Prince of Demons

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  “Now, Lord?” The page fidgeted. The hall sconces lit flitting highlights in the folds of his linens.

  “Please,” Dh’arlo’mé confirmed.

  “He’ll be . . .” the page started. “I–I mean, you don’t . . .” He paused to gather his thoughts, growing obviously more uncomfortable. “Lord, do you wish me to awaken him?”

  Dh’arlo’mé’s elfin patience tolerated the stammering. Compared to She of Slow Emotions, the most sluggish human acted at a gallop. “If necessary, yes.”

  “Thank you,” the page said unnecessarily. He darted down the hallway.

  Dh’arlo’mé did not bother to watch him go. Opening his door, he went inside to await Baltraine.

  CHAPTER 4

  Damnation

  What good is a man whose worth derives from the courage or competence of his ancestors?

  —Colbey Calistinsson

  Prime Minister Baltraine raced through the corridors of Béarn Castle, as fast as dignity allowed. Dh’arlo’mé rarely called for him in the middle of the night, and he had little choice but to assume the situation was dire. The familiar paintings, tapestries, and animal-shaped torch brackets flew past, unappreciated. The light blurred into confluent streaks on either side of Baltraine’s peripheral vision, creating the illusion of a never-ending tunnel. The need to descend stairs broke the sensation at intervals, which Baltraine appreciated. At length, he came to Dh’arlo’mé’s door and knocked in triplicate.

  When there was no response, Baltraine contained his impatience, accustomed to the maddening unhurriedness that characterized everything elfin. Finally the door swung open, and Dh’arlo’mé gestured to Baltraine to enter.

  Baltraine obliged, and Dh’arlo’mé closed the door behind him. Patting the nearest chair, the elf sat on the edge of the bed. Baltraine took a seat in the indicated spot. “What can I do for you, Dh’arlo’mé?” His harsh, human tones mangled the musical elfin name.

  Uncharacteristically, Dh’arlo’mé came straight to the point. “Has anyone arrived in Béarn recently?”

  Baltraine shook his head. For months, no messenger or envoy sent by Béarn had resulted in reply, including those sent to recover the missing heir to the throne. “No one has come to Béarn in weeks.” The obvious question followed. “Why do you ask?”

  “Curiosity.” Dh’arlo’mé dismissed the significance with a word.

  Baltraine shrugged, attributing the seeming oddity of an apparently idle question to the early hour of his summoning. “Is that why you called me here?”

  “No.” Dh’arlo’mé’s smooth, green eye met Baltraine’s brown ones. “I need you to do something for me.”

  Baltraine nodded once in confused agreement.

  “I need you to have the staves brought to me.”

  “The staves?” Baltraine’s heavy brow furrowed. “What staves?”

  Dh’arlo’mé studied Béarn’s prime minister as if he had descended into madness. “The staves of the staff-test.”

  Baltraine could not stop his eyes from growing as round as coins. He knew Dh’arlo’mé appreciated subtlety of expression, but surprise would not allow him to maintain his calm demeanor. “You want the staff-test brought to you?”

  “Yes,” Dh’arlo’mé confirmed. “Is that a problem?”

  “I don’t know,” Baltraine admitted honestly. “No one’s ever tried to move it before.” He considered his few experiences with the staves and their test. Historically, when the king or queen died, the heirs underwent the staff-test in order of seniority. The first to pass became the successor. Those who failed often became despondent, many to the point of suicide, addiction, or psychosis far beyond the despair ever reached by those heirs left untested. No one who had not undergone the staff-test knew what it entailed, at least to Baltraine’s knowledge. Those who failed refused to detail their humiliation, and those who passed had never chosen to do so. Even the understanding of how the tested knew the end result was a mystery.

  “Please have them brought. Move them separately or together as you see fit.” Dh’arlo’mé’s strange eye sparkled like a faceted emerald in the moonlight. “One caution. Choose the carrier or carriers well. They must be strong enough to resist temptation yet not so strong they grasp for power.”

  A shiver ambushed Baltraine. The supernaturalness of Dh’arlo’mé’s knowledge seemed unclean. “I don’t understand.”

  Dh’arlo’mé smiled. Though the expression fit the ancient creases engraved on his skin, it still seemed evil. “You don’t need to understand.”

