by Ari Marmell
Six years…
Six years since the armies of Audriss, the Serpent, and Corvis Rebaine, the Terror of the East, had clashed beyond Mecepheum's walls. Six years since Audriss, gone mad with stolen power, had unleashed horrors on Mecepheum in an apocalyptic rampage that had laid waste to scores of city blocks. Six years-more than enough for the Guilds to patch Mecepheum's wounds, if not to heal the scars beneath.
Oh, the citizens had avoided those mangled neighborhoods for a time, repelled by painful memories and superstitious dread. But cheap property near the heart of Imphallion's greatest city was more than enough to attract interest from outside, in turn inspiring Mecepheum's own merchants and aristocrats to bid for the land lest outsiders take it from them. The rebuilding, though slow to commence, was long since complete. An outsider, ignorant of the region's history, might wonder at the abrupt shift from old stone to new wood, from the affluent to the average, but otherwise would never know that anything untoward had ever happened.
The confident footsteps of the richer-and safer-neighborhoods transformed into the rapid tread of pedestrians hoping to reach home before trouble found them, or else the furtive stride of those who were trouble. Coarse laughter staggered drunkenly through the doors and windows of various taverns, voices argued behind closed shutters, ladies-and men-of the evening called and cooed from narrow lanes. Still Kaleb ignored it all. Twice, men of rough garb and evil mien emerged from doorways as though prepared to block his path, and twice they blinked abruptly, their faces growing slack and confused, continuing on their way as Kaleb passed them by.
The rain had grown heavier, threatening to mature into a true summer storm, when Kaleb finally reached his destination. It was just another building, large, ungainly; he wasn't even certain as to its purpose. A storehouse, perhaps? It didn't matter. Kaleb hadn't come for what was, but for what had been.
Ignoring the weather, he lowered his hood and glanced about, his magics granting him sight beyond what the night and the storm permitted anyone else. Even in brightest day, no other would have seen what he did, but there it was: scorched wood and ash, the last remnants of the lot's former edifice, mixed in with the dark soil.
He knelt in the dirt behind the ponderous structure, digging his hands into the earth until he was elbow-deep, first through clinging mud, then drier loam the falling rains had not reached. It smelled of growth and filth, things living and things dying.
Very much like Mecepheum itself, really.
Kaleb tensed in concentration, closing himself off from the world around him. As though he had melted in the downpour, he felt himself-the essence of what he was-pour from his eyes like tears, flow down his skin and meld into the yielding soil. He cast about, blind but hardly unaware, seeking, seeking…
There.
He rose, the soil sliding in chunks and muddy rivulets from his arms. He moved several yards to his left and knelt once more. But this time, when his hands plunged into the soil, they did not emerge empty. He carefully examined his prize: a skull, cracked and broken, packed with earth.
Without hesitation or hint of revulsion, Kaleb lifted it to his mouth and drove his tongue deep into a socket, probing through the dirt to taste the essence within. It was not a technique his "master" Nenavar would have recognized. For all the old wizard's skill, there were secrets of which even he remained ignorant.
Six years, but there was just enough left to work with. Just enough for Kaleb to taste, and to know that this was not who he sought.
No surprise, that. The dead from Audriss's rampage, lost amid burned ruins and collapsed buildings-buried by nature, by time, and by the rebuilding-numbered in the hundreds, if not more.
Kaleb, frankly, had no interest in taking the time to search them all.
With a grunt, he planted the skull before him and began to trace symbols in the mud. Twisted they were, complex, unpleasant even to look at, somehow suggesting memories of secrets never known…
He was chanting, now, his words no less corrupt than the glyphs accompanying them. Sweat covered his face, a sticky film that clung despite the pounding rain.
Until, audible to none but him, a dreadful wail escaped the empty skull.
"Speak to me," Kaleb demanded in a voice nigh cold enough to freeze the surrounding storm. "Tell me what I need to know, and I'll return you to your rest. Refuse… Refuse, and I will bind you to these last of your bones, here to linger until they've decayed to dust."
