by Steve Thomas
Grellok sighed. “It’s my fault, too. I pushed her into using the ghouls as soldiers.”
“We can’t let her continue on this path. The necropolis is a place of peaceful death, not a den of evil.”
“Then send her away. Tell her you won’t teach her any more, and she and I can finally leave.”
A nervous laugh bubbled from Orlume’s pale lips. “We both know how that would end. She wouldn’t agree to it. She’d kill me and enslave my very soul as her eternal adviser.” He shuddered. “No, that’s no solution at all. It wouldn’t be enough.” He dug a toe into the dirt and rubbed his forehead. “I need your help. I can’t deal with her without you.”
So Grellok hadn’t lost his opportunity after all. Orlume was alone, nervous, and off guard. And he had just cleared Grellok’s conscience. It wasn’t enough that he had taught Caeva this dark magic. He had done so reluctantly, and now he was threatening to lash out at her. But Grellok would keep her safe, no matter what she had said or done. “Thank you,” said Grellok. In a single motion, Grellok drew his mace and swung. It struck with a bloody thump and Orlume’s brains leaked onto the ashen ground.
From the city streets, he heard wailing and screeching and stomping. The ghouls outside scurried in all directions, caught in a frenzy upon the death of their master. Shrieking and roaring, the riot converged upon him. Grellok didn’t pause for breath. He kicked open the nearest mausoleum and darted inside.
The ghouls beat upon the wooden door, which was already weak with rot. One hinge came loose at the first strike. Grellok began pulling the dead from their beds and piling them against the door. Then he tipped over a great stone bed to act as a barricade.
The ghouls smashed through the door. Some reverently attended to the dead bodies Grellok had unseated. The others came for him, jaws slavering and claws shining, come to avenge their master and expel this interloper from the tomb. They flooded in, clambering past one another to be the first to attack. Grellok swung his mace and kicked at them with his bare feet, but he knew it was futile. He punched at one with his left hand, and the monster snapped its cruel jaws like a dog snatching at a bone and caught Grellok’s fist in its mouth.
Grellok’s eyes went wide. He tried to pull his hand free. He desperately swung at the ghoul with his mace. The ghoul flinched at the blow, then stared deep into Grellok’s eyes with its unfeeling red orbs. Grellok braced his foot against the ghoul and tried to pull his arm free with all his strength.
Bones crunched and sinews ripped in the monster’s maw. In an instant, Grellok toppled against the wall, clutching a bloody stump to his chest. He screamed as the ghouls closed in on him, all claws and fangs and ill intent.
A burst of crimson light crackled through the room and the ghouls froze in place. Caeva was standing in the doorway. She was hunched over, straining with effort. Blood dripped from her left wrist and she held a jagged dagger in her right hand. She walked from ghoul to ghoul, smearing her blood on each of their heads. Each one she touched dropped to one knee and bowed its head to her.
Finally, she stopped at Grellok. “Did you kill Orlume?”
Grellok coughed up a mouthful of bile. In a hoarse voice, he answered. “Yes. It is my…” He coughed again. He heard a tooth click against the floor. “It is my duty to protect you.”
She raised an eyebrow, and Grellok noticed for the first time that her eyes had taken on an otherworldly red tint. The whites of her eyes swirled with gray clouds. “How did you imagine this would play out? Did you think I would thank you? That we’d make love atop the ziggurat and then I’d follow you to some corner of the earth where we could live together forever?” She chuckled. “I have taken responsibility for my own safety. I have an army. What do you have?”
“You can still run away.”
“Why? My father’s spies are everywhere. You saw them. I know you watch my ghouls bring in prisoners. I know exactly where my father is and I know that he’s still looking for me. Could you have told me all that?”
Grellok was fading. He tried to stand, but couldn’t find footing in the pool of his own blood. “And what about your sister? I thought that this was all about her.”
She laughed again, laughed at his pain, at his ignorance, and at the life passing from his body. “Stupid brute. It never mattered why she died or whether she deserved it. What matters is that my father wants me dead, but I won’t let him have me. He can’t have me. Not now.”