  Baltraine pondered Dh’arlo’mé’s statement. “If I don’t understand, how can I choose the bearer wisely?”

  Dh’arlo’mé relented. “A worthy point.” He leaned forward, the inhuman eye and the empty socket disturbing Baltraine as they never had before. “I will tell you this much. The staves do more than judge. They contain powers beyond human understanding which may try to subvert their wielders. The ones who bring the staves to me must have the discipline to resist the power they offer.”

  Baltraine licked his lips, despising his position. The world seemed to crumble around him. He could only guess what effect removing staves placed by gods might have. Yet disobedience to Dh’arlo’mé would not only ruin his chances to place his line upon the throne; it would ensure his death. “How quickly do you need this done?”

  “As soon as possible.” Dh’arlo’mé gave the obvious answer, without revealing the motives Baltraine had hoped to hear. The staff-test had existed long before elves had come to Béarn, and Baltraine could not help wondering why they had suddenly become important enough to Dh’arlo’mé to drag the prime minister out of bed.

  “Very well,” Baltraine said. “You’ll have them.” He tried to sound confident, even as ideas crushed in on him, demanding sorting. He headed for the door, the mirror reflecting his Béarnian bulk, black mane, and hastily donned silks. Opening the panel, he paused in the doorway. Too many questions came to his lips at once, so he discarded them all. Better to mull the situation in private before raising issues that might annoy the elf. Saying nothing further, he stepped into the hallway and closed the door behind him.

  The click of the latch released a torrent Baltraine felt helpless to control. Memories rushed down on him, interspersed with myriad questions; and he stood, confused beyond action. At length, he managed to force his legs to move. He shuffled mechanically down the corridor, then the steps, headed toward the first floor. There, the staves occupied a central room, scarcely bigger than a closet. By the time he reached the meditation area, directly beside the Room of the Staves, his mind was still in a desperate muddle. He plopped down on one of many padded benches, staring at the swirling design that formed the back wall, its brilliant hues providing focus for his vision while his mind hammered out issues he would rather have forgotten.

  Aside from Griff, lost to exile, every heir to the throne had undergone the staff-test at Baltraine’s insistence. He had sent them in the best interests of Béarn and with King Kohleran’s consent. The king’s imminent death and the rash of assassinations had forced his hand. Baltraine had waited by the door while each heir underwent the test, a brief matter, though the participants always seemed certain the trial had lasted for hours or days. None had passed the test. None. Baltraine recalled the desperation that discovery had raised. Bard Linndar, Darris’s mother, had brought Griff’s existence to his attention. That remembrance jabbed pain through Baltraine. Linndar had died at the poisoned feast, like so many others of Kohleran’s most faithful, and Baltraine had had a hand in her demise.

  Baltraine squirmed away from the pain of memory, forcing his thoughts to the matter of the staves. Failure had brought despair upon the heirs, but each seemed to cope in his or her own way. Only one had abandoned Béarn; sixteen-year-old Matrinka had demanded disownment before leaving the kingdom, an understandable request given that assassins had slaughtered so many of the heirs. When messengers and envoys failed to retrieve Griff, Baltraine had acted in hopeless
urgency, retesting each of the heirs. He had done so in good faith, as always in the best interests of Béarn. The second judgment demolished those tested. Suicide and murder had taken those not lost to wine or drugs. One heir, particularly unworthy, had died during the second testing. The image of her twisted corpse, ivory-white face, and bloodless lips haunted his memory.

  Baltraine craned his neck toward the Room of Staves. The plain door gave no hint of the power that lay within, and the quiet surrounding this area seemed eerily inappropriate. He knew of no one he could trust with the task Dh’arlo’mé had given him. Baltraine had always determined worth and ability by bloodline, disdaining those ministers who had won their titles honorarily or who appeared contaminated by Erythanian, Pudarian, or, worse, Eastern ancestry. Enlisting a proper man for the job meant revealing the elves to another and risking the plans they and he had so carefully constructed. No mere servant or page could perform this task. To Baltraine’s mind, any soldier would have physical strength but little of the brain capacity necessary for the mental resilience Dh’arlo’mé had suggested would be necessary.

