by Jack Conner
A wave of dizziness rose in Giorn. He was in some sort of nightmare. This is my home! As he moved about the room, he saw other bodies. A human head was mounted to the wall, still living, its eyes rolling. Giorn saw what he at first thought was a corpse chained to a wall, with visible ribs. Then its finger twitched. Further on, Giorn saw what had to be a corpse sprawled across the bear-fur rug; its entrails had been spread out in a halo around it. The intestines writhed like snakes.
“Dear Omkar,” he whispered, over and over again, finding more horrors.
His words drew Niara, and soon she was choking back sobs.
He shoved his lantern in her face. “Now do you see? That thing is evil! Look what he’s done!”
She shook her head tearfully. “No. He didn’t do this, Giorn. It was Saria. This was her room.”
How could she still be so blind? “This was my home,” he said.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Spare me your pity.”
She looked at him as though his words had wounded her. “Giorn. Don’t. Don’t hate me. I—”
She stretched out an arm to him. He shrugged it off, and she looked stung.
Screaming erupted from below.
“What’s this?” Giorn said.
More cries echoed up the spiral stairs. Giorn and Niara shared a look.
“A trick,” he said. Raugst had not gone on to the highest level, but had remained at the penultimate one.
Giorn flew to the doorway and hobbled down it, going as fast as he could with his lame leg. Several times he nearly stumbled and fell headlong, but at last he reached the doorway to Rian’s old suite.
Something moved on the floor. He entered the chambers, his lantern illuminating the area in a tight circle about him. The thing on the floor showed itself to be the remains of one of his soldiers, disemboweled, legs missing, his face a ruin, but somehow still alive, dragging itself along.
“End me,” the man gasped. “Don’t let me die . . . like this . . .”
Giorn suppressed the wave of pity that threatened to unseat him. He nodded and pressed his blade over the man’s heart. “What happened?” he said.
The man’s face screwed up in pain. “Demon. Struck from the shadows . . . blood . . . blood everywhere . . .” He grabbed the blade, guiding it toward his heart. “End . . . me.”
“Go to the Lights of Sifril,” Giorn said, and plunged the blade home.
Niara was in the doorway. By Giorn’s lantern she would have been able to see what happened.
“Raugst did this,” he said. “You cannot deny that.”
She said nothing, just looked sad.
Giorn wondered if Raugst were still here, or if any of the soldiers had survived. A quick inspection turned up two more bodies, each more torn-up than the last. Just as Giorn found the second one, more screaming filled the stairwell.
Knowing what he would find but unable to do anything else, Giorn hobbled down the stairs, his breath coming fast and hard. Sweat trickled down from his hair and burned his eyes, sticking his shirt to his back. Niara came behind.
At the next suite of rooms Giorn found more bodies. These were in the hallway, apparently having just emerged from their inspection of the rooms. None of the soldiers were in one piece. Their body parts were strewn up and down the stairs, and Giorn slipped in their blood and intestines as he made his way down.
The first group of soldiers had fared the best, he saw when he rounded the next bend. By this point Raugst must have been weakened by blood loss sustained from the first two groups, so he had not been able to slay all of this last group. One survived, though his chest bore deep scratches and his arm had been broken in several places.
Sitting amid the ragged body parts of his fellows, the man’s eyes widened when he saw Giorn. With his good arm, he pointed down the stairs.
“There,” he gasped. “The demon . . .”
“I’ll send a healer,” Giorn promised. He descended the stairs, slipping on blood, entrails, and, once, a severed hand. Over his shoulder, he barked, “Now do you see what you’ve fallen for?”
Niara let out a sob behind him but did not answer.
Giorn returned to the feasting hall, where Duke Yfrin and several soldiers were looking harried. Three freshly dead and mutilated bodies lay upon the floor.
When the duke saw Giorn, he said, “Thank the Omkar! I thought it killed you all.”
It was then that Giorn saw the fourth body. His heart twisted.
“Oh, Fria . . .”
He sank down beside her ravaged form, holding her to his chest. She was still warm. He stared down at her pretty face framed by that curling, chestnut hair. One eye seemed to be staring at him, the other had rolled upward. Indescribable grief filled him.
