Thornhold h-16

by Elaine Cunningham

  Hronulf fixed a searching gaze on the priest. His eyes went bleak as the truth came to him, but his face hardened.

  His gaze pointedly swept flag's black and purple vestments, then fixed upon the symbol engraved on his medallion. "I have no son, Cyricist. My son Byorn died a hero, fighting against the Zhentarim."

  Even though he had expected them, these words struck flag's heart with painful force. "Did he really? Have you never wondered how the closely held secret of your family's village reached Zhentarim ears? Or for that matter, how a Zhentilar band managed to unravel the secrets of this fortress? Look, and wonder no more!"

  Dag snatched the black globe from its hiding place and held it before his father's eyes. The purple fire burned high, casting unholy light upon the face of Hronulf's oldest and most trusted Mend.

  "How may I serve you, Lord Zoreth?" inquired the image of Sir Gareth Cormaeril.

  Shock, disbelief, and sudden bleak acceptance flashed through Hronulf" s silver-gray eyes. He lifted his gaze to flag's coldly vindictive face. "Gareth was a good man. To corrupt a paladin is a most grievous evil and a black stain on the souls of all who had a hand in his downfall. You will not find another here who will have aught to do with you, Cyricist."

  With great effort, flag kept his face neutral. "I've come to claim my heritage and meet my sister," he said. "Where is she?"

  "This is a fortress of the Knights of Samular. No women reside here."

  "Finally, you speak something resembling truth," flag said coldly. "But let us not play foolish games. We saw a young woman enter this fortress. We did not see her leave."

  "Nor will you. She is beyond your reach, Cyricist."

  Dag merely shrugged. "For now, perhaps, but the day will come, and soon, when the three rings of Samular are reunited in the hands of three of his bloodline. Tell me what that means. What power will that unleash?"

  "It matters not. You do not wear the ring. You cannot,"

  "Perhaps not, but my daughter can, and she will do as I tell her. Soon my sister will do the same. As long as I command the power, it matters not whose hands wield it." The priest unfolded his arms. He held out one hand and took a step forward. "It is time for you to bequeath me my inheritance. The second ring, if you please!"

  Pain flared in the paladin's eyes as his fallen son approached, for the evil of Cyric burned men such as Hronulf as surely and painfully as dragonfire. Dag Zoreth saw this, expected it. Nevertheless, he kicked the regal sword out of Hronulf's grasp and snatched up the paladin's hand between both of his own.

  "No ring. The other hand, then," he demanded. In defiant response, Hronulf raised his bloodied fist and spread the fingers so that the priest could see that there was no ring upon them.

  Dag's face darkened as anger rose in him. "Once, when I was no more than seven winters of age, I hid such a ring for safekeeping in a hole gashed into an oak, rather than have it taken by the raiders. Could it be possible that you have done much the same?"

  "I do not have the ring," Hronulf stated.

  "We shall see."

  Dag did not doubt that the paladin spoke the truth. He knew that by all that was reasonable, he should find a way to heal the man and question him, but flag was beyond reason. Rage, grief, the madness of his life of terrible isolation- a torrent of emotions too many and complex to catalogue or understand-tore him over the edge. In one swift motion, he plunged his own hand deep into the paladin's wound.

  A roar of agony and outrage tore from Hronulf's throat. Dag suspected that the touch of a priest of Cyric caused pain greater than the paladin would know if a dwarven smith quenched a red-hot iron in his belly. This pleased flag, but it was not quite enough to sate him.

  Dag held his father's anguished eyes as he began to chant the words of a spell. The god Cyric heard his priest and granted the fell magic. Dag's frail fingers suddenly became as sharp and powerful as mithral knives. Up they tore, through walls of muscle and flesh, and closed surely around the paladin's beating heart.

  With one quick jerk, flag Zoreth pulled the heart out through the wound and showed it to the dying paladin. Then, just as quickly, he threw the heart into the hearth fire.

  Dag Zoreth spun on his heel and stalked from the room, still chanting softly. The last sounds Hronulf of Tyr heard were the hissing, sputtering death of his own heart and the voice of his lost son, cursing him in Cyric's name.