A moment, as though the risen spirit hadn't heard, or wasn't certain it understood, and then the wailing ceased. It was all the answer Kaleb received, and all he required.
"You did not die alone," he told the skull. "Hundreds perished even as you did, burned by Maukra's fires, drowned in Mimgol's poisons, or crushed as the buildings fell. From here, your ghost made its way to the Halls of the Dead in Vantares's domain. You must have seen the others as well, and it is one of your fellow dead whom I seek."
"A name…" It was no true sound, a mere wraith of a voice for Kaleb's ears and Kaleb's mind alone. "His name…"
Kaleb spoke, and the spirit howled as though the worst agonies of Vantares's deepest hell had followed it even into the living realm. But the necromancer would not relent, and finally the skull spoke, told him where he must dig.
And dig he did, in another lot some streets away. Again his senses plumbed the earth, revealing to him the broken bones. Again he drew forth a skull, his tongue flickering out to taste of whom it once had been.
But this time, Kaleb drew no sigils in the mud. He had no use for the spirit that had gone below. From this one, he needed knowledge possessed while living, not sights seen beyond the veil of death.
For hours he sat, fingers and tongue flitting across the interior of the skull, seeking every last trace of lingering thought and dream, every remaining sliver of what had once been a living essence, desperately seeking, desperately hoping…
And only as the eastern sky began to lighten, dawn transforming each falling raindrop into a glittering jewel, did Kaleb hurl the skull to shatter against a nearby wall, screaming his frustration to the dying night.
Chapter Two
ALTHOUGH SITUATED ABOUT AS FAR from Mecepheum as Imphallion's borders allowed, Rahariem was one of the nation's more important centers of trade. Grains and hardwoods thrived nearby, and what little trade trickled into Imphallion from Cephira and other neighboring dominions invariably crossed this border. Even more significant, however, the local laborers and craftsmen were rather more enthusiastic about working in general, for they kept more of what they earned. Far-eastern Imphallion remained largely under the sway of its hereditary landowners, and while taxes and tariffs weren't precisely low, they were lower than those imposed elsewhere by the reigning Guilds, and handily offset by the high prices Rahariem's merchants could charge the rest of Imphallion for their exotic goods.
Of course, dwelling so far from the centers of power also had its inescapable downsides. This was a lesson taught to Rahariem-in blood-more than twenty-three years ago, at the start of Corvis Rebaine's campaign of conquest.
It was a lesson of which they'd been forcibly reminded two weeks ago.
Today, not only the streets of Rahariem, but also its surrounding fields and gently rolling vales were occupied by thousands of newcomers, and these were not the sorts of traders, travelers, and merchants the region welcomed. They swarmed the city, clad not in silk and velvet but thickly padded doublets, armored cuirasses of boiled leather, and hauberks of chain. At their sides hung not purses filled with discretionary coin, but broadsword and hand-axe, mace and hammer. Like an avalanche, they had rolled over the grossly outnumbered knights and foot soldiers of Rahariem's nobles. What they wanted, they took, and woe betide the vendor or shopkeeper who dared raise voice in protest.
Yet for all the terror and violence of their conquest, looting, rape, and other atrocities had been kept to a minimum. Riding their barded chargers throughout the multitudes of soldiers, their crimson banners flying from every go
vernment structure in the city, the officers of Cephira kept an iron-fisted command of conquered and conquerors alike. Encased in gleaming plate, tabards sporting the black-on-red gryphon crest of Cephira's throne, the captains and the knights waged a war as disciplined and civilized as war ever got.
And if certain men among the occupied populace-men long frustrated with the nation's bickering factions, furious that the Guilds had not responded to Cephira's act of blatant aggression, disgusted by the lack of discipline in Imphallion's own military-if these men couldn't help but admit a grudging appreciation for the competence of the invading armies and the rigid order imposed by the officers, perhaps they might be excused for such borderline treasonous thoughts.
It was early summer, some weeks yet before the scorching heat of the season would grow fat and harsh. Cooling, cleansing rains remained common, but not so frequent as to thicken the air with oppressive humidity and render sweating its own exercise in futility. And for all of this, the citizens had cause to be grateful, for Cephira's soldiers weren't about to allow such a readily available workforce to go unused.
