozen lorn bellies and backsides within easy reach of it.
Dauntra raced past overhead, drawing the attention of many lorn as she hacked and thrust, darting and swerving in a wild, swift progress that few lorn could turn quickly enough to follow, though it drew all eyes.
Juskra thrust her spear again and again into the nether parts of lorn, jabbing swiftly and moving on rather than risking plunging her borrowed weapon in deeper and getting it stuck and torn from her hands.
Not far away, Ambrelle was diving in behind the lorn who were starting to pursue Dauntra, flying just above them and using her sword to slash wing-tendons. A helplessly-tumbling lorn who can't fly is one less lorn for outnumbered Aumrarr to fight.
Dauntra gasped as a lorn spear caught her ear and sliced it away. Some of the lorn beneath her raised a liquid, laughing roar of triumph and anticipation—but were drowned out, almost instantly, by the dismayed sigh of scores of others.
The first rift had closed, as abruptly as the passing, air-slicing blade of a hard-swung sword. Only one vast darkness now hung in the air.
The four Aumrarr were fighting for their lives, so they fought on uncaring. All that mattered was that the rift, when it had vanished, hadn't helpfully sucked all of its lorn back through it.
Leaving them behind for four increasingly weary winged women to hack and hew as best they could, with arms growing heavier with each stroke, and fingers more numbed with each crashing meeting of blade and foe.
Then Ambrelle found time and breath enough to notice that a lot of sky around her was blue again, more or less. Empty of flapping, clawing lorn, anyway.
Had they—?
Lorn were wheeling away from her, now, drawing back for the first time, their bloodthirsty eagerness to jostle each other aside to take part in slaughtering these four outnumbered foes gone.
Behind and below the midair battle, dozens of wounded lorn were tumbling toward the distant ground, some of them struggling to fly and others plunging, limp and dead.
Drenched in blood and sweat, half-blinded, the winded Aumrarr fought on viciously, snatching wild-eyed lorn to use as flapping, frantic shields against lorn spears, swords, and claws. Living shields that did not cling to their lives long.
More lorn swooped away, fleeing the fray.
As something happened that did make the four weary sisters smile.
Silently and swiftly, without any sound at all, the second rift closed and was gone, leaving perhaps two dozen lorn still sharing the sky with the Aumrarr.
Lorn that now, in silent accord, turned and flew away.
THE LYROSE WAY was the sneer and the biting comment, not snarled oaths or angry shouting.
Yet the four surviving Lyroses had forgotten and flung aside their customary manner long ago, so heated in the disagreement that had followed their smallmeat tarts and wine that they had ordered servants and guards alike out of earshot, then stormed up to the long-disused topmost turret bedchamber of Lyraunt Castle so they could shout and spit at each other freely without being overheard.
What the family Lyrose was arguing so heatedly about was what to do in the ongoing war with Hammerhand.
Lord Magrandar was furious, and had taken to repeatedly saying so.
He was saying so right now, in roars that echoed thunderously around the small, round stone room.
"I am furious that Eldred and Horondeir were so rash and stupid as to get themselves killed!" He ran out of room to angrily stride across the small bedchamber and whirled around, half-cloak swirling. "To say nothing of hurling aside the lives of a lot of my best knights! They were like eager children!"
He whirled around again. "Why, anyone could have foreseen that the Hammerhands would fight to avenge their heir, not flee hand-wringing and shrieking! What were Eldred and Horondeir thinking?''''
Pelmard knew very well how much he'd led his father's opinions astray in his twisted retellings of what had happened on the forest trail, but he dared not change his tale again now. He'd been busily blaming his two dead brothers for every last little misfortune, and if a Lyrose was going to be blamed for something, let it be a dead one, and not a far more favorite family target: the sull
en youngest son, Pelmard Lyrose.
He hadn't known his icily-calm, nasty father could grieve, but grief must be the fire behind Lord Lyrose's wild scheme.
Unless Lord Magrandar Lyrose was given to bouts of sudden madness he'd hitherto managed to hide from his family.
Two of his sons might now lie dead as a result of testing them, but—Dooms take us all!—the Lord of Lyraunt Castle actually thought the ward-piercing crossbow quarrels the wizard Malraun had given them had worked so well that he wanted to strike at Hammerhand right now, so as to do the most harm he could.
Not by besieging Hammerhold, mind, but by seeking to capture Irontarl, and so luring Hammerhand's troops into street battles in the town, where they could readily be slain with the new quarrels, by Lyrose archers aiming along streets and alleys and down from rooftops.
Pelmard tried to keep his incredulity off his face, but he knew all too well where this was heading.
Sly, craven coward he might be—he knew that was every last Lyrose's opinion of him—but this was madness.
Madness he wanted no part of, yet was quite likely to be hurled into the heart of, if he knew his kin.
This rash attack on Irontarl would doom them all, when just sticking to their defenses and patiently waiting a season or so longer would see Hammerhand overreach himself.
He said so, trying to sound calm and wise, as if he'd observed and considered this very matter for months. "Hammerhand is a warrior—he must be in the thick of the fray, sword in hand. So we give him frays, of our choosing, and wait for the moment when he rides too far, and we can surround and overwhelm him. If we can kill Burrim Hammerhand, he has no heir left now but his spit-shrew of a daughter. And I know just how to handle her." He kept his leer soft and slight.
Yet found himself staring into three coldly hostile gazes.
"Your problem, my son," his mother said icily, "is that we all know you rather too well. We look upon Pelmard Lyrose, and see a coward who would betray—even slay—us all in an instant if doing so aided you in any way."