Alaeda rushed forward, though not in time to stop it from blasting Talara and Pakka with blue lightning. Talara fell to the ground. Pakka went to one knee then stood. She called out in a loud voice, “Aqalnor!”
In answer, a shimmering, translucent being emerged from the ground. Water droplets fell from its body to spatter on the sand. The great water spirit slammed the monster, crushing bones with a single swing from its massive fist.
Alaeda was still too far to help. The monstrous leader crashed into the spirit and ripped it into watery gobbets the sand drank greedily. The monster then dived into the sand and erupted out from the sand at Talara’s side. It reached for her throat with clawed hands. Alaeda stepped into its embrace to shoulder it to the ground.
Alaeda saw Pakka. Fresh blood spilled from her nostril. Could the watery thing’s demise have harmed her? Pakka called out the name once more, and the damp sand gave birth to another watery horror. It started spinning, becoming a raging storm of swirling sand, debris, and bodies. Although the summoned monstrosity ripped apart the other creatures, it did not touch Alaeda or Talara. Death spread out in all directions. The attacker’s leader fled. Alaeda gave chase. She sprang into the air and landed on the fiend’s back. With one arm wrapped around its neck, she shoved her blade down into its neck. It fell and excreted filth as its body jerked. Alaeda struggled to stand. Pakka’s summoned servant raged.
The surviving raiders fled into the sands. The wind’s howl died down, and the spirit vanished. Quiet. They would not return. At least not in the same night.
Groans and cries rose from the survivors. One stood out from the rest. Pakka knelt by Talara, cradling her head in her hands. She looked to Alaeda, tears streaming down her face.
After four days of waiting, Korvak still had nothing. He fumed as he walked the wide streets of the Merchant District. Iron Square lay ahead. There the mighty merchant houses dealt with the public. The day was bright, hot, and crowded with people from all across the Seven Cities, their tongues and dialects swirling together in a confusing noise. Master Astini’s patience would soon run out, and it would be back to the Vault of Records for Korvak.
By the third day, Korvak had begun to question his going to Melech in the first place. The man, not much more than a boy, was unreliable at best. Korvak believed he was the kind of man who would respond to only pain. And by response, he would do anything to flee it. So Korvak used the curse on Melech. It didn’t have any lasting power and would fade after a few minutes. Until Melech figured out the spell had broken, he would, Korvak hoped, do his best to dig up the information Korvak needed. Korvak knew the same tactic had worked on Melech before. The thief’s master, Torston, had beaten Melech until he knew his place. So Korvak was confident Melech would serve him, for a while at least. Or so Korvak hoped. Melech could not serve two masters, and just as soon as Torston wised up to what Melech was doing, it would be all over for the thief.
Korvak entered the wide thoroughfare ringing Iron Square. Offices and warehouses formed a block of buildings in the center. Wagons drawn by kanks, common giant insects similar to ants, carried goods in and out of the busy place. The people were a mixture, the typical assortment of humans with a smattering of elves, dwarves, and half-giants looming over them all. As Korvak rounded the block, he saw the house sigils displayed over the doors—Vordon’s iron diamond, Wavir’s silver crodlu, Shom’s white dragonflies, and the yellow eyes of Tsalaxa, every merchant house had offices and warehouses there.
Korvak loathed the merchants. They abided by no laws but their own. They bowed and scraped like the rest before the kings, yet they followed their own customs, acknowledged their laws alone. They were a people apart, loyal to their own and unpredictable when dealing with others.
Patriotism did not drive Korvak to expose Thaxos Vordon. Korvak, more than anyone, knew the price of nationalism. His own loyalties cost him status, power, and influence. No. Korvak wanted to expose Vordon because the old merchant didn’t play by any rules, not even those set down by the merchants themselves.
After a quarter hour spent leaning against a wall and watching traffic flowing in and out from the Vordon Emporium, Korvak determined he would learn nothing there. Commerce cared nothing for kings and their struggles. Korvak expected they would conduct business even as Urik’s soldiers marched through the streets, slaughtering civilians on their way to siege the Golden Tower and raze it to the ground. Korvak pushed off from the wall and headed for a narrow street off Iron Square.
There the cobbled road gave way to an old, dry riverbed. No one in Tyr remembered when water flowed there, and few people used the path. It hadn’t been long since nobles filled the corridor to bid on slaves from the auctioneers who displayed their goods from the high bridge spanning the gulch. As he rounded the corner, the bridge came into view, and Korvak could see the brightly dressed nobles with their attendant servants coming and going, some laden with packages and others with coins. The Elven Market, which wasn’t far from the bridge, was the place to acquire goods of dubious and rare origin. Korvak preferred to keep away from the market. Thieves abounded there. There were times, however, when even he needed to navigate its perilous pathways.
He walked up and out from the gulch and into the decaying Warrens. There one would find true human misery. All around, buildings sagged and crumbled. Korvak ignored the dirty and hungry faces staring at him from squalid, decaying hovels.
Few templars dared enter the Warrens, for the people there were desperate enough to kill even the king’s servants. Korvak hoped the scum would try it. He needed an excuse to loose his magic, to burn his enemies with lightning and fire. And he was disappointed when none dared.
