“Your threats are meaningless,” said the shaman. “I know your powers have not returned, at least not in full strength. Otherwise the Warchief’s pet thugs would not have been able to capture you so easily.”
Calliande raised an eyebrow. “Perhaps I permitted myself to be captured. Perhaps I simply wanted to see you for myself.”
The shaman shrank back into the cushions. Who had Calliande been that she could cause fear like that?
“No,” said the shaman at last. “No, if you wanted me dead, you would have done it already.”
“I don’t recognize you,” said Calliande. “Why would I wish you dead?”
“If you knew who I truly was,” said the shaman, “then you would attack me at once.”
“Then who are you?” said Calliande.
The kobold shaman hissed and drew himself up. “You knew me as Talvinius.”
Calliande could not remember if she had heard that name before. Yet Talvinius was certain that he knew her.
And Talvinius was not a kobold name.
“You’ve changed,” she said, trying to think of something to say.
Talvinius wheezed with laughter. “Changed? Yes, I would think so.” His tongue flickered over the broken fangs. “The centuries have not been kind to me, no?”
Centuries? He had known Calliande centuries ago?
“They have not,” said Calliande, hoping to lure him into telling her more.
Talvinius croaked his laugh. “I once lusted for you, you know. I thought to lure you into my bed. But you were always too focused upon your duty, so concerned with your great and holy cause.”
“You are mad,” said Calliande, “if you think I would willingly take a kobold into my bed.”
Talvinius sneered. “But I was not always a kobold.”
“No?” said Calliande. “You claim you were once human? That you are not merely a mad kobold claiming to be a man I once knew?”
Again Talvinius laughed. “Is that what you think, dear Calliande? That I am merely a mad kobold? Oh, but this is delightful. I was once human, a Magistrius of the Order.”
“Human?” said Calliande. “And then you accidentally transformed yourself into a kobold? A likely tale.”
“Do not mock me,” growled Talvinius. “Not after what I have endured. But…ah, I understand now. You slept for too long. You know nothing of the Eternalists. That is modern history, too new for an ancient hag like you.”
“First you lust for me, and now you call me a hag,” said Calliande. “Amazing that your honeyed tongue never lured me into your bed. But your fables intrigue me. Just what is an Eternalist?”
“There were those among the Magistri,” said Talvinius, “who came to question the restrictions placed upon our Order. Defense, knowledge, and communication. The three uses of magic permitted by the law of the High King and the Church, the three uses ordained by our treaty with Ardrhythain. Practically speaking, this narrowed us to spells of warding, healing, divination, and telepathy. But magic…magic could be used for so much more. For far greater purposes.”
“Humans are not to be trusted with power,” said Calliande. “We are a fallen race, and our hearts turn towards cruelty and tyranny. We must shepherd the power of magic well, and guard is closely. The Magistri are to be the servants of humanity, not its rulers.”
Those words had felt so familiar, as if she had spoken them a thousand times before.
“The same trite sermons as always,” said Talvinius. “Two hundred years and you have not changed. You slept…but some of us dreamed of more. Some of us had the vision and courage to realize that the Church’s scriptures and histories are merely fables, that such places as Rome and Jerusalem and Athens never existed. Perhaps even Malahan Pendragon himself was but a legend, a lie concocted by the clerics who feared the power of the Magistri. Magic possesses the power to change humanity, Calliande, to make us as strong as the urdmordar, as powerful as the dark elves…and as long-lived as the high elves.”
“Eat of this tree,” said Calliande, “and you surely shall not die.”
“That is a misquotation and you know it,” said Talvinius. “Humanity is at a disadvantage, Calliande. The dwarves can live for five hundred years, the dark elves for a thousand, and the high elves even longer. The urdmordar are effectively immortal. If humanity is to survive, it must be guided…and who better to guide it than Magistri gifted with immortality?”
“And so these Eternalists of yours,” said Calliande, “were Magistri who tried to find a way to live forever using magic.”