Overseen by crossbow-wielding sentinels stationed atop buildings and boulders and hillsides, the common folk of Rahariem labored for their new masters. Some constructed fortifications, hauling wood and stone that would ward off the population's potential liberators if and when the Guilds finally ceased dithering. Some razed houses and shops for raw materials, weeping at their loss but never daring to object-for they'd seen the even harsher labors heaped upon the shoulders of those who had. Others labored beyond the city gates, tearing up stumps, hacking through undergrowth, breaking rocks and carting them away: expanding the roads that led east from Rahariem, making them ready for supply wagons and numberless Cephiran reinforcements.
The bite of picks on stone was deafening; the rock dust in the air blinding, choking, a poisonous blizzard. The sun, gentle as it was so early in the season, still beat down between clouds whose shade never lingered long enough to appreciably comfort the workers. Trickles of sweat scribed intricate tattoos into the dirt-caked chests and faces, and though the guards were not stingy with the canteens, the water never soothed.
Leaning upon his heavy spade, one of the workers raised a ragged sleeve to wipe the moist filth from his forehead. Eyes hidden by the gesture, he peered intently at the guards, cataloging, assessing. This soldier was alert, but that one preoccupied; one politely solicitous of the prisoners in his charge, another delighting in any excuse to wield discipline's whip. But today, as every day for the past two weeks, none had what he sought, what he must have before he could take his leave of these intolerable circumstances.
He certainly appeared unremarkable. He was a lanky fellow, wiry rather than gaunt, the athletic tone of his limbs sharply contrasting with the crags that creased his weather-beaten face and the grey that had long since annexed his hair and close-cropped beard. He might have been a man just approaching middle age who looked older than his years, or one on the far side of midlife who kept himself rigidly fit; casual observation refused to confirm which.
"Hsst!"
This from the worker beside him, a younger man responsible for cracking the rocks that he himself was supposed to be shoveling. "Whatever you're daydreaming about, Cerris, you'd best shake it off. The guards won't be happy if they see the rubble backing up."
The grey-haired fellow, who was so much more than the moderately successful Rahariem merchant he was known as-so much more, and so much less, no matter how determined he was to think of himself only as "Cerris"-grunted something unintelligible and resumed scooping.
All right, then. He'd given it almost two weeks, and two weeks of hard labor was more than enough. It was time to go looking. EVENING NEARED, signaling the workers to queue up under the watchful gaze of the guards. As a dozen crossbows quivered like hounds straining at the leash, a single Cephiran soldier moved down the line, closing manacles around every left ankle. They were simple shackles, these-U-shaped iron cuffs, closed at the back with a stubby rod-but quite sufficient for the job at hand. Following behind him, a second man huffed and sweated as he lugged an enormous length of chain, threading it through hoops in those cuffs.
Watching through tired eyes as they neared, Cerris began to whisper under his breath. His hands opened and closed, the rhythmic stretching serving to hide the subtle twitches of his fingers.
It was a simple enough spell. A shimmer passed over his left leg, so faint and so swift that even Cerris himself, who was not only watching for it but causing it, barely noticed. He shifted his posture, standing rigidly, feet together, keeping his real-and now invisible-leg outside the phantom image. Not a comfortable stance, but better that than to have the guard bump a knuckle into something that wasn't supposed to be there.
The guard approached-yawning as he knelt-clasped the manacle around a length of absolutely nothing that looked and felt an awful lot like a human ankle, and continued on his way.
Cerris continued his whispering, new syllables replacing the old. He saw the manacle fall to the dust, but to everyone else, it was invisible, appearing instead to be firmly locked around the equally illusory leg. It was enough to fool the second guard, who passed his length of chain through the nonexistent ring without so much as a heartbeat's hesitation.
Struggling to conceal his smile, Cerris knelt briefly as though massaging a sore foot and slipped the real manacle around his arm so as not to leave any evidence behind. Then, matching his shuffling step to the prisoners who actually were chained together, he allowed himself to be led away.