“You can still run,” said Grellok. His vision lost its focus. The image of Caeva before him split into two. Then two knives dragged a red trail across two palms, and two hands reached for him.
Grellok’s breath rattled as he exhaled his last.
***
“Wake up, Grellok.” Caeva’s bodyguard opened his eyes. His lay on a table inside the necromancer’s chamber with Orlume spread out beside him, pale and still. His mistress stood before him, clad in flowing black robes. Her arms were a web of scars and scabs and cuts, grim reminders of the many blood rites she had conducted under Orlume’s tutelage.
Grellok lumbered to his feet. The body was his own, but it felt unfamiliar. It was stiff and clumsy, coated with bone plates and bronze armor. He tried to speak, but his tongue was thick and slow. He could only produce a breathy snarl.
Caeva took a few steps back and reclined on a pulsating throne of beating flesh and polished skulls. “Grellok, I want to apologize. I should have known that you were loyal to a fault. You would never betray me. Even when you killed Orlume, you only did it because you thought you were protecting me. Isn’t that right?” Grellok managed to nod and she smiled. “Will you grant me a favor?”
Anything. Anything for Caeva.
She leaned forward and licked her lips. “Bring me my father. Bring me Valmi.” She bit her tongue and spat, consecrating Grellok with a splash of her own ichor. It dribbled down Grellok’s face and into his mouth. He tasted it, and he tasted the blood of the man he would bring to her. He would find this man who shared her blood, and he would deliver him to Caeva.
Grellok emerged from the necromancer’s chamber carved into the side of the ziggurat in the city of the dead. A legion of ghouls and demons fell in behind him, marching in step with Caeva’s Great Demon.
Purpose filled him, a purpose he could never deny, a purpose he was powerless to resist. He would protect Caeva, no matter what the cost.
The Last Sangrook
My son, do not trust the Convergence. They’ve been infiltrated and corrupted. Wear the pendant. It has protected me, and my father, and his father all the way back to the first reign of the Sangrooks. It will protect you as well. There is a new heir to the Sangrook Throne. She is Crisaelva reborn.
You must defeat her. You must end the Sangrook line.
- Author Unknown
Say what you will about Caeva Sangrook, but she was good for business. Rumor had it, she was one hundred years old and lived in a mansion that moved across the land like a leaf in the sea. Some said she killed a god of death and took his place. Others said she was the true power behind the Church of the Convergence. Still others said she was already laying in a tomb and her children kept her name alive because of the terror it invoked.
Hale Haberson tried not to pick a side in those debates. It didn’t matter how inflated Caeva Sangrook’s reputation might be. It didn’t matter if she was the Devil Queen of the North or the Converged God’s Whore. Caeva Sangrook, or whoever was using her name, had a nasty habit of capturing innocent villagers and dragging them into the wilderness.
Hale Haberson didn’t stand for that. Hale stood with his back pressed against a thick tree, craning his neck to peer at the road without being seen. Like most things of any value, these roads went back to the times before the War of the Gods, back when kings had the time and knowledge for things like building civilization. Nowadays, the only useful skills were survival and scavenging, and doing either usually put you at cross-purposes with someone else working towards the same goals. In this case, the four ch
ained-up villagers clinging together in a forced march down the road were hoping to survive, and the three ghouls prodding them from behind were trying to scavenge some new slaves for Caeva.
The ghouls had let their guard down. They always did when they reached the forest. Hale popped his head back into cover before anyone spotted him. He knew he was putting too much effort into it. The ghouls were single-minded and inattentive to their surroundings, but he couldn’t risk the chance that Caeva sent something worse than a ghoul. He waited until the creatures and their prisoners had marched past him, then crept through the brush and onto the road. Reflexively, his fingers clutched the two amulets around his neck, a medallion cast with the image of a horned demon impaled by a spear, and a heart-shaped ruby. One marked him as a Convergence-sanctioned demon hunter. The other was a family heirloom that protected him from dark magic.