“Yes,” said Talvinius. “Great strides were made. But in time word of our experiments leaked out, and the High King, the Church, and the Masters of the Magistri turned against us. Most of the Eternalists were killed, the rest scattered. I fled here to the Deeps…and in time, my body grew old. I had no choice left…”
“So you turned yourself into a kobold?” said Calliande. Then the answer came to her. “No…you expelled your spirit from your flesh and possessed a living kobold.” She frowned. “Why a kobold?”
“Because,” said Talvinius, his voice sour, “a kobold was all I could manage. Expelling one’s spirit and seizing control of another body is a rather…arduous process, to say the least. Had I more time to prepare…but my final illness came quickly, and so I seized a kobold’s body for my own.”
Calliande felt her lip curl in disgust.
“And that is why the Magistri and the High King turned against you,” she said. “You were trying to possess other people in your experiments.”
“They were only peasants,” said Talvinius. “Dumb brutes, ignorant and savage and unlettered. They exist only to serve their betters. And if their betters chose to spend their blood in pursuit of immortality…”
“That’s monstrous,” said Calliande. “They are living men with hearts and souls, and you had no right to steal their lives to extend your own.”
“I had every right!” said Talvinius, pounding one arm of his couch with a clawed fist. “And I did it.” He cackled. “Two hundred years, Calliande, two hundred years after you hid yourself in that vault in pursuit of your phantoms, and I am still alive. All my contemporaries died long ago. Yet I am still here.”
“And in such a glorious form, too,” said Calliande. “How long have you lived in that kobold’s body? When was the last time you were able to rise from that couch?”
“The kobolds worship me as a god,” said Talvinius. “They provide whatever I require.”
“You’re pathetic,” said Calliande, “and you’ve made yourself into a monster. I don’t know whether you are more pitiable or contemptible.”
“Then destroy me,” said Talvinius. “Strike me down, and send my rotted soul screaming down to hell…assuming such a place is not just another fable of the Church. Do it, Calliande. Do it now.”
Calliande hesitated.
“I thought not,” said Talvinius. “I suspected your powers had not returned. And I now know your memories have not come back to you. Very well played, I might add. I was not sure...and you learned quite a bit from me, I suppose. But if you have come into my lair without your powers, then I know you have not regained your memories.”
Calliande felt her mouth go dry. “How?”
“Because,” said Talvinius, “if you had your memory, you would not have come here…because you would know how much danger you are in now.”
“You’re going to kill me?” said Calliande.
“Kill you?” laughed Talvinius. “I suppose this body wants to kill you. Two hundred years, Calliande …and you are just as lovely as the day you buried yourself alive. I suppose I should desire you. But I wear the flesh of a kobold…and I want to feast on you, not ravish you. I wonder how your flesh and blood would taste against my tongue. But I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to take you.”
“Take me?” said Calliande. “How…”
But then she understood, and she turned to run.
It was too late. Talvinius crooked a fi
nger, and white mist swirled around Calliande’s feet. A heartbeat later a block of thick ice encased her feet and shins. The thick boots kept the chill at bay, but Calliande could not move. She pulled at her legs, but the ice held them fast.
“It will be demeaning, I suppose,” said Talvinius, “to wear the flesh of a woman.”
“I thought you could only claim the flesh of a kobold,” said Calliande, trying to wrench free of the ice.
“That was a century ago. I have practiced since then,” said Talvinius. “And I shall have the aid of the empty soulstone you carry. Did you think I would not sense an item of such power? Ah, but you lost your memory. With the aid of that soulstone, I shall leave this decrepit carcass behind and claim your body for my own…and then all your power shall be mine. What wonders and terrors I shall wreak upon the High Kingdom!”
Calliande struggled to free herself, and Talvinius began casting a spell.
Chapter 14 - Fangs
Ridmark turned, the remaining smoke thinning.
“What are you doing?” said Caius.
Ridmark ignored him for the moment. There was a great deal of sand and dry silt on the floor of the cavern, no doubt left from the occasional flood of the stream.
That meant anyone passing through the cavern would leave footprints.
