Taker Of Skulls (Book 5)

by William King

  “A little bird been whispering lies to you, has she?” Otto asked. He strode closer, loomed over the table. More of his men entered the Axe and Hammer. The other customers, sensing trouble, buried themselves in eating their food, or scurried towards the doors of their rooms.

  Kormak rose from his seat and Boreas did the same. Sasha had her pick in her hands now. Karnea removed her glasses and placed them on the table in front of her. “I can understand your disappointment but there is no need to be rude. You will not need money for supplies since you will not be going with us, but I am willing to pay you something for your trouble.”

  Thinking he sensed weakness, Otto said, “I think you should pay us what you owe us. A deal is a deal.”

  Kormak stepped between the prospector and Karnea. He smiled and said, “The lady has been kind enough to offer to pay you for your trouble. I think you should take her offer while you are still capable of doing so.”

  Otto was still looking at Karnea. “Or what, you will kill us all?”

  “Just you and anybody who tries to help you,” Kormak said. Something in his tone got Otto’s full attention. The prospector looked at him as if for the first time. He slapped the hammer against his palm again. He looked Kormak up and down and said, “You really think you can do it? Get your blade out before I can smash your fool head off and kick it all the way back to Aquilea?”

  Kormak said, “Why don’t you try and we’ll find out.” Otto looked as if he was contemplating exactly that.

  The barman brought a crossbow to bear from under the bar. “If you want to keep this up, do it somewhere else. Any blood gets spilled in my place, I’ll be the one doing it.”

  “Only got one shot in that thing, Lucian,” said Otto.

  “One shot is all it will take to send you to hell,” said Lucian. “Now get out of here and don’t come back.”

  The stable boy and some other big lads were entering now. Otto sensed the odds were shifting out of his favour. He let his hammer drop to swing from its leather strap on his wrist. “We’re not done yet,” he said to Kormak and turned on his heel and left.

  Kormak looked at the Innkeeper, “Thanks,” he said.

  “No bother,” said Lucian. “Can’t have his type threatening the customers. Bad for business.”

  Karnea coughed. “You could just have let me pay him off,” she said. “It would have been much less trouble.”

  “No trouble,” Kormak said.

  “Yet,” she replied. “We won’t get to the city if you get us all killed.”

  “We won’t get to it either if you give away all our money.” He knew she was right but he felt he had to say something.

  “I don’t think a few silver will put us in the alms’ house.” Kormak saw Sasha’s eyes narrow slightly. She was paying careful attention. She was starting to realise that Karnea was a very wealthy woman.

  “Men like Otto always want more,” Sasha said. “You’d only be buying off trouble till another day.”

  “In another day we will be out of here, if you are ready to show us to Khazduroth, young lady,” said Karnea. It was odd to hear such words coming from Karnea’s lips. She did not look any older than Sasha. Still, something about her mannerisms suggested a great difference in their ages.

  “I’m ready to go when you are.”

  “What will we need for supplies?”

  “It’s two days to the mountain and we may be underground for a few days. Best take two weeks supply of food just to be on the safe side. Jerky, oatcakes, waybread, dried fruit. You can get them all from the merchants here. Won’t cost you more than an arm and a leg.”

  “Boreas, will you see to it that we are supplied,” Karnea said. The big man nodded. “Anything else?”

  “You’ll need lantern oil and lanterns. Many parts of Khazduroth are in darkness now.”

  Karnea nodded. Kormak was surprised to discover that not all of the city was dark. “Anything else.”

  “Weapons you’ve got and you’ll need. It can be pretty hairy down there.”

  “I think we knew that already,” Kormak said.

  Sasha said, “Get your gear and meet me at the last league post at noon then and we’ll be on our way.”

  “The last league post?”

  “It’s where the royal road ends and the track up into the mountain begins,” Sasha said. “You’re at the edge of civilisation now.” She looked around and grinned. “If you can call this civilisation.”

  Chapter Four

  KORMAK ARRIVED AT the meeting point early, leading his pony. It was on the edge of the village. The last league post was half as tall as a man and showed the horned crown within a solar disk symbol of Taurea. It was well-weathered.

  He was surprised when Sasha showed up early as well. With her were two other people. One was a pretty sad-faced girl a few years younger than the prospector. The other was a sickly-looking little boy not more than five. He watched pale faced and a little tearful. He kept glancing at the weapon on Sasha’s back then at the long winding track up into the mountains. Clearly both had significance for him. He knew it meant she was going into danger.

  “They’re not coming with us,” Kormak said.

  Sasha said, “They’ve just come to see us off.”

  “They your kin?” She nodded. The girl and the little boy were watching him wide-eyed. He seemed to make them nervous. It was something he was used to. He took a copper piece from his purse and flicked it to the boy. He snatched it from the air and gave a quick bright smile.

  “Say thank you, Tam,” said the sad-faced girl.

  “Thank you, sir,” said the boy. He walked over to Sasha and tried to take her hand. She squeezed his fingers and then let his hand go. He clutched her hip and pressed his head against it. Half-angry and half-affectionate she pushed him away then bent down till her head was level with his.