“Fria . . .”
“She came at him,” Duke Yfrin said, stepping forward, looking ill. “While the others rushed him, she slipped up on him from behind . . .” He shook his head. “He slew them all.”
Weeping and not caring what the others thought, Giorn said, “Where did he go?”
The Duke swallowed nervously and pointed. “The catacombs, I think. A handful of men went after him. I don’t know if they stand a chance.”
Giorn rose and limped after his quarry. A line of blood showed the way. I will end him, he thought, his mind a whirlwind of hate. I will end him, if I do nothing else. He slew Father. Meril. He caused Rian’s death, I know that now. And Fria, poor, sweet Fria . . .
Just as Yfrin had said, Raugst had descended toward the catacombs, and soon Giorn, following the trail of blood, found himself delving into the corridors below the castle, the place where the Wesrains kept their dead. The darkness grew darker, and moisture dripped from the walls deeper in. The air turned cold. Behind, of course, came Niara. She wasn’t crying anymore. Probably she was too exhausted. Hopefully Fria’s death had served to at least bring home her shame.
The ancient sarcophaguses of Giorn’s family lined the halls. Many had their own chambers, and black doorways loomed on all sides. Giorn expected attack from any of them. Candles burned from within recessed niches, lit at irregular intervals. It was customary to light these catacombs so that visitors could pay their respects, but the light was dim and uneven, and it left more in shadow than not.
Sounds ahead. Screams. The scrape and thunk of swords striking flesh and stone. The growling of some loathsome creature. Giorn’s blood ran cold. Nothing living should make such sounds.
When he came upon the scene of combat, he swore.
It was in a relatively large chamber, with a high, domed ceiling supported by thick stone pillars, and in the midst of it all stood a terrific demon, black-furred, two-legged, arms long and tipped with hideous claws. Its monstrous, wolf-like head was coated in gore around its mouth, and its whole body was spattered and dripping red. But its eyes, its burning black eyes, were what arrested Giorn. They seemed to blaze from the very depths of the Abyss.
A dozen bodies lay around the great, shaggy demon, which must have stood ten feet tall, and the last two soldiers were lunging at it. They hacked at it with their swords, plunging their blades home even as it slashed and snapped at them. The towering abomination roared as one soldier stabbed its side. The creature grabbed the soldier and hurled him against a pillar so violently the body broke open, bursting with blood. The soldier sagged to the ground, dead instantly.
The last remaining soldier used Raugst’s distraction to duck under Raugst’s arms and thrust his blade through the demon’s ribcage. The attacking man, eyes wide and hair limp with sweat, shoved his blade toward Raugst’s heart.
Overcoming his shock, Giorn hobbled forward to help. The soldier’s blade was wedged between two ribs. He struggled to free it, shove it deeper. Giorn was almost there. If only—
Raugst snatched the man up by the arms and pulled the arms in separate directions. The soldier shrieked. Raugst wrenched the arms off. Blood fountained from the sockets. The man would have fallen to the floor, but Raugst clamped the soldier
’s head in his great, monstrous jaws and, with a wet crunch, crushed the skull in his teeth.
Niara screamed.
Raugst let the body fall. He spit out the pulped head. His eyes fell on Giorn.
Crouching, Giorn stared up at him. The final confrontation would happen in that catacomb chamber, Giorn knew—the great, wolf-like demon rearing over a mound of dead bodies and body parts, Raugst covered in the bloods of his victims; Giorn, furious and weary, slender blade upraised; and Niara, heart-sick, leaning for support against a pillar.
“You won’t escape,” Giorn said.
Raugst’s lips drew back from his fangs. Blood and saliva trickled down.
Strangely he did not attack. Perhaps something vaguely human still lurked inside him; perhaps he felt remorse. Whatever the case, for a long moment he stared down at Giorn, unmoving. His gaze strayed to Niara. Some of the madness left him. Where before he had been overcome by primal instincts of rage and slaughter, now something of a gentler nature stole into his eyes.
“Niara,” he said. His voice was wet and garbled, but intelligible.
“Raugst,” she said.