He paused at the base of the cliff and examined the marks upon the ground.
The answers came to him easily enough. Calliande had been standing there when the smoke bomb had gone off. The fumes had stunned her, and the kobolds had dragged her across the cavern as Ridmark and Kharlacht struggled against the remaining warriors.
Caius walked to his side, Kharlacht following. “What are you…”
“Quiet,” said Ridmark, holding out his staff to block their path. “And hold still. You’ll foul the trail.”
He worked his way across the cavern. There was less sand further away from the stream, but there were enough mushroom spores and silt upon the floor that he could follow the kobolds’ trail. If he read the signs right, he suspect they had carried away Calliande in a net.
The trail ended at a narrow cavern entrance, the tunnel beyond sloping upward.
Ridmark stopped, grimaced, and beckoned the others forward.
“What happened to Calliande?” said Caius. “The smoke bomb overpowered me, and when I awoke…”
“The kobolds took her,” said Ridmark, “this way. Clever of them. They distracted us, and then snatched her while we were fighting.”
“But why?” said Caius.
Kharlacht shrugged. “Perhaps the same reason Shadowbearer commanded Qazarl to slay her upon the altar.”
“You are going after her?” said Caius.
“I am,” said Ridmark. “And no lectures about how I wish to throw my life away, Brother Caius. I told Calliande I would help her.” He hesitated. “There is no need for you to accompany me. Follow the stream to the surface, and go warn Sir Joram of Qazarl’s attack.”
“By now Sir Joram likely knows more about Qazarl’s attack than we do,” said Caius. “I shall not abandon a comrade in arms and a woman in need.”
Ridmark nodded. “I would be glad of your aid.” He looked at Kharlacht. “You have no need to accompany us. Return to the surface and rejoin your kin.”
Kharlacht shook his head. “I will follow you.”
“Why?” said Ridmark. “You have no obligation to do so. Once you leave the Deeps, you are released of your oath to aid us.”
“I have no wish to see Calliande fall into the hands of the kobolds,” said Kharlacht.
“You would prefer to hand her over to Qazarl yourself?” said Ridmark.
He expected anger, but Kharlacht only shook his head. “I do not wish her ill. And I am bound by my word. I swore I would see you returned to the surface, that I would not harm Calliande…and if I let her remain in the hands of the kobolds, I would bring her harm.”
“That would be the kobolds’ doing, not yours,” said Ridmark.
“But the responsibility would be mine,” said Kharlacht. He looked at Caius. “As in the Dominus Christus’s parable of the traveler beset by brigands.”
“Very well,” said Ridmark. “Then let us waste no more time in talk.”
He led the way into the tunnel, Caius and Kharlacht following. The cavern floor sloped up, lit by patches of ghost mushrooms clinging to the floors and walls, and Ridmark saw signs of the kobolds’ passage, the scratches of claws upon stone, the occasional fallen scale.
After a third of a mile he saw signs of a scuffle, droplets of blood upon the ground. Ridmark dropped to one knee and sniffed.
“Kobold,” he said. “Not human.”
“Perhaps Crotaph suffers from dissension in the ranks,” said Caius.
“Indeed,” said Kharlacht. “Among the clans of Vhaluusk, a chieftain is often hard-pressed to keep his authority, especially when there are desirable captives available.”
“Given that kobolds eat humans,” said Ridmark, “I think we had best hurry.”
He saw no sign of any human blood. If the kobolds had come to blows over Calliande, they had not harmed her.
But nor had she been able to escape in the chaos.
The tunnel widened around them, the ceiling getting higher. A faint breeze brushed Ridmark’s face, and he smelled the dusty odor of kobold scales in the air.
A lot of kobold scales.
Ahead he saw the glow of firelight in the distance.
“Wait here,” he said. “I think the village of the Blue Hand is just ahead.”
“Risky to go alone,” said Caius.
“Of course it is,” said Ridmark. “We have done nothing but take risks for the last three days. But it is less of a risk for me than it is for either of you. I can move with greater stealth than you or Kharlacht.” He tugged at his gray elven cloak. “And I have this. If I’m careful, I can get close enough to scout the village and return.”