  SEVEN

  The sounds of battle faded swiftly as Bronwyn plummeted down the steeply sloping shaft. Down she slid, picking up speed as she went.

  Dimly she realized that the tunnel was carved into the thick wall of the keep and that she had fallen down what was a nearly vertical drop. She wrapped her arms over her head and steeled herself for whatever would come at the bottom of the shaft.

  But the tunnel curved suddenly, sliding her into what seemed to be a spiraling arc. She suspected that the tunnel was sweeping down through the curved wall, but she could not be certain. Balance and sense of direction had abandoned her, swept aside by the speed of her headlong slide. There was no time to consider her situation, to plan or even to react. She had no choices, no options, but to surrender to the force that held her in its grip. This she understood without words or even conscious thought, and the understanding raised her frustration into simmering rage. Was there nothing in her life, nothing at all, over which she had any control?

  Suddenly Bronwyn realized that the tunnel had widened.

  She no longer felt the walls rushing past her, brushing her along one side and then the other. And she no longer felt the ripple of the closely fitted stones beneath her. The floor over which she careened was still smooth but seemingly of solid stone.

  She was inside the mountain now, Bronwyn realized, and still falling.

  Her speed hadn't lessened much, but at least she had some room to maneuver. She wrenched herself to one side, tucking her knees up against her chest and then kicking out as hard as she could. Neither her outstretched hands nor her kicking feet managed to graze a wall, but stretching herself out full length had some effect. Her wild slide began to slow. Bronwyn dared to hope that the ride was almost over.

  Just then she hit another curve. Her weight shifted, sending her into a spin. Completely out of control now, Bronwyn tumbled and rolled. She flailed about wildly, seeking something, anything, to hold onto that might halt her wild ride. There was nothing; the stone floor and walls were smooth and sheer. She was grateful for that. If the tunnel had been rough, she would have been torn and battered past recognition, but at the moment, she would almost welcome a boulder in her path if it would stop her precipitous slide.

  Then, suddenly, one was there-or at least, something that closely resembled a boulder. She caught a glimpse of it, silhouetted against some faint, distant light far beyond. She threw her arms over her head to ward her face, and then plunged headfirst into a hard, rounded wall.

  Fortunately for Bronwyn, the "wall" had some give to it. A startled oofl wheezed out, and strong, stubby arms and legs thrashed about in a brief, desperate attempt to hold position on the steep incline. For just a moment, Bronwyn grappled with her unseen "rescuer" as they both teetered on the edge of a fall. They lost the battle, and the slide resumed in a tangle of arms and legs and a flurry of gruff-voiced and exceedingly earthy curses.

  The tunnel began to level out, and Bronwyn slowly skidded and spun to a stop. She had no idea where she was, but at least there was a bit of light-a soft, greenish glow, probably due to the phosphoric lichens that grew in some underground caverns. Bronwyn lay flat on her back, willing the whirling shapes and colors to sort themselves out into images she could use. With one hand she groped for her knife, in case she needed to defend herself against what she could not yet see.

  A few paces away, Ebenezer groaned and rolled up onto his knees. He hurt from beard to boots, but his belly had definitely taken the worst of it. Physical pain was something he knew, something he could handle. Compared to the agonizing grief of his clan's destruction, a few
aches and pains was almost a relief. A distraction. So was the anger that welled up when his eyes settled on the small, disheveled woman sprawled out on the stone floor of the cavern.

  Ebenezer rose to his feet and staggered over to the dazed human. "Well, are you gonna lie there all day?" he demanded in a querulous voice.

  She opened her eyes and squinted in the direction of his voice. Her head bobbed around a bit, as if she were trying to peer through a swirling haze.

  "A dwarf;" she muttered, and her eyes drifted closed again. "No wonder I thought I'd run into a boulder."

  "You weren't far wrong," Ebenezer said in a tight, rumbling growl, "only boulders generally don't go taking revenge when they're attacked."

  That got her attention. Her eyes popped open, and she pulled a long knife out of a sheath attached to one side of her belt. She hauled herself onto her feet, looking so wildly unsteady that Ebenezer confidently waited for her to fail. She wobbled a mite, but stayed up. Dropping to a respectable crouch, she held her knife in a practiced, blade-down grip.