  “While I am gone you’re going to have to look after your Auntie Sal,” she said. “Make sure she does not get into any trouble.”

  The boy looked at her with big eyes, and nodded. He pushed himself against her then. She pushed him away and ruffled her hand through his curly dark hair.

  “Don’t go, Ma,” he said.

  “I’ve got to,” she said. It sounded like she had explained this to him many times. She said it with a kind of weary patience. “We need food. We need money for Aunt’s medicine. We need money for clothes.”

  Kormak looked away not sure what to say. The boy gave him an imploring look.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll see your mother comes back.”

  “Promise?” the boy asked.

  “I promise,” Kormak said. As the words came out of his mouth he felt their weight settle on his shoulders, heavier than any pack. The boy ran and grabbed Sasha again.

  Kormak stared down the main street. Karnea and Boreas walked towards them, leading mules with gear slung over their side.

  “It’s time to go,” Sasha said. She gently detached the little boy from her and pushed him into the arms of her sister. The boy was crying. She walked away, standing stiff and straight and she did not look back. Kormak did and saw the little boy waving.

  Kormak looked over his shoulder down the steep rocky slope. Varigston had dwindled to a toy town beneath them, as they followed the Dwarf Road. Tiny figures swarmed in the streets, and moved along the ridge-lines. Smoke rose from chimneys. Temple gongs tolled.

  Sasha saw the direction of his gaze. “Worried about being followed?” she asked. Kormak nodded. “We left some annoyed people back there; from what you told me they seem like they might be the sort to be vengeful.”

  “So do you,” she said. “If you don’t mind me saying so.”

  “I don’t go looking for fights. I get enough in the normal line of things.”

  “You a mercenary?”

  “I prefer to think of myself as a soldier.”

  “You must be a very successful one.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Not many sol
diers can afford a dwarf-forged blade. To tell the truth, I thought only Guardians of the Order of the Dawn carried those. Curiously enough they carry them on their backs as well, just like you do. Something about symbolising the burden of their calling. Or so I’ve heard.”

  Kormak shot her an amused glance. Clearly she knew more than she chose to let on.

  “How do you know so much about dwarf-forged blades?”

  “My father was a prospector and a learned man in his own way. We drifted from ruin to ruin when I was growing up. I keep my ears open. I hear stories. I’ve heard the name Kormak before too.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Hero of the Orc Wars, killed more orcs than the Red Plague, saved the life of the King at the battle of Aenar. Outlander too. Supposed to look a bit like you, although the stories make him out to be a giant.”

  “I’ve heard those stories,” he said.

  “You don’t believe them?”

  “I believed them once.”

  “Not any more, eh?”

  “Believing in heroes is for the young.”

  “It’s a pity—this is a land that’s sorely in need of heroes. The Great Comet is in the sky. The shadows lengthen. Civil war in the South. Orc hordes on the move in the east. And we’re here looking for old runes in the rubble of Khazduroth.” She let the implied question hang in the air.

  “Speaking of dwarf weapons, where did you get the one on your back?”

  “The stonethrower? It belonged to my father. He found it up in Durea. I’ve got few fire-eggs for it. It might prove handy if we run into any goblins.”

  “Let’s hope we don’t.”

  Her lips compressed and she glanced back in the direction of the town. “Yes, let’s.”

  He let the silence hang for a moment then said, “Is Tam your kid?”

  She nodded. “Duncan, his father, died last year. He was killed by goblins on the way out of Khazduroth.”

  “Sorry to hear that. Is your sister going to look after Tam while you’re gone?”

  “Why you interested?” She sounded guilty and her tone was aggressive.

  “Just making conversation.”

  “You always this curious?”

  “I am when my life might depend on someone.”

  “You don’t trust me?”

  “I don’t trust anybody. No offence.”

  “You think I’m going to lead you down the wrong path, like Otto would.”

  “It would be a big mistake if you did.”

  “Don’t worry. I won’t. I want your money. And I confess I am curious about what you are doing… soldier.” She placed an ironic strain on the last word.

  “It does not pay to be too curious,” he said. Another glance behind showed a large party on the road. He counted the numbers. They were just right for Otto’s gang.

  Chapter Five

  THEY MADE CAMP in the shelter of a group of large rocks, up a side track just off the Dwarf Road. Boreas built a fire from lichen and some sticks he had gathered. He did it with the ease of long practise. Clearly he was a man who was used to setting up camps. The mules were all tethered alongside Kormak’s pony.

  Karnea got a pot full of herbs and dried meat and some wine stirring. Smoke smudged her cheeks. The flames reflected in her glasses making it look as if she had eyes of fire. She stirred the mixture with a wooden spoon, clearly enjoying herself. Kormak walked back to the road and looked along it.

  In the moonlight, he could see quite far. In front of him the cliff dropped away, falling scores of feet. He had a clear view of the road below. Beyond the path the mountains were vague bulks in the darkness. They were a long way up and the air was cold. The sweep of the wind was audible. His shadow danced in front of him reacting to the blaze of the fire. He sensed someone coming closer, recognised the tread as belonging to Sasha.

  “Looking for Otto?” she asked.

  “Or anybody else who might come on us in the night.”