Caius sighed. “Your plan is madness…but it is sound, as always. We shall wait here for your return.”
“If I don’t return by the end of the day,” said Ridmark, “assume that I am dead, and return to Dun Licinia to warn Sir Joram. And to warn the Magistri and the Swordbearers about that soulstone. Such a thing is far too dangerous to remain in the hands of a kobold shaman. And Shadowbearer may try to claim it.”
“Go with God,” said Caius.
Ridmark nodded, drew his cloak around him, and hurried forward.
The tunnel opened into a vast cavern, larger than the chamber of the waterfall in Thainkul Agon.
The village of the Blue Hand occupied most of the cavern.
A stockade wall of rough stone encircled the village, kobold sentries standing guard upon the rampart. Beyond the wall Ridmark saw houses and workshops of loose stone, roofed by dried mushroom caps. Hundreds of tunnels marked the cavern walls beyond the stockade, and Ridmark realized the kobolds had tunneled into the stone like ants.
Finding Calliande would prove a challenge.
For some reason, his mind flashed back to the desperate days before the Battle of Dun Licinia. Master Galearus and the other chief nobles and Magistri were dead, slain at parley by Mhalek’s treachery. Ridmark had taken command of the host because there was no one else left to do so. His men had been badly outnumbered and demoralized…but he had turned the tables and defeated the Mhalekite horde.
He had snatched victory from the jaws of defeat by turning his foe’s weaknesses against him.
Perhaps the kobolds had a similar weakness.
Of course, his victory against Mhalek had cost him everything.
What might a victory here cost?
Ridmark ignored the thought and moved closer to the village, creeping from stalagmite to stalagmite. Murrags grazed among the mushrooms, tended by kobolds armed with bows. Ridmark avoided them and came to the intersection of the cavern wall and the stockade. It was the obvious place for anyone to scale the wall, but the kobolds had posted no guards there.
A weak
ness.
Ridmark climbed the rough wall and pulled himself up to the ramparts.
At once he saw why the kobolds needed no guards on this corner of the wall.
A fenced pen sat below the stockade, holding at least one hundred and fifty spitfangs. Most of the creatures were sleeping, their scales blended to match the gray stone around them. Others were awake and prowling, and a few snapped at each other.
None of them had seen Ridmark yet.
He climbed back down the wall. Had he delayed any longer, the spitfangs would have detected his scent. The resultant noise would alert the kobolds.
He leaned against the wall, wrapped in his cloak and watched the village.
Where would they have taken Calliande? The largest building within the stockade looked like a long hall, no doubt the seat of whatever chieftain ruled the village. Yet the shaman had sent Crotaph to kidnap Calliande, not the chieftain, and Ridmark suspected the shaman ruled the kobolds of the Blue Hand. The kobolds worshipped an odd smattering of gods – the orcish blood gods, the great darkness of the dark elves, and some offered sacrifices to the urdmordar.
Was the shaman of the Blue Hand in fact a priest of an urdmordar? That was a worrying. Few creatures were as dangerous as an urdmordar matriarch in her full might…and only magic could harm an urdmordar.
Ridmark had no such magic at hand.
His eyes fell on a large cavern entrance, higher than the others. Human skulls hung from the entrance, and he saw strange symbols carved into the wall nearby. A dim glow of firelight came from within that cave, visible through the pale radiance of the ghost mushrooms.
The shaman’s chambers. Ridmark was sure of it.
A plan formed in his mind. It was bold, and could well work. It was also reckless, and might get him killed.
But that would be no great loss. If he had died the day he had faced Mhalek, then Aelia would still live.
Ridmark slipped from the cavern and returned to the tunnel leading back to Thainkul Agon. Kharlacht and Caius awaited him, weapons in hand. To his satisfaction, neither the orc nor the dwarf noticed him until he was only a few feet away.
Frostborn: The Gray Knight (Frostborn #1) Page 16