Korvak’s rounds patrolling the city took him into the Warrens every day. Astini, Korvak was certain, thought someone would knife him at some point and, thus, remove the troublesome templar from service. Korvak, however, was one of the rare templars to still hold the magic granted by the late king and, thus, had nothing to fear from thugs or gangs. He did, however, fear the people he sought, the Veiled Alliance.
Korvak turned down a narrow alley. He searched the clay bricks for the telltale signs the Alliance sometimes used to communicate with its members. The few people who knew about them thought they might come out into the open after Kalak died. Some had. Most hadn’t. Korvak had been hunting their kind for most of his career and had himself led a few raids into their safe houses to root them out.
He had been fighting the Veiled Alliance for almost his entire career. They were a society of magic-users; however, they rejected the defilers’ methods and opposed anyone who supported those dark wizards. Most Veiled Alliance members were what some called preservers. They fueled their arcane magic with life energy, but they never took too much, never drained their environments to the extent Korvak and his colleagues did, and instead supplemented the energy with energy from within. Preserving techniques were inferior to defiling in terms of raw power, yet they left the world intact, something no defiler ever did.
Different views on magic’s use combined with their subversive efforts to undermine the sorcerer-king’s authority had made the Veiled Alliance one of King Kalak’s direst foes, and thus it fell to the templars to destroy them, root and branch. The Veiled Alliance never proved an easy foe, however. Secretive and cunning, they stayed hidden, moving from safe house to safe house, keeping their identities veiled so they could work from the shadows to topple the greatest defiler in Tyr: King Kalak.
Although Korvak had killed many Veiled Alliance members throughout his career, he sympathized with their efforts and their methods. He was not blind to the cost his spells exacted from the environment, and the devastation wrought from even a minor spell left him wondering if the power gained was worth the price to the world. After all, was it not the sorcerer-kings who reduced the landscape to its present desolate state?
His responsibility and expectations were clear, though, and he did his duty to his master. He did, however, find it was useful to allow
the Alliance to keep a few hideouts. Korvak never knew when Kalak would demand a few preserver heads or if the Alliance would one day prove useful to him. Korvak had found several locations, yet he never exposed them to his masters.
The place he sought was a network of tunnels under Kalla-Kouro. He learned about the hideout two years earlier, and there was nothing to suggest they had abandoned it. The site was fascinating but one a passerby would miss. Locals knew the place to be haunted, sick with ghosts, and if the haunts didn’t get you, a falling rock or the noisome vapors rising through the floors would. Kalla-Kouro was once a bathhouse, in a time when water was more plentiful, a place of dubious report where secret deals between the nobles occurred. When the local wells dried up, the neighborhood died along with all the luxuries the nobles enjoyed.
As Korvak drew nearer to the old bathhouse, he noticed the buildings beginning to change. In the decaying architecture, Korvak could still see signs of wealth and power. One rubble pile was indistinguishable from any other rubble pile, and the bones of palaces mingled with those of huts, yet here and there an old statue would stand in the ruins of an old noble’s townhouse or a cracked fountain remained in a community square.
Kalla-Kouro had not changed since he saw it last. Korvak slowed as he approached and ducked behind a crumbling wall across the street from the bathhouse to watch for movement. He saw no one.
The building was not much to look at. Only a few outer walls still stood, revealing a shattered interior, a rubble-strewn maze. Somewhere in the ruins, Korvak would find the Alliance. He just had to look.
He waited ten minutes. No one entered. No one came out. When he could stand it no more, he stood up and walked into the ruined building. His first step inside summoned a green, ghostly form. It resembled an elf woman. Something had torn out her throat. She moaned and pawed at him, but her touch proved harmless. Korvak ignored the apparition and took another step. A foul, yellowish cloud rose up from the broken tiles. He held his breath and moved deeper inside. More hauntings, rattling noises, and other deterrents revealed themselves. None were more than an annoyance, all tricks and traps designed to keep locals from exploring too far. Korvak’s patience trickled away.
“I thought you were wizards,” he shouted. “This”—he gestured to the freakish displays—“any prestidigitator could do.”
Rocks tumbled from behind him. He turned toward the noise. “Final—”
A thunderous wave blew him backward through a wall. Bricks tumbled down on top of him.
He was surprised. His head spun. When the world stopped spinning, he pushed aside the rubble to sit up. He was bleeding. He felt a sharp pain. He had broken a rib, maybe more.
“Templar scum,” said a female voice echoing around him.
Korvak looked up just in time to see a fiery ball streak toward him. He threw up his arms and fell back. Fire rushed over him, scorching his robes and singeing his hair.
Disembodied laughter filled the air.
Korvak felt his anger building. “Impudent bitch.”
He stayed low to the ground and drew his rod free from his robes. He peered through the tendrils of rising smoke.
“Come out, come out, little man,” she called. “I didn’t kill you yet, did I?”
He waited. The spell he held was burning his tongue.
The smoke cleared and he saw her, beautiful with long brown hair and fey features. She appeared to be a gifted witch, a powerful mover in the mage circles. She also hated templars, it was clear. She wouldn’t listen to what he had to say. He expected he would have to kill her.