  Other concerns pressed Baltraine, more selfish in content yet every bit as worrisome. If Dh’arlo’mé tapped the power these staves apparently contained, he might no longer need the prime minister who had guided him through what Dh’arlo’mé called Béarn’s “maze of incomprehensible behavior”—its formalities and its culture. Baltraine could become as dispensable as the humans the elves had blithely ordered executed. Baltraine dared not answer his own worries, yet his mind would not allow him to escape them. Until recently, he had complied with the elves because their intentions jibed with his own. Now, these threatened to diverge, and Baltraine needed to do something, anything, to stop them.

  Baltraine was up and pacing before he realized he had left his seat. Remembrance proved unkind. Much of what he had done for the elves was born of fear. He had long promised himself he would oppose them if they caused harm to Béarn, yet he had already waited too long. The urge to ran to the temple nearly overwhelmed him. The terrible awe it held for him had begun in childhood and remained with him even after he had gotten to know the priests as men. The massive teak doors had sported carvings of rearing bears, their eyes sapphires and their ear leathers shaven pearl. One door ring had simulated the sun, the other the moon, worn smooth by myriad grips over centuries. These rings slammed the wood as the door closed, announcing the presence of anyone who entered, the embarrassment virtually assuring no one arrived at services late.

  Twice in the temple, Baltraine had met an armed blond man who appeared to be Renshai yet called himself immortal. He had denied being a god, instead naming himself the Keeper of the Balance. First, he had advised Baltraine. The second time, immediately after the poisoned feast, the stranger had condemned him. Burning down the temple had rid the prime minister of the blond’s irksome, judgmental presence; but it had not wholly cleared his conscience. In his stronger moments, Baltraine followed the way of the elves with fanatical devotion. In weaker times, doubts descended on him; and the blond’s words and manner returned to haunt him: “There is much of evil in you, Prime Minister Baltraine. And more chaos than law.” He alternated between times when he worried that such might be true and decisive moments when he knew it definitively false. And the blond had said another thing Baltraine remembered now: “Urgent problems need urgent solutions.”

  Baltraine turned his pacing into a walk to the library. Ignoring the texts, all of which he had read, he scooped up a woven bag used for wrapping books removed from their sanctuary. He headed for the Room of Staves with a confidence more feigned than real. Without hesitation, he pulled a ring of keys from his pocket, inserted one in the lock, and spun it until it clicked. He removed the key and replaced the ring. When his hand touched the latch, his bravado deserted him. He froze in place, fingers curled around the cold metal. Time seemed to stand still. He had done nothing irrevocable. Yet.

  For what seemed like hours, Baltraine’s mind had been battered by endless conflicting thoughts and schemes. Now, when he most needed his wits about him, his mind went blank. Awareness of the passage of time pushed him onward. His hand winched closed, and he pulled the door open.

  Immediately, his memory conjured images of the last time he’d stood in this same position. The worst of the heirs lay sprawled on the cold stone floor, the staves still leaning in their respective corners. Terror seized Baltraine. He blinked several times, and the corpse disappeared. Light angled through the partially opened doorway, and shadow touched every edge of the tiny room. The staves angled harmlessly in the far corners, their plain wooden constructions suggesting nothing of their power. The scene appeared so quiet and peaceful, Baltraine could scarcely fathom the wild pounding of his heart. Keeping one foot wedged in the door, he groped along the corridor wall. His fingers found a bracket in the shape of a wolf, and he gingerly worked its torch free. Torch in hand, he stepped fully inside and closed the door behind him.

  His light played over the tiny, square room, so much like every other, aside from its size. Baltraine cringed, awaiting some grotesque punishment from the gods for his effrontery. Nothing happened. Gradually, he relaxed and studied the staves; the room contained nothing else. They lay still, inanimate for all their legend. Their plainness seemed a mockery. Baltraine found himself wondering if the whole had not been an elaborate hoax from the start. Perhaps the heirs decided among themselves who would rule, and the staff-test served only as a device to convince the populace. Baltraine dismissed the possibility as swiftly as it materialized. The gentle, naive men and women who had governed Béarn through the centuries could never create or tolerate such deception. Dh’arlo’mé’s desire for the staves only assured their significance.