Not far from the road crouched a simple wooden hall of slipshod construction. Thrown together by Cephiran soldiers, it served as bunk for the road workers, far more convenient than herding them back through the city gates every night. Cerris wrinkled his nose as he passed through the wooden doors, the miasma of sweat and fear, waste and watery stew an open-handed slap to the face. It had long since soaked into the wooden walls and the cheap woolen blankets on which the exhausted prisoners slept away their fitful nights. Bowls of that stew, which contained as much gristle as meat, already awaited, one bowl per blanket. Foul as it was, nobody hesitated to down their portion in rapid gulps. While their companions watched from the doorway, two guards moved through the hall, one collecting bowls, the other fastening the end of the long chain to a post that punched through the wooden floor and deep into the unyielding earth. Thus secured, the prisoners could shuffle around the room-clanking and clattering the chain like a chorus of angry ghosts, more than loud enough to be heard from outside-but even if they could somehow force open the door, they wouldn't have sufficient slack to pass through.
It was a simple arrangement, but an efficient one… assuming, of course, that the prisoners were actually fastened to the chain.
Cerris lay back on his blanket and waited, though he yearned to be up and moving. In a matter of moments, the snores, grunts, and moans of exhausted sleep rose from all around him. He found himself halfway tempted to join them-the accommodations were hardly comfortable, but damn, he was tired!-and it was only sheer force of will that kept him from drifting off.
After what he judged to be about an hour and a half, Cerris was certain that every man in the hall was deep in slumber. Sitting up, he glanced around to confirm, and then rose, wincing at the faint popping of joints that were, despite his fervent demands to the contrary, growing older. Hefting the manacle in one fist, he stepped over the length of chain and crept on silent feet toward the door.
It was slow going indeed, for the room's only illumination was the occasional flicker of the campfires outside, slithering in through tiny gaps in the wood or the handful of six-inch windows that prevented the air within from growing too stale. More than once, Cerris stumbled, and though reflexes born of a violent life kept him upright and silent, he still cursed his own clumsiness.
'Getting decrepit, old boy. Slow and clumsy. Even just a few years ago, you'd never have…'
Then he was at the door, the time
for bemoaning over, and Cerris gleefully shoved that voice back into its burrow in the depths of his mind. He knew that the door boasted no lock, but was held shut by a heavy wooden bar in an iron bracket. More than secure enough, since even if a prisoner could slip his chain, he had no tools at hand with which to lift that bar.
Except, of course, for the manacle that was supposed to be linking Cerris to the others.
For long moments, he listened, struggling to judge the number of guards by the occasional shifting of mail or bored sigh. Possibly only the one, he decided eventually, certainly no more than two. He contemplated a spell to cast his sight out beyond the door, but even after several years of practice, he found clairvoyance disorienting and difficult. He might learn what he needed to know, only to find himself in no shape to take advantage of it.
Ah, well. He'd faced worse odds, in his day.
'Yeah, but you always had help facing those odds, didn't you, "Cerris"? You never were worth half a damn on your own.'
He frowned briefly, pressing his lips tight, forcing himself not to respond. It had been years since he'd banished the vile thing that had once shared his thoughts, yet still he swore he heard that mocking, malevolent voice in his head. And all the more often, these past few months. He must finally be losing his mind.
'Not that you ever had much of one to lose…'
"Shut up!" he hissed, even though he knew, he knew he was berating himself. He forced himself to relax with a steadying breath, then opened the manacle and began working the rod-a length of iron nearly six inches long, and almost as thick around as his thumb-through the gap in the door.
And thank the gods the Cephirans had been in such a hurry to throw this place together! It was tight going, but the narrow rod indeed fit. Cerris slid it upward, slowly, wary of allowing it to screech or grate against the wood. Inch by inch, carefully, carefully…
The rod touched the bar with the faintest of thumps. Cerris held his breath, waiting to see if the guard-guards?-had heard. Only when a full minute had passed was he confident enough to continue.