  “I took us off the main road and our fire is well hid up here among the rocks.”

  “If he knows these hills as well as you, he’ll know about this place, won’t he?”

  “We’ll hear him coming up the road, and his men can only reach this place one at a time.” Kormak thought about the narrow path they had led the mules up and saw that this was true. “And if you are as good with that blade as you seemed to think you were back in the Axe and Hammer, they won’t get past you.”

  “Only if I am standing there when they come, and I have to sleep some time.”

  “Your friend looks like he can handle a weapon as well.”

  “That he does.”

  “Go back to the fire. I’ll shout if evil Otto and his boys come up the path. It smells like the food will be ready soon, and you need to eat.”

  “So do you?”

  “I’ll eat later. We do the watches in rotation.”

  Kormak shrugged and made his way back to the fire.

  “Interesting conversation?” Boreas asked. His voice was flat and there was no real curiosity in it.

  “We talked about setting up watches. Sasha reckons one man can hold the path.”

  “She’s right, if the people coming up it don’t take a bow or a slingshot to him.”

  “If they can do it on that path in the dark, they’ll be miraculously good shots.”

  “Or fortunate ones. I’ve seen some very good warriors go down to a lucky blow.”

  “It must have seemed anything but lucky to them,” Kormak said. Boreas’s teeth gleamed whitely in the darkness.

  “What do you think about this place?” he asked. Now they were on the road he seemed less touchy, more a professional doing a job and confident about it.

  “It is defensible and we are hidden from the road, but it would be as easy to bottle us up in here as it would be for us to hold an attacker off.”

  “I was thinking the same myself.”

  “Still it’s probably better than the alternatives.”

  “You think our friends from back in town will come looking for us?”

  “You saw them. What do you think?”

  “I think they think we have money and that they want some of it.”

  Sasha returned and made a shushing sound. When she spoke her voice was pitched low. “If you want to see where Otto is,” she said, “come take a look.”

  Shadows moved on the road below. Kormak could see a number of warriors and a number of mules. The men were armed and some of them held crossbows. They did not stop at the place where Sasha had taken them off the road. Either they did not know it was there or they had missed seeing it in the gloom. After a few minutes they disappeared round a bend in the road.

  Sasha smiled triumphantly. “Old Otto does not know these mountains as well as he thinks.”

  “Let’s hope so,” said Kormak. “And let’s hope some of his boys are not sneaking up on us even now.”

  “Why don’t you go down the path and take a look,” she said.

  “I’ll do just that thing,” Kormak replied. He padded down the trail, silent as a great cat. He kept his hand near the hilt of blade but no shadowy figures sprang on him from the darkness. When he reached the road, the only sign that anyone had been this way were some mule droppings on the interlocked flagstones of the old dwarf path. It looked like they had indeed been missed.

  He wondered how long things would stay that way.

  Kormak sat down by the fire, eyes narrowed and focused away from the glare to preserve his nightsight. An eerie howl echoed through the night. It was answered by another. Kormak had heard howls like that before, far to the east in the great Elfwood.

  “Dire wolves,” said Sasha. “Packs of them haunt these mountains.”

  “What’s the difference between a dire wolf and a normal wolf?” Boreas asked. His voice came from further back on the path, where he stood on watch.

  “What’s the difference between a domesticated terrier and a hungry wolf?” Sasha replied. “Dire wolves come up to my ch
est and they can chop through a man’s leg with one bite”

  They fell silent for a moment. All of them were imagining what meeting a pack of such creatures would be like.

  “They run with the goblins,” Sasha added, apparently determined to lower the mood even more. “Little bastards use them as steeds.”

  “I would have thought they would just be snacks for the wolves,” said Boreas. He was attempting to make a joke of it.

  “Don’t kid yourself, they are about as vicious as the wolves and they are a lot more cunning. Both like manflesh to eat.”

  Karnea ladled out some of the stew. “I love cooking,” she said. “I am not so sure about camping.”

  Kormak tasted the stew. It was very, very good. “You could make a career as prince’s chef,” he said.

  “Cooking is a hobby. I’m afraid most of my life has been spent studying the Art and the ways of the Khazduri.”

  Sasha spluttered food at the mention of the Art.

  “You are a witch,” Sasha said. There was an undercurrent of fear in her voice that was not there when she had talked to Kormak about the possibility of being killed.

  “I would not exactly say that,” said Karnea. “Although I do know some herb lore and I have the gift for healing and warding.”

  Sasha’s eyes widened. If anything, the fact that Karnea so calmly admitted what she was had dismayed the prospector even more. “Aren’t you worried about the Shadow?” she asked.

  Karnea took off her glasses and studied them for a moment. It was as if she was looking at her reflection in them. “All with the Gift must worry about such corruption but I can assure you I am well warded against such things as it’s possible to be.”

  Sasha fell silent. Kormak imagined she was stunned by this calm discussion of the risks of losing your soul by another woman, particularly one as harmless looking as Karnea. He was not fooled. He knew there was no such thing as a harmless magician.

  Karnea did not seem to notice Sasha’s appalled look. “And you can be touched by the Light as well as the Shadow,” she said. “Scripture says so.”