Crooked Finger and the Warl of the Dead

by Rex Hazelton

  “There’s nothing wrong with losing the sense of humor you used to deal with the harsh realities that came with living in Ar Warl now that you’re dead. But I think you’ll always be able to laugh, though the things you’ll laugh about now might be different.”

  Gaunt of face from living an ascetic life for so long, the wrinkles at the corners of Findyl’s eys looked like the pages of a book partially opened as he smiled and said, “I, for one, am glad your wit has not entirely abandoned you. I have a hunch that your unwillingness to let it go is one of the reasons why you were drawn to me and why I could sense your presence. But one reason is not enough to explain our unusual meeting. Tell me…can you think of another.”

  Sitting down beside the fire Findyl had made, only having to touch the blue stone once each to initiate the conversation, the spirits of the two men went on to explain how Jayk and the others were trying to reach Bridgewater after Gyan and Trotts showed up in camp. They told the wizard that something had to have gone wrong back home. As they talked, Findyl thought he caught glimpses of the men in the fire’s flickering light. From Petyr and Cloy’s perspective, they found that Findyl was becoming less distinct the longer they spoke. Only flashes of clarity, that came and went with the firelight as it brightened and waned, revealed the wizard in the details the men first saw.

  “Just as you and the others were drawn to Bridgewater, I’ve been drawn to find Jayk and any of the other villagers who have survived the war,” Findyl said as he gave a reply that included the tale about how he and Bowdyn had helped the villagers escape from Bridgewater.

  Findyl finally concluded the exchange with Petyr and Cloy by saying, “Ar Warl will always have its troubles. The time for you to worry about your loved ones is over. You’ll find that out soon enough. Leave them to me, Jayk, and Bowdyn. We’ll do everything in our power to keep your families safe. Still, heed my warning: There are wraiths moving through the forest that will wrap you in bonds that will keep you from travelling on to the Great Hall of Death that awaits you. Don’t think because you’re dead, you can no longer feel pain in Ar Warl. Evil spirits called fraethym will come at the wraiths bidding and throw you into such torment you’ll wish you could die again. Beware. Be blessed. And away with you, for our time together is done. Take solice, I’ll tell your friends and loved ones about our meeting.”

  Chapter 18: The Table is Set

  Just as suspected, Nyeg Warl’s armies faced little resistence as they marched from Suskynd to Claryn, from Claryn to Dublytt, and then on to Malam. The Sorcerer had his forces apply enough pressure to keep the Nyeg Warler’s on edge. Acts of terrorism were preferred over outright battles. Assassinations and abductions were common occurances. The abductions usually were precursors to whiteskins infiltrating the camps on suicide missions that took as many lives as possible. As it so happened, the victims of the kidnappings were turned into the whiteskins that carried out the attacks. Armed with incomplete memories of their past lives, the assassins were still able to target those who once were their friends. The horror at having a loved one act as a tool of destruction was discouraging to the point that a bad mood sat over the warriors like campfire smoke on a windless day.

  The psychological battle the Sorcerer was waging was debilitating to say the least. Having to kill friends to save oneself was the chief reason for this. Fear that the next day would bring more of the same, kept everyone on edge. Wondering what the Sorcerer’s next insidious plan of attack would be, made that edge exceedingly sharp. And the plan they learned about included news that the Prophetess had been taken captive, news that nearly threw Nyeg Warl camps into disarray until Goldan stepped forward to restore order.

  “More than ever, we need to press forward,” Goldan raised his voice as he addressed the assembly of sovereigns that had come together after they reached the city of Dublytt. “The Prophetess and the Hammer Bearer are in front of us, not behind us. Even with Muriel taken captive, the Hammer of Power’s magic her husband wields gives us a tangible chance of defeating the Sorcerer.

  “What else can we do: surrender? The memory of the evil the Lord of Regret perpetrated against Cassiakynd, Timberkynd, and Shomeron during the Battle of Decision should keep us from entertaining such foolish thoughts. And now with stories that tell how the Spell of the White Hand is sweeping through Ar Warl like a plague, do we dare retreat and let this sorcerous pestilence follow us back to the Nyeg?”

  ****

  It was in Claryn that the scope of this epidemic was first seen. What they found in Dublytt only confirmed their discovery.