He drew in a breath and unsheathed his sword. He moved silently over the ancient cobblestones, all cracked and displaced by the mass of tree roots running through the ground underneath as the ferns and bushes squeezed the road from the sides.
There were four prisoners: a scrawny, graying man, a heavy-set brown-haired woman, and twin young boys who had the same round face and brown hair as their mother. The woman and children were manacled and chained together in a line. The man was bound separately. One ghoul held each chain, with a third lagging behind. The man looked particularly downtrodden with his torn shirt revealing a plethora of cuts and bruises. His face was downcast, no doubt ashamed that he had failed to protect his family from Caeva’s machinations. There was no dishonor in being bested by her ghouls, but he had failed nonetheless, and he would never forgive himself. Hale hoped he’d stay out of the way and not get himself killed in some misguided bid for redemption.
Hale skewered the first ghoul, the rear guard, with a quick lunge and kicked the body off his blade while it was still screeching. It fell to the ground, thrashing and scrabbling as whatever magic animated it spilled out. Hale silenced it with a boot to the head.
Its screams had already won the attention of the other two.
Ghouls were obedient. Ghouls were relentless. But ghouls were not smart. Hale had fought dozens of them over his life, and they had stopped surprising him after the first few encounters. They dropped their chains and lurched forward in tandem.
Hale spared a glance at the villagers. They stood frozen in fear. Perhaps they were surprised by the rescue attempt. Perhaps they didn’t believe it was real. Perhaps they took him for a slaver rather than a demon hunter or a dashingly heroic altruist. It didn’t matter. They needed to move, not to watch and let fate run its uncaring course. Hale barked at them, “Run, you idiots!” He couldn’t afford them any further attention.
The closest ghoul spat out a glob of caustic bile. Hale side-stepped it and lashed out with his sword. The ghoul caught the blade in his sharpened claws. Hale leaned into the attack, pressing his sword through the ghoul’s fingers and into its neck. Fermented blood oozed out. The monster screeched and backed away.
The other ghoul floored Hale with a kick to the back of the knee. Good. A kick, rather than a sudden decapitation, meant he hadn’t failed to notice any weapons. Caeva’s ghouls tended to fight unarmed, but they were hardier than a living man thanks to Sangrook magic. Hale had crashed his way through enough catacombs to know how fragile a human corpse became after being left to decay, but ghouls only grew tougher as they aged.
So did Hale.
He converted the fall into a roll and regained his footing. The two ghouls faced him, one ready to fight and the other with a mangled right hand and a gash across his neck. They bore down on him in tandem. Hale dashed between his two attackers, landing a quick stroke against the already-injured ghoul and cleaving off its good arm. The other ghoul weaved a fire spell with waving arms. Hale waited. Ghouls rarely surprised him, but he knew how to surprise them. He feigned fear until the jet of flame sprung from the ghoul’s fingers, then lunged with a practiced stab. The flames were nothing but a hot breeze to Hale thanks to the Heart he wore around his neck, and his reliable old sword left the ghoul dead for good.
He turned his attention to the crippled monster. It was in that moment that the captured man worked up the courage to attack. He tackled the ghoul and tried to wrap it with the same chain that still bound his own hands. They fell to the ground together, but the man was at a severe disadvantage. Hale bounded forward, but before he could cross the distance, the ghoul had already opened the poor villager’s throat.
Hale took advantage of the man’s sacrifice and sliced off the distracted ghoul’s head with one last blow. He kicked the torso aside and checked the man for a pulse, but he was already gone. Hale ran his fingers down the dead man’s eyes to close them.
He scanned the trail, but he couldn’t see far through the dense woods. The mother and children were gone. The husband and father should have been with them. It was a stupid, pointless death. The man should have run and let Hale handle the ghouls himself.
Hale pushed the guilt aside. The man had made his choice. The children would live. It may not have been a complete victory, but it was a victory all the same. He’d have the priests say a prayer to honor the dead and bless the living. There was nothing else he could do.