Seeming to muster her courage, she moved forward, having to step over two bodies on the way. She came to stand only a few feet from Giorn. He could smell her perfume war with the stench of death all around.
“Don’t go to him,” Giorn said. “Don’t make this more difficult.” His voice shook. “He slew Fria. Please. Look at him!”
“He’s not . . .” Niara took another step. She was almost within range of Raugst’s claws.
Raugst just stood there, seething, letting them work it out for themselves. Perhaps he hoped Niara could help him.
“You’re mad,” Giorn said. “Stay back. If we allow him to escape us, he’ll just go down to the secret tunnels. That’s where his agents are, guarding the tunnels there—against me. If he gets down there and organizes them, he could storm the castle and retake it.”
Niara looked slowly from the great demon to Giorn. “Yes?” she said.
He nodded frantically. “Yes.” Maybe she would see reason, after all.
But no. For then, madly, insanely, she stepped closer to Raugst, and turned her back to him to face Giorn.
Giorn regarded her in horror.
Raugst looked down at her. Slaver ran from his jaws. His clawed fingers twitched.
Giorn didn’t know if Raugst would have slain her or not, though later he suspected not, but it was too much for him. He lunged forward, knocking Niara aside, and ran his blade up under Raugst’s ribcage.
Raugst did not immediately block him because Niara was in the way. As soon as Giorn knocked her aside, though, he acted. Too late. Giorn drove his blade deep under Raugst’s ribcage and shoved up, toward his heart—
Raugst batted him through the air.
Crack! Pain suffused Giorn. The world tilted, blurred. Grew dim.
When he woke, he was staring up from the floor. The world spun slightly, and there was a ringing in his ears. His back hurt.
Groaning, he sat up. Fire filled him. Only then did he notice the pillar beside him and realize what Raugst had flung him against. He was resting on a corpse. Giorn picked himself up. The body was soft and wet beneath him, its split intestines reeking. Why hadn’t Raugst finished him?
Then he saw the demon, and his heart sank.
Raugst, the great, black-haired, gore-coated wolf-creature, lay sprawled upon the pile of bodies. He lay on his back, Giorn’s sword hilt sticking from just under his ribs. Half a hundred sword cuts and thrusts had maimed him and weakened him, but Giorn’s had been the most potent. His sword had gone the deepest. Blood trickled out of Raugst’s mouth, and he made pitiful choking noises, which cheered Giorn. The cheering was completely overshadowed by the awful grief he felt, and rage, for Niara, beautiful, beloved Niara, had not gone to cry over Giorn’s inert body. She had gone to Raugst. Even as Giorn struggled to his feet, she was pulling the swords from Raugst’s chest, weeping over him as she did so. She flung herself on him and kissed his wolvish face, then buried her face in the hollow of his hairy neck.
Giorn stared.
Earlier, he had felt something die in him when he realized Niara loved Raugst. But now, when the evidence against Raugst was so plain, and she still loved the demon, something even greater went silent in him.
It was with a dull ache that he crossed that horrid chamber. He picked up a sword, gingerly, and limped over to the great, black, bloody mound that was Raugst. Giorn moved slowly, every step an agony. His leg burned like fire.
His mind was clear, though. Clear, and cold, and dead.
He stared at Niara, weeping, then at Raugst, and as he drew near he marveled at all the cuts the great beast had endured. If nothing else, he was a worthy enemy. Raugst’s chest still rose and fell, just slightly, and the faintest traces of steam rose from his maw.
“Get back,” Giorn told Niara.
She ignored him. Perhaps, over her sobbing, she didn’t even hear him.
Footsteps echoed on the stone walls. A dozen castle guards burst into the room led by Duke Yfrin. He stared agog at the terrible beast and the maid who wept over it.
Giorn nodded to two of the soldiers. “Secure the lady,” he said.
Cautiously, the two he had indicated approached Niara and the demon and tried to pull her away. She resisted at first, but then the fight seemed to leave her, and she was dragged away. She watched Raugst unblinking, and tears poured freely down her cheeks.
Raugst breathed, in, out, in, out. Blood coursed in rivers down his mangy hide.
Giorn, feeling dead, stood over him.