  After Nyeg Warl’s northern army approached the city, representatives of Claryn rode out under a white flag to surrender the city and to ask for mercy. Old men all, Claryn had been stripped of its youth who were forced to retreat to Malam. A large number of women were left behind. Of these, only mothers with young children were not elderly. The sick and infirmed were left behind as well.

  As the terms of surrender were being negotiated, the representatives willingly told their conquerors about the outbreak of the Spell of the White Hand that had besieged the city, turning more than half their population into whiteskins. And with the telling, they conveyed the horror of seeing their loved ones changed so drastically that it was difficult to recognize them. This confirmed the Nyeg Warlers own terrible experiences as they marched toward Claryn. Only now, the broad extent of that experience was revealed in the trembling voices of a people ravished by the Spell of the White Hand’s evil magic.

  “Can we expect the same from you?” was a question that both Claryn and Dublytt’s representatives asked. “Will you use magic to subdue us and turn us into creatures you can easily control?”

  With their own emperor doing what he did to them, why wouldn’t the people of Claryn and Dublytt expect their enemies to do worse? For them, night had already fallen. The appearance of the Nyeg Warlers only confirmed that it wouldn’t end.

  “Avoid deception, answer questions when asked, keep to your normal routines, don’t carry any weapons and don’t mistreat one another.” King Phelp explained the rules that would be implemented. “The Order of the Candle Makers will govern you for the time being. Though they possess magic, none of it will be used to harm any of you. To the contrary, take your suffering to the Benevolent Wizards and they will use their power to help as best they can. Ask them for food and you will be given what can be spared. We’ll not let you starve.”

  “Benevolent wizards you say, is such a thing possible?” was the incredulous reply that came from both Claryn and Dublytt’s citizens.

  “In the Nyeg, yes. Now that we are here, the Ar will learn the truth of this.”

  ****

  “I’ll not withdraw or seek to make a treaty with the Sorcerer.” To Charl, the new Bull King, the choice they had to make was so obvious he didn’t even take time to stand to emphasis his point. “With the devastation Ab’Don’s lackey heaped on Wyneskynd in the Battle of Decision and with the murder of my father, I’ll be burned in the Fires of Darkness before I trust the Sorcerer any farther than I can throw him.”

  “We’re all in agreement on this,” Phelp stood to add emphasis to Charl’s words. “We’ll not flee from a battle we’ve yet to fight, nor will we seek to make peace with a fiend who is sure to break any agreement he makes.”

  “Indeed, we are facing a fiend, if there is any truth to the message the griffin delivered to us. In it, the esteemed Brown Wizard explains how an evil entity escaped from the Warl of the Dead and has taken possession of Ab’Don’s body.” Elamor, leader of the Candle Makers and Muriel’s mother-in-law, spoke as she stood to address the sovereigns. “The missive states that the entity is the same one that drew the Prophetess’ spirit into the Warl of the Dead where it tried to besmear her with darkness during the Battle of the Temple of the Oak Tree. In the circles where magic is practiced, the thing is refered to as the Nameless Evil or Evil One. Where this thing came from before it was thrown into the Warl of the Dead, none know.

&
nbsp; “Some say it’s as old as the Singer himself. But I believe this is a false assumption. From what Muriel told me, when the fiend touched her mind with its own as it was busy torturing her, she gathered a sense that it was a creature banished from the Warl of the Living during an age predating the history of humans, elves, hunchmen, and giants alike, back when the Warl’s Magic let others sing its songs, those we have never met nor know about. It is likely that this entity tried to take control of the warl much as Ab’Don has been doing. But it failed; a failure it longs to rectify.

  “It now plans on finishing the job by using powers it has perfected over the countless ages it has been imprisoned in the shadows. It seems clear that it intends to use Muriel and the magic she wields to carry out these plans.”

  “What are her powers?” King Ballastyn of Riverkynd asked his question from where he sat. “The Hadram think of her as a Healer.”

  “Those living in Dalnostrokynd see her as a Deliverer,” Dalstyn, Chief of the Forest People, explained, “since she is directly responsible for getting so many of them out of the Cave of Forgetfulness where they were held prisoners by the monster, Schmar, and his equally monsterous wife, Arachnamor.”