The demon hunter unsheathed his belt knife, knelt down next to the nearest ghoul, and sawed its left ear off. He repeated this process for the remaining two bodies. The ears were trophies, proof that he had slain the monsters. He wondered sometimes how the Inquisition knew that the ears came from ghouls and not, for example, exhumed corpses. Maybe their alchemists could differentiate a ghoul from a human by dunking the flesh in vats of arcane chemicals and timing the bubbles. Maybe some diviner could extract a bit of residual essence from the ears, drink it in a tea, and dream of its last days. Or maybe still, and this was Hale’s pet theory, the Inquisition didn’t give a damn whose ears he turned in as long as he wasn’t disfiguring anyone who paid their tithes. And if he did, well, the Inquisition would probably pay him all the same, then declare his victim a heretic and offer forgiveness for a price.
But Hale liked killing ghouls much more than he liked scamming Inquisitors. He’d sooner kill a ghoul for free than scam a cabal of soulbound priests. It was the only thing he was good for, his only way to contribute, the only way to atone for his ancestors’ sins. He pocketed the last ear, sheathed his knife, and started back down the forest path.
***
They called Vestige “The Immortal City.” It had survived all the way from before the War of the Gods to the current reign of the Convergent Inquisition. Hale had no doubt it would live on for centuries to come, and wouldn’t be half surprised to discover a prehistoric mud hut somewhere within its walls.
Hale always felt out of place here. Merchants, tradesmen, and their patrons crowded the streets in their stiff wool doublets and flowing dresses, while his mail rustled over his blood-stained gambeson and his boots left a muddy trail on those ancient cobblestones. He channeled that self-consciousness into disdain and pushed his way through the pampered dandies. They, in turn, were all too happy to clear a path for an irate northern barbarian.
As he made his way toward the demon hunters’ temple to turn in his bounty, he heard a horn blow two short blasts followed by a long, low note. This repeated twice more, and a hush fell over the streets. In moments, the crowd was scrambling to clear the street. Business deals abruptly ended. Carts of goods were rolled against the nearby shops. Everyone present crowded together on the sides of the roads, standing silently at attention.
All except Hale. He snatched up an apple as a cart scurried by and dropped a coin in its place. Then he bit into his new snack and stood in place, shifting his weight on his feet. It wasn’t long before three young marshals imperiously turned a corner, marching with strict, rigid steps. They were young enough that they could barely contain their joy in leading a parade, yet old enough to deal with any stragglers who, like Hale, refused to clear a path. Each was dresse
d in a freshly-oiled hauberk and a white tabard bearing the Three Points of the Convergence. The one in the center wore a coiled brass horn around his shoulder, while the other two tilted wooden rods against theirs, ready to push any stragglers out of the way. As soon as they spotted Hale, both rods dropped from shoulder to hand in an unmistakably threatening stance.
Hale waited.
Next came the Inquisitor, a pompous, self-important man of middling years who had shaved his head, probably to mask his encroaching baldness. He was clad in scarred white leather and wore a short sword on his belt. When he spotted Hale still loitering in the street, his right hand drifted to the hilt.
That was all Hale had been waiting for. He liked to remind the Inquisition that demon hunters were still out in the wild doing their job for them. Apple in hand, he gave the Inquisitor a mock salute and strolled to the crowd, pushing through until he was leaning up against a brick wall. The marshals visibly relaxed.
Finally, to the tune of rattling chains, the Templars and their prisoners appeared. They walked in two rows, men in gleaming steel plate and great helms leading the haggard and defeated enemies of the Convergence, dressed in nothing but manacles. Hale folded his arms and scoffed. Six prisoners this time. Four men and two women. They’d be called heretics, Sangrook sympathizers, blasphemers, or witches, but those accusations were a farce. More likely, they were common criminals or debtors. Most likely, they had done nothing worse than fall short on their tithes to the Inquisition. That was the reason for these sick parades. The Inquisitors loved to bind their victims and march them through the streets bruised and bloody, stripped of all dignity, for their families, business partners, and customers to see, then secret them away for rehabilitation or execution. The best these people could hope for was to live out their days working a menial job in a distant monastery.