  A fight, then. That was fine with Ebenezer. He pulled from his belt the hammer he'd taken from Frodwinner's cold, clenched fist.

  "You're wrong. I didn't attack you," the woman stated as she began to circle around him.

  He turned with her, rubbing his aching belly. "Yeah? What would you call it?"

  "Falling."

  Despite his anger, Ebenezer had to admit that there was something to that. When humans wanted to bombard someone, they didn't generally use their own bodies as missiles. Ebenezer granted that this human might not have deliberately halted his process up to the fortress, but he still had ample justification for wrath. His clanmates had been slain or captured. Ebenezer would kill any Zhent he saw in Stoneshaft tunnels, starting with this one.

  "Falling, eh?" Ebenezer echoed bitterly. "Get ready to fall a mite further. I'm-a gonna send you and all your kind straight to the Abyss."

  He circled her, measuring her height and balance and stance. Humans, in his experience, were fairly predictable. When they saw a hammer or axe coming at them,! most of them instinctively ducked. But it seemed that their instincts didn't take into reckoning the measure of a dwarf's height and reach. Ebenezer noticed that oftentimes all they managed to do was lean into the coming blow. Aim at the shoulder, and he'd get the head. A good deal, by his measure.

  He lashed out, swinging the hammer in a high, side-sweeping blow.

  But this human didn't respond as Ebenezer had anticipated. She dropped flat to the cave floor, rolled in the opposite direction of his hammer swing, and came up behind him. Her knife slashed across the seat of his leather breeches.

  He whirled at her, one hand clutching at the sudden, stinging breeze. "You've fought dwarves before," he observed coldly. That confirmed his suspicions. Not many humans took on a dwarf, not unless they had a powerful personal grudge or a bunch of Mends close at hand. Judging by the devastation of the clanhold, she had a big bunch of Mends.

  The woman danced back a few paces. Her big-eyed gaze darted around the cavern as if searching for a means of escape. "I've known some dwarves, that's all." She lifted one eyebrow and gave him a small, knowing smile. "One of them, I knew very well."

  Her meaning was unmistakable, but Ebenezer wasn't buying that. Humans and dwarves did very littie cavorting, and no serious courting to speak of. "Bah!" he scoffed. "What would a dwarf want with the likes of you?"

  She proceeded to tell him, in detail so vivid that he was certain his cheeks were as red as his beard. Ebenezer liked a good tall tale as much as the next dwarf; but he was in no mood to swap boasts with a murderous Zhent wench. He cut her off with a quick advance, followed by a series of hammer-swings that kept her dodging and retreating for several long moments.

  "You're quick," he gave her, when they both paused for breath. "But trying to distract me just ain't going to work!"

  "No?" The woman smirked and lunged forward with a knife feint.

  Ebenezer leaned back away from the blade. She sprang at him before he could right himself He did his best to bring the hammer up and around, but she was already in too close.

  Her weight slammed into him-a pretty good hit for such a scrawny thing, but Ebenezer was used to harder hits, and he didn't expect to go down. He wouldn't have, except for the large stone right behind him. Seems that he had been a mite distracted, after all. Never saw the rock. It hit the back of his knees, which buckled and folded on him. Ebenezer toppled back, much to his mortification.

  The woman went down with him, writhing and scratching and spitting mad, impossible to hit in so close and just generally as hard to hold as a trout. Little and puny she might be, but she fought with a fury that would have had Tarlamera's cats sitting up and taking notice.

  Embarrassed now as well as angry Ebenezer wanted nothing more than to be finished with this. He palmed the stone floor in search of his hammer. Nothing. He cast a look to one side-and hollered when the damn female sank her teeth into his exposed ear. The weapon lay well out of reach. Ebenezer swore and shoved the two-legged she-cat away. He scrambled to his feet and then dived for the hammer.

  The woman spat blood and leaped after him. Her arms wrapped around his ankles. Down he went, flopping onto his already abused belly. His chin hit the stone with a mind-numbing crack. Worse, his outstretched fingers fell short of the weapon's handle.

  She scrambled over his back and grabbed the hammer, then flung it away as far as she could. Ebenezer heard the crack of mithral on stone, then the slithering, metallic slide down the steep bank into the river.