  “Aye,” Elamor rubbed her hand over one of her Candle Maker robe’s voluminous, white sleeves a she spoke, “Muriel is both a Healer and a Deliverer. The Community of Blood would say she is a griffin-woman. And, indeed, she stands between the warls of the griffin and humans, for like her husband, she is a bridge and a bridgebuilder whether she wants to be one or not. It comes naturally to her and is an inherent part of the magic she possesses.

  “With this said, is it any wonder that a being from the Warl of the Dead, who has somehow gained access to the Warl of the Living, finds a bridgebuilder of interest, especially one who has raised the dead back to life.

  As we all know, at the Nameless Evil’s direction, Ab’Don sent her spirit to the shadows the foul being rules over in the Warl of the Dead. And after she escaped and returned to the Warl of the Living, the spirits of the Otrodorian nobility, those whose souls were darkened by their lust for power, were able to return to the place where they once ruled, the same place where Muriel’s body hung on a tree of iron with a talisman that has come to be called Crooked Finger rammed into her heart. With the fiend’s recent advent into our warl by way of possessing Ab’Don’s body, I think we can assume it wants to use the Pophtess’ magic again to open a larger door its dark hosts can use to join it. We can also assume: Crooked Finger is buried in her chest once again.

  “I’m convinced, if the thing has its way with Muriel, the armies that come against us won’t all originate in Ar Warl. This we can’t allow. We must continue to advance until we join the Hammer Bearer, so that we can stand by his side when he goes to free his wife from the fiend’s control like he did once before in the Temple of the Oak Tree, though the place where he’ll have to accomplish this feat is found at the foot of Ab’Don’s seat of power, making it exceedingly more dangerous than the Temple of the Oak Tree ever could be.”

  The idea that they would be facing a dark host that marched out of the shadows found in the Warl of the Dead was sobering to say the least. Still, what did they expect- with magic in play that was so great it split the Warl into two continents called the Nyeg and Ar and then drew them back together again- a simple fist fight? Nothing about this affair was normal. Not even the most gifted purveyors of magic would claim this, nor the elves and griffin. If the enigmatic waterkynd were there, it could be said: Not even the Mythorians would say such a thing.

  ****

  “The Sorcerer is spreading us thin,” Bardensen told Goldan and the kings once Elamor’s words had been digested. “With three large cities to keep watch on in the north and two more in the south, we’ve had to leave too many warriors behind to keep an eye on places that could pose a threat to us if we’re forced to retreat from Ab’Don and his hordes. If our advance had been slower, we could have secured the cities in a way that would enable a skeletal force to keep control of the citadels until our return as victors or those fleeing from a battle that can’t be won.”

  “Sir, you’re correct in your assessment,” Goldan replied as he rubbed his clean-shaven chin. “Either Ab’Don intends to weaken us by having us spend our valuable resources on the cities we’ve taken control of, or, as we’ve suspected all along, he wishes to draw us to Malam as quickly as possible whether we are weakened or not. As close as Malam is to the heart of the Sorcerer’s power in the Hall of Voyd, that’s where he’ll flex his muscles and reveal his full might. Aware that the Nameless Evil is in control of Ab’Don’s considerable resources, we can be certain the dark entity has melded its own magic in with these resources, amplifying their power….” Golden clenched his fists after hesitating, “to something than could be beyond our ability to conceive of.

  “That’s why I’ve sent messengers to Suskynd, Clayrn, and Dublytt with orders to evacuate the cities and come to our aid. I’ve also sent a request to Cassiakynd to spare as many warriors as they think wise, while maintaining enough strength to keep control of Port Crown and to act as out rear guard. The Bjork are being asked to do the same in Belem.”

  “What about the rest of Nyeg Warl?” Bardensen asked.

  “We won’t squeeze the wineskin, so to speak. With how slowly the Nyeg and Ar were pulled together, we’ve had time to plan for every conceivable scenario unfolding. Our plans our sound, though we didn’t anticipate how quickly we would move through Ar Warl.”

  Looking past the pavilion set up on a treeless hill for the meeting, past where the walls would have been if the roles of cloth used to make them were unfurled from the places under the roof’s edges where they were stowed and out toward the vast expanse of camps and the blue sky that covered them, Goldan thought the sight could be mistaken for a fete that all of Nyeg Warl had been called to. With so many colors being visible, the festivity had to be a holiday of epic proportions. With the panoply of hues, matching the colors used in each livery worn in Nyeg Warls’ kingdoms, arrayed in a way that displayed those kingdoms as being distinct realms that viewed themselves as a united people, Goldan’s reverie made him think he was looking at a celebration of life instead of a struggle for survival. But isn’t the struggle a part of the celebration, he mused. If so, I can’t think of a better people to celebrate life with than those gathered in the tent with me.

  “Thinking of Truamor,” Tsut’waeh asked with subtle smile on his face. “Don’t you remember, she’s meeting with the quartermasters to discuss supplies as you requested.”

  “He thinks more about Truamor than the battle he’s about to lead us into, if you ask me. By the way, where’s my mate?” Way’Gar laughed in the growling, snorting way the Bro’Noon did. The other hunchmen in the room joined in laughing along with their chief, while an embarassed look swept over Tsut’waeh’s face for giving rise to the commotion.

  Having been broken out of his reverie by the Tayn’waeh’s not so subtle prodding, and the Bro’Noon expanding on the subject, Goldan said. “I was thinking of the next best thing: All of you here, my brothers and sisters in arms. I was thinking that I couldn’t imagine being in better company.” Then the Tsadal Commander sighed and flashed a brief smile of his own. “Working together, I don’t think there’s anything we can’t accomplish.”

  “Aye, General.” A tall woman, everyone saw Dolfon the instant she stood. Being middle-aged sat well with the Master Candle Warrior. Time had given her face character rather than softening it in the way the passing winters did to most people. The increased number of wrinkles on her face gave her a sculpted look that was in keeping with her role as the leader of the Candle Warriors. The heavy braid of bown hair that lay against her back, and over the cowl found there, spoke of the vitality she still possessed. “We’ll beat the Sorcerer and his fire-blasted army. I was in the Temple of the Oak Tree. I saw the evil dead rise out of the ground and saw the Prophetess and Hammer Bearer send them scurrying back into their hole. Then I wi
tnessed wonders take place I never dreampt were possible. Those two, I swear, they have more miracles left in them. I don’t care that Muriel’s fixed to some tree. I’ve seen her hanging on one before, and it couldn’t hold her. Neither will the one that stands in the Hall of Voyd. The Sorcerer will learn that soon enough when the Hammer Bearer arrives. And when he does, we’ll be standing by his side just like Lady Elamor said.”

  A gaze that could wilt flowers was sent the sovereigns and their generals’ way as Dolfon lifted her voice like she was a captain speaking to warriors under their charge. “Do you agree?” She shouted in the way soldiers did. And like soldiers were trained to respond, the room replied, “Aye” with a united voice that reached out into the camp.

  Nodding her head with satisfaction, Dolfon folded her arms over her chest and sat down.

  “Thank you, Master Candle Warrior,” Goldan lowered his head in deference to the great woman before he added, “It’s time to go over our battle plans.”

  ****

  “I have a proposal that will help strengthen the bonds of friendship we have with each other.” Claude, King of Plagea, had found the opening he had been looking for to submit the idea that had been gnawing at his patience.

  “Sire,” Goldan replied, “please tell us what you’re thinking.”

  Looking at Bardensen with a calculate gaze that was accompanied by a smile that didn’t reach his eyes, Claude began. “As all of you probably know, there has been some rancor between Plagea and Shomeron. Today, if King Bardensen will accept my offer, I would like to bury the disagreements we’ve had and begin a new relationship that is in keeping with the united front we will throw against the Sorcer’s ambitions.”

  Aware that he would never fully trust the man, Bardensen was not opposed to a compromise that could only make the Nyeg Warlers a better fighting force, so he said, “Go on, I’m listening,”

  You’re not the only one listening, Shaw thought as he stood beside one of the poles that held the kings’ pavilion up. Neat to fault as he had always been, Shaw’s hair had grayed over the summers that separated him from the first time he met Muriel Oakenfel in such a way that gave it a silver aspect. Meticulously cut, it was combed back in a manner that gave the Tsadal a look of substance that men and women who have done great deeds have. The quality of clothes he wore and the highly-polished boots he put on hid the fact that he had given up the life of intrigue that Credylnor’s elders had recruited him into, to take Eunice as his wife and to accept the life of a farmer along with her. Having had three children together, the two named their oldest son Beryl to honor the giant Shaw had become friends with during the Battle of the Temple of the Oak Tree, a friendship that continued to this day.