“So it ends.” Giorn raised his blade, shared a look with Duke Yfrin, then prepared to swing. Raugst stared up at him, weak but conscious. Good. Giorn wanted him to see who slew him. “Farewell,” Giorn said.
He swung.
It all happened very fast.
One moment, he had been triumphant. The next moment, disaster.
Niara had been merely pretending at obedience. She had gone limp and fooled the guards that held her so that they would not grip her too tightly, and then, when they had relaxed, she had torn loose. She was slippery with blood, and it was easier than it should have been.
Just as Giorn swung, she flew like an angel in white directly between his blade and her beloved.
Giorn struck down, saw a flash of white, saw her beautiful, tear-stained face, and tried to check his blade’s descent. Too late. He felt the thunk of his blade striking deep, saw crimson stain her gorgeous ceremonial gown. Then she was down, bleeding, sprawled across Raugst.
“Niara!” Giorn cried
She lifted a bloody, white hand, let her blood fall into Raugst’s open, gasping mouth, and sagged.
“Niara!” Giorn dropped his blade. Knelt down and pulled Niara off the demon. “Oh, Niara . . .”
That deadness he’d felt was gone, evaporated on the instant. In its place he felt overwhelming pain. What have I done?
He inspected the wound. His blade had slashed across her front, shattered a collar bone and several ribs and bit deep; she was bleeding terribly. There was nothing he could do, nothing anyone could do. She was dying.
Her eyes found him. They were dimming, but they were still the beautiful blue eyes he had fallen in love with years ago, when he had been but a boy. She smiled. A trickle of blood ran down from her lips.
“Giorn . . .”
His tears fell onto her upturned face. Only then did he realize he was crying. “Niara . . .” He found her hand and squeezed it. “I’m so, so sorry.”
Her expression was serene. “I did it,” she said. “Not you.” Her hand returned his squeeze weakly.
“Why?” He was desperate to know the answer, why she had chosen Raugst over him.
Her free hand pointed, indicating the demon. Giorn looked. To his astonishment, he saw that Raugst had reverted to his human form. Naked and bloody and apparently dying, he lay on the corpse-strewn ground. His eyes were open, and he
was looking at Niara with great sadness. Later Giorn would realize that it was Niara’s blood that had given him the strength to heal, and transform.
As Giorn watched, Raugst tried to sit up and crawl over to Niara, but his wounds were too great. Shuddering, he collapsed.
“Niara,” he moaned.
She smiled, first at Raugst, then Giorn. “Do not kill each other,” she said. She squeezed Giorn’s hand with what must be her last strength. “Promise me, Giorn. You will not kill him.”
“But he’s . . . look at what he’s done. And Fria!”
Her eyes grew troubled. “You did this, Gi. He just . . . defended himself.” Her hand fell away. “You’re not enemies. You both . . . oppose Vrulug.” She was fading. “Promise me,” she said. She still had enough strength to meet his gaze. “If you ever loved me, promise me.”
He stared at her, perplexed. Yet there was only one thing to say. “I promise.”
She rewarded him with one last smile, and he felt that old familiar warmth inside him. Then the light in her eyes faded, and she went limp. She did not move again.
For a long time, Giorn just knelt over her, cradling her in his arms, unaware of anything else. Then, slowly, he became aware of Raugst dragging himself across the corpse-strewn catacomb chamber toward them.
Duke Yfrin and the soldiers surrounded the demon and drew their swords. A circle of naked steel glittered in the dim light. The circle drew tighter about Raugst, whose face was impassive. He said nothing. His cheeks were wet, Giorn saw with surprise. The demon had been crying.
“What shall we do, my lord?” Duke Yfrin said. “End him?”
Giorn looked from Raugst to Niara’s lifeless body, then to the bloody sword on the ground.
“Release him,” he said. With a ragged hiss of air, he added, “He’s free to do what he will.”
“Are you sure, my friend?” Yfrin said.
“I’m sure.”
With obvious reluctance, the soldiers stepped back, but kept their swords bared. Raugst, who had not taken his eyes off Giorn, nodded once. Giorn returned the gesture.
“Leave us,” Giorn told Dalic.