  That was one blow too many for him. Ebenezer bucked once, easily throwing her off. He staggered to his feet and stabbed one stubby finger at her in furious accusation.

  "Now you're starting to get me riled," he bellowed, with typical dwarven understatement.

  The human was already on her feet, circling again, those big eyes all wild looking and wisps of her brown hair sticking up every which way. It occurred to Ebenezer, briefly, that she looked almost as angry and crazed and grief-ravaged as he felt.

  "Getting riled, are you?" she gritted out. "Then I suppose it won't make much difference if I do this-"

  She leaped at him, cat-quick, and fisted both her hands in his long red beard. Ebenezer yowled in pain and fury and outraged dwarven dignity.

  But the wench wasn't done with him yet. She leaped up, yanking back hard on his beard as she tucked up her knees and then kicked out, planting her booted feet squarely into his belly. She went down onto her back, dragging Ebenezer down after her. His hands braced out to catch himself when he fell, partly by instinct and partly because he didn't much like the idea of wiping squashed human off his tunic.

  Things didn't quite work out that way. The woman hit the floor first and kicked her feet up and out. Ebenezer felt the cavern shift weirdly, and his boots described a fast arc over his head. Over he went, flipping like an oat cake on a griddle. He soared over the woman and landed hard on his backside.

  Quick hands swept his beard up past his face, crossed, then pulled back down. Before his head crashed to the stone, Ebenezer felt a quick, strangling tug. Disbelief coursed through him, along with a fresh wave of anger. The woman had the stones to try to strangle him with his own beard!

  Ebenezer struggled to his feet, dragging the stubborn woman up with him. He twisted this way and that, but she clung to him like a burr on a mule and only tightened her grip. His lungs began to burn, and his vision turned dark around the edges. The pounding of his own heart grew until the roaring in his ears thundered and rolled like the dingblasted sea.

  This was not the sort of death that would earn him a place in the hall of heroes. Determined not be brought down in this ignominious fashion, Ebenezer staggered over to the cavern wall. If he could get there before he fell, if he could slam her up against the stone a few times, maybe he could break her grip.

  He was almost there when her stranglehold suddenly loosened and her weight slid down his back. Ebenezer dragged
in a ragged breath and dug his fingers beneath the suddenly slack strands of his beard. He started to pull, but stopped suddenly when he saw what she had seen.

  "Stones," he muttered in a voice raw from near strangulation.

  The conquest of Thornhold was complete. Dag Zoreth walked through the fortress reviewing the work his men had made of the job.

  They had certainly been thorough. Only a few of the servants remained alive. The man who kept and butchered the pigs and chickens, for instance, the brewer, a few of the kitchen staff. Most of the fortress's inhabitants had been too infected by the paladins whom they had served and were even now turning to ash on the massive bier.

  Smoke rose in dark, fetid clouds from beyond the fortress walls. The slain paladins and their followers had been tossed onto a burning pile of driftwood and old straw. Such fuel did not produce the hottest fire, but Dag's new castellan-a thin, dark man who would have been handsome but for the livid brand on one cheek-was a practical steward and manager, and he decreed that Thornhold's supply of firewood and timber was too dear to waste on such matters. Dag had been content to yield the decision to the castellan; after all, the man had ably managed the estates of an Amnian nobleman, until the discovery of his dalliance with the man's wife had led to his discharge and disfigurement. Dag cared nothing about a man's habits, and the castellan's advice seemed sound enough. And if the paladins did not burn completely, what of it? Did not the ravens and wild beasts of the Sword Coast need to eat?

  The celebration inside the fortress that night was raucous and long. The soldiers raided the cellars and brought casks of ale and wine up to the keep's dining hall. Several of the slaughtered animals, along with leeks and root vegetables from the cellar, went into a huge pot for stew. The men feasted and drank and sang and boasted until the moon had set, and stayed doggedly at it until most of them were snoring at the table with their faces pillowed in their gravy-soaked trenchers.

  Dag held himself apart from this, watching and waiting quietly until he was certain he would have the privacy he needed. There was one more thing he must do, the one final thing that would make the victory truly his.