The witch searched the ruins for Korvak, calling for him to come out. When she looked away from where Korvak had been hiding, he stood, raised the rod, and spoke the incantation. An emerald ray shot through the haze and slammed into her arm, spinning her from the impact.
Korvak whispered Kalak’s name and grinned when eldritch shadows emerged from the ground to claw at her body. Her groans and cries almost made up for his own injuries.
“I hope I didn’t kill you yet,” he mocked as black ashes swirled in the air around him. The curse he laid upon her twisted her features into something monstrous. He had destroyed a lot of life with his spells so far and wasn’t sure there was enough left there to keep fighting her. He kept his implement raised for another spell as he cast out his senses to find additional energy to power his next spell.
He regretted not casting another spell.
She recovered from his attack and threw multicolored sand into the air. The dim sunlight struck the granules, and they exploded into color. All sense fled Korvak’s mind. He loosed a crackling lance of eldritch energy. Unable to see her, he flung the spell and missed her, blowing a hole through a phantom ghost still moaning yards away.
When he shook his head clear, she was gone again. He coughed. His head felt as though it would split apart. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
More laughter. “I think you’re the one who’s getting hurt.” From behind a wall, a black ray lanced out and would have hit Korvak had he not ducked in time. The wall behind him where the beam struck crumbled to dust.
He responded by launching an arcane pulse at the woman who had stepped into his sights to fire her last spell. His silvery ray struck and encircled her with scintillating bands. As they tightened, they lifted her into the air.
She struggled for a moment but stopped after she turned green and retched.
“Now. Stop,” he said. He was breathing hard. He sank to his knees.
He let the spell go a moment later. She dropped to the ground, though she was as injured as he.
“Are you going to stop?” he asked. “I … I can explain … why I’m here.”
She shuddered and took a step forward. A flame burned at the end of her staff.
“I’m serious. I have no quarrel with you, but if you test me any further, I’ll kill you if you force me.”
She hesitated. The fire burned.
“I want to talk with Matthias.”
“No chance,” she said. Her voice’s hoarseness told him she was as drained as he was.
Korvak closed his eyes, opening the pathways in his mind. He did not often resort to the Way, the path to psionic power, but he did know a few tricks. He imagined himself as a sphere made from green fire and hurled that thought construct at her mind. She was unprepared. Her whimper told him she was his.
He opened his eyes in time to see a bead of blood drip from her nose and spatter on the rocks. She fell to the ground. Her staff guttered out, falling from her nerveless fingers.
Korvak stumbled over to her and kicked her staff away.
“Matthias?” he repeated. Matthias was the purported leader of the Veiled Alliance in Tyr. He avoided attention by keeping to the shadows. Few had seen him; fewer even believed he existed. More than one templar believed he was a phantom the Alliance invented to keep the templars chasing after nothing and to protect the organization’s true leaders.
She answered in a monotone, “He isn’t here.”
“Damn it.”
He loosened the psychic hold. She curled into a tight ball and panted. “You’re not half bad,” she said after a few moments.
“I think we’re far beyond compliments.”
“Indeed.”
“What are you after, templar? Besides Matthias.”
“It’s Korvak.”
“I know who you are,” she sneered.
“Help.”
Her eyes widened. She started laughing. She wiped blood from her mouth. “The great and mighty Korvak needs help?”
Korvak raised his rod.
She flinched then stiffened. “You’ll get no help here.”
“Just hear me out.”
“Talk all you want,” she said.
Korvak looked around. No one else had appeared. Had another wizard appeared, he was sure he would be the one on the ground, spilling all his secrets, instead of her. Korvak knew the very best lies contained a seed of truth. “A new enemy threatens Ty
r, an enemy I believe to be operating within the city. This enemy plots against Tithian and against Tyr’s new freedom.”
“And who is this enemy?” she asked.
“I suspect Thaxos Vordon,” he said.
“A merchant? What do I care for a merchant’s plotting?”
Korvak told the woman Vordon had pledged his soldiers to the Crimson Legion and explained his suspicions. He twisted the truth when he also told her he believed Vordon intended to betray Tyr and hand the city over to Urik.
She started laughing halfway through. “You and your intrigues. No. You won’t get any help from us.”
“But Thaxos could be plotting something against the king. He might betray all of us.”
“So? Tithian is no better than Kalak. And even if Urik conquered the city, King Hamanu can’t be in two places at once. He’ll just install an administrator. In fact, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if Hamanu did win. It would remove Tithian, and Urik would be weaker for dividing its attention between two cities.”
“You know Hamanu isn’t a fool. He’d just enslave the free folk and burn the city to ashes. You know what this would mean for the people.”
She said nothing.
“They’d be slaves,” he pressed. “Some might live. But have you ever seen the slaves from the obsidian mines? No? After a year, they’re so mangled, they don’t even look human anymore. What kind of life would they have pulling obsidian out from blistering tunnels until the glass walls cut them one time too many? Or maybe some horrible creature in the dark drags them off screaming?”
She looked at him, puzzled. “Of all people, you are the last I ever expected to defend a slave.”
Death Mark Page 10