  Urgent problems need urgent solutions. Baltraine could not banish the thought from his mind, even as most other ideas had abandoned him. He looked at the bag in his hand, then hurled it to the ground. I will not work for elves any longer. It is not in Béarn’s best interests. Baltraine wanted to shout the words at the top of his lungs, hoping the gods might hear and knowing no other would. The room’s walls and door, deliberately thick, muffled sound into obscurity. He contented himself with the thought. The self-proclaimed Keeper of the Balance had read his mind effortlessly. Surely the gods could accomplish nothing less. Baltraine continued to stare at the staves. He was descended from true nobility, without honorary titles or commoner’s blood to taint his line. Like Kohleran and his children, Baltraine could trace his roots to Sterrane the Bear, the last king coronated before the staff-test. So many twists and turns in Baltraine’s ancestry had nearly landed him on Béarn’s throne. Had the old laws of ascension still applied, Baltraine would almost certainly sit there now.

  Dizziness assailed Baltraine suddenly. Realizing he was holding his breath, he released it in a long sigh. He had read every scroll and text in existence, but none of these had brought him succor. Odin had decreed that only siblings and direct descendants of the king be tested. The gods had made no provisions for situations such as this: no suitable heirs in Béarn and the only one remaining to attempt the tasks unreachable. Baltraine stomped on the bag. His gaze returned, once again, to the staves. Urgent problems need urgent solutions.

  Closing his eyes, jaw set, Baltraine reached for the first staff. His fingers closed over the wood, and it felt smooth and cold against his palm. Slowly, it warmed to his grip. Baltraine opened his mind, waiting for the contact Dh’arlo’mé described, for reaction from the gods who had created this test, for some indication that he touched other than ordinary wood. Nothing happened. His head pounded, and he could hear the blood flow through it. He forced himself to relax, and the pain lessened in increments, a product of his own tension.

  Baltraine pursed his lips, uncertain whether to take solace or hopelessness from the situation. His heart rate quickened further, hammering a steady cadence. He sucked in another deep breath, then touched the second staff. When no reaction followed, he flicked his fingers over
it in an undulating motion, rolling the sanded wood into his palm.

  Pain exploded through Baltraine. The room filled with a scream that echoed through the confines in his own voice. The sound crashed against his eardrums, intensifying an agony that already seemed beyond endurance. He collapsed, torch sparking on the floor, muscles tightening at once, including his hands. The wood pinched his flesh, minuscule beneath the torrent that assaulted him, and he became frighteningly aware that he could not release the staves. The realization became desperate need. He channeled the stray bits of concentration that pain allowed toward ridding himself of the staves.

  Sweat dribbled into Baltraine’s eyes as clenched muscles refused to slacken, and a ceaseless dull ache joined the sharp agony lancing through him. He felt consciousness slipping and deliberately hurled himself toward that oblivion. Then, abruptly, his body loosened and seized up again. Convulsions racked him, frenzied movement he could not control any more than the screams that ripped from his throat repeatedly. He lost control of his bowels and bladder, but his thoughts remained mercilessly clear. The pain stabbed, seared, and hammered relentlessly, hovering toward unbearable, then losing ground as he gradually grew accustomed to its presence. Eventually, his mind refused to register it.

  Baltraine’s world went dark, though the clarity of mind remained. The pain became distant background, and he lost track of its presence. Believing himself alone, he huddled into himself as much as his twitching allowed and fought to gain control of a body that seemed no longer his own. The sensation of someone studying him cut over other ideas, and he sought dappled patterns in the otherwise limitless blackness.

  The other’s voice touched him first. “Baltraine Demekiah’s son, why did you come here?”

  Baltraine forced all attention to the voice, desperately needing his wits. The words he chose for answer would surely clinch his fate. The pain dispersed, though whether due to the intensity of his efforts to concentrate or from true recession, he did not know. His body seemed distant, still beyond his control. He could not tell if he still clutched the staves, though he savored a new lucidity. “I beg your forbearance for this question, but formality requires knowledge. You know my name, but I am ignorant of yours.” He left the matter open, not daring a direct question. Already, he began carving shape from shadow. A being stood in front of him, though he could not